HairSnip.com

I began to get a sinking feeling in my stomach as I rounded the corner that November Sunday evening in my high school senior year. Even so, my steps did not slow as I aimed myself toward a house on the right that I knew quite well: Rhiannon’s house. The night was a bit chilly, but my varsity sweater provided enough warmth for me during my short walk. The cool air felt good as it chilled the skin above my taut knee socks and crept slowly up under the pleated skirt of my cheer uniform toward my thighs. 

Rhiannon and I had been friends since first grade. We were in class together almost every year in grade school. Those years that we were not we were still inseparable on the playground. And in junior high school, when recess was a thing of the past, we were together almost every day after school and on weekends. 

Rhi and Ri. Rhiannon and Rita. 

But as our freshman year of high school rushed by a cloud suddenly descended on us. Enrollment in the district had been slowly and steadily increasing each year for the past decade and the bond issue to fund a new high school had passed three years previous. That shining new edifice, its bathroom stalls still free of graffiti and all its light bulbs presumably working, would be ready for its first classes the following fall.

Rhiannon and I hadn’t thought this would affect us. We lived only two blocks from each other. Just take a right out my front door and walk a block to where my neighborhood ends at county highway 117, a two-lane, increasingly busier thoroughfare. Cross the highway, walk one block, make a left and Rhiannon’s house is the second on the right. 

What separated us was the decision by the local school board to use county highway 117 as the boundary between the two high schools’ service areas. Shocked and disappointed, we learned that I would spend my last three years at our current high school while Rhiannon would attend the new school. 

Sure, we stayed in touch and got together when we could. But with academics and clubs and sports and other activities we slowly, and I suppose inevitably, receded from each other, our relationship becoming increasingly tenuous. 

One girlish enthusiasm we shared from our first meeting in childhood was what we then considered the swanky, to-die-for excitement and thrill of being a cheerleader. We both wanted to be one someday, and many of our play encounters found us jumping in the air trying to see how high we could fly and how wide we could spread our legs while shaking imaginary pom-poms. 

That last year that we were together in school, freshman year, the first thing Rhi and I did was audition for spots on the cheerleading squad, vowing not to participate if the other didn’t make the team. Well, for reasons no one ever had the time, inclination, or obligation to explain to me I was selected and Rhiannon was not. 

Talk about a dark cloud. My heart broke for her. My promise to Rhi pressed on me like the weight of the world. How could I not honor my agreement with Rhi? But how could I pass up the chance to pursue the dream and goal I had entertained since my knees were covered with scabs? Finally I sat down with Rhi and told her how much I wanted to cheer. Could she ever forgive me if I went ahead and accepted the spot on the squad?<br><br><br> 

As I walked along the dark sidewalk in front of the house next to Rhi’s I could still hear her voice clearly in my mind, and imagined I could hear it in my ears. 

“Sure, Rita," I heard her voice say. “Sure go ahead. I wouldn’t want you to miss out on your dream." I could hear her heavy emphasis on the words ‘you’ and ‘your.’ Now, twenty years later, I would know exactly a girl’s feelings hearing that sentence spoken in that way. But then I was far too immature to understand her meaning. Instead I heard only the surface words, the sweet parole that set me free. All else was dismissed unnoticed in the swelling of sheer joy her permission had unleashed in me. 

The rest of the year went by, but even I began to notice by February how distant Rhi had become toward me. When I asked her what was the matter she would smile and tell me, ‘Nothing, Rita. Nothing at all.’ 

I don’t know that my soul really accepted that evaluation, but in that chilly, third academic quarter portion of the academic year any association with our broken cheerleading deal in September had receded too far into the past for me to link it to whatever might be bothering her. I was a cheerleader, she was not, and those two facts had now become just a part of our lives and our experiences at school.<br><br><br> 

My sinking feeling came from all the cars parked in front of Rhiannon’s house and farther down the street. I had never seen so many near her house. I suspected the reason for their presence, and that suspicion sparked a knot of trepidation in my gut. We had said friends could be invited, but I never imagined any crowd like all these cars seemed to forebode. 

I had timed my departure from home to arrive at Rhi’s front door at exactly the appointed hour: eight in the evening. From all those years of experience I knew well by now exactly how long it took for me to walk from my house to Rhi’s. At right on the dot I was ringing her doorbell, after having mounted the two steps from the sidewalk to the Paulson’s walk, and then the three steps up to the small porch at their front door. I rang the bell and waited, the sight of those numerous cars again tickling at my apprehension nerve.<br><br><br> 

While I waited a moment for the door to open a recent memory came to mind, and in spite of the unease that I was feeling since turning the corner. The memory made me smile. It was just a couple weeks ago, a week or two into November. I was in the convenience store and suddenly there she was two aisles over. I’d not seen Rhi for months, not since the summer in fact. But it was good to see her and I immediately made my way in her direction. 

I came at her from the side and slightly from the back, she examining the choices displayed on the magazine rack. I gave a hank of her shoulder blade length raven hair a little tug. She looked up, a smile starting on her face. When her eyes met mine the smile faded and she said, “Oh, hi, Rita." 

Her demeanor left no doubt she wasn’t excited to see me. I guessed that we really had taken different forks in the road after freshman year, and that we were now far down sundered and increasingly divergent paths. I tried to make some small talk, tried to engage her in a conversation about how our respective senior years were going. But no dice. 

