Zacchaeus got a haircut; his hair wasn’t very long, but it had grown like an unkempt lawn all over his head, neck and face. It grew patchy on his face and neck and made him look weathered, but the black facial hair against his brown skin made him brooding, older in a wise way. He always thought facial hair made him look dirty, like he lived on the streets and slept under starlight, and under better circumstances, he got a haircut and shave about once a week from the same barber who had cut his hair since high school.
The barbershop was walking distance from Mavis Turner’s house, and as he walked along the sidewalk in a hoodie with the hood on and bubble vest over it against the cold, the Needy expressed his frustration locating the mysterious land of the dead.
I know it’s in the northern hemisphere and it seems to be North America which is convenient for us, but I can’t quite pinpoint it. It could be in the vicinity of Charleston, SC or maybe the low country. It could be somewhere near Houston, TX or the gulf. I’ve sensed the spirits of the dead in those areas, more so than other places. Maybe you should consult a medium. Some of them can see and communicate with the spirits.
“Oh man,” Zacchaeus said aloud. “I can’t believe the Needy is admitting it don’t know something. I thought you been around forever and knew everything.”
This is a fairly new thing, Zacchaeus. The world is much more busy now than ever in its history, it’s much harder to keep track of everything going on everywhere.
“Don’t be so sensitive. But if I gotta track down Jordan by myself, then I don’t have to do anything for you.”
You want to go back to the Fonlands as much as I do. I was just giving you the excuse you need to see Coffey again.
“Oh it’s like that?” Zacchaeus said with a chuckle. “I wouldn’t mind getting away to that fairytale for a while. I wish Mavis Turner could’ve seen it. We wouldn’t have if not for her.”
Zacchaeus and the Needy were quiet as they arrived at the barbershop. It was a few hours before noon, and though there were three barbers in matching polo shirts with the shop logo on their chests behind chairs talking about whatever was showing on the TV hanging on a wall, there were no other customers. One was a short dark-skinned man who was only about a foot taller than his chair. In the middle was a tall woman who leaned back against the wall behind her chair; she wore a durag underneath a hat and if Zaccheus didn’t already know her, he might have mistaken her for a man. The last barber was the oldest with salt and pepper hair and big glasses that always seemed to sit on the tip of his nose, even when he was cutting hair.
“Look who it is!” Otis, the oldest barber, said jovially when Zaccheus walked in.
“Looking like a nappy fox,” Tyrone, the shortest barber, said.
“Like a fucking coon,” Fel, the tallest barber, said. “You can’t be our customer walking around looking like a extra from the Color Purple.”
“Like Danny Glover after everybody left him,” Tyrone said. “You got goats roaming around your house, Z?”
“Y’all leave Zacchaeus alone,” Otis said over the laughs of his coworkers. “He obviously been grieving his grandmama, that’s why he looking like a werewolf in the middle of transforming. Come on over here, Zacchaeus.” Otis waved a hand over to his chair and slapped the back.
“Y’all think y’all funny,” Zacchaeus said, rubbing the stubble on his chin. “That’s why I don’t let y’all cut me. Y’all ain’t getting my tips with all that disrespect.” He sat in an empty chair along the wall opposite the front entrance where customers normally waited.
“You know we love Mavis Turner in here,” Fel said as she walked around to sit in her chair. “We was just trying to make you laugh. It ain’t easy to lose your grandmama and I know y’all was close.”
“We heard you made out like a bandit, though,” Tyrone said. “Your uncle was in here cursing yo name the other day like you forged Mavis Turner will. We shut him up in here cause we know better, but you might wanna have a talk with him.”
“Money make people crazy,” Otis said thoughtfully. “I knew Mavis was doing good for herself, and that should be good for the family, but all it really do is make people jealous. Good luck with that, Zacchaeus. I hope you dealing with it all ok.”
“Judging from them Jim Crow era naps in his head, it’s probably been tough,” Tyrone said.
“It ain’t that bad,” Zacchaeus said and scratched at the hair at the back of his head.
“Bruh,” Fel said with her eyebrows high on her forehead and eyes wide. “I ain’t never seen you like this. But, we get it. Macklemore won’t be in til late afternoon, though, he cleaning and closing tonight.”
“He wish he was Macklemore,” Tyrone said and he sat in his chair after Otis sat next to Fel. “People hate on that white boy, but I think he the best white rapper.”
“Man, shut up,” Fel said aggressively. “He ain’t got nothing on Eminem.”
