Keri, Revisited

Keri was standing at the office copy machine, nestled back in a secluded supply closet, minding her own business when she heard the suspicious shuffling of feet behind her. The noise was followed by an all-too-obvious-yet-nearly-silent closing of the door, and then three more soft-soled steps toward her.

She knew it was Mark well before she felt him behind her, his tall, solid form brushing lightly against her backside as his hands came forward to rest against the copy machine on either side of her. He leaned in, his breath warm against her neck, eliciting an unbidden smile and giggle as his nose nestled up the side of her neck toward her ear. 

“You look amazing today,” he whispered. It may have been a lie considering she was wearing a simple green sundress with a linen sash and a white sweater to make it more office appropriate, but she was willing to believe him anyway. Even her hair, her pride and joy, was in nothing more than the most casual of updos, struggling to break free wisp by wisp from the clip that strained to keep it in place.

She knew even that tenuous hold was in danger as soon as Mark’s left hand disappeared from sight. 

“No, don’t!” She chided, but it was too late. The clip was pulled free and her thick, beautiful mane tumbled free. It fell heavily over her left shoulder and face as Mark wrapped his arms around her wast and held her close, soft kisses along the naked side of her neck creeping dangerously close to starting something they definitely shouldn’t finish in the office.

This was the part of relationships Keri loved — early enough for everything to still hold a bit of newness, but old enough to have a certain familiarity and comfort to it. Unfortunately, this much familiarity in the wrong place at the wrong time could get them fired. Or at least a talking to from Amanda in Human Resources.

“Calm down, Champ. Come on,” she pleaded.

He did, pulling away just enough to let her turn around, though he did seize a small kiss once she faced him. With a gentle caress, he tucked her wealth of auburn locks back behind her ear, his fingers trailing down the length of her abundant tresses to where their soft ends rested against her breast. To his credit, he did not attempt to cop a feel.

He smiled that knee-weakeningly adorable smile of his and let his hand slide down her side to cup her bottom. “You coming over right after work tonight?”

She shook her head, letting the dark locks threatening to hide her left eye dance a little bit. Though it didn’t make her feel proud, she did enjoy seeing the pain of disappointment flash across his handsome features for just a moment. “I have an appointment to get this mop trimmed first.”

“Mop?” He asked. “What mop?” His hand rose to pinch a lock of her hair and lift it. “This mop?”

She nodded. “Not a chop or anything, I promise. But I haven’t had so much as a trim since moving out here, and it’s overdue.”

“Ah.” He smiled, and added, “So I’m still going to have to go hunting for your neck tonight?”

He leaned in for the exposed side of her throat, and she fended him off with a laugh. 

“Yes. Yes, you will.”

She couldn’t be certain, but she was pretty sure she saw a bit of disappointment flash across his handsome features.

“What is it?” She asked.

He smiled a knee-weakening smile. “Nothing.”

“No, it was something. What?”

He laughed, a genuine and delightful outburst. “Nothing, seriously. But you know you’d look really cute with short hair, right?”

Now it was her turn to laugh. “No, I’m afraid not. Been there, done that, and it’s taken me years to recover.”

Now, as he continued holding her close, he looked curious. “You did? When?”

She sighed thoughtfully. “Way before I moved out here. Three years ago, maybe? I had it short. Ridiculously short. Brutally short, even. Clippers and all.”

His eyebrows rose. “Pictures?”

She turned in his arms, pulling out her phone as he nestled his chin against the crook of her neck and shoulder, arms squeezing her waist and forcing her not to think about how his body was reacting to having her so close.

Finally, and fortunately for the sake of distraction, she found the pictures of when she had a bald-fade pixie cut. It was a cute picture of her, certainly, but the hairstyle was unbelievably severe and the result of a spite-cut after a bad breakup. A few hours before her friend had taken this picture, her thick, pin-straight auburn locks had reached her waist. But in the photo, her scalp was easily visible around her ears, with the few inches remaining atop her head slicked to the side in a severe part. 

She had loved that cut…. At first. But the grow out began the second she stepped out of the stylists chair that day, continuing with only subtle trims to keep her mane looking neat and professional as it made its way back toward mid-back.