She answered my questions monosyllabically or with as few words as would suffice, her body still mostly turned toward the Newsweeks, Times, Guns & Ammos, and Seventeens. She asked a couple questions of her own, but I could tell her heart was not in it. 

I made a last stab before withdrawing. I knew that after that disastrous, strained freshmen year she had hit her new school and immediately had made the cheer squad. ‘Mission accomplished,’ I had thought when I’d heard the news. She was off on her own adventure, her own childhood wish fulfillment quest. I had sincerely hoped it would be good for her. 

“So, still with the cheer squad?" I asked. 

“Um, yeah," she said, her eyes avoiding mine. I didn’t really have to ask: her varsity jacket told me the tale. I was not wearing mine that day. 

“I made co-captain this year," I said, trying to make the statement matter of fact, not wanting to seem like I was rubbing my success in her face in case her own experience had not taken her to such lofty heights. 

“Wow, good for you," she said, real enthusiasm in her voice for the first time. She turned more toward me displaying the front of her jacket: the varsity letter, the words ‘Cheerleader’ and ‘Co-captain’ in wooly script. “Me too. I’m co-captain this year too." 

I leaned into her for a hug saying, “I’m so happy for you, Rhi." I was glad to see she hesitated only an instant before returning the embrace, although not as tightly as I would have liked. 

We pulled back and looked in each other’s eyes. “All those years ago," I said, giving my head a sentimental shake. 

The veil seemed to drop back over her face and her eyes became clouded and then dropped. “Yeah, all those years ago," she said with a little forced enthusiasm. 

I really couldn’t think of anything else to say, and couldn’t bear to torture her any longer if this really was the chore for her it seemed to be. 

“Well," I said. I wasn’t sure how to withdraw. “See you," I offered. Lame. 

“Yeah, see you," Rhi returned in a rote fashion. 

I paid for my purchases and exited the store. I beeped the car open, put my two bags in the back, and was standing next to my car, my back to the store, fumbling a bit to isolate the ignition key before I climbed in. 

Suddenly arms were around my shoulders squeezing me in an embrace, and Rhiannon’s head and hair were tight against mine. I knew her scent and breathed it in, relished it. 

“Hey girlfriend," she said, real sparkle in her voice. “I guess I was a little distracted in there. Sorry." 

“It’s ok," I offered. “We all have those days," I said, turning and cupping her cheek with the palm of my hand. “Rhi it was really good to see you. Remember all those days we spent all afternoon playing cheerleaders? Well, I guess we’ve both arrived." 

Her mood seemed to darken again for a moment, but she brightened right back up. “Both made co-captain,"  she said. “One to cross off the ol’ bucket list." 

I laughed at her joke, glad to see her in a good mood. 

She got serious for a moment. “Hey, we need to get together," she said. “Our birthdays were a couple weeks ago." 

“Ta-da!" I enthused. “Eighteen at last!" We had been born three days apart, her on October 30^th and me on November 2^nd. 

“Well, we need to celebrate," Rhiannon said. And we were soon into planning our night out. I felt on top of the world. 

I was never much into drinking and I was glad to discover Rhi had not gotten into it either. We ended up going out that Saturday evening. Of course we were not old enough to enter any licensed establishment, and not being too interested in alcohol abuse neither of us had the needed fake ID. But we hung out, went here and there, drove around laughing, and we ended up back at my house. 

I opened a bottle of wine, snatched from the pantry, and we toasted our birthdays while watching a movie in my room. Our low alcohol tolerance was clearly evident: both of us got a little snockered by sharing a bottle of wine. 

“You know what we need to do?" Rhiannon asked me at the conclusion of the movie. 

“What, Girlfriend?" I asked in return. 

“We’ve got to do something wild. No, no. Something outrageous," Rhi said. 

“I’m listening," I said. 

She thought for a few moments, but I got the sense she knew where she was going. That was fine with me since I had no clue where to take this. I just knew I wanted Rhi and Ri to be together again. The Dynamic Duo. 

“Ok," Rhi said, and her face colored. “Remember seventh and eighth grade?" she asked, her voice lowering. 

“Sure. What about it?" I asked. 

“Remember how we used to play strip poker?" she asked. 

Now my face took on the same reddish color Rhiannon’s was exhibiting. We had been twelve and thirteen in those two grades. Both of us had been starting to sense insistent feelings from ‘down there’: the promise and potential for enormous pleasure, curiosity and an unfocused longing filling our minds. We shared the news of the tickle we both felt in our stomachs: not just the curiosity of seeing another person naked, but the thrill of having to strip for another. 

We had always used the word ‘strip’, rather than a synonym like ‘disrobe’ or ‘unveil’ or ‘undress.’ Although not invariably. Sometimes we would a play a game in which no clothes came off until the end of the game and the loser was obliged to strip from scratch. On those occasions if I were the loser Rhi would take particular delight in loudly ordering: “Ok, Rita, you lost. Peal!" 

It didn’t matter yet at that age that our eyes would take in the nude body of someone of our own sex, or that our revealing of our own nudity would be just to the eyes of another girl. We just knew that we wanted to experience that thrill. The prospect and anticipation of that thrill was mixed up somehow with those blurry waves of desire we were both experiencing. 

