Chasing That High

Jason’s heart was hammering in his chest. His dark hair fell in its thick, familiar waves over his shoulders and down the striped barber cape fastened around his neck. He could feel the tissue the barber had wrapped around his neck too, a sensation he never found in a salon. The barber pulled his hair out to its full length once more before letting it fall back into place as she picked up her clippers and switched them on. The buzzing seemed to fill the shop. Jason’s heart felt like it was in his throat now. “Ready hun?” she asked as she lifted a lock of his hair and held the humming clippers near his temple. A shaky exhale passed between Jason’s lips.

“You know,” he said with a slight quaver in his voice, “I don’t think I can. I want to. I really want to but my girlfriend loves my hair too much. Whenever I talk about cutting it she gets so sad. When I walked in this afternoon I just wanted it off, to be done with it, to finally have that buzz cut I’ve been dreaming about. But I can’t break her heart like that. I’m sorry but I can’t cut it.”

“Are you sure?” she asked, pulling his hair back with her free hand to reveal his face more clearly. “You’d look so good with short hair. In my professional opinion, a #2’s the longest you should ever go.”

“I’m sorry, I can’t,” Jason said swallowing past the lump in his throat.

“That’s a shame,” his would-be barber said as she switched off her clippers and put them back on their hook. “It would’ve been such fun to shave all this off. You’d’ve looked really sexy too, buzzed all clean. If you convince your girl to let you get rid of this mop, you come find me, ok?”

“Ok,” Jason said, his voice still a bit shaky, as he rose from the chair.

Walking back out onto the street Jason felt the comforting sensation of the wind dancing through his long hair. His hair hasn’t been above his shoulders since middle school. He always had long hair.

What he didn’t have was a girlfriend.

Sitting in his car outside the shop, letting his heart slow, Jason texted his best friend, Christina. They’d been friends for years and they shared everything. Well…almost everything. Christina didn’t know the way Jason felt about haircuts, not really.

“This is a little ridiculous,” he texted her. “I really need to stop doing this. I keep going into different salons, asking for a buzz cut, and then changing my mind and saying I shouldn’t get one. Tonight I was in the chair with the cape around me before I backed out! Even when I said I wasn’t going to do it, the stylist was really excited about buzzing me and kept urging me to cut all my hair off.”

Then another text, “Honestly, I don’t want a haircut. I don’t. I love my long hair. It hasn’t been bugging me at all lately. It looks great. But the thrill of the almost haircut is so damn addicting!”

He glanced back at his phone when he heard the chime of Christina’s reply.

Several laughing emojis were followed by the haircut emoji. Then, “You are crazy!!!! You are playing a dangerous game getting that close to a buzz cut! This is funny that it has become a sort of ‘high’ for you!”

Christina had no idea. Jason loved his long hair more than anything but, for as long as he could remember, he found the idea of haircutting and short hair – the shorter the better! – sexually arousing.

God only knows how many hours he spent on YouTube and TikTok watching people cut their long hair short. Few things were more exciting than seeing it in person. Many lunches were spent in the mall’s food court, casually glancing through the window of an adjacent salon, hoping to see someone’s hair get cut off.

The only thing Jason found more thrilling was the idea of cutting his own hair off, though he’d never do it. He loved his hair. Every partner he’d ever had loved his hair. Everyone loved his hair. It was the first thing people noticed about him and he’d been getting a steady stream of compliments since those waves first began brushing his collar. It wasn’t just the source of his confidence but the source of his identity.

Jason was his hair and he loved that.

This attachment was what made the idea of cutting it off so thrilling! Many nights were spent laying in bed masturbating as he imagined what it would feel like to get a buzz cut, the clippers running all over his head and his precious hair falling to the floor.

Hence his flirting with a major haircut. Jason would spend months crisscrossing town, going into every salon and barber shop he could find. He’d tell the stylist he really wanted to cut his hair off, a crew cut or a buzz cut or even a flat top, but his girlfriend loved his hair and she was begging him not to cut it. The girlfriend was crucial to his game. It let him dance on the line of wanting to cut his hair freely, voicing that desire, while giving him an ironclad out.