“Just cause he rap fast don’t mean he good. What the hell he be talking bout?”
“What do any of them rappers be talking about?” Otis asked genuinely. “Ain’t it always the same thing? They all Vanilla Ice to me.”
“Don’t do em like that, Otis,” Zacchaeus said.
“Foul,” Fel said then turned her attention to Zacchaeus.“You gone wait for Wesley or you want one of us to cut you so you don’t have to worry about them fugitive slave hunters asking for your papers.”
“Give him his free!” Tyrone said with his hands up to the heavens.
Zacchaeus thought about Coffey as laughter filled the shop, and even though he was having a good time, he thought about when he’d first met her in the swamp on that other Earth where she had just escaped slavery and the hell that came along with it. He wondered if all the jokes were insensitive, but he didn’t let it weigh down his mood.
Suddenly, a white man in the barbershop collared-uniform and baggy pants burst through the front door. It was Zacchaeus’s barber, Wesley, and he looked like someone had chased him inside the shop. He was winded and looking through the glass front door.
“Wesley who you running from?” Tyrone asked.
Wesley turned away from the door and acknowledged everyone inside. He wasn’t the shortest or the tallest of the barbers, but he was the only white barber, and the majority owner of the shop since the original owner died. All four of the barbers were part owners by that point, but Wesley was able to secure the loan to buy the business from the previous owner’s son to keep the shop in the community and his friends employed. Everyone was grateful for Wesley and the barbers all bonded like family. Zacchaeus enjoyed being there even when he didn’t need a haircut, and he realized after being away from it for a couple months just how much the shop meant to him. He’d known Wesley since high school, and even though he was a white boy, he grew up close enough to Zacchaeus’ community that he learned how to navigate the world from black people. He dressed like Fel and faded his white boy hair like Tyrone. It never felt disingenuous, Wesley was just being who he was and everyone who knew him, knew he was a good guy. And he could cut hair, which Zacchaeus appreciated.
As he watched Wesley calming himself at the door of the shop, Zacchaeus was especially glad to be there. He had lost his grandmama and his weed man, he didn’t want to lose his barber to whatever had Wesley so upset.
“What’s up with you?” Zacchaeus asked Wesley.
He seemed to relax when he looked at Zacchaeus and he crossed the barbershop to sit next to him.
“Can you believe my daughter already thirteen?” Wesley asked Zacchaeus.
“You had her when you was thirteen, didn’t you?” Zacchaeus asked, though he was exaggerating a little. Wesley had just turned sixteen when his daughter was born.
“Babies having babies,” Tyrone said, shaking his head slowly as the other barbers chimed their agreement like a chorus.
“Kids grow up fucking fast, man,” Wesley continued. “I thought we had to grow up fast, but we didn’t have the internet and shit like that to deal with. It’s hard to be a good parent these days. I thought I was doing good too. Me and Daisy spend time together, I go her dance things and singing stuff. I’m there for my daughter. But she got a whole life I don’t know about, and that’s cool, I want her to be her own person, but I don’t want her to be in over her head. ”
Zacchaeus, the Needy said inside of his mind and he mostly nodded to pretend to listen to Wesley while the Needy spoke to him, this man is a medium. I’ve been paying closer attention to the humans we interact with, and this man has a slightly different energy than others. It’s a very miniscule variance, but it is the same as other mediums I have encountered. I can see images of his consciousness and he hides his abilities for fear that you and his other friends will mock him. But his experiences are genuine. His daughter is the victim of an elaborate scheme perpetrated by a much older boy who is a thrall of a ghost seeking revenge on Wesley. He is not aware of the role of the ghost, though.
That’s convenient, Zacchaeus thought.
“This boy is eighteen years old!” Wesley was saying. “Why would he even be interested in a thirteen year old? That’s creepy as fuck! I hate to step in cause she making a lot of money flipping merch on eBay, and apparently this dude helped her set it all up, but he can’t be around my daughter.”
“You did something to that boy, didn’t you?” Fel asked. “That’s why you looking over your shoulder? You think he coming by here?”
“Nah,” Wesley shook his head, “it’s not like that. I just saw this dude for the first time and he don’t look nothing like I thought he would. The dude is a fucking creature, ugly as sin, haunt your nightmares ugly. He got me paranoid, like if ugly muthafuckas like him exist, then hell is real and I gotta look out for demons. Just seeing him gave me the fucking creeps. The worst thing, my daughter don’t see it. Nobody seem to. He got all these young girls falling all over him on social media. It’s fucking bizarre y’all.”
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