So for the last couple months of seventh grade, through the ensuing summer, and into eighth grade we dealt the cards on a regular basis whenever we had her house or my house to ourselves for an hour or two. 

The thrill had been everything my adolescent, just barely pubescent brain had hoped for. My stomach roiled with anticipation every time, both and either over the prospect of our game ending with me nude and blushing or me giggling in triumph as Rhi was obligated to model her birthday suit. 

And the night after every one of those games my hand was in my panties under the covers as that potential for pleasure I had sensed became a powerful and mind-numbing reality. 

“Oh, do I ever remember," I said smiling. “These little fingers never got such a workout as they did at night after those games." I wiggled the fore and middle fingers of both my hands at her. 

She laughed. “I know exactly what you mean," she said. 

“So, should I find a deck of cards?" I asked. 

“No," she said. “No, something else just came to mind." But again I got that sense that whatever she was leading to had come to mind before this minute. “Not a card game," she seemed to muse. “Mmmmm. How about a bet?" she asked. 

“Well, on what?" I asked in return. 

“The homecoming game is coming up this Thursday," she offered. 

“Thanksgiving Day," I said. 

This would be the third year the other high school, Rhi’s school, would be open. And the tradition of a Thanksgiving Day, season-ending matchup between her school, West, and my school, East, had started the first year. Each school had won one of the first two gridiron meetings. 

“Ok," I said. “Fine by me. But what are we betting?" 

She leaned in toward me and began to explain her idea. It took a little convincing but not too much to get me on board. I was just a little shocked at her proposal, but I could also see the outrageous and essentially harmless mischief in it. And that insistent little tickly thrill in my stomach and from below, the thrill of the risk I’d be taking, was a strong argument in favor.  What finally won me over was the thought of sharing this experience with Rhi: how close I would feel to her (and I hoped her to me) as the suspense of our bet built over the next four day, when we got together to have the loser pay off, and when we then (in my imagining of the event) retired to her room or mine, depending on who had won the bet, giggling over our outlandish wager and its consequence for the loser. 

And in my hastily concocted little fantasy that would be the reincarnation of Rhi and Ri. 

Chapter Two 

The front door opened, and I jumped a little. I had been that lost in my recollection. 

“Well, Rita," Rhi’s mother said, “right on time. Please do come in," she added as she stood back to allow me entrance.  I knew Mrs. Paulson very well and, in spite of not having been in her presence for a long while, could tell that something seemed not quite right about her demeanor. I could hear, was it condescension in her voice? Did I detect an almost mocking tone I had never heard from her before? Ridiculous. I dismissed my feeling as just the product of interacting with someone I had not talked with in over a year. 

I was stepping through Rhi’s front door now, rather than vice versa, because the scarlet and blue of my school, East, had gone down to defeat three days previous on Thanksgiving at the hands of the gold and white of Rhi’s school, West. The score had been 32 to 27. It meant West had won the intra-district bragging rights for the next year.  And it meant our bet had been resolved: I was stepping into Rhi’s house now to pay off my lost bet to her, rather than the other way around. 

I supposed Rhi might enjoy this. Certainly she would enjoy the experience more than she would have had West gone down to turkey day defeat; certainly more than I was about to enjoy the result of our bet. But was I getting the impression right that her mother was going to enjoy this every bit as much as Rhi? 

With nothing else to do I stepped through the doorway feeling as if I were shrinking by the second. 

Again that possibly derisive tone of voice as Mrs. Paulson said, “You know where the rec room is, don’t you, Dear?" 

“Yes I do," I said, the first words I had spoken since arriving. Mrs. Paulson smiled sweetly (and sarcastically?) at me and held out her hand in the right direction. I made my way through the kitchen to stairs at one end of the house leading downward. The Paulson’s had finished the entire basement some years ago as a recreation room and entertainment center. 

Immediately on opening the door I could hear a substantial babble, and as I descended the stairs the magnitude of my audience was revealed to me. The room was not exactly packed, but it was filled with many dozens of kids, seemingly about equally divided between boys and girls. At least I knew now that I had been right about the meaning of all the cars parked along Rhiannon’s street. Some kids I knew from Rhi’s side of the county highway: kids who had gone off to the new high school with her three years previous.  But many I had never seen before. Many of the kids, probably most, were certainly seniors like Rhiannon and me. But others seemed younger, some even appearing, as freshmen and even sophomores sometime can,  to be of junior high age. 

As I descended the stairs all this came into my view and I also came into the view of Rhiannon, standing at the far end of the room laughing and talking with a girl I’d never seen before. Rhi’s eyes settled on me and she smiled broadly and in the same sarcastic way I thought her mother had. What had I gotten myself into? 

“Well, well," Rhi said in a loud voice to be heard above the gathered spectators, “it seems the guest of honor has arrived." This announcement was met with deafening cheers and whistles, and with every kid turning his or her head to catch their first sight of the loser of the bet, of the victim. 

I didn’t stop or even pause, just continued my progress to the bottom of the stairs and then began to slither my way through the assembled throng toward the other end of the room and Rhiannon. Midway through the room my progress was interrupted. Two girls I had to move between stopped me, grabbing my arms on either side. With their loose hands they pulled my top slightly down and outward to flatten out the front. 

