Flash Fiction: SNIP by Ell Kershaw


He knows when she’s washed her hair. It curls differently, tighter, doesn’t reach as far down her back. He prefers it when she hasn’t washed it. If she turns her head he can sometimes catch the scent of her. Musky. Bed hair. Dirty girl hair.
She gets on his bus every day at the station. She’s a student. History. He’s seen the books she reads. He hangs back until she boards and then he follows and settles as near as he can. She gets off near the woods by the park. He followed one day. He knows where she lives.
                Most days, he gets the seat directly behind so that he can watch that teasing hair as it tumbles past her shoulders. If he leans forward, pretends he’s dozing, he can get right up to it, stroke it.
                It was a while before he dared to use the scissors. He’d put them in his lunch bag along with some of the little plastic sample packets from his laboratory. Then, one day, he’d done his fake sleep act again and brought the scissors up, snip, just like that. 
                He’d already bought the doll. Lifesize, pink PVC skin and dark brown hair just like hers. He stuck the curl on when he got home. Kissed it first.
                Then it was easy. One, sometimes two, tiny snips a week.
                Today he’s sitting close behind, brings up the scissors and goes to cut but she moves, feels his hand brush her neck. She turns, stares at him. Her lip curls up. Her eyes are hard and mean. Alley cat eyes. She says, ‘Pervert’. The woman next to her glares at him.
                He sits back. His heart is stiffening with anger. His hand closes over the scissors and he feels them sharp against his palm. Remembers that the dark nights are coming. 

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