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There's something refreshing about taking the time just to sit and look from time to time. To think about everything and to think about nothing. Where better to do it than at a street cafe? What makes it even better is when you are on vacation with nothing to worry about, no deadlines to meet, nobody to please but yourself. That last bit is a little unfortunate, but true.

I divorced a good few years ago and recently became single after my boyfriend of two years decided that he would rather bend a trainee over the photocopier at an office party than be with me. That sounds so clichéd and stupid when I see it written down, but it's true. So here I am, alone, one week into a vacation where I'm trying to purge him completely from my system. One week, three different men and not a decent fuck yet! You know what they say, if at first you don't succeed....What it is to be 40 and independent!!

I didn't actually notice when I sat down, but the cafe was just across the street from a hairdressing salon. I had been sitting there watching for ages, sometimes staring into space and sometimes focusing on what was going on. I've never actually paid that much attention to the goings on in salons where I've been having my hair done, but it is quite interesting when you have time on your hands. It was certainly more interesting than watching happenings at the book shop next door.

I sipped my coffee. I looked at my wrist to check the time. That was the third time that I had done that since I had been away, each time forgetting that I had deliberately left my watch back in the hotel. What difference did it make what time it was unless I was actually going to see a film or something? I pondered. I looked across at the salon again. I drained my cup and picked up my bag.

"Hi, I don't suppose you've got anyone free have you?" I asked.

The receptionist didn't sound anything like the way I had imagined. She didn't have the same regional accent as other people around here.

"All the ladies stylists are booked for a good while I'm afraid. I could book you in about 4 if you like."

I shook my head. "No don't worry, it was a spur of the moment thing".

"What was it for?" a voice asked from just inside the salon. A woman appeared, peering around the partition.

"Just a cut" I said.

"I can take you, if you want, but I'm a barber rather than a ladies stylist. I don't do colours or anything like that." she smiled.

"Yea, fine. Hair's hair" I said, then almost instantly regretted how stupid it sounded. In the time that I had sat and watched I had not seen any men come through the door, so that probably explains why she was so eager for custom.

Ok then, we're though here. I'm Sasha, by the way." she said. So here I was, a 40 year old woman, with shoulder length hair following a female gents' hairdresser who was about to cut my hair. Following her up the stairs.

"Welcome to my lair" she said. For some reason, the boss tries to keep the men away from the main salon area, thinks it scares the customers away or something."

I smiled. I looked around me. This was very different from the salon downstairs. This was functional, masculine.

She patted the back of the chair. This was a proper barbers' chair, not some flimsy salon chair. I was well and truly in a mans' world. I put my bag on the counter and sat down. She swung a large cape over me and fiddled at the back of my neck to fasten it.

"So, how would 'Sir'like his hair?" she said with a big smile on her face. She turned me to the mirror and flicked the trapped ends of my hair from within the gown.

"I really haven't thought about it" I said.

"What brings you here?" she asked.

"Bit of a change, you know. Just trying to get away from it all, get over a guy, usual story."

"I meant the salon" she said.

"Oh, I'm sorry.."

"Only kidding. So, time for a new start then?"

"I think I've decided to give things like that a rest for a bit." Well, after last nights' fumble I had anyway. The guy was an absolute charmer until we got down to business and then I came to the conclusion that he had never seen a woman naked, or if he had, he didn't know what to do with one. A non-experience, best forgotten.

"So this is the bit where everything gets sorted out with a haircut, is that it?"

"I suppose so," I acknowledged.

"So, was it bad?"

She must have caught my look in the mirror, slightly put out by the question.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to pry, I was just trying to get a feel for how short we're going."

I softened a little. "As bad as it can get, you could say."

"All off then?"

I looked at her in the mirror.

"I only have trims."

"That was before you met me" she said. "The girl's downstairs call me 'Bladerunner' because I persuade so many guys to go shorter than they intended.

"It's alright for them, they can get away with it." I said.

"So could you, easily, and what better time to try?"

"Try what?"

"Something different, shorter.........very short," she said.

My eyes went from her, back to my own reflection. This was me. Reasonably attractive even if I do say so myself, reasonably trim, shoulder length hair. Always shoulder length hair.

"What do you say, shall we go for it?" she asked.

"We?" I said quizzically, looking at her own hair, that wasn't long, but certainly wasn't that short.

"I'm overdue for my summer cut. I could give you the same as I have, if you like."

"You have yours shorter?"

She smiled. "I like to surprise myself sometimes. Let it grow and then cut it off."

"So how short do you go?"

"I'll show you if you like?"

"And what if I don't like it?"