My boobs pushed against the fabric of my varsity letter sweater with the big E on it. There was really no avoiding those two mounds beneath my top since the E on my sweater could refer with equal validity  either to East high school or my bra cup size. One of the girls read the writing on the front of my sweater. “East High School. Varsity Cheerleader. Co-Captain." She paused for just a beat then added, “Impressive!" 

The other girl said in an overly loud voice, speaking to me but wanting to be generally heard, “Dumb move, betting against us, Bitch. I’ve really been looking forward to watching this." I just kept my head down, my cheeks and ears taking on a bit of mortified heat, and kept my mouth shut. I couldn’t imagine any words that would be of any help, and I was a little surprised and alarmed by the vitriol with which the girl had spoken those words. 

They let go of my arms, one giving me a little push on my way, the other flipping my skirt up in back, both of them laughing. 

As I reached the front of the long room I saw the rest of Rhiannon’s cheerleading crewmates standing with her in uniform. Rhi’s uniform sweater boasted a large W for West high school and contained the same information about her status as co-captain of her squad. The only essential difference between our respective sweaters was the scarlet on blue of mine and the white on gold of hers. I also noticed against the wall to my far right Rhi’s dad and her 16 year old brother and 15, 13, and 12 year old sisters. She had invited her family too? 

Just before I stepped out into the small clear space at the front of the room a leg shot out and I fell forward. The action was so unexpected that I almost didn’t get my arms out in front of me to break my fall. I lay there for a brief moment, but should have gotten up immediately. I felt my skirt lifted in back as a hand grasped the back of my uniform panties and the thong underneath and pulled me up by them. The fabric wedged into my ass crack and vulva and I quickly used my hands and knees to scramble to my feet. 

The hand was still grasping the back of my underwear when another hand grabbed the back of my hair and roughly pulled my head back and my face up. Whether the two hands were attached to the same person I didn’t know. A mouth close to my ear said with a female voice, “Good lookin’ butt honey. I thought I’d grab a handful of this while I still could." She gave my head a painful, hard shake by the handful of hair she was tightly grasping. 

I took a deep breath in response to the pain from my scalp, but the discomfort was immediately gone as she pushed me toward Rhiannon, leaving just a throb. 

As I took the last few steps toward Rhi she smiled widely and wickedly. “Your throne awaits, Your Worship," she said. 

Just to one side of Rhi was an ordinary wooden dining chair without arms. With no choice but to obey I stepped in front of the chair, turned, and resigned, settled my bottom onto it, smoothing my uniform skirt underneath. 

Unknown to me four members of Rhi’s cheer squad had approached, two from either side. Without warning I felt my wrists grasped and held tight against the outer back of the chair near my hips. Simultaneously my ankles were grabbed and held as tightly against the bottom of the front chair legs. Other members had then come up from behind and my ankles and wrists were quickly secured with rope in their positions, inescapably tight. 

I was so shocked that it could not think to form words. Meanwhile more lengths of rope were looped around my limbs to secure my arms above the elbows to the chair back and my legs below my knees to the upper chair legs. And ropes immediately circled my waist and my chest just above and below my breasts, and were pulled tight and tied off. The sum of all this activity was that in seconds I was left utterly immobile except for my head and neck. I could not even move my shoulders to any significant degree. 

Finally words came to my lips and I stammered out, “Rhi! What the? You don’t have to do this. You know I’ll pay off my bet!" 

As I said these words Rhiannon came around to my front and put her face at the level of mine. “Rita,"  she said, “just shut the fuck up." With that her hands came up. She applied a piece of duct tape across my mouth that stretched from one corner of my jaw to the other. She completed the action by pressing it tight. 

My eyes, I knew, were wide with panic at this unexpected turn, and Rhi looked over my stricken expression and laughed. She slapped at my cheek on one side with the palm of one hand several times, not too hard, but plenty hard enough to produce a sting. “I’m going to enjoy this so, so much Rita," Rhiannon said, her voice now dripping with the condescension and distain, the mocking and scorn I had thought I’d only imagined in her mother’s voice just minutes previous. 

You see it in movies all the time. The victim is tied and gagged and yet still goes through the absurd and futile labor of trying to form intelligible words. I would laugh and shake my head every time I saw a character do that. But that was exactly what I was doing now. Only the loud laughter and pointing fingers of those immediately in front of me made me catch myself, will myself to stop looking more ridiculous than I already did, and settle down to await however the payoff of my lost bet would play out. It was my only option. 

Rhiannon was now behind me. 

“Are you ready for the main event?" Rhiannon asked the crowd in a loud voice. There was not a dissenter in the room, and they all gleefully shouted back their eager agreement. I looked toward Rhi’s father and brother and sisters, now to my left, and found them shouting for the show to begin as enthusiastically as all the others. 

“Down here is the challenger: Rita Selwyn!" Rhiannon announced in a loud voice. “And up here," she continued, “is the all-time heavyweight champion: electric clippers!" 

The room exploded in laughter. At Rhiannon’s last word a deep and ominous vibrating buzz began, my audience quieting in anticipation. Although I had expected the sound I still stiffened in response. Then the sound and vibrating sensation were at my hairline somewhat left of center. 

I felt and heard the buzz and vibration deepen as the blades began to cut through my thick hair. The sensation slowly proceeded to the back of the top of my head and then was lifted away. Something floated downward before my face. I looked down to see an extraordinarily large length of my mid-back length hair sitting in the lap of my uniform skirt. 

