The evil hairdresser from Rostock-3

The evil hairdresser from Rostock-3

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)

 

Arrested

On Sunday evening, Bärbel calls, desperate. “Fritz is gone!” “What do you mean, gone?”

“He didn’t show up for work yesterday, and they were babbling something about the police and the Stasi.”

“Stay calm. Are you in Rostock?” “Yes.” “Good, then we should wait a few days.”

“And then?” “Just stay calm and wait.”

Two days later, on Tuesday morning, two police officers show up at Christiane’s workplace. She is asked to come to the station, otherwise no information is given.

“Do you know a Fritz Lehmann?”

She is interrogated by various officers for six hours.

Bärbel has been arrested on suspicion of aiding and abetting escape from the republic and espionage!

At home, she dials her fingers sore. Where is Bärbel now! No one will give her any information.

Completely distraught, she sinks down onto the sofa in the evening when the doorbell rings.

She throws open the door, hoping to see Bärbel standing there.

But it’s Olaf Böhmer!

“Mr. Böhmer, what are you doing here! I really don’t have time right now.”

She wants to close the door again when he says, “I thought you might be interested in some information about your sister.” “What do you know about my sister?”

“May I come in?” Reluctantly, she lets him in.

“I know she’s in custody, in a special section of Rostock prison.”

“How do you know that?” He grins. “I had her sitting in front of me in the chair today.”

“What chair? And what do you have to do with Rostock prison?”

“Me and a few colleagues help out there as hairdressers, Tuesdays for women and Wednesdays for men. And just this morning they brought your sister in. With hair that long, they’re very strict about following their rules. But she had already asked me about short hairstyles. So I let her be the first to sit in the chair.“ ”You cut her hair?!”

“There are clear rules in that section. But when she cried like that, I bent the rules as far as I could. I cut her bangs nice and short, leaving them at ear level with a short pageboy cut. My colleagues would certainly have done things differently.“ He shows the length with his flat hand. ”It went pretty quickly, she doesn’t have hair as thick as yours. Cut off the braid, then cut the bangs and all around with scissors. Shave the neck and nape cleanly with a razor. Unfortunately, I wasn’t allowed to keep the braid, otherwise I would have brought it to you. But they keep it and sell all braids longer than 30 cm to the West.“ ”Braids cut off! Ear length! You cut off her long hair?

Are you crazy!“ ”I’m sorry, but it had to be done. Actually, I should have cut it short as a matchstick.”

Christiane is horrified. Now the first tears are running down her cheeks.

“How can I visit her there?” she tries to ask calmly. Inside, she is more upset than ever before.  “Not while she’s in that section, only when she’s transferred to the normal remand prison.”

“But that’s not why I came.” Christiane stares at him in horror.

“What’s the problem then?” “She’s in a cell with seven other women, and there are a few really nasty ones among them. Of course, I have a few connections through my work. Under certain circumstances, it might be possible to get her into a two-person cell.” Christiane keeps brushing her thick hair behind her ears. Some of it immediately slips back down. “Then please do that.”

“I’ll try, but unfortunately it will cost something.” “How much?” “5,000.” “How much! 5,000? We don’t have that much.” He shrugs his shoulders. “I have to pay a few people.”

Christiane is desperate. “Where am I supposed to get that much money?”

“How much can you come up with?” Christiane thinks hard.

“3,500, and if I borrow some more from friends, it might be enough.”

“When you have it, bring it to the salon and I’ll take care of it.”

He looks at his watch. “I have to go now,” he says goodbye.

The next morning, she calls in sick to work and runs to the bank, emptying her account. She has 3,958 marks.

In the afternoon, she calls all her friends, borrowing 100 here, 350 there, even 500 in some cases. Then she has it all!

“I’ll keep you posted,” Olaf promises her, “and we’ll talk about your haircut later.” “My haircut?”

“Sure,” he grins at her, “we’ll make an appointment for that.”

Two days later, she learns that Bärbel is now sharing a two-bed cell with a Vietnamese woman. Visits remain out of the question for the time being.

It’s Tuesday evening again when Olaf Böhmer stands at her door once more.

“I have some news about your sister.” “Come in.”

He sits down in the kitchen and Christiane sits opposite him. “First, the good news. Your sister will be transferred to normal remand custody on Thursday. Then a visit would also be possible.” Christiane breathes a sigh of relief. Finally, she can visit her.

“And the bad news?” “The Vietnamese woman in her cell has been diagnosed with lice.” “So what? There are remedies for that.”

“That’s true, but the remedies in prison are quite radical but effective.”

“What does that mean?” Olaf just shrugs his shoulders.

“No!” Christiane covers her mouth with her hands. “They’re not going to cut off all her hair, are they?” “Yes, unfortunately. Usually, the hair is cut quite short with scissors first and then the rest is shaved off several times. First to 3 mm (0,12 Incnch), then the last few millimeters with a small machine.”

A pause of horror from Christiane, then a straw.

“But she’s moving to another department the day after tomorrow!”

“That’s the day after tomorrow, but tomorrow the other regulations still apply and we have to prevent her from spreading the lice to other areas.”

“What can I do to spare my little sister this?” she whines.

“Well, I could leave a little later tomorrow and take the Vietnamese woman first.” “And then?” “Her hair reaches down to her hips, and if I take my time with her and work especially thoroughly, it might be noon by the time I’m done, and I’ll have to call it a day.” “Then you wouldn’t…” Christiane is visibly relieved.

“But that would mean I’d still have to shave the other one.” “Shave?”

