Bare Bones

This is a very short story, just a blip in my mind. If you haven't read it, the recent, longer one is below.

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"I don't want to see you anymore."

I quickly scanned the table for the steak knife, suspecting that someone had accidentally stuck it in my chest and was currently swirling it around my insides. But it was still there, sitting next to my half-eaten salmon. It was only offered as grilled on my menu, but they broiled it for me. And it was offered with mashed potatoes and string beans, but I got it with french fries and broccoli. But the broccoli was only offered sauteed, so I asked them to steam it, which they did. And the lemon wine sauce was on the side too. Of course. Always on the side.

"You're just...too much for me."

We had been dating for a few months. We met at an Oscar party, which is pretty much a Superbowl party for homosexuals. Except instead of heros and beer we have asparagus tips and white wine. Steamed asparagus tips, of course.

"It shouldn't be this hard."

I absentmindedly unfolded my napkin, forgetting that I had stuffed some fish bones into it. The bones fell across the table, mixing in with my food. I tried to nonchalantly sweep them back into the napkin, but the napkin was covered with ketchup which then stuck to my hands. In fact, my entire plate was covered with ketchup. Pointless, really, to force the kitchen to make me a special dinner when I just covered everything in ketchup. Sauteed and steamed broccoli both taste the same, smothered in ketchup. I read somewhere that ketchup is the most popular condiment because it contains all seven types of flavor, including the elusive umame. Some of us just like to have it all.

"I don't know, maybe it's me."

I nodded in agreement, not really agreeing. As far as I could tell, the common denominator in all my relationships was me, not him.

"My mother was very hard on me."

By this point, my stomach was starting to churn, and I felt vaguely like I was about to vomit. Not quite enough to make me excuse myself from the table, especially since he seemed to be in the middle of an important point. There was something he needed to get off of his chest, and I owed it to him to sit it out, and nod at the right moments, so he wouldn't feel so alone.

He spent several minutes talking about his mother, and how she handed him off to the nanny whenever he would cry. That didn't sound so horrible to me. Mary Poppins was a nanny, and she made cough syrup taste like candy and sang her kids to sleep. My mother never sang me to sleep. She didn't care much for music. She liked one song by Peter, Paul, and Mary, and that was it.

"And my father was never around."

He'd already told me all about his father, on our last date. He spent hours describing the pain of having an absentee father. Mostly I nodded, but I asked a few questions too, so he'd know I was interested. Later that night, while he was falling asleep, I told him how my own absentee father had left pornography behind in the basement after he moved out, which I considered a misguided attempt at sexual education.

"Oh, your parents were divorced too?"

I nodded, and he went back to sleep.

"My last boyfriend was abusive."

That wasn't a surprise. I had met his last boyfriend at a party once. We didn't talk much, but he just looked angry. I wondered whether he became an angry person because he looked angry, or whether he looked like an angry person because he was one.

"No one understands me."

He started crying. I gave him a tissue from my pocket to wipe his eyes. It was a used tissue, but I had only used it to spit out my tic-tac, so it was like new. It smelled like mint. I thought that would make him happy. He liked mint. He liked mint, and Liza Minnelli, and skyscrapers. His birthday was coming up soon, and I had already bought him his gift, a rare recording of Liza at Carnegie Hall. I'd give it to him anyway. It would make him happy. Like the mint tissue.

"Everyone wants me to be something I'm not."

Yes, I would definitely give him that Liza recording. I liked Liza too, but he liked her more.

"I don't know who I am."

My body relaxed a bit, or perhaps I had become accustomed to the pain. It didn't take too long anymore. He signaled for the waiter to bring the check. There was still half a piece of salmon on my plate, but it was covered in ketchup, so he probably couldn't see it, and I wasn't hungry anyway.

"And you seem kind of, well, like, vulnerable. I need someone strong."

He coughed slightly, and I worried for a moment he might pull some of his stitches. A few weeks before he had been in the hospital with appendicitis. He had been admitted on Friday night, but didn't call me until Saturday.

"Why didn't you call me last night," I asked him, already e-mailing my friends to cancel our plans for that night. We had tickets to The Lion King. The music is slightly cheesy, but you can't go wrong with dancing puppets, especially when those puppets are tall enough to crush a Winnebago.