I began to shake my head in despair. I, of course, had known that this would be the result of losing my bet to Rhiannon. I knew the beautiful long hair I was so proud of, that I shook with abandon and pride before the packed stands and cheering fans at every football game, was to come off. But this was not remotely how I had expected my debt to be collected: tied immovably tight to a chair, gagged, the object of leering and jeering entertainment for a large roomful of taunting and heckling onlookers. 

Immediately the buzzing clippers were at my hairline again, this time dead center, and they made the same deliberate passage across my scalp. A moment later another large hank of hair dropped into my lap. My vision blurred with tears as I looked down at the gorgeous blonde locks of which I was so proud. 

The clippers were again making a pass across my head, now right of center. They moved slowly, occasionally backtracking. I knew Rhi was slowly, deliberating shearing off these channels of hair as close to my scalp as the clippers would allow. That pass ended and more hair fell into my lap as I fought to control my tears, to keep them in my eyes. 

Rhiannon made a dozen or more additional swipes, taking in portions of my scalp farther to either side, and re-clipping already covered areas. After a swipe into a virgin area another large clump of long hair would add to the already amazingly large pile in my lap. 

Without any warning one of Rhiannon’s teammates was moving in front of me with a mirror that must have been secreted to one side of the room, or which I simply hadn’t noticed. It was a framed wall mirror I had often seen in a hallway upstairs, perhaps a foot and a half wide and four feet long. The girl positioned it several feet in front of me, and held it tilted back slightly with the long dimension vertical, and I could not keep my eyes from the glass, as morbid as that sounds. 

I saw myself sitting perfect-posture straight in that chair, back arched, held in that impeccable bearing by tightly secured coils of rope. My cheer  uniform was neat as a pin, flawless except for where the sweater was bunched and pressed by the ropes. Those tight bindings immediately above and below my boobs made them jut out lewdly, and I flushed in shame. The rest of the image was as much a shock: a large tangle of blonde hair in my lap. The sight of my head caused in me a jolt of misery and adrenaline. The top of my head was cut down to tiny stubble, while the rest of my long locks radiated down from the stark clearing atop my head. I looked, to be bluntly and brutally honest, like a clown: exactly like a clown with a smooth, tonsured head top surrounded by a fringe of orange or red hair, sticking straight out. 

But my bald patch was surrounded by long blonde locks, reaching down in back and spilling over my shoulders on the sides. Then my tears and uncontrollable sobs came hot and wet, spilling down my cheeks. I hated myself for a moment for losing control like that because the entire assembly roared their amusement and mocking at my burbling misery. But I couldn’t help it. 

I saw Rhiannon in the mirror, behind me, laughing and waving the clippers in one hand and a large mass of my newly separated hair in the other. The hair left her hand to drift down in front of my face. Then she had the clippers at the right side of my head, taking slow passes lower and lower and then around my ear. In a few moments she was at my left side doing the same. 

My eyes found the mirror and the humiliating image it reflected. The top and sides of my head were now nothing but stubble, and there was a fan of hair visible at the back of my head. Wanting not to see this shaming view I cast my eyes to the left only to have my gaze fall on Rhiannon’s family. Her mother had come down and had joined the festivities. She was now standing tight against Rhi’s father, her arms around his waist as they both bellowed in hilarity. Her siblings were in hysterics, her two youngest sisters pointing at me as they laughed. 

I felt crimson to the crown of my almost naked head, and began to feel a bit lightheaded. 

Then the clippers were at the back of my neck. I stiffened and moved my head back in response. But the palm of Rhiannon’s hand was immediately flat on my scalp, her fingers digging into the stubbly skin, rudely pushing my head forward. I looked straight down as I was obliged to do and saw the immense pile of my hair in my lap. I had a fleeting wish that my hands could be in the middle of it, could caress my now separated locks. It wasn’t until I saw tears falling into that mass of blonde strands that I realized I was still bawling, had been weeping steadily and loudly since I had first glimpsed my buffoonish image. 

Rhiannon took the clippers again and again up the back of my neck and head, moving first to one side and then to the other. More hair piled into my lap until finally the clipper’s buzz was silenced. 

Chapter Three 

A loud cheer filled the room, mixed with laughter so loud and raucous it was almost a collective scream. Again my eyes found the mirror. I have no idea why – it would have been a humiliation to do so – but I had the desire for free hands. I saw my imagined free hands as they tentatively touched at the tiny stubble my head of luxurious hair had become. In the mirror my eyes widened and brimmed anew with tears as I saw with my mind’s eye my hands fluttering over the humiliating wreck my head had become. Finally my illusory hands lighted firmly on my head. On the palms of my actual hands, lashed firmly to the sides of the chair back, I clearly felt the short, sharp, and pliable stubble I saw in the mirror. 

I desperately wanted to rise to my feet: to somehow escape this embarrassing, shaming, humiliating horror. I began to struggle against my bonds, to try to rise to my feet, needing movement to escape this nightmare, but Rhiannon’s hands were on my shoulders in an instant, stilling my entirely futile struggles. 

