Bad Haircut (16 page)

We ate without speaking. The food was wonderful, and I felt unreasonably hungry, like I hadn't eaten for days. I finished a turkey sandwich and was halfway through a serving of lasagna when Estelle came out and told us that Millie had something to show us in the living room.

“Something about Jerry,” she added nervously. She was standing at the edge of the patio wearing a big pink oven mitt on one hand. When she saw that we weren't getting up right away, she pulled a lawn chair up to the table and sat down.

“I live alone,” she announced. “I don't have a car. It's not easy for me to get around.” She spoke quickly, as if pressed for time, her words tumbling out one on top of the other. Her eyes were moist and slightly distorted behind thick glasses. “Whenever I needed to go somewhere I called Jerry and he said, ‘Estelle, I'll be right over.’” She tried to smile but her lips began quivering. She buried her face in the oven mitt.

All the curtains were drawn in the living room. We had to bring in extra chairs from the kitchen to get everyone seated. Judy, Mrs. Norman, and Estelle were squeezed together on the couch. There was a carousel slide projector set up on the coffee table.

Judy stood up. She kept her head down and her hands folded as she spoke. “My mother would like to thank you all for joining us in this difficult hour. She thought you might like to see Jerry one last time before you go.” Mrs. Norman nodded, and even in the dim light you could see that her face was swollen and blurred with grief. Judy sat down and switched on the projector. It was squat and round, like a miniature flying saucer. A fan started humming and a blank square of light appeared on the wall. She clicked the advance button three or four times before the first fuzzy image filled the empty space. Mrs. Norman adjusted the lens, and her husband jumped into focus. He was walking through the front door, carrying groceries
into the house. He seemed happy to be home.

I glanced at Bob. He was sitting next to me, pressing his fist against his mouth, biting down hard on the thumb. Dozens of pictures flashed and vanished on the wall. Most of them were candid shots taken around the house. Mr. Norman stood by the bathroom sink, smiling through a beard of shaving cream. He mowed the lawn in a sleeveless T-shirt. He sat in a chair looking gloomy.

Mr. Norman took out the garbage. He did a wild dance at Judy's wedding, waving a napkin over his head. In Atlantic City, he hit the jackpot on a slot machine; coins poured like water into his plastic cup. Mr. Norman read a magazine. He gave Halloween candy to a child dressed as a ghost. He sat with me on the couch.

For some reason, Judy let that image linger. In the photograph, I had long curly hair and wore a blue flannel shirt. I couldn't believe how young and fragile I looked. Mr. Norman was huge in comparison. He had one arm around my shoulder, pulling me against him. Our eyes glowed red from the flash. Bob found my hand and squeezed it.

“That's you,” he said, his startled voice breaking the silence in the living room.

Acknowledgements

 

The author would like to thank the following people for their help and support: James Linville, Kimberly Witherspoon, Alexandra Shelley, Barbara and Warren Phillips, Lee K. Abbott, and Joe Gordon. Special thanks, of course, to Joe and Sue Perrotta, and to Mary Granfield.

About the Author

 

TOM PERROTTA
is the author of five other works of fiction:
The Abstinence Teacher, The Wishbones, Election
, and the
New York Times
bestselling
Joe College
and
Little Children. Election
was made into the acclaimed 1999 movie directed by Alexander Payne and starring Matthew Broderick and Reese Witherspoon.
Little Children
was released as an Oscar-nominated movie directed by Todd Field and starring Kate Winslet and Jennifer Connelly in 2006. Perrotta lives outside of Boston with his family.

Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins author.

From the reviews of
Bad Haircut
:

‘Darkly tender, simply written tales about growing up in the Garden State in the 1970s’

New York Times

‘His stories remind me … in their wit and humanity and cumulative impact, of Philip Roth's
Goodbye Colombus.
Like that book, Perrotta's funny and deeply touching collection marks the arrival of a writer who's here for the long haul’

TOBIAS WOLFF

‘More powerful than any coming-of-age novel I've read recently … These stories of the 70s deserve to be read by everyone who grew up in that blighted decade’

Washington Post

‘A strong, funny debut’

Washington Times

‘Perrotta's novels are sheer pleasure’
San Francisco Chronicle

‘Funny and ingenious … It's tempting to call
Bad Haircut
an “auspicious” book, but that doesn't say enough; in fact Perrotta has already delivered the goods’
Los Angeles Times

By the Same Author

 

The Abstinence Teacher
Little Children
Joe College
Election
The Wishbones

 

Copyright

 

Harper Perennial
An imprint of HarperCollins
Publishers
77-85 Fulham Palace Road, Hammersmith, London W6 8JB

www.harperperennial.co.uk
Visit our authors’ blog at www.fifthestate.co.uk

This Harper Perennial edition published 2009
1

First published in the US by Bridge Works Publishing (1994).
Published by Berkley in 1995 and 1997.

Copyright © Tom Perrotta 1994

‘The Wiener Man’ first appeared in
Columbia Magazine.
‘Forgiveness’ first appeared in
Crazyhorse.
‘Wild Kingdom’ first appeared in
The Gettysburg Review.

Tom Perrotta asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

This is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

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EPub Edition © MARCH 2009 ISBN: 9780007319428