As it turns out, I am a shockingly good hairdresser
We’ve silently agreed to push the past, at least the worst of it, out of the way, and over shared tandoori chicken and vegetable kurma we talk easily about our new lives. But after lunch, when I head to a discount drugstore for the scissors, Austin looks nervous.
“Are you sure about this?” he asks
I know how men are about their hair. No makeup, no fancy high-heels—it’s the only outlet they have for all that anxiety My father used an English styling cream that he could only buy at a high-end apothecary on Seventh Avenue. It came in a porcelain jar and smelled like witch hazel. One of the few times I saw him mad—not depressed but hotly pissed off—was when my mother forgot to pick a jar up for him before one of their big parties and he had to make do with Brylcreem 198
“Of course I’m sure,” I tell Austin. I walk into the drugstore and into the hardware aisle, acres of sharp silver files and clippers and scissors. Austin follows, silent as I pick out the Lovely Locks, take them to the cashier, and pay my $8.75. He still looks nervous Outside the store I stop and take his arm.
“Look,” I tell him. “You have to trust me. Today you don’t believe I can cut your hair, tomorrow you’ll think I’m … I’m … sleeping with the mailman.”
He laughs. “The mailman?”
“Whatever. The point is, if you don’t trust me now, you never will. This type of thing never gets better. It’ll only get worse.”
“So if I don’t let you cut my hair now, that’s it? We have no future?”
“Exactly.”
Austin rolls his eyes, but he hails a cab and tells the driver to take us up to Thirty-eighth and Ninth
Austin’s apartment is actually a loft, as big as any I’ve ever seen The front half is a studio, full of lights and cameras and colossal rolls of backdrop Separated by a clean white wall is the space where Austin lives In a bedroom he changes into a worn white T-shirt. He keeps his eyes closed while I’m cutting, and when I finally give him a mirror he breaks out into a big smile
“This is the best haircut I’ve ever had,” he says with amazement.
It is a great cut. Even, yet rounded on top, just a smidgen shorter on the sides, curving down to a subtle fade at the nape of the neck This does everything a good cut should—his eyes are bright, cheekbones high, the whole face is well-framed. No one else, I think, could make him so beautiful.
Afterward, we sit on opposite ends of the big black velvet sofa and smoke a joint.
“I can’t believe what I have to worry about now,” I tell Austin “Investments, taxes, what to do with the brownstone. I feel like some kind of dowager ”
“You’re only thirty,” says Austin, nudging me in the arm.
“Yeah, but I never thought I would be thirty. What are you now, thirty-three?”
“Yep ”
“You know, that’s the age Christ was when he died,” I tell him
“And it’s the age when Buddha reached enlightenment,” he answers “Thirty-three is supposed to be, like, the hardest year for men. You’re supposed to reach spiritual enlightenment Or at least try But, you know, it’s always something Soon I’ll be looking at forty—then I’ll really have to worry ”
“You know,” I say, sucking down the remains of the joint, “my cousin’s the president of MOFUG ”
Austin gives me a funny look. “Leopold?”
“Yeah, Leopold ”
He picks up a fat plastic bag of weed off the table “Who do you think I bought this from?”
“No way.”
“I can’t believe he’s your cousin He’s a great guy.”
“Yes,” I say “He is a great guy, isn’t he.”
“Yes,” says Austin. “That’s what I said.”