“Okay, that was a bit harsh,” Mark admitted. “But you still wore it well.”

“Told you. Harsh,” she repeated. She started to put her phone away, but her grabbed hold of her hand to keep the phone where it was, and began flicking through her photo album. 

“Hold on. I want to see more of baby Keri.”

“Baby? It was only three years ago…”

But he wasn’t paying attention. Even just out of the corner of her eye she could see his eyebrows rise again and his pupils dilate just a little bit. She looked back at her phone, at the photos from maybe four to six months after the cut. On a boat belonging to her friend’s parents, she smiled in a bikini top and windblown wrap, her soft, still-short hair blowing freely and softly around her sunlit smile. 

“Now that is fucking adorable,” he said.

“Really? I felt so… unkempt.”

“Are you kidding?” He scrolled through a few more photos from that time period. “It’s gorgeous. Short enough to show off that gorgeous neck, but long enough to bury my fingers in when I’m kissing you…”

Keri’s cheeks burned as Mark spoke, her heart suddenly fluttering as she thought of those things happening. 

“I…I…,” she stammered. “Just a trim, this time. Sorry, old chap.”

Mark turned her around, smiling as he kissed her lips once more. “Text me when you’re on your way, and I’ll order dinner.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

He lingered at the door for a moment more, and then opened it and was gone.

After catching her breath and finishing her work at the copier, Keri dropped everything off and made her way into the ladies bathroom to assess herself in the mirror. Finger-combing her boyfriend-mussed hair, it didn’t take long to arrange the long, reddish locks to fall in their preferred center-parting in front of either shoulder and down her back. 

With only the barest hint of face-framing layers, she loved how much length and body it had recovered since that ill-fated chop following her Junior year of college. The look had a certain sex appeal, for sure, but it wasn’t Keri and the regret and dismay had set in about three days later despite the fact that, objectively, she never felt her features had shone brighter. It was through that trial — and the continuing trial of growing her lush mane long again — that she had truly learned how beautiful she looked with it all gathered back or worn up.

Even now, with the freshly washed locks being barely styled, she felt there was a noticeable difference between the “sweet” kind of beautiful she was when her hair was loose and how, as she began to gather it all back to be fastened in place with a hairclip once more, she took on an elegant, Audrey Hepburn-esque regal beauty. The fact that it left her neck so naked and vulnerable to Mark’s amorous attacks was just an added bonus. 

Her eyes remaining on her reflection, she turned her head to the left and then the right, taking in her petite jaw and delicate cheekbones. Her cute little ears and the dangly jewelry they were adorned with. The long expanse of her pale throat…

He had said she looked adorable in those sailing photos.

Fuck. Was she being tempted to cut it again?

Because of a guy? Again?

She swore that wasn’t going to be the case. Not again. No way, no, ma’am. She’d spent way too much time and effort to get her hair back to the length it was and on its way to where she wanted it to be to give it up now.

But the Phoenix heat certainly didn’t help. 

Driving to the salon, she kept her window down to feel the breeze brush past her naked neck and tickle her ears. Would it be so bad to feel that all the time, without needing a hairclip or having to bush out her windblown hair once she got wherever she was going?

No, she told herself. That’s what ponytail holders were for. She wanted it to be long, and wanted it to get longer. No cutting it, not today. Mark would just have to continue spelunking for her neck during sexy time, like he had been for months.

Once she reached the salon, Keri pulled the clip from her hair and shook it out, letting it tumble down around her shoulders as she met the woman at the front desk with a smile.

“I have an appointment with Bethany.”

Bethany was just about ready for her, so the young receptionist with the cute, sleek bob led Keri back to a salon station, settling her down and offering a glass of water while she waited. 

Keri gladly accepted, but a woman a few years older than Keri showed up in the mirror before the water even arrived. She had a slight, boyish build, with light, golden blonde hair that was cropped into a wavy undercut pixie. If she’d worn it slicked back, it would have reminded Keri of her own bald-fade cut she’d gotten, but the woman’s sides and back were a bit too long for that.