The next thing I knew Rhiannon was in front of me, leaning down, and her face a foot from mine. She picked up a handful of the hair in my lap and slapped my face back and forth with it and then shoved it at my nose. The sweet scent of my hair that I have loved so well filled my senses again, but this time with the strands I smelled no longer attached to my head. 

“We’re not quite done yet, now are we, Rita?" Rhiannon asked, again rubbing my own hair in my face. 

I again went through the futile effort of trying to make words understood through my gag, but Rhi was no longer there. I heard a noise behind me like an egg being whisked in a bowl before being put on the griddle to make scrambled eggs. Then there was what looked like a large coffee mug in front of my face. It took me a moment to register that it was an old fashioned shaving mug, a cake of soap at the bottom and Rhiannon swishing a shaving brush around in the cup to build a head of suds. 

Then the cup was gone and coolness was on my nearly bare head as Rhiannon slowly and deliberately slathered the soap across and around my head and down onto the back of my neck. The brush tickled a little as she soaped above and behind my ears. I had that same reaction to tilt my head back as I felt the cool suds applied to the back of my head and neck. 

Rhiannon put her head next to mine, leaning over me slightly. 

“Dear old dad had these sitting around. Got handed down from his grandfather. Isn’t that right, Dad?" Rhiannon asked, her voice louder to reach her father at the side of the room. To my left I saw Rhi’s dad smile, laughing and putting up both thumbs. 

The next sight was scary. An open straight razor was before my terrified eye. 

“Oh, don’t worry. I shaved my dad and brother the last few days with this. You know. Practice makes perfect. And I think I’m pretty good at it," Rhiannon said. “But I suggest you keep really, really still. Or who knows what could happen." 

The impulse to struggle washed over me, but I was too scared to move a muscle. I had to try to calm my still insistent sobs and sniffles. Then I felt the blade as it began to tug at the stubble at my hair line. Rhiannon took off the stubble in little patches of an inch or two, stopping after each three or four swipes to wipe the suds and stubble off the razor. 

The noise from the audience died down some as this shaving took some time. But soon enough Rhiannon was saying how satisfied she was and how the straight razor had done so much better a job than ‘one of those dinky little plastic things’ could have. 

The level of excitement in the room began to rise along with the number of derisive and mocking comments. I felt Rhiannon’s hand again across the top of my head. She moved the smooth skin around and then drummed the end of her fingers on my head. One of her squad mates must have handed her something. 

“Why what ever are these?" Rhiannon exclaimed with feigned curiosity in her voice. Her hands were again before my face holding several tubes. “Why what does it say here?" She turned one tube so that I was able to read the label. “Why it says ‘permanent marker’, doesn’t it, Rita? And look, they are one of our school colors: gold." The marker’s cap indicated a darker shade of yellow, almost an orange, rather than a rich gold, but the distinction hardly mattered to me. 

Before my eyes Rhiannon uncapped one of the markers. As the odor suffused my sense of smell my sense of touch registered the feel of the fibrous tip on the top of my head. Rhiannon hummed as she wrote, ending with a short laugh as she finished. 

“I’d like to offer my squad mates the opportunity to add their sentiments," Rhiannon said with a flourish. Soon both sides and the back my head was the medium for I knew not yet what sentiments. After all dozen or so members of the varsity cheer squad had taken a turn things seemed to settle down. At least I could not imagine what other indignities Rhiannon could imagine to visit on me. 

Rhi’s mom was then in front of me, leaning so her face was just a few inches from mine, my face and cheeks now squeezed between the palms of her hands. 

“Oh, don’t you look so precious now, Princess Rita," she said in a mocking tone. “Don’t you just look so, so precious." As she said this second sentence she was using one hand to rub more of my hair in my face while she used the other hand to pinch my tape covered mouth between her thumb on one side and the rest of her fingers on the other. “I can’t tell you how glad I am to see you here just exactly like this little girl. Little Princess Cheerleader Rita." 

She laughed again and was gone from my face. And the truth suddenly hit me then. I think my eyes must have gone wide. I thought, ‘How many times did Rhiannon cry in her mother’s arms after I betrayed her freshman year? How many times had Rhiannon’s mother held her fourteen year old daughter as she wailed out her inconsolable misery and hurt? How many times did Rhiannon cry herself to sleep that freshman year, her teeth clenched, holding a fistful of the pillow her face was buried in cursing me for my betrayal.’ 

Now I understood why there had been no little good humored, silly shaving in front of a few friends, and then Rhi and I off to her room to laugh about the goofiness of it all. I understood why I was sitting there tied to a chair in front of a throng of her laughing squad mates and friends, clipped and shaved bald in the most humiliating way possible, my loose hair piled ignominiously in my lap, rubbed in my face. How, do you suppose, did she describe to them the show they would be witness to when she invited them over for this evening? 

Rhiannon made another appearance before me. I had no idea what else she could possibly do to me. But my realizations about why she was doing this to me had taken the fear from me. I felt apathetic and hollow and didn’t move at all. 

“You know what?" Rhiannon asked in that same voice she had been using to ask all her mocking rhetorical questions. “I just noticed that I missed some hair on your head!" Rhiannon asked with feigned alarm. 

I heard the clippers begin to buzz again and saw them move upward, but they stopped long before they reached the top of my head. Rhiannon held my red and tear-streaked face by pinching my chin tightly between her fingers. 