"Because I knew you'd come last night, and I didn't want to see anyone last night" he replied, in between short, jagged breaths. Within twenty minutes I was standing outside the hospital, but he wouldn't let me come up. His family was visiting, and they didn't know about me, or about him, or about us. So I wandered around the city for four hours and bought him various items that I thought might make him feel better. He didn't know who he was, but I did.

"I need to focus on me right now."

The waiter brought the check. I reached for it, as usual. I made a lot more money than he did, it was only fair that I pay. Plus, we were at my favorite restaurant, which he didn't particularly care for, but agreed to because we had gone to his favorite restaurant the last four times. I didn't blame him for that either. The restaurant wasn't particularly good, but it was one of the few that had shoe-string french fries. My father made shoe-string french fries, before he left, while my mother played Peter, Paul, and Mary on the stereo.

"And I've kind of been seeing someone else."

The waiter started clearing the plates, giving me a funny look while he delicately placed the ketchup-soaked napkin on my plate. We talked a bit about the new guy. It felt good to ask him questions again, even about that. They had met at a bowling party. The attendant had switched their shoes. Prada, size 11, Gucci, size 10.5. Hilarity ensued. They hadn't been out yet, but he was optimistic. I was too. He sounded like a really nice guy.

"You know, I feel better," he said, smiling. I smiled back, because that's what I do.

He got up from the table, and I touched his hand lightly. He immediately pulled his hand away. He was clearly uncomfortable enough, without my neediness getting between him and the front door.

"I'm glad," I replied. He'd feel even better next week, when I gave him the Liza recording. He could listen to it with his new boyfriend. That's two people I could make happy, with just one gift. Really, a net positive.

I watched him get in his car through the restaurant window. He offered to wait for me, but he didn't really want to, so I didn't want him to. The waiter had missed a few stray bones. I gathered them up and deposited them in my water glass.

Another three months. Another ketchup-stained napkin. Another steak knife in my chest. But all in all, not a bad evening, as far as these things go.

I paid the check, wiped the ketchup off of my cheeks, and left.

A Hair's Breadth

The devil does not exist. I am absolutely certain of that, as certain as I am that tube socks have more than one purpose. Over the past thirty years, I have repeatedly closed my eyes and offered the devil my soul for bargain basement prices that only an idiot would have passed up. If the devil existed, I would have been a member of the Partridge Family. If the devil existed, I would have had my first sexual experience with Tony Danza. But most of all, if the devil existed, I wouldn't be losing my hair.


Many people would benefit from a pact between myself and the devil to replace my lost hair follicles. My friends, for one, who I have often kept waiting at movie theaters, restaurants, and other locations while I spend hours manipulating my hair into unnatural shapes to mask the receding hairline. And then there's my employer, who financially suffers while I sit at my desk and stare in a plastic mirror that I ripped off of the Crest White Strips container. The list goes on from there -- drivers who I've sideswiped because I was checking out my hair in the rearview mirror; dates who I canceled on because I couldn't quite get the third hair from the left to curl appropriately; my mother, just because I blame her when I can't find someone else to blame.




But the person who stands to benefit most from the existence of the devil is my hair stylist. Or, I should say hair stylists. Over the previous several years I had left several of them in my wake, repeatedly disappointed by their failure to validate my existence.

"So what are we doing today?" Wayne was my newest victim. My last stylist, Blue (actually her real name) had completely misunderstood her mission, the result of which required me to wear a baseball cap for three weeks, even when I was alone in my apartment. The only time I took it off was when I slept, and even then I only took it off because my head got too hot in the middle of the night. Otherwise I would have sewn the hat directly to my scalp.




Wayne probably expected a short, "a little off the sides" answer. Unfortunately, I was several years past "a little off the sides." Since graduating from law school, my hairline had receded into a noticeable U-shape. It started off slowly enough, with a hair or two clinging to my comb each time I brushed, causing a slight bit of panic that was easily dismissed, at least after half a Xanax and some boxed wine.






Initially, I chalked up my hair concern to paranoia, which wasn't too difficult, seeing as about half of my thoughts can be chalked up to paranoia. But then the deluge began, and no amount of anti-anxiety pills could shield my eyes from the thin layer of dead hair that covered my apartment. At first I tried just putting them back on my head, figuring that maybe they would reabsorb into my scalp and be reborn as wholly new hairs. When that didn't work, I resorted to expensive shampoos made out of exotic ingredients like beetle juice and bull semen, and then to even more expensive medications, which to my dismay, were not covered by insurance. Every time I went to fill the prescription, I received odd looks from pharmacists, one of whom actually asked me if "this stuff really works."