“Hi. I’m Bethany! You must be Keri.”

“I am. Hi!”

Bethany was right to business, stepping up behind Keri and running her fingers through the long auburn locks she was being entrusted with. “I saw you wearing all of this up off your neck when you came in. Are we thinking of going shorter for the new year? Getting rid of all this weight?”

Keri hesitated, then snapped out of it and shook her head. “No, definitely not. I’m growing it out, actually.” She nodded to herself in the mirror, but wasn’t certain she sold it even to herself.

Bethany’s hands deftly gathered Keri’s hair back into a thick, swingy ponytail. “So just a healthy trim? That’s a shame. You have gorgeous features.” With a quick movement, she twisted the ponytail and clipped it atop Keri’s head, and then set about unfurling a light, white cape across Keri’s lap. “Perfect for a really short cut, which, you can believe me, is pretty great in this weather.”

Thinking about how she had felt on the drive over, Keri nodded absent-mindedly. “I know. But I think I’d just like to have it long again.”

Bethany undid the clip she had just put in Keri’s hair to let it fall free again. She started running a comb through the silky soft mane, starting close to the ends and slowly moving upward toward the crown, the soothing strokes growing longer in length and becoming almost hypnotizing. “Again? So you had it short before?”

Keri nodded. “Like really, really short. Shorter than yours, even.”

Bethany’s eyes widened at that.

Keri shook her head to ward off any pursuit of that idea. “It just wasn’t me. I let myself be talked into it, and it was too short for me.”

“I refuse to believe that. Not with your bone structure and adorable little ears.”

Keri hadn’t expected to find herself blushing when she arrived at the salon, but that didn’t matter. Her cheeks warmed to a pinkish hue anyway. “If you’ll forgive me being kind of conceited, it looked amazing. But it just didn’t fit me, you know?”

“Were there any short looks that did fit you as you grew it out?” Bethany asked. She’d stopped combing, instead taking up position behind the chair and tracing her fingers along the waterfalls of locks in front of Keri’s shoulders, gently tugging them back behind Keri’s ears.

“My boyfriend seems to think so, but I’m not so sure.”

“Oh? Can I be the deciding vote?”

Keri rolled her eyes, but reached for her purse. Bethany handed it to her and then took it back after Keri had her phone in hand. Fortunately, her photo gallery was still open right at the spot around the time of the sailing trip. She heard Bethany sigh in admiration over her shoulder.

“Oh, sweet. That was so adorable on you!”

Keri swallowed, growing a little nervous at the constant outside reinforcement of a bad idea. “That’s pretty much exactly what he said.”

“He must have loved it back then.”

“He actually wasn’t around at the time. We only met after I moved out here a few months ago, so he’s only known the long-haired me. Didn’t even know I ever had it short until a few hours ago.”

“Seriously? Wow. I almost feel bad for him.” Bethany began clipping up sections of Keri’s hair, meticulously parting and measuring out even measures of her soft, shiny auburn locks as she worked. “Actually, I feel bad for both of you.”

“Why?”

Bethany grinned somewhat mischievously. She’d pinned up enough of Keri’s tresses to leave the sides of her neck completely bare, with only a long, uniform fall of her dark locks remaining free down the back of the chair. “Oh, come on. Like you wouldn’t enjoy all of the nips and kisses of having your neck and throat so easy to get at? At those cute little earlobes waiting to be nibbled?”

Keri’s reflection blushed brightly, making her blush even more on top of that.

“Yeah, I thought so,” Bethany chided. Sitting on a wheeled stool, she pulled out her scissors and clicked them open and shut. The blades then disappeared behind the chair, and Keri heard the first crunching snips and felt the gentle tugs at the very end of her long locks. “So, how do you think he’d react if you showed up with your hair cut like that next time you saw him?”

The stylist glanced up in time to notice Keri’s cheeks somehow getting even redder.

“He hinted that he might like it,” Keri replied, grinning at the obvious understatement. She started thinking of how he’d bury his fingers in the short lengths, using the grip to pull her against his hard, perfect pecks and abs, not to mention other hard things, like… She brushed the thought aside, catching Bethany’s bemused look in the mirror.

