Blonde Rebecca
“Hi ya, what are you watching?” asked Rebecca, as she breezed into the room.
“Nothing much, just some music videos on MTV,” replied Kate, who was slumped across the sofa.
“This one sounds good, who is it?”
“I think it’s Alannis Morrisette.”
“Can’t be, she’s got really long hair,” Rebecca quizzed as she checked her reflection in the large wall mirror.
“No, it is her. She had her hair cut short months ago. Where have you been?”
“Wow,” exclaimed Rebecca as she leaned over the top of the sofa to take a closer look at the singer, “you’re right, it is her. She looks great, it really suits her!”
Kate turned her head towards her flatmate. “She probably got fed up with it one day.”
Rebecca returned to the wall mirror.
Kate continued, “It probably pissed off her record label though. After all, it was one of her trademarks.”
Rebecca did not reply. She had gathered her own shoulder-length hair into a ponytail, behind her head, and was examining her reflection. She tilted her head to the left, and then to the right.
“I’d like to go shorter again some time,” she declared, ” I think it suited me.”
Kate looked over the back of the sofa.
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“My hair, I wouldn’t mind having it shorter again.”
“Again?”
“Yeah, I used to have it quite short at one time,” she declared,” but when I met up with Adrian he wanted me to grow it and so I did.”
“So why haven’t you had it cut since you two split?” Kate sat up on the sofa and turned to face her flatmate, increasingly interested in Rebecca’s revelation.
“I don’t know really,” she mused, “it’s not as if I haven’t thought about it. I mean, I’ve made appointments with every intention of having it cut shorter, but I always get cold feet when I get there.”
“What, at the hairdressers?”
“Yes. Having grown for six years, I’m kinda nervous about having it all cut off again.”
Kate’s hair was short, almost a grown-out crew cut. Hearing Rebecca talk about having her blonde tresses cut short excited her no end, and she was keen to encourage Rebecca to go through with it.
“Why don’t I book an appointment at my hairdressers for you, and we can go down together?”
Rebecca turned and looked at Kate.
“Oh that’s sweet, but I’d still chicken out at the eleventh hour I know I would.”
“Not once they’ve got you in the chair! I could tell them to cut it short and give you no choice.”
Rebecca giggled at Kate’s suggestion.
“Maybe that’s it, maybe I need the choice taken away from me. Maybe I do need to be frog-marched to the hairdressers and made to have it cut short,” she smirked.
“Sounds like it to me. Do you want me to make that appointment?” Kate was eager to get Rebecca to agree to this.
“Let me think about it.” Again, Rebecca fell short of a commitment.
Just as Kate was about to push for a definite answer, Rebecca’s mobile phone rang. She answered it.
“Oh, hi Trish, how are you?”
As she talked, Rebecca walked across the room, out of the door, and into the hallway.
Damn it, thought Kate. She felt that Rebecca could have cracked and agreed if that bloody phone hadn’t have rang!
“I’ve got to go Kate,” called Rebecca from the hallway, “I’ll see you later, bye!”
Kate sighed as she heard the front door close. Whilst she liked Rebecca more than most of her recent flatmates, she would still love to see her lose those long, blonde tresses. Better still, if she could dictate how short her hair was cut.
Kate pictured the image of Rebecca, caped in the chair, with her long hair being cut short to Kate’s instructions. She imagined Rebecca’s face as she told the stylist to cut her hair above the ears, and to taper the neckline with the clippers. Perhaps Rebecca would begin to panic and try to get out of the chair? Then she would be pushed back down, and tears would flow from her eyes as the clippers were passed over her head as punishment for struggling. Her blonde tresses would fall to the floor in clumps, as Kate just stood there, smiling down at her caped flatmate.
Yes, Kate loved the idea, but needed to sweet-talk Rebecca and that was not going to be easy.
Or, at least, that’s what Kate thought!
Later that evening, as she watched television, Kate heard the front door open. Into the room walked Rebecca, who appeared slightly worse for drink, and her friend Trish.
“I think Bec will need a black coffee.” Trish observed.
“Yeah, I’ll go and make her one. Do you fancy a cup yourself?” replied Kate.
“Yes, that would be great. Here, let me help you.” With that, Trish followed Kate into the kitchen, leaving Rebecca sat on a dining chair in the living room.
