As he neared Vince’s Corner Barbershop, he could see through the window that Vince only had two customers. One of them, Al, an old man Harry had seen there before a few other times, was reading the paper. The other, a businessman, was in the barber’s chair. Frosted onto both of the windows of the barbershop in big, white letters were the words "Men’s, Women’s, and Children’s Hair Cutting and Styling." In reality, women almost never went to Vince’s (Harry, at least, had never seen any there), and Vince did very little styling. Just to one side of Vince’s door stood an old-fashioned red and white barber’s pole. It had recently been damaged by vandals. Harry heard a rumble and looked down the street where an El train was departing from an overhead stop.

When Harry opened the door to the barbershop, a string of sleigh bells attached to the handle jingled, and Vince turned to see who was coming in. Vince was a tall man and wore a close trimmed beard.

"Hey, Harry. How ya doing?" he said.

Harry wiped his feet on the mat just inside the door. "Not so bad. Need a haircut." He tugged on a clump of hair on the top his head and smiled. The hair extended nearly to the tip of his nose.

"It’s been a while," Vince said. "I’ll be with you after I take care of this mop top." He nodded toward Al, who laughed and threw down his paper in mock disgust. Except for a fringe of hair around his ears and neck, Al was completely bald.

Harry exchanged greetings with Al and sat down in the row of chairs underneath one of the windows. He nervously flipped through a pile of magazines sitting on the chair next to him -- Sports Illustrated, Popular Science, Field and Stream, Outdoor Wisconsin, and a few old Playboys. Al picked his newspaper off the floor and offered it to Harry. "Want the Trib, son? It’s just about my turn at the chopping block." Harry thanked him and turned to the sports section.

Vince was finishing the businessman’s haircut. He brushed off the man’s neck and took his money. The bells on the door jingled as the businessman went out. Vince swept up around his chair and said to Al, "You’re up, Curly."

Harry half-read the paper while Vince and Al talked. Harry listened to the rhythmic snip of the scissors. He found it relaxing. Vince and Al were talking about baseball.

"Cubbies above .500 now?" Al asked.

Harry looked up from the paper where he had just been reading the result of last night’s game. "Nah, they’re two games down," he said.

"If they hadn’t canned that series with the Padres, they’d a been over," Vince said.

"That kid just up from the farm pitched a good game against ‘em though," said Al.

"That Velasquez kid? Let me tell ya that kid got one hell of a curveball. He’s going places." Vince gave Al a hand mirror to check the back of his head. While Vince was lathering Al’s neck, Al asked after his wife, Phyllis. Vince told him about Phyllis’ new job at an insurance office uptown. She was a secretary.

"Now, don’t forget to wear a hat so you won’t catch cold," Vince said to Al as he was leaving.

Al rubbed his shiny head and smiled. "We’ll see who’ll be laughing when I sweep the pool this week."

Harry stood up and stretched. He felt tense and anxious. Vince slung a towel around his shoulders as he sat down in the chair. It still felt warm and slightly sweaty from Al’s body. "You want to get in on the pool, Harry? Five bucks a square. Win fifty."

"Nah, thanks. I gotta save as much dough as I can right now."

"That girl you seeing costing you a pretty penny, huh? What’s her name, Katie, Cassie?" Vince drew a comb out of his jar.

"Oh, her, she took off a couple weeks back."

"Oh, yeah?" Harry looked into the mirror and noticed a look of concern pass over Vince’s face.

"Nothing I’m too worried about though." Harry shrugged his shoulders underneath the towel. Vince tied a dark blue barber’s cape around his neck.

"Hey, it happens. Women are like the weather; can’t never predict what they’re gonna do next. So, how are we doing this today?"

Harry slid his hand out from under the cape and ran it through his hair. He crossed his arms over his chest again and thought for a moment. Harry’s hair was very black and sometimes he wore it slicked up. He’d been letting it grow out. "You know what, buzz it right down. I’m sick of all this hair."