Keri swallowed and tried to regain her composure.

The stylist waited.

Keri bit her bottom line, looking at the old photos of herself. 

“You really think it’d look good?”

“I know it would,” Bethany insisted. She stood from the stool, and slid her scissors back into her shirt pocket. “Do you want to leave him speechless?”

Keri looked at her reflection, at the long, silky mane piled high atop her head. She thought about the length of time it’d taken to regain, the effort she’d put into caring for it. But she also thought about the Arizona heat, the styling time she could save, and being able to sleep in later on workdays next to Mark.

Keri bit her bottom lip, and nodded.

Bethany smiled brightly. “Perfect.” Gentle fingers set themselves just above each of Keri’s ears and guided her to look downward. The stylist reached to her cart of tools and picked up what looked like a long, thin razor, and moved behind Keri once again. 

Keri felt the stylist’s fingers high against her neck, gathering and lifting a thick, auburn lock. 

“Ready?” Bethany asked.

Keri closed her eyes and nodded.

There was a gentle tug and a loud rasp, and then nothing. Keri waited a split second before opening her eyes just in time to watch a silky, foot-long lock of her gorgeous mane float down into her lap where Bethany had dropped it. As Keri looked at it with wide eyes, another lock was taken hold of, another tug was felt, and another rasping sound heard. Again and again the happened, with the gentle tugs slowly climbing up Keri’s nape as Bethany worked, slicing away years of Keri’s efforts to regain her crowning glory. 

Keri watched in the mirror as Bethany dropped the shorn locks to the side, letting Keri take in their full glory as they floated to the floor. With every shearing swipe, the locks seemed to get longer and thicker, until Bethany was releasing full sections form her carefully placed hair clips and shearing them all off in on go, dropping sixteen and eighteen inch lengths to the floor before attacking the seven- and eight-inch remains even more with her trusty razor. 

The thin, heavy sections, when shorn and discarded, could be heard hitting the floor with a soft poof, disappearing from sight and Keri’s life almost simultaneously. As her head grew lighter, Keri’s anxiety began to grown heavier. She watched Bethany lift thick, silky locks at her crown and quickly slice through them, only to let the shortened locks fall into place, be fluffed by the stylist’s fingers, and then lifted and shorn again. 

Soon, as the stylist worked in an arc from side to side, Keri’s right ear was almost completely bared again, with the discarded length falling heavily against Keri’s shoulder before sliding into her lap. Then lighter tufts followed as the style began to take shape, with the remaining locks almost curling upward without the weight of the mid-back locks to pull them down. Keri’s heart raced as she watched her left ear being revealed in the same manner, the rasping of the razor blade against her strong, healthy hair almost deafeningly loud, or at least seeming to be, as Bethany sculpted the dark locks to highlight its nibble-friendly lobe.

When the last of Keri’s long locks were released, they tumbled down in front of her eyes, though only for a moment. Barely a second after they’d settled against her breast, the thick mass of auburn tresses were gathered up and sacrificed to Bethany’s blade, the soft rasping edge dancing in front of Keri’s face as the last of her flowing hair was shorn away at nose-length. It didn’t remain there for more than a few breath’s time, though, as Bethany continued to slice away again and again, lifting the length of those dark locks up past Keri’s eyes and then past her eyebrows. 

And with that, all of Keri’s long hair was gone. Again. Three years of effort given up on a whim, an entire timeline of growth reset in just a few minutes.

She looked at the shaggy woman in the reflection before her as Bethany undid the cape and spilled the shorn locks that had gathered in Keri’s lap to the floor. In silence, she took note of the deep blue eyes filled with concern, the long, elegant neck left completely naked, and the allegedly adorable earlobes peaking out from under some well-crafted wisps. 

“It’s a shock, I know, but we’re not done yet.” Bethany took Keri’s hand and led her back to a wash basin, humming softly as she guided a warm, cozy showerhead against Keri’s shortened locks. Keri felt her heart calm as Bethany worked, gentle fingers caressing and rubbing her temples in between shampoo-laden passes through the mass of hair that wasn’t even a quarter or one-fifth of what had been on Keri’s head when she first entered the salon. 