Many stylists agreed with his imagined partner, taking one look at his thick waves and refusing to cut them off. Others would discuss the idea with him, as he stood at the counter and they covered various styles he could do and how he could cushion the blow for his girlfriend, before he left.

But this afternoon was new. This was the first time his little game had led him into the chair, with neck tissue and cape wrapped around him, a barber’s hands in his hair and her whirring clippers close to his head before he backed out. His fetish had never found anything so exciting before.

The closer he came to those clippers the harder he came when he thought about it later that night. This was the closest he’d ever been and best he’d ever felt.

But Jason could only push his game so far. Once he hit every salon or barber shop around town he’d have to retire the bit for a year or two, not wanting anyone to recognize him and call out his con. He was mindful never to waste anyone’s time, only going in salons or barber shops that were quiet so as to not pull a stylist away from another client who did want a haircut as he debated a buzzing he would never get.

The next afternoon Jason pulled into the parking lot of Sally’s Salon after work. It had just opened in the last year which meant he never played his game here before. That made the high all the more exciting. He heard a bell jingle as he walked into the quiet little shop.

“Hiya, I’m Sally,” the titular stylist introduced herself. “What can I do for you?”

Jason began his well rehearsed line, his heart already starting to hammer in that uniquely thrilling way. “Well,” he said, “my hair’s just been so long for so long and I’m done with it. Like I’m over it. I want to cut it all off. I don’t want any hair on my neck anymore. I don’t even want any hair left to style.”

“Oh!” Sally said with an excited gleam in her eye, “so we’re talking short-short! We’re talking clippers and getting rid of all of it! Have you ever had short hair like that before?”

“Yes,” Jason lied. He found that lying to stylists about having had short hair before made them more excited to cut his, not having to worry as much about shock or cutting remorse or going slowly, and their excitement fueled his. “I used to have a #1 buzz cut years ago. I loved it! And I really miss that feeling. The problem is my girlfriend. We started dating after I’d grown my hair out and she loves it. She cries every time I talk about cutting it…so I really want it short but I don’t want to hurt her feelings.”

“Well come on over,” Sally said gesturing to her stylist’s chair, “I’m sure we can work this out.”

The chair, Jason thought as his heart beat faster, I’m sitting in the chair again!

Jason sat down. Sally put her big cape around him as she began running her hands through his hair.

Jason’s breathing was quickening and he did his best to control it as she laid his hair out over his shoulders and then pulled it back in a tight ponytail, revealing his face free of hair as the barber had yesterday.

“The nice thing about hair that short,” Sally said as she began closing her scissors on his ponytail, “is there’s actually a lot of wiggle room. We’ll start with something longer than your old #1 buzz cut. That way your girlfriend doesn’t think you’re bald but you still get that fuss-free clipper cut you want! She’ll see how sexy short hair is on you, too.”

Jason was frozen. All his rehearsed banter died in his throat.

“Oof,” Sally said with exaggerated drama as her scissors sawed through his hair, “I can’t tell you the last time I cut off a ponytail this thick.”

Then, “Tah-dah!” Sally held his thirteen inch ponytail aloft, waggling it back and forth triumphantly. “Wow! That was a lot of hair! I bet you feel better already,” she said. Sally put a band around the sawed off end of Jason’s ponytail and laid it lovingly on the counter in front of him. “We’ll save this in case your girlfriend wants to keep it, ok?”

“Uh…” was the best Jason could muster.

“How does this feel?!” Sally asked with enthusiasm as she began running her fingers through Jason’s hair, now falling in uneven layers around his jaw and sheered to what felt frighteningly close at the nape of his neck. I felt scissors on my neck, Jason thought in disbelief, on my neck! What’s happening?

“Uh,” Jason tried again, “you, that was fast. You just, you just…cut it…off.”

“Sure,” Sally said. “Why make you wait any longer than you already have? Plus, it gets the dramatic part out of the way and lets us dive into the fun part.”

