Short Hair

She loved her lips, the soft curve up and sharp curve down, coming together to form a cupid’s bow that could really be admired.

Her lips were a good thing, and she was grateful.

Her eyes were a good thing too. Their appearance was brown, but lovers knew that there were little flecks of green and gold hidden except for when the sun shone.

She grew to love her eyes the first time she was loved because of them.

“Your eyes,” a lover had said. “They shine like Gold!”

The girl had blinked confused, but in her lover’s view she was batting her eyelashes at him.

“They are?” she’d asked.

“They are,” the lover said, placing a kiss on the lips she loved.

The lover looked at her and allowed her to look at herself. For the first time she saw her eyes the way they were. Gold and all-seeing.

The hair came next.

Although she grew up in a home that told her change was weird and uncalled for; in her pubescent adulthood she discovered that kitchen scissors could do no harm. Hours wasted creating designs out of her dull brown hair brought her mother to tears.

“What have you done to your beautiful body?” her mother asked.

“I made it me.” she’d say.

She dated many men and women while her hair formed. She poured herself into each relationship and felt poured out once it ended.

“Love me!” said each lover.

“I can’t!” she said back.

The lovers would leave and she would walk in front of the mirror with level eyes, the kitchen scissors never leaving her side until she looked different, until she looked better, until her hair was shorter.

Sometimes she would go to bars alone and meet women in dark hallways who looked like a woman she’d once loved.

“Your hair is your power,” they would say. She would laugh and blush, and they would laugh too — their infectious laughter chewing her up and spitting her out.

“Don’t forget about me,” said the men.

“I never will” said every woman she had ever loved.

On these nights, when she spun out of the bar without knowing where she was, her hair cascaded down her back. The people there said they could feel her memories pulling down on her skull from its roots like she could. The people who were there will say they knew how she felt as she fell, but none of them will be right.

“Let me go!” she yells at night when there is nothing but a light floral blanket keeping her safe from the cold, impending darkness.

“Let me go,” she yells while holding her head in anguish in an attempt to stop the remembering of the memories that pressed against her skull.

snip. snip. snip. She takes her handy scissors to work, ignoring the real shears shoved in her direction.

“They’re too sharp and shiny to dull my pain.” she’d say to no one in particular. Always talking to no one in particular.

And she would get to work, shaving off the memories as the seasons changed — as boyfriends came and went — as girlfriends came and left.

It was a way of breaking free she thought, but that voice was never louder than the voice telling her to dye her hair black, even when she wanted to dye it pink.

But she still liked it when her hair was black, even as she liked it when her hair was short, even as she liked it when her hair was long.

“Your hair is so beautiful.” people would say in passing.

“I know,” she‘d say without lying at all.

Her love of the rest of her would came later as she learned what she was, what she added, what she took away.

“I’m crazy you see.” she’d say once she realized her hair holds memories, powers, and spells that only she could see.

“We see.” the crowds chimed back as they ebbed and flowed around her, sometimes coming closer, but usually retreating further.

Sometimes the crazy showed in her eyes, but usually just in her balled up hands, clenched as they came down on her eyes, cheeks, and thighs.

She admired the bruises and those soon became a part of her too, a favorite feature.

“Do you like my favorite feature?” she asked a lover when she showed him her blue, red, and black.

“No” the lover said in a way that made her hands ball up and return upon her what she felt towards the lover.

But there was a piece here that she consistently forgot, and it would take her years to remember.

She knew that she existed, yes, but she neglected to ensure that her lover was not just a reflection of herself. She forgot to check that there was even a lover at all.

She forgot to notice that there was no lover there to hand her the kitchen scissors when she needed them most. There was no lover to comment on her new hair. No, there was only kitchen scissors. There was only the removal of memories. There was only the betterment of her.

She’s smiling now, down there in a chair below. There’s a cigarette in her hands and a slight crease on her forehead from where the nicotine has impacted her skin’s moisture barrier.

There’s a tilt in her head and a smile on her lips.

Her hair is short. Her scissors have been put away. The hunt for a new lover has not yet begun, but it is certain that she has begun again.