"Buzz it huh. You wanna look like a Buddhist monk or a neo-nazi?"

"Give me the monk."

"All right, monk, that I can do." Vince put his comb back in the big jar and opened up the drawer in which he kept the clippers. "So, got a joke for me today?"

Harry tapped his chin with his index finger and pretended to assume a thoughtful expression. "Hmm… let me think." This was a common exchange between Vince and Harry, ever since Harry was a kid. All through grade school, Harry had wanted to be a comedian and had a joke ready whenever his Dad brought him into Vince’s for a haircut. During high school, though, Harry drew into himself a little more and lost the exuberance he’d had as a younger boy. His mother attributed it to his Dad’s death.

"Let me see… hmm, well, you’ve already heard the one about the one-legged man’s wife. What about the rabbi and the virgin?" Vince plugged the clippers in and switched them on. "Nah, wait, here we go. Ok, so, Superman’s always had a thing for Wonder Woman. He’s totally hot for her. One day as he’s flying through Metropolis, what does he see when he looks down but Wonder Woman lying on top of a skyscraper, spread-eagled and naked as the day she was born. Superman flies down, whips off his cape and his tights, and starts going at it. He goes at it for quite a while, and when he rolls off, he says, ‘Wow, that was unbelievable. That was the best lay I’ve ever had.’ And Wonder Woman looks at him real confused and says, ‘Well, you’re welcome. But I don’t think the Invisible Man will ever be able to sit down again.’"

Vince laughed quietly and shook his head. "You always could tell a dirty joke, kid." He laughed again. "Where do you hear stuff like that? I’d ground you if I was your ma." Vince walked over to his counter and switched on a portable radio. He and Harry listened to a local news report on an AM station over the hum of the clippers. Harry liked the feel and the vibration of the blades running through his hair. Vince tilted his head downward. Vince’s hands felt strange on Harry’s nearly naked scalp, and the sensation made him feel slightly uncomfortable. Bunches of his hair collected on the black and white tile floor. Vince handed him a small hand mirror so he could check the back of his head. His image, and that of Vince behind him, was reflected infinitely between the two mirrors.

"So, how is your mom doing? It’s been a long time since I’ve seen her.", Vince asked.

"Oh, she’s ok. Really busy at the factory. How’s Chuck?" Chuck was Vince’s son and had gone to the same high school as Harry, only in a class a few years younger. Now he was going to school at Northern Illinois University.

"Yeah, he’s doing good,", Vince replied. "Getting good grades. You want these sideburns trimmed up?"

"Yeah."

Vince buzzed Harry’s sideburns. He put the clippers down and began to work up some white shaving lather in a mug. Harry looked at his watch and then out the window. The rain was falling more heavily than it had before.

"Actually, I got to get going. So, no shave, thanks."

"You must be in a rush today, huh. What’d ya got that’s so pressing you can’t have a nice, clean shave?" Vince said as he removed the towel from Harry’s shoulders and brushed off his neck.

"I just got some errands to run before my flight."

"Oh, yeah? Where you going?"

"Going out to California," Harry said as he stood up.

"Little vacation time?"

"Nah, I’m moving out there. Got a job lined up." Harry handed Vince a ten dollar bill.

Vince looked surprised. "You don’t say. Leaving today, huh?"

"Yup."

"Well, hey, kid. Good luck." Vince looked down at the tile floor where Harry’s hair surrounded his chair. He seemed to not know quite what to say.

"Thanks." Harry walked to the door and began to open it. Outside, rain was running off the gutters.

"Hey, Harry," Vince said as Harry was stepping out, "How long I been cutting your hair?"

Harry stood half inside, half outside. "I don’t know. Long time I guess."

"I figure it must be about twenty years. Yeah, about twenty years."

"That sounds about right."

"Yeah, you were five or six when you started coming in here. Hell, that was probably just a few months after I opened up." The two men stood in silence for a moment. "Well," Vince finally said, take care of yourself, kid."