The clippers stopped their upward progress and moved toward my forehead. This got me moving and I tried to back my head away. Rhiannon held fast and put the head of the clippers above my nose at the inside edge of my left eyebrow. She flicked the clipper rapidly along the brow and I knew it was gone. Then the clipper was at the inside edge of my right brow. Flick. And it too was gone. 

“Oh, now that’s so much better, don’t you think girls?" Rhiannon asked her squad mates. They had gathered around Rhiannon to witness at close hand this last indignity, this final mutilation of my appearance, and they all now enthusiastically voiced their agreement. 

As Rhiannon stepped behind the chair I heard her say, all phoniness gone from her voice, only bitterness remaining, “Let the bitch loose." 

It took a little while as the girls tried to pick their knots open, and finally called for someone’s  leatherman knife to cut the ropes. One by one the bonds came loose. As soon as I was able to I stood, the mountain of my severed hair falling to the floor forgotten. I turned to face Rhiannon. 

Her eyes were glazed and shiny: tears I knew she would not let fall. But aside from the tears her face was filled with some combination of mockery, contempt, and triumph. She reached out and picked at a corner of the tape that was still across my face. When she had a good grip on the tape she put her other hand behind my head to hold it firmly in position. Then she ripped the tape slowly and deliberately across my face and off, the strong adhesive pulling agonizingly at my skin and lips every inch of the way. 

“Rhi, oh God, Rhi, I’m so sorry," I stammered when the tape was off and I had spent a moment mastering the agonizing pain. “This is about freshman ye…" 

No more words left my mouth. Rhiannon slapped me across the face harder than I have ever been slapped. A loud smack filled the room, quieting the spectators. 

“I am so glad you lost this bet, Bitch," Rhiannon said, seething. “I’m so glad I didn’t have to go to your house and pretend everything was all right and play a little game of ‘friends’ while I had this done to me." She was beginning to lose it, almost hyperventilating in her anger. “You look fucking ridiculous, Bitch." 

“Rhi," I started. 

The slap this time came from the other side, harder, making me senseless for a second and getting that cheek burning as hot as the first. 

“Go on," she sneered, “get out of here. Have fun explaining to all your cheerleader buddies and school friends why your head is so shiny and how it got that way. And don’t try to lie because you can bet everyone in this room will be spreading the word." 

This happened seventeen years ago, in the days long before a video of this would have found its way onto YouTube, with a few hundred thousand hits in the first week; in the days before there were compact video recording units. Some of my audience had taken pictures with little snippy cameras. Pictures would exist and get shown around (and be laughed at heartily I’m sure), but I couldn’t know then how fortunate I was that there was only the beginnings of the internet then, and that the pictures could not then fly around the world at the speed of light. 

I backed away from Rhiannon and almost fell in turning. Suddenly Rhiannon grabbed my arm and pulled me back. 

“Oh, I almost forgot," she said, “They only had yellow markers, so we couldn’t use both our school colors on your head. But here’s a little white and gold for a going away present." Her hand came up and I thought she was going to slap me again, but her hand continued to the top of my head and landed there with something between a crack and a splat. I felt something creeping down on all sides of my head. A viscous liquid was flowing over the ridges above my eyes, where my eyebrows no longer were to slow it down, before I realized she had cracked an egg on my bald head. She turned me then and shoved me into the crowd of spectators. 

It must have taken me five minutes to cross that room. I had to press through the throng, now packed tightly to get close to me, my progress often at a complete halt, I forced to stand still and endure until I could again manage to make a few steps’  forward progress. And what I had to endure to escape that place of shame and humiliation! 

My skirt was to my waist the whole time and within seconds my uniform panties and thong were around the middle of my thighs. Hands squeezed my ass cheeks and invaded my ass crack, and fingers probed my backdoor. Hands cupped my mound and a few kids tried to pull out little tufts of pubic hair. I think some of them were successful. My eyes watered anew at the intense pain. Fingers from both back and front found their way to my vagina. 

Hands found their way under my sweater. My bra was unhooked in back and both my sweater and bra were pushed high, just under my chin in front and hunched up on my shoulders in back, freeing and exposing my boobs. My naked breasts were groped and squeezed continuously, my nipples pinched. Sometimes the squeezing and pinching were hard enough that the pain competed with that from the tugs at my pubic patch for my attention. The hands and fingers belonged to both boys and girls, and they explored and invaded my body with equal opportunity enthusiasm. 

As I finally reached the halfway point to the stairs, that malevolent collective mind conjured a new way to humiliate me. I felt my sweater pulled up anew, my arms were held up, and the sweater was gone. Then my bra was pushed down my arms and was off me. I felt hands at the waistband of my skirt and it, my panties, and my thong went down my legs. As they were pulled under and away from my feet I lost my balance. But tightly packed in that sea of bodies I didn’t even begin to fall. 

Those kids had ruthlessly and gleefully stripped me naked, and my body was now nude except for my knee socks and shoes, and all the hands and fingers had unrestricted access to my body. I began to push more insistently through my tormentors and that helped to slightly speed my progress, although the attacks and invasions of my body never slackened. 

And apparently eggs had been passed out and what seemed a constant barrage of them were cracked on the top and sides of my head, or pushed against my breasts. Many were cracked between my legs or my ass cheeks. 