"Well, if it doesn't, let's hope my insurance covers the anti-depressants," I replied.



Indeed, neither my pharmacist nor my friends were particularly concerned with the disaster area developing on my head. My friends made vaguely placating comments, like "that should be your biggest problem," and "Patrick Stewart makes it work." But I didn't buy it. Captain Picard piloted a Galaxy-class starship. I couldn't even operate a blender without adult supervision.






I walked Wayne through my carefully designed plan for masking this latest cruel trick of nature. His eyes glazed over several times during my instructions, cutting his tip in half each time.



"Now I want this clump of hairs to fall delicately across my face, while this clump should be combed backwards to ameliorate any comb-over effect." I motioned to various parts of my head, frustrated at Wayne's flip attitude towards this clearly grave situation. Maybe this is why the Bay of Pigs had failed. Uncommitted hair stylists.






"And this is very important -- you see this hair?" I said, pointing to a single hair laid across my forehead. "Under no circumstances should this hair be cut. This hair should remain exactly the same length. Otherwise the whole illusion will be ruined."




Nonplussed by the potential lawsuit sitting in front of him, Wayne began to cut, simultaneously filling me in on the sordid details of his life. He didn't seem to want my opinion on anything; he just wanted to talk. I indulged him by grunting unintelligible sounds at various points in his stories.




"So my boyfriend moved out last week, and I say, good riddance!"


"Mrble."


"My Schnauzer gave birth last week. And we thought she was a boy!"


"Rwndor."


"I got tickets to Cher's Farewell Tour. I know she says every tour is her farewell tour, but this time I think it's true!"


"Tuifrb."


Over the next half-hour, I tried to distract myself from the goings on behind me, afraid that if Wayne made a wrong move I might not be able to control my reaction. There were too many potentially dangerous objects around to take that risk. Everyone has their boiling point, and the combination of poor customer service and screwing up my hair was likely beyond mine. I could barely control myself when a waiter mistakenly refilled my Sprite with water.



"...I really think Aladdin is the sexiest Disney cartoon, don't you..."



"Breeu."

Haircuts weren't always an unpleasant experience. When I was six years old, my mother took me for my first official haircut. Previously my haircuts had been DIY affairs involving my mother, a pair of office scissors, and the bathroom mirror. It'd be charitable to attribute her entrepreneurial attitude to an overprotective nature, but more likely she was just trying to save a buck. In terms of childhood milestones, this one was shortly after my first tricycle, and shortly before my first enema. Most six-year-olds are not given enemas, but they certainly count as a milestone for the small number who are. I was the only kindergarten student who could spell suppository.

Eventually, either because my mother grew tired of our mother-son bonding time, or because my growing hair became increasingly unmanageable, she finally gave in and took me to her salon for a real haircut. Even though I was only six years old at the time, I have a phenomenal memory for the events of my childhood -- a blessing in some instances (the first time I met Miss Piggy, my first orgasm (not unrelated events)) and a curse in others (most family vacations, the aforementioned constipation debacle). Though I don't actually remember my birth, I'm still pretty sure I could find my way around a vaginal canal, if it ever became necessary.

My mother's salon was in a strip mall, sandwiched between a supermarket and a pet store. Though we lived in a predominantly gentile town, you wouldn't know it from the clientele in Ruth's Hair Plus. There wasn't a nail in the whole establishment shorter than a lion's claw. If an adult male had walked in, he would have been castrated on the spot. But given my tender age, curly blond locks, and large Bambi-like eyes, the ladies who nosh didn't just tolerate me; they adored me.

"Oh Sharon," one woman exclaimed. "You didn't tell me you had such a beautiful son!"

Though I don't remember my mother's exact response, it was likely something dismissive, as it did not fit neatly within her preconceived notions of my place in the universe. My sister was the pretty one, and I was the smart one, the two traits being mutually exclusive, at least in my house.

