Page 36 of A Fabulously Unfabulous Summer for Henry Milch

“I’ll be done in a minute.”

His customer was a guy in his sixties in overalls and gray stubble. There was a John Deere cap sitting on the counter. I assumed it was his and wondered if it really mattered what his hair looked like.

The other barber was much younger, tall and thin, pale, with a dimple in his chin and a patch of acne on each cheek. His hair was short and spiked up with gel. He’d painted one fingernail black, a small act of rebellion.

His client could have been the brother of Mr. John Deere. They looked that much alike. The radio was playing Dr. Laura. I guess they thought they were feminists.

I sat down in what seemed to be a banquet chair. On the chair next to me was a recent copy ofField & Stream.I did not pick it up.

Opal must have sent me here to meet the younger barber, which kind of sucked because he wasn’t going to cut my hair. But exactly why did she want me to meet him?

George Clooney’s older brother was ready for me, so I got up and climbed into the barber chair. Meanwhile, he went over to the cash register and took the previous customer’s money. For a moment they talked about someone named Jack, whichcould have been about a dozen people in my opinion. This Jack seemed to be drinking too much as he went through a challenging divorce.

Old George Clooney said good-bye to the guy and then came over to me.

“Your turn.”

I got into the barber’s chair, placing my feet on the built-in step. It was a weird thing; it always was, facing forward while someone stood behind you.

“So, what’ll it be?”

Since my hair was longer, we could do something with it so I said, “How about a faux hawk?”

“Oh yeah, I know what you mean. Sure.”

He put a giant smock around me.

“Are you Bob?” I asked.

“You’re not from around here,” he said, rather than asked.

“Um, no.”

“There hasn’t been a Bob for twenty years.”

“Oh. Okay.” Even though it was the other barber I needed to be talking to, I decided to be friendly to this one. “I’m Emma Cole’s grandson.”

“Uh-huh, I know,” he said.

How did he know? Why did he know? I’d never seen him before in my life. What was it with these people?

“I used to cut your grandfather’s hair.”

“That’s cool. I guess.”

“How are your cherries?”

“They’re fine,” I said, wondering how exactly were cherries supposed to be? And why did people talk about them so much?

“I cut Jasper’s hair, too.”

“Cool. I’ve only been here since February. I came out from L.A. To take care of my grandmother for a while.” Yes, yes, yes,that was a lie. But then, didn’t everyone lie to their hairdresser? Besides, I had the feeling he already knew most of my story.

I tried to think of something else to say but came up empty. I mean, I wanted to find out what they knew about Reverend Hessel, but that was awkward. And besides, Opal had sent me here for the younger guy. That meant he might be a tweaker. Right? And if he was the druggie who tried to rob the church and killed the reverend—well, I probably shouldn’t let him know I was onto him.

“Los Angeles is a pretty dangerous place.”

“Not really,” I said. “On a per capita basis there’s less crime in urban areas than rural ones.”