Mountain, Man

by Heather Shaw

“Look, miss, I’m going to have to cut your hair to do this. Is that all right?”

She smiled at him from her upside-down, bent-over position, so he took that as a yes. He found an old pair of garden shears and took a hunk of her hair, gathered it into a rough ponytail, and hacked it off.

A pair of mountain bluebirds flew out from where the nest of hair had been.