"He's gifted you know," my mother said, redirecting the conversation to a more comfortable topic. "Go on, Jonah. Show them how smart you are," she insisted, pushing me forward into a throng of blue-haired ladies. I wasn't sure how to go about honoring her request. I didn't see any chairs to stack, no one was playing hide-and-go-seek, and spelling suppository might have gotten more curious looks than admiration.

Fortunately, before my mother could force me to explain the Pythagorean theorem, the stylist whisked me up into a high chair and started cutting. Before I knew it, my wild curls had been chopped into something actually presentable, prompting oohs and aahs from the other customers, most of whom had gathered around to watch what appeared to be a monumental event. And no one seemed to mind that I hadn't said a word, or done anything remarkable, since I walked in the door. Just my very presence was enough to make them happy. My presence, and a cute pair of overalls.

"Jonah, you are so adorable!" one woman gushed, kissing me on the cheek with such passion I was scrubbing lipstick marks off my face for hours after. "And those overalls are just fabulous!"

And so I was passed along to at least a dozen women, each of whom bestowed a special gift on me -- a lollipop, a junior mint, a piece of bubble gum. One lady even had tootsie rolls in her pocketbook, which instantly made her my favorite person in the salon, my mother included. Even though I didn't reject their generous gifts, I didn't need candy to make that day any more special. After five years of being essentially invisible except when I'd bring home my report card, this dozen or so little old ladies gave me hope for the future. Maybe in my house I was the "smart" one, but to the rest of the world I was a great beauty. I had the lipstick-smeared cheeks to prove it.

Still, there was some truth to my mother's perspective. My sister was indeed quite pretty, which had been objectively confirmed by her winning second prize in a pre-teen modeling contest. The prize for semi-finalists consisted of a hair dryer, a short but potentially profitable shopping spree at the Limited, and the opportunity to participate in a runway show at the Massapequa mall.

Though I wasn't permitted to go with her on the shopping spree -- they didn't have little boy clothes, but I was curiously interested in the opportunity regardless -- I did attend the runway show. The whole event was so glamorous, I was certain my sister was headed for fame and fortune. While my parents and I sat in folding chairs in the mall foyer, I watched several adults prepare my sister for her big moment. One adult painted her nails; another combed her hair; another applied a gratuitous amount of blush to her cheeks, even by Long Island standards. Then they whisked her even further behind the glorious plastic screens that separated the beautiful from the ordinary. When I finally saw her again, she was dressed in an off-the-shoulder, lime green summer dress. The red light from the Radio Shack sign over her head gave her an exotic, sophisticated look, which, combined with her bare shoulders, outshone any of the professional models walking along side her. Instantly she went from being my sometime protector, sometime tormentor, to my hero. I clapped louder and longer for her than anyone else.

After the show, my parents looked prouder than I had ever seen them, even prouder than the day I spelled suppository.

"You looked beautiful," my mother gushed in a rare expression of praise. "Now, if we could just do something about that nose."

My father gave my sister a hug; not the half-assed, one pat on the back, type of hug he usually gave me, but a full bear hug. Years later he tearfully gave her the same hug when she left for college, shortly before he left for a new life, without giving me a hug, not even a half-assed one.

Later that night in my bedroom, I mimicked my sister's runway walk in my bedroom, figuring that I should practice for my eventual day in the sun -- after all, my sister and I both had the same cheekbones, the same doe eyes, and I didn't see much difference between our shoulders. Unfortunately, my mother caught me mid-swish, and charged into my room, half-enraged, half-disgusted.

"Boys don't need to be pretty," she proclaimed, yanking my hands from my hips. "You can have a pretty wife."

The next day she signed me up for peewee football. From then on, I spent half of my days faking various injuries and wondering exactly what my cup was supposed to protect, and the other half being subjected to a barrage of IQ tests to prove my supposed "advanced" intelligence. Apparently I did well on the tests, because when the results came back my mother was just as happy as she had been at my sister's runway show.

"See, you are gifted," she said, leaving me to wonder whether being "gifted" meant I would be wrapped in Christmas paper and given away to the neighbors with next year's fruitcakes. "Now stop picking your nose, smart boys don't pick their noses."

But she was wrong. Smart boys pick their noses. They pick their noses, and hide behind books, and are seldom heard, rarely seen, and never touched. Smart boys are kept at a distance, respected only in the shadows and only for what they can do for you. Fathers leave smart boys alone with their crazy mothers, to teach themselves how to shave and how to tie a tie and how to pick up the pieces. And mothers expect smart boys to fix the television set and become lawyers and save them from themselves.