"It'll grow again."

"Simple as that?"

"When you've done it once, you'll never have it long again."

"So you think that because I've just split up with a guy and I'm on vacation, I'll cut my hair off just like that?"

"There's no better time."

I sat in silence for a few moments. I thought about sitting in the hotel bar allowing myself to get picked up in search of a quick thrill. I thought about the thrill that was over all too quickly. If it actually was a thrill. I thought about the sensations that I had got now. The start of the feeling that I was looking for in those bar encounters. I'd come all this way to get turned on in bed with a guy and here I was getting it, sitting in a barbers' chair with a woman the only other person in the room.

"Show me" I said quietly. She didn't need telling twice. The air was filled with a loud humming noise. The source of the noise was place at my forehead. I closed my eyes. No one had to know that you had tried for a cheap thrill the night before. Everybody was going to know about this. The source of the buzzing moved backwards. The vibrations moved down into my body where they met sensations that I was generating myself. My own sensations weren't regulated in the same way that the mechanical ones were. They were increasing as she did her work. I opened my eyes.

I stared. My hair still hung loose at the sides. The top was standing up. Half an inch. My hair, half an inch long. She paused. Her left hand moved down from my head and rested on my shoulder. She squeezed.

"It will look amazing" she said. I closed my eyes again. There was nothing that I could do now except let it happen, let the feelings wash over me. She worked steadily for a couple of minutes and then paused. I heard something fall. I opened my eyes. There was a plastic comb-like thing just coming to rest on the ledge in front of me. Part of the clippers. I looked in the mirror. The bulk of my hair had gone. It was still me in a way, but a very different me. An edgier me. The new me.

"Regretting it yet?" she asked. I looked at the pile of hair in my lap and could sense a similar amount on the floor around me. I looked back at myself in the mirror.

"It's not going to take long to blow-dry, that's for sure." I said.

"And we're not finished yet," she said.

"There's not much left, for God's sake" I said.

She turned the clippers off and turned the chair around so that I could look at her directly rather than just her reflection in the mirror.

"I suppose I'd ought to tell you what I do when I have my Spring clean." she said. I looked at her. "I shave it."

"All?" I asked.

"All" she replied.

"Well, you know how to take someone's breath away." I said.

"So, are we?"

"There you go again with that 'We' business. It's me" I said.

"At the moment it's you" she said.

"And when are you doing yours?" I asked.

"Soon" she said.

"And you take it all off?" I asked again, still not quite believing it.

"Baby's bottom" she said.

"What's it like?" I asked.

"I can't describe it. I'll have to show you," she said.

"You would say that wouldn't you?" I replied. She smiled. The clippers sprung into life again. I looked at her. Using my feet, I turned the chair back towards the mirror. The blades were at the nape of my neck. They changed tone as they moved upwards. She moved round to the side. I could see bare scalp. She carried on, rythmically, gently. I closed my eyes and abandoned myself to her. There was no point thinking about it now. The only thing that I could do would be to delay my return home for a while longer if I really didn't like the way it looked.

The clippers fell silent. I opened my eyes. There was a barely discernible pelt on my head, but you wouldn't actually call it hair. She put the clippers down behind me and then approached me again with a can in her hand. She squeezed something into her hand. You didn't need to be a genius to know what was about to happen.

"I don't want....." I began.

"You're so close" she said. I nodded.

It was an weird feeling to see this head in the mirror suddenly gain a crown of white foam. She smoothed it evenly and then the caress of her fingers was replaced with the cold steel of a razor. She slowly revealed my scalp from underneath the foam, pausing occasionally to rinse the razor. In minutes it was over. I didn't want it to stop.

I looked. I was bald. Forty years old and bald. I looked very different, but I looked good. She undid the cape, brushing the back of my shoulders to get rid of any stray hairs. There certainly wouldn't be any of those for a while, I thought.

"I must be mad" I said.

"You're stunning" she said "and it's not many of my customers that I say that to." She smiled. I stood up.

"How much do I owe you?" I asked.

"You can have that one for free" she said.

I dug in my purse and handed her a note. "Have a drink on me at least." I said.

"Thanks very much" she said.

I moved to the stairs and started down. I stopped and turned back.

"I don't suppose you fancy that drink with me, do you?"

"Sure" she replied.

"I'll see you in the lobby of the Cromell at 8 then. Is that OK?" I asked.

"I'll be there" she said, raising her hand in a small parting gesture. I walked down the stairs. Amazed at myself. for shaving my head. For asking a woman for a drink. Well, she had given me the best orgasm of my vacation so far, I thought.

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