I was crying bitterly again at the magnitude of my pain, indignity, and humiliation long before I finally reached the stairs. When I had finally attained that goal I tried to quickly scurry up, but stumbled several times and crawled up a few of the treads. Rhiannon and the rest roared their amusement and approval. I looked several times into the room as I lurched up the stairs and saw my skirt and sweater, my panties and thong and bra held up and waved in the air as trophies. 

Finally up the stairs I made my way through the house and out the front door. 

I stumbled down the black street as I wiped egg white and yolks from my eyes, felt the gooiness of the same substance on my back and stomach and between and on my boobs. The gelatinous substance ran down the insides of my thighs and I could feel my pubic hair matted with it. Bald, slimy, and shamed I made my way back around the corner, my arms around my breasts. 

No one was out and I trotted back to the corner in blessed solitude. I rounded the corner and the highway intersection was a block ahead. I approached the crossroad cautiously. But because of so many trees and so much brush on the corners of the intersection there was really no way to know for sure what cars were or weren’t approaching the crossing. 

I hesitated for long moments undecided. I was essentially nude. The neighborhood was quiet, but was never really all that unbusy in the middle of the evening. 

I knew the longer I stood there the more certain became the prospect that a car would come from behind me leaving the neighborhood, my bare ass bidding them a safe journey, or that a car would suddenly turn the corner off the highway greeted by the site of a shapely young woman in nothing but knee socks and shoes, her dark blonde pubic patch on display and arms across her chest hiding her naked boobs. 

Finally I set aside my fear and hesitation. There was another twenty feet to the intersection. No headlight beams lit the road surface. But how far did they really reach? And the two bright street lights at the corner would have made the detection of headlight beams less likely. I began to trot and then run. I cleared the trees and foliage and slowed just a bit as I checked the roadway with a glance in both directions. A car was approaching the intersection in the far lane from my right, still about a hundred feet away. Another car was approaching from my left at about the same distance, its right turn signal blinking. 

Past the point of no return, I got my legs moving faster and crossed the intersection at something between a jog and a sprint. I was across the highway and a few feet down my road when one car flashed past behind me. A horn blared and something unintelligible was shouted at my naked buttocks. I glanced back over my shoulder in time to see the other car turning into the street where I had been standing just seconds previous. 

Less than a minute later, beginning to shiver a little, I crept silently into my house. I ended the worst night of my life in the shower, trying to clean my body and to cry out my misery, shame, and humiliation. <br><br><br> 

I was glad and relieved to discover that the ‘permanent’ in ‘permanent marker’ is more marketing than reality. I spent the next few days out of school and discovered that rubbing alcohol, used enough times, removes most of the ink, leaving just a faint reminder. Twice daily hard scrubbing for a week with ordinary soap removes the last traces. But I studied my head in the mirror as I scrubbed for the first time, the pain of the alcohol on my freshly shaved scalp stinging and never dulled with repeated application. Rhiannon had written ‘WEST IS BEST!’ on the crown of my head. Her squad mates had added on the top and around the sides ‘WEST!’, ‘WE WON!’, ‘STUPID BITCH’, ‘LOSER’, ‘IM A BALD FREAK!’ and other ripe sentiments. 

My parents were angry, of course, but just as much at me as at Rhiannon and her family. Nothing came of their wrath (except that I got grounded until after winter break! I counted myself lucky: it would have been until graduation if either of them had seen me come through the door bare-assed naked and covered in egg slime). 

When I finally returned to school on Thursday I held my head as high as I could. There was no need for me to explain why my head was shaved bare, why the faint marks of humiliating comments were still barely visible on my entirely smooth, hairless head. Why my eyebrows were absent. The story had already been told and re-told hundreds of time before I walked through the entry doors. Because I had not been present for three days some rumors had gotten out of hand regarding just what had been done to me and how bad I looked. But the essence of the story was largely sound: that I looked as I did because I had bet on our football team in the Thanksgiving Day game; that I had bet my hair on our team emerging from the game victorious. That I had bet my hair and lost. 

My squad mates were outraged. Not so much at the fact that I was bald: they each understood about making bets and that there are consequences to losing. (I had witnessed one of them once topless, on her knees, and sucking the dick of a boy she’d lost a bet to at a party.) But they were incensed by what they had heard about the way the payment of my bet had been carried out, irate at the unnecessary humiliation and degradation that I had suffered in front of the audience Rhiannon had gathered. Most of what they had heard was mostly true, and I told them in detail just what had happened. It was mortifying both to recall and to relate. But I thought they deserved the entire and true story. 

I had thought the tale of my risking and losing and paying so much because of school spirit might cut some ice. And some of the students in my school supported me, both by telling me my bald appearance looked good (even hot!) and by telling me how they admired me for having honored my bet. 

But truthfully on some days and in some of our hallways I was the object of just as much mocking and derision as I would have been walking with my bald head down a hallway at West. I even had to withstand the humiliation of snickers that, in spite of all efforts, had slipped out of a few of my teachers. 

I would just put my chin down and proceed on my way. 

By the time I returned from spring break in the middle of March my hair had grown back in enough to be styled to some degree. By graduation I had a handsome, albeit shorter, coiffure. People began to forget. 

But I never have. Seventeen Thanksgivings ago, and I still remember every detail. They stand out in my mind, each recollection honed into intense detail on the sharp edge of abject humiliation.

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