The day at my mother's salon was a respite from unasked for intelligence tests and ill-fitting jock straps, however brief.

"Bring him back soon, Sharon!" one lady called after us as we left the salon. Oh, we'd be back soon, if I had any say in the matter, which of course I did not. The next month my mother found a cheaper establishment closer to our house, a barber shop whose clientele was curiously unimpressed by my overalls and winning smile. From that point on, whenever my mother would take me food shopping, I longed to escape from the shopping cart and run to the pet store, where I could pet the puppies, and the salon, where I could be the puppy, where I could be seen and heard and loved without being expected to give anything in return, except a smile.

But by the time I was old enough to choose my own hair salon, my puppy days were long gone. There were no "oohs" and "aahs" from the other customers today. Just the whirr of the cappuccino maker and the faint lisp of my stylist. It's quiet there, in the shadows, even after twenty-five years.

"And we're all done," Wayne declared proudly. I quickly removed the apron and stood up, avoiding all eye contact with myself, which was difficult given that I was in a hair salon with wall-to-wall mirrors. "Don't you want to look?" Wayne asked.

"No, thank you," I replied. "I trust you." But I didn't trust me, and the scissors were still within arm's length.

Wayne followed me to the register, pointing as we went at the entirely expensive and entirely unnecessary products lining the walls, each of which promised in no uncertain terms to replace my lost hair. Of course, I bought everything he showed me, regardless of its ridiculous purpose. That's what credit cards are for, after all. To replace hair, and cloud judgment.

As I walked out, a strikingly handsome man entered the salon. I didn't look directly at him at first, but I knew he was strikingly handsome. You just know when pretty people are there, even when you don't. I didn't want to give him the satisfaction of yet another salivating admirer, but my eyes wandered up towards his. Surprisingly, when I looked up at him, he was already looking at me.

"Don't I know you?" he asked, holding the door open for me. I doubted it. People like him didn't know me, even when they did. "You work upstairs, right?" He stuck his hand out, smiling. His teeth were bright white, and something told me they didn't come from something he had bought at CVS. His hair was well-coiffed, prompting me to wonder why exactly he was coming to the salon, unless he was there to be a hair model, or the salon was instituting a go-go boy night.

He held his gaze just a moment too long, thereby revealing his true intention. But it wasn't my intention.

"No, I don't," I lied, and pushed my way through the door without thanking him for holding it open. He didn't need my gratitude or my hand, or anything else that a balding attorney with three-year-old bags under his eyes could give him. His life had been full of handshakes and coy touches on his shoulder and bear hugs. His father had stayed, and his mother hadn't fallen apart, and he hadn't been shoved in lockers as a teenager or ignored at gay clubs as an adult. He didn't sleep alone every night with a teddy bear pressed against his back, just so he could feel some warmth under the covers. And most of all, he still had every hair on his head.

When I got back to my office, I took the plastic mirror out of my drawer and finally screwed up the courage to look at my reflection. I didn't instantly scream out in horror, which was a step up from the previous haircut. And I didn't race to the bathroom to examine each hair in minute detail, or decide to call in sick the next day while I shopped online for toupees. Perhaps I had found the right stylist. Or perhaps my hair was just as bad as it had always been, and my standards had lowered. Either way, I was satisfied enough not to march back to the salon and demand my tip back.

I took out my newly purchased hair products and began testing them. One particular hair spray made the grandiose claim that it could "turn the clock back" on the balding process, which I doubted, unless the spray was somehow linked to a flying Delorean. But I didn't entirely discount the possibility. Funny how anyone can fall for an empty promise, when it suits them.

Deciding to give the devil one last chance to buy my immortal soul, I closed my eyes and began spraying. Maybe, if I wished really hard, the spray would live up to its promise, and when I opened my eyes my hair would magically reappear. Maybe if I wished really hard, the bags under my eyes would disappear, my shoulders would broaden, and I would grow four inches. Maybe if I wished really hard, my father would have hugged me, and my mother wouldn't have fallen apart.

And maybe if I wished really really hard, I would have been the pretty one. It might cost me my soul, but no one ever said beauty was cheap.