The shampoo was magnificent, but short. 

Just like Keri’s hair, in a way.

After a tumble-some toweling off, Bethany led Keri back to the chair. 

Seeing her reflection again, Keri couldn’t help but laugh at how much like a drowned rat she looked, though, admittedly, a really adorable drowned rat. What was left of her gorgeous, stick-straight lengths was now sticking up in random, four-inch spikes, curls, and whatever other kind of shape crazy-ass hair could make. But even as messy as it was, it screamed out for her to notice her own cheekbones, her jawline, and, again, her pale neck. 

Bethany set about getting the shorn locks back in order almost immediately, using a comb to guide them into a general style before picking up her razor again.

When Keri’s eyes widened, the stylist insisted, “Just a few touch ups.”

And so they were, with just a few bits and pieces being sliced away, showing off the bottom half of her ears a little more, adding some framing around her face, and shortening the length at her nape to just an inch or two. Then the hair dryer came out, gusting her hair around with an insane amount of ease compared to the effort that would have been required just an hour ago. 

Keri smiled at her reflection as her new hairstyle danced around, its length at her crown measured by three or four inches, whereas a short while ago it would have been about two feet. It was a messy, fluffy, wonderfully overgrown pixie; perfectly sculpted mayhem of natural highlights and softness atop her head. Shivers zipped up and down her spine every time Bethany’s fingers slid through the thick locks from her nape toward her crown, and Keri couldn’t imagine how good that would feel when Mark did the same in just a short while.

Turning the dryer off and setting it aside, Bethany asked, “So what do you think?”

Keri was speechless at first, smiling nervously as she reached up and tucked a few wispy locks back behind her ears, only to free them again shortly afterward. Her fingers ran back through the warm, silky locks, burying themselves in its minimal length and feeling just how short it had become at her nape. Chilly thrills coarse through her, finally taking the form of a delighted, nervous giggle. 

“I might be really mad at myself tomorrow morning, but I think I like it. No, I know I do. I like how it looks and feels… it’s so light and cute!”

With a smile of her own, Bethany pulled the cape away from Keri’s lap once again, spilling a much smaller load of dark locks onto the floor this time. “I think ‘adorable’ was the word everyone was using.”

Keri laughed, rising form the seat to step closer to the mirror, running her fingers through her silky, auburn mop and shaking it out wildly. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t seem to get it to look bad — there were only varying degrees of magnificently manicured messiness. 

“Okay, I was wrong — I love it. I really do!”

Bethany laughed. “I thought you would. You looked so damn happy in all of your short-haired photos. I think you just went a bit too far last time.”

Keri had to agree there. Still playing with the length at her nape — length that had been nonexistent the last time she’d had her hair clippered short — she made her way up front to pay. 

“So…,” Bethany began delicately, “are you going to see your boyfriend tonight?”

Feeling confident enough in her vixenness to go without blushing, Keri grinned and flicked an eyebrow upward. “On my way now, actually.”

Bethany laughed. “One tip, if I may, from someone who learned the hard way — be sure to have some foundation or a nice scarf for your neck tomorrow morning. It’ll help avoid a lot of embarrassing looks at the office.”

Keri couldn’t fight the blush then, and a little thrill of anticipatory delight grew within as she considered why she might need such things. “Thank you — I definitely wasn’t in a headspace to think of that beforehand. See you again in a month or so for a shape up?”

A short time later, Keri realized she probably should have just the up her second appointment right then, because she was pretty sure another grow-out wouldn’t be happening anytime soon. But there’d be time for scheduling such things later — right now, she had a boy to get to and a naked, vulnerable neck that needed ravaging.

 

-End-

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Thanks for reading! Been working on this one for a while, but hopefully following efforts will come a bit quicker. Let me know what you think, if you have a moment — I’d love to hear your thoughts.

And if you’re interested in reading up on Keri’s first experience with super short hair, it can be found at:

Because of a Joke