All these months of trying to get a decent cut, and I still can’t tell if I visit the barber once or twice every month.
“Chairman,” he’s smiling at me as I enter and I know it’s not because I have a special head. Gbenga’s the go-to guy. Every time. Like most men, I tend to be monogamist when choosing my barbers. Maybe I hop around once or twice a year, but I always pitch my tent in one salon.
I know all the routines. Sit on the swivel chair and sink into the leather. Wait till he wraps that white strip around your neck. Wait till he wraps that cape around your body, then folds back the white strip so none of your hair goes below your neck or into your clothes.
The waiting is over. I’m bound.
That buzz. That clipper buzz.
“Just a little lower,” I say, like I say every time. Your hair doesn’t recover from clipper damage for about two weeks.
Even though the mirror’s calling it my right, I know he’s taking the left part of my hair first.
Back to front. Back to front. Back to front. Enough pain that you can feel something, but not enough to make you wince. Or maybe my threshold is just higher.
Everything that happens at the barber’s happens in the reflection. Parents bringing their sons. Women going to the spa upstairs. Barbers cracking jokes. A TV as fodder for banter.
MTV Base is on. Ehis is hosting a show called Celeb Living.
“You’d have to sell a lot of plantains to get a house like this,” he says.
In the show, Timaya comes out to meet Ehis and says “wow Ehis long time no see, where have you been,” like he wasn’t just prepped to say “wow Ehis long time no see, where have you been.”
They step into the mansion, and all the barbers as if choreographed, stop barbing at once. Timaya’s house is massive.
“How many rooms are here,” Ehis asks.
“I dunno,” Timaya laughs, “I’m not the Real Estate Agent. Don’t worry, you can do the counting while I show you around.”
The first barber to speak is my barber.
“Omo, these guys dey live life. See house.”
All of my hair is levelled now, a little lower than I wanted, but not low enough to piss me off.
He dabs the part of his palm below his thumb in powder, dabs the clipper on his powdered palm. Carving time.
The clipper leaves a white line everywhere it touches now. Along the hairline above my forehead. Along my side-beard. Along the beard beside my mouth. Along my moustache.
That’s when I see it. If he cuts along the white line on my face with a blade, and lays out that meat on a table, it’d look almost like the Wu-Tang Clan’s logo.
He pauses for a moment, looks at my face, or hair in the reflection. Whichever. Dives into a drawer, and out comes a Razor blade. New and shiny. He grabs a comb too.
But there’s no face to cut for him, at this time. Only hair. In combing motion, he trims my hair, smoothening it out. I watch his hand closely, a small worry in the corner of my mind, that the comb might slip and the razor will comb out a fine piece of my scalp.
He drops the blade.
Ehis and Timaya get into his children’s room as he picks up the Clipper.
“How’s he the only one in this big house,” one barber says.
“They’re inside the house,” Gbenga replies, “He’s not showing his children so that they won’t get kidnapped.”
I try to read this piece on wealth and pop culture to distract myself. It works for only a few lines.
He adjusts the headrest and I know he wants me to lean back. Time to take the chin.
The clipper touches my neck just as I begin to wonder in what mood he really is in today, beneath all the laughter. What if he digs these clippers into my flesh, gunning for blood?
The blades retreat. My head is raised again.
A hot towel presses against my head and for a moment, there’s no thought of a blade cutting my throat or scalp, or my face getting skinned. Just this warm towel on my head.
Then the hair cream follows with that light sting that tells me there’s sulphur in it. I want to tell him to stop, because I’m still going to end up taking a shower, but keep going Gbenga. Spoil me. Make me feel good.
The spray follows, and my head is shining. For a moment, I make a mental note to buy that spray, and shut it down the next moment.
He’s dusting down the cape as I hand him the price for the part-torturous, part-relieving hour.
He knows I won’t ask for change, so he smiles that smile he smiled when I first walked in again, just as I head for the door.
