I got another pair of clippers I usually use, these here are pretty rusty, which is why I was sitting in her with the drapes pulled when you started yer knockin. You can see for yourself this is pretty much the outskirts and there ain’t no real great place to get your scissors sharpened, got to do it yourself. So that was the task I had set for myself, befoe you came a knockin.
Holy moley, was that your ear, no, oh good I scared myself for a jiffy there.
You’re not from these parts, are ya? No, but I thought maybe I recognized you, just that you’d gone a bit shaggy. Not that it looks bad on you, but we’ll fix you up, prettify you good.
Things around here just have not been the same since Jim took the shotgun and killed his wife, three daughters, the neighbors, people down the street, all his coworkers and their families, police and firefighters, twenty national guard, my helper who come over on Sundays, and himself.
No siree. Place feels like a ghost town these days, the reporters come in, they dig around in all our lives, wantin to look in my cellar, then they leave and everyone feels right broke inside.
Weren’t like that, see. I bet they was more dancin done in Peoria than in any town its size outside Chicago before Jim gone done that thing.
Oh no, oh Jimminy Cricket.
Oh heck I thought that was blood for a second. You’re fine, not to worry son.
Not that Jim was a bad guy, just worked a screw loose somehow I would say. He always used to come in here get gussied up for the big holidays, but back then they was a line of men out around the corner, but they always let big Jim skip to the front of the line, and whoever was asat there in the chair would skedaddle without a word. Lots of fine curly head of hair back then, important men with important hairdos. You would not know it now.
Ouch, is this your blood or. No no no, it’s mine.