Translated with google

He nods. “With a knife, the last tenths of a millimeter. The entire head is shaved spotlessly clean, but that’s always very unpleasant for the ladies. On the white scalp, however, you can see any possible infestation. But that’s also very time-consuming, and I might not have time to serve your sister.”

Christiane remains silent. “Should I shave the Vietnamese woman or shave both of them?” He looks at her with a slight grin.

After a while, Christiane nods. “What now? Your decision.”

Christiane desperately puts her face in her hands.

“Shave,” she stammers after a while. He grins broadly.

“Now we have a small problem.” “Why? I think so…” “If it weren’t for the afternoon.”

“Why afternoon?”

“I’d have to go back this afternoon and then…” He shrugs his shoulders again.

“No! You can’t do that!” The relief suddenly vanishes.

“If I had a client appointment, of course?” “Then what?”

A little relief returns. “Do you have one?”

“Miss Christiane, you could do one with me.” Christiane stares at him.

“It’s not exactly cheap, though.” “How much?” she asks anxiously.

“Let’s say 500 marks.” “But I don’t have that much left. Because of the 5,000 marks I have payed, I still owe friends. I’ll never be able to manage that.” “Then Miss Bärbel will be the first to go tomorrow morning and get a particularly thorough shave. Let’s see what the Vietnamese pay.”

Christiane is desperate. “No. Please, you can’t do that.”

Olaf leans back. “We could come to a debt agreement.”

Christiane wipes the tears from her eyes. “Anything they want.”

She hides her face behind her hands, crying.

“Good, then you’ll be at the salon tomorrow at 2:00 p.m.” Christiane looks up.

“You both come every first Saturday of the month for a trim, and each of you will pay 50 marks for six months.” “But that’s 600 marks!”

“Each trim, plus interest. And if you don’t stick to it, 2,000 marks are due immediately. And your sister will be back in jail immediately.”

He opens his bag and places a piece of paper and a pen on the table.

“Sign here!”

Christiane’s Victim

She’s been running restlessly around the apartment all morning. She’s already stood in front of the bathroom mirror five times. Now she’s doing it again, combing her thick blonde hair, with the result that she’s crying again. Eating is out of the question.

At 2:00 p.m. sharp, she enters the salon. The first thing she sees is Olaf standing behind the cash register, and then, diagonally behind him, his friend Susanne.

“My sister! What about her?” she asks immediately.

“Almost everything as discussed. Did you sign the agreement?”

She silently hands him the note. He nods and points to the barber’s chair.

“If you stay seated, I might have some good news for you.”

Christiane is now sitting in Olaf’s barber’s chair, a dark blue cape tied around her neck.

Susanne comes over with a camera and takes pictures of her, while Olaf rotates the chair 360° with her.

With both hands, he repeatedly runs his fingers through Christiane’s soft blond hair, starting from the front. He grasps her neck and runs his spread fingers from the back of her neck up to the back of her head.

Christiane shudders, finding the situation so revolting.

Susanne stands next to her with a brush in her hand. With forceful strokes, her thick, shoulder-length hair is now brushed back.

Her head is jerked back with each stroke.

Suddenly, the backrest is tilted back a few degrees and the chair is jerked upright. Christiane grips the armrests with her hands. Susanne now has a large comb in her hand, combing everything further back and the sides over her ears.

Olaf attaches an attachment to the large hair clippers and turns it on.

He nods to Susanne. “Of course,” she grins, and grasps Christiane’s chin with her thick fingers. She pushes her chin up so that she’s looking at the ceiling.

He places the clippers against her forehead. Christiane closes her eyes and grips her hands even tighter into the armrests. Susanne’s grip on her chin also tightens. The loud humming sound changes as the blades grab the first hairs. Very slowly, the machine crawls backward over her head. She doesn’t see a whole mountain of her 40 cm (15,75 inch) of hair fall to the floor. He shaves her thick blonde hair, strip by strip, 10 mm (0,4 inch) short across the top of her head. Olaf turns off the machine to change the attachment, and Susanne raises her backrest.

“Now look in the mirror.”

Christiane wants to scream. The top of her head has been shaved short to 1 cm. Her shoulder-length hair is still on the sides.

The machine hums again. Susanne grasps her neck and pushes her head far forward, her other hand strokes her soft hair from the nape of her neck to the back of her head.

And then she feels the machine on her neck. He shaves her hair to 5 mm (0,2 inch), which now lands in thick clumps beneath her on the cape. Susanne turns her head slightly to the side so Olaf can get a better look at her ear. The mountain of her shorn hair in her lap is growing rapidly. It takes forever. Finally, he turns off this horrific machine. Christiane stares in the mirror, stunned. “That’s not me!”

Olaf reaches for the comb and scissors again. Here and there, the scissors trim a few longer hairs from the nape of her neck and around her ears.

He runs his hand over her short-cropped hair on top.

A crew cut! They’re just 1 cm (0,4 inch) high on top, and the sides are shorn close to the bare bones. “Feel this,” he says to Susanne, who immediately grabs her hair.

He takes off her cape, and the whole pile of her hair lands on the floor.

She runs to the door. “By the way,” he stops her, “I heard that Miss Bärbel might be released soon after all. But she still had to leave a few strands.”

At home, Christiane throws herself onto the sofa, crying; she doesn’t want to look in a mirror. She cries even more that afternoon.

It gets dark, then night, with nothing changing. It’s night again when the bell rings. <Let it ring.>

To be continued