“Listen, Bec was telling me about getting her hair cut and all. She says you were encouraging her to go shorter?” asked Trish.
“Yeah?” Kate looked at her puzzled.
“I totally agree with you! I’ve known Bec for years and she looked great when her hair was cropped. If it hadn’t have been for that loser Adrian she would never have grown it longer.”
“So?” Kate was still puzzled.
“So, if she can’t face getting it cut short herself, let’s do the deciding for her?”
“Great!” quipped Kate sarcastically. “Okay Rebecca, we think your hair is too long, go and get it cut. Yeah, she’ll really go along with that!”
“No, you don’t get it. WE cut her hair short for her!”
“We? How?”
“Look, she’s sitting through there pissed out of her head. We could do whatever we want to her and she wouldn’t know, let alone protest about it.”
Kate had to admit she liked the idea. However, she was uncertain about Trish’s motives.
“So why do you want to cut your friend’s hair off?”
“Kate, Rebecca wants short hair. She’s just too god damn scared to go and have it cut. This way, she wakes up in the morning with short hair – job done. If she doesn’t like the exact style, she can go to a salon and have it tweaked.”
In her own mind, Kate knew that Rebecca had sounded keen on shorter hair earlier in the day, and there was some truth in her being scared of getting it cut. Besides, if her old friend thinks she would be okay, then why not?
“Okay, let’s do it!” said Kate excitedly.
“Good girl.”
The plotting pair went back into the living room. Rebecca was leaning forward, over the dining table, virtually passed out. Trish gently leaned her back against the chair, whilst Kate moved the table away creating `working-space’ around Rebecca’s chair.
“Have you a sheet, or something like that, for a cape.” Trish whispered to Kate.
“Yeah, I’ll just get it.”
“Scissors and comb?”
“Oh yeah!”
“Hair clippers by any chance?”
“Afraid not.”
Within a couple of minutes, Rebecca was caped in a sheet and was ready for her haircut. Trish began combing through her locks.
“How short do you think?” Whispered Kate.
Trish sectioned off some hair, and pulled it up in her fingers. She then slid the blades of the scissors into the hair, approximately six inches from her scalp.
“What do you think?” She asked.
“Yeah, that’s good.” Kate replied.
Just as Kate answered, Trish dropped the blades another three inches towards the scalp and cut through. A long length of blonde hair fell from her fingers, onto the floor.
Kate gasped. “How short are you going?!”
“What’s the matter, you said okay?”
“Yeah, but I didn’t think you would cut that much off!”
Trish’s demeanour changed as she continued cutting. Kate’s opinions were no longer asked for, as first Rebecca’s bangs were cut to about an inch in length, and then her hair was cut well over her ears.
“That’s getting very short Trish?” Kate was becoming quite nervous now. True, she had been excited by the prospect of Rebecca’s hair hitting the floor, but Trish had taken on the appearance of a back-street barber. Rebecca’s hair had been quickly reduced to a short crew cut,
and there was no sign of Trish stopping!
“Are you sure she’ll want her hair that short Trish?”
“No, but that’s what the bitch is getting!” She retorted.
Kate stood there stunned.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean this bitch is getting the haircut she deserves!”
“I don’t understand?”
Trish sighed deeply as she reduced the last tufts of hair, on Rebecca’s pale head, to just stubble.
“Adrian was my man before he met this slut. This slut, supposedly, was my best friend. This slut who still does not realise that I know every sordid detail about their relationship. Now do you understand?”
Trish picked up a handful of blonde tresses and smiled.
“I have waited so long to pay her back!”
“But I thought you were both friends?”
“It served a purpose. As did you dear Kate.”
“Me?”
“Well yes, Rebecca spent the evening telling me how you were getting your rocks off trying to make her get a haircut. When she wakes up tomorrow and finds her head shaved, who do you think she will blame? She won’t even remember me being here.”
Trish placed the scissors on the table and walked towards the hallway.
“I have always made a point of complimenting Bec on her hair, so there is no way that she’ll believe any shit you can come up with. Your scissors, your house, your mess. See you Kate!”
Kate looked over at her shorn flatmate, surrounded by her blonde tresses. No, this isn’t how she had imagined Rebecca’s haircut would be.