‘Name it.’
‘My hair. It is like a crazy wild man in the woods.’
It was true, his dark hair went everywhere; there was absolutely loads of it, straight and in his eyes.
‘Isn’t there a hairdresser in the village?’
‘There is. It is a lady . . . She is pupil.’
Marisa wondered if it was one of the ones who brought love songs but didn’t like to mention it.
‘And she has a lot of questions always for me.’ He looked pained.
‘I do not want to be rude but . . .’
She looked at him. ‘You don’t want me to do it.’
‘Just makink it straight at back. I cannot see it.’
‘I can’t cut hair!’
‘Will be fine.’
‘It won’t be!’
‘Marisa,’ he said. ‘You have no faith in yourself.’
‘I know that!’ she said despairingly. ‘That’s why I’m here.’
He looked at the sun, moving towards the sparkling sea.
‘Can’t I just give you cash?’ she pleaded.
His face took on a stubborn look.
‘No. Hair. Stay here.’
He went in and returned with a bowl of water, his own hair dampened down, and a pair of scissors.
‘These are kitchen scissors,’ she exclaimed.
Of course they had a pale blue handle.
‘They are not . . . used scissor. So. They are anythink scissor.’
He sat at the edge of his steps with his back to her so she could reach through the divider. Then he brandished the scissors and a comb behind him.
Marisa sighed. ‘If this is a disaster . . .’
‘Everythink can be disaster,’ said Alexei. ‘Still. We try.’
He leaned back his head on her side of the steps, and she felt the weight of it in her hands.
‘Don’t lean too far.’
‘Thank you. Don’t die for haircut. Is good advice.’
Marisa began to comb out the bushy head. He had his eyes closed, and she understood why: it was oddly personal this, to be so close to someone, especially when you had access to scissors. It had, she realised, been a long time since she had been in such close proximity to another human being, particularly a stranger.
That seemed so awful; to lose something as fundamental as touch.
She combed everything in a straight line, then did what she’d seen hairdressers do and held a line of it between her fingers, then snipped it off.
‘Hmm,’ said Alexei.
‘What’s the matter?’ said Marisa, panicked.
‘Well, now I think, perhaps my power is in hair.’
‘Like Samson?’
‘Yes. Perhaps if you cut hair, I not play any more.’
‘Great!’
He laughed ruefully, but there was no rancour between them now.
His hair was thick and long. Marisa made another straight line of her fingers, and snipped.
After the first shining dark locks fell to the ground – which did feel in fact, rather like a shame – it was much easier. She cut and shaped round the bottom of his head. There was a scent to him, feeling so intimate up close; like woodsmoke. It was pleasant, like whisky, a hint of the cigarillos; pencil sharpenings for some reason, and tobacco, and something a little sharper, like oranges. It was an old-fashioned smell.
He sat perfectly still under the bright blue sky, the only sound the snip snip snip as she tried to tidy everything up, and, if she was entirely honest with herself, not really wanting it to end. His face with his eyes shut was much more expressive and pleasing than when hunched in a permanent grimace.
She felt she should speak, but she was concentrating. Plus, if everyone in the village asked him too many questions, she didn’t want to add to the onslaught. And she didn’t want him to ask any questions back.
It was not unpleasant, feeling her hands on his head, in the sweet spring air.
‘You should cut your beard too,’ she said.
‘Now you are professional, I see.’
‘Ssh, don’t move.’
He obediently closed his mouth. High above, a pair of gulls circled lazily in the soft air, cooing to each other.
‘You do not ask questions.’
‘You said you don’t like it.’
‘Well, now is too quiet.’
She snipped gently.
‘I ask you. Why you never go out?’
‘I have . . .’
She had told Polly. She could talk about it.
‘It’s an illness. Called agoraphobia. I’m getting better though. I’m on the steps! I am talking to you!’
‘So you hide at end of world?’ he said, musing. ‘Well, I’m glad you do better.’
‘Why are you here?’ said Marisa in answer.
‘Oh,’ he sighed. ‘Is long story.’
‘You have a lot of hair.’
He smiled.
‘Don’t move.’
‘Well. Is not long story. Is old story. Beautiful woman. She not want me any more. “Go away, Alexei.” So. I go away. Very far.’
He sighed.
‘Very far.’
‘You’re done,’ she said, having finished the rest of the job in silence, wondering what on earth the woman was like, what had happened that had made his friends send him a bar to hide himself at the foot of a country he wasn’t even from. No wonder he didn’t want to get his hair cut in the village.
When he finally sprang up, shaking off the hair down below into the dirt of the unpaved road, he realised he didn’t have a mirror.
‘Well?’
Marisa smiled. She was quite proud of her handiwork. Now, his hair softly and lightly covered his head, one stray here or there but mostly just a gentle covering, with a longer quiff on front. He pulled his hand through it distractedly.
‘It’s lovely,’ she said, then bit her lip. ‘Well. I hope you like it.’
‘Perhaps I will not be frightenink all the children,’ he said.
‘I don’t think they’re frightened really,’ said Marisa. ‘You’re not that frightening a person. When you get to know you.’
There was an odd moment there as his face looked sad suddenly; his eyes far away.
‘Well. I am glad you are thinkink that.’
Chapter Twenty-seven
Anita was pleased, of course she was. But she had seen this before; the teacher-pleasers who rushed ahead with their books, who thought they were doing perfectly, and then hit a wall at the first setback. She hoped Marisa wouldn’t be like this but she couldn’t be sure.
After all, Marisa couldn’t live like this for ever, with a next-door neighbour with a bottomless drinks cabinet and a computer grandmother, Anita said, rather sternly.
Then she had paused and said, as World War Three appeared to be breaking out above her head briefly, that it did in fact actually sound rather nice and then she remembered herself and ordered Marisa to go for a walk up and down the street.
And Marisa was going to – when she could hear Alexei was safely ensconced with a student; when it was a lovely day, which it was, and she could go out and turn right, up towards the cliff edge, not back down towards the village, on the unmade road, so she wasn’t going to run into anyone and she could stay close to the centre of the road so it would be perfectly safe and she was not going to panic and if she did, she would only be two steps away from the house. So. She was not going to panic. If she thought she was going to have a panic attack she could head back to the house. She was going to do it. She was.