POP. Bzzzzzzzzz…

Jason had no time to savor the hum of the clippers as he did the day before. With a, “Woo!” Sally was pulling them from his forehead to the back of his head as all that remained of his long hair was sent sliding down the sides of his head.

“To make this easier for your girlfriend, I figured we’d start with a crew cut over your classic buzz. So I’m using a #4 guard. I know that’s a lot longer than what you’re used to – and I can always cut it shorter if you want! – but I figured we’d go easy on your partner first.”

His stomach flopped as Sally ran the clippers up over his ear and that hair tumbled into his lap. Unless he was wearing his hair in a ponytail, Jason hadn’t seen his ears since he was twelve-years-old.

Before he could even focus on the sensation, Sally had shaved all the remaining long hair off his head, switched guards on her clippers, and went back to work on the sides and back.

Ok, Jason thought to himself as panic continued to flood his body like he never felt before, this is happening. It’s happened. You can’t stop it now. You sure as hell better enjoy this and make this horrible fuck up count for something.

So he did. Jason abandoned himself to the feelings – his eyes riveted, unblinking to the mirror, trying to savor every moment – as Sally ran the clippers over the sides and back of his head again and again, buzzing it progressively shorter.

“To balance this hippy-hair I left you with,” Sally said as she ruffled the ½ inch stubble left on top of Jason’s head, “I figured I’d take you down to the skin on the sides and back. “As you can see,” she said pointing to the line curving down from his eyebrows, “I left the fade line pretty high so you get a lot of skin but your girlfriend still has hair to play with, too. What do you think?”

Again Jason struggled for words. “It’s, uh, it’s…short.”

“Yah it is!” Sally smiled. “I always give my clients what they want. And trust me, your girlfriend is gonna love this. You look so much better. I can see why you wore your hair buzzed before! She’ll be shocked but she’s gonna love it.” With a wink she added, “I bet you won’t be able to keep her off you tonight once she sees how damn sexy you look and gets her hands on your new hair.”

Jason thanked Sally and paid in a daze. He snapped fully back to reality as he felt the wind whipping around his head for the first time outside the salon. Each little half inch bristle on top of his head moved with the wind in a way he never felt before. How could he be more aware of so much less hair?

When he got back in his car he touched his buzzed head for the first time. It was so soft! So much softer than he imagined! Touching his head, Jason marveled that he had no hair! There was nothing there! For the first time in his life, Jason had no hair to run his hands through. He could only run them over his hair. As he slowly rubbed his head, he came like he never had before.

Jason couldn’t wait to get home and properly enjoy this disaster. My favorite mistake, he mused to himself.

But first, he had to text Christina. “So, you were right,” he wrote. “This was a dangerous game…and I kinda lost tonight.” Then he sent her a picture of his ponytail in his hand and a selfie of his freshly buzzed head.

Her reply was immediate. “OMG WHAT?!????!!”

Then he saw the dots as Christina typed. Dots and dots and dots…but no message came.

As Jason pulled into his driveway he saw Christina waiting on his front stoop. Her hands were on his head as soon as he got out of the car. Without warning Christina went from rubbing her hands up and down his fresh crew cut to pulling him into the most passionate kiss he’d ever received. Already aroused from the high of the unexpected haircut, Jason’s body was alive with her kiss in a whole new way.

“I’m sorry,” Christina said. “I know this is weird and we’re friends and I don’t want to ruin that or make you uncomfortable but…I like you. I have for awhile and I…fuck, I love short hair. I know it’s weird but short hair – especially cutting long hair off really short – has always turned me on. So as soon as I saw that picture I had to touch your buzzed hair for myself. I had to touch it to…to touch you. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be,” Jason said breathlessly. “I…I really didn’t want to cut my hair off. It was an accident. My game got away from me. But I…I actually love it. And I…I am into this, to us, too.”

Jason pushed Christina’s long chocolate hair back from her face and as he kissed her, returning her passion in kind. They went inside, giggling as they explored each other’s bodies, eager to start this new chapter in their lives together in a brand new way.