The asphalt of NH5 stretched out before me like a desolate ribbon of black velvet, cutting through a wasteland that was as empty and silent as a graveyard. There wasn’t another soul in sight. The late afternoon sun beat down heavily, casting long, eerie shadows across the cracked pavement. Desperate to make up for lost time, I pressed my foot hard against the accelerator. The engine roared, and the speedometer needle crept well past the legal limit. I foolishly thought this reckless burst of speed would save me some time.
But my luck was about to run out in the most bizarre way imaginable.
A sudden, sharp wail shattered the silence. In my rearview mirror, a police cruiser materialized out of the heat haze, its red and blue lights flashing aggressively. My heart sank. I pulled over onto the dusty shoulder of the highway, killed the engine, and waited for the inevitable.
When the officer stepped out of her vehicle, my anxiety momentarily gave way to sheer shock. She was stunning—a tall, striking blonde with piercing blue eyes, her uniform tailored perfectly to her curves. She walked with an air of absolute authority, the heavy black leather of her duty belt creaking with every step. She stopped at my driver's side window, her shadow falling over me.
"License and registration," she demanded, her voice a smooth, commanding purr.
I quickly reached into the lower compartment beneath the dashboard, pulled out my driving license, and handed it over. She took the plastic card, squinting down at it. She looked at the driver’s license, then back at me, then back at the license again. Her brow furrowed.
"Is this really you?" she asked, tilting her head.
"Yes, officer," I replied nervously. "That's me."
"But in this picture, you are completely bald," she pointed out, tapping her fingernail against the photo.
"I know," I stammered, rubbing the back of my thick neck. "It was back when I had a shaved head. I used to buzz it down all the time, but I decided to grow it out recently."
She locked her icy blue eyes onto mine, a slow, predatory smile creeping onto her lips. "Well, you also crossed the speed limit by a significant margin. You have to pay a serious charge for that. A reckless driving ticket on this stretch of NH5 carries heavy fines, points, and an automatic court appearance."
I desperately wanted to avoid any tickets on my record. Desperation making me bold, I looked up at her and asked, "Is there... something we could do to settle this out here? Any way I can make amends?"
She stared at me, her gaze intensifying, tracking the line of my hair. "Yes, there is something. Come close to the window. Lean your head out."
Slightly confused but eager to please, I shifted in my seat and put my head out of the car window. Before I could ask what she was doing, she grabbed the back of my head with a surprisingly iron grip.
"Stay perfectly still," she ordered.
Panic flared in my chest. I got a little scared, my muscles tensing against her hold. "What are you doing? Let go!"
"I’m matching your face to your driver's license picture," she replied coolly, her voice dropping to a whisper. "I am going to perform a mandatory headshave."
I wrenched my head back into the safety of the car cabin, breathing heavily. "Are you crazy?! What are you saying? You can't just shave someone's head on the side of the highway!"
The blonde cop leaned down, resting her forearms on the window frame, trapping me with her gaze. "I can arrest you right now for outstanding highway violations, reckless endangerment, and non-cooperation with a law enforcement officer. Or, you can stick your head back out of this window and let me rectify your appearance. It’s your choice."
I sat in the sweltering car, my mind racing. Hair against arrest. It was a humiliating, bizarre ultimatum, but the alternative—a night in a jail cell and a ruined record—was far worse. The answer was clear. Swallowing my pride, I leaned over and placed my head back out of the window, exposing my scalp to the hot air.
She reached into her back pocket and pulled out a gleaming tool. My eyes widened as I saw it: a traditional, wicked-looking straight razor. The polished steel caught the harsh sunlight. She held the handle expertly in her right hand, while she began running her left hand through my hair, feeling the contours of my skull.
Without applying any shaving cream or water, she placed the cold, bare blade of the straight razor directly onto the center of my head. I instinctively faced down toward the gravel, my heart hammering against my ribs.
Scrape.
She pulled the blade from the crown of my head down toward my forehead. The sound of the dry hair getting cut at the roots was incredibly loud in the quiet desert air. Instantly, a thick clump of my hair fell off my head, drifting down to the dusty ground.
A soft gasp escaped her lips. She was clearly enjoying the act of headshaving me; I could actually hear her moaning quietly with satisfaction as she cleared the first long swath of hair. The raw steel of the razor was clearing my scalp with terrifying efficiency. It started feeling incredibly odd, a sudden, shocking coldness on the freshly exposed, shaved head portion of my skin.
Scrape. Scrape.
After roughly shaving my head from the front, she shifted her stance to target the back and sides. Now, after every single razor glide, the heavy tufts of hair fell directly onto my shoulders, sliding down the front of my shirt before hitting the ground. She was aggressively pushing the straight razor from the top of my crown all the way down to the nape of my neck. The crisp, slicing sound of the hair being sheared away filled my ears. Within minutes of this intense, dry headshave, I was completely bald.
She ran her bare palm over my stubbly scalp, then reached for the wireless radio clipped to her shoulder. She clicked the button. "I got one. Come here soon."
I had no idea who she had just called, but I was too stunned to move, sitting with my head dangling out of a car window on an empty highway, covered in my own shorn hair.
A few minutes later, the roar of another engine broke the silence. A second police cruiser pulled up right behind the first. Out stepped another female officer. She was just as hot as the first one—a stunning brunette with a fiery gaze. She marched over, looked at my half-shorn, stubbly scalp, and crossed her arms, looking thoroughly annoyed.
"It was my turn!" the second cop complained, pouting. "And you went ahead and balded him completely!"
The blonde cop smirked, wiping my hair off her blade. "I know, I know... but I just could not help myself. The opportunity was too perfect. Next time you will be the first to shave, I promise."
The brunette cop sighed, stepping closer to my window. She reached out and rubbed her palm roughly against my scalp. The friction of her hand against the stiff stubble made a loud rasping sound.
"Still, smoothness is missing," she noted critically. "This isn't a proper job."
The blonde cop intervened with a grin, "Yes, that's exactly why I called you. I need you to make it a perfectly smooth shaved head."
The second cop smiled warmly, her annoyance vanishing. "I love you, baby," she cooed to her partner.
She took the straight razor from the blonde's hand. Placing her left hand firmly on my forehead to tilt my head back, she began shaving it in reverse—from the back of my neck up toward the top of my head. This reverse headshave was intense. The blade was scraping directly against the grain of the hair. After every single stroke, she casually wiped the dark, stubbly hair stuck on the razor blade directly onto my white T-shirt.
Once the back was done, she gripped my chin and forced me to look straight up. Positioned right outside my window, her chest was practically in my face, but she wasn’t paying attention to me at all; she was completely focused on the art of the headshaving process. She placed the razor at the very front of my hairline and pushed it firmly toward the back, cleaning up every remaining follicle. She continued using my T-shirt as a rag to wipe away the hair grease and stubble. The first cop stood by, watching the blade glide across my skin with absolute fascination.
In just a few more minutes, the transformation was total. My head was completely, flawlessly shaved smooth.
The brunette folded the straight razor shut with a sharp click and handed it back to her partner. Then, both of the cops stepped in close, leaning through the window. Together, they rubbed their hands all over my freshly smooth shaved head, enjoying the tactile sensation of the bare, hairless skin.
After admiring their handiwork for a few minutes, the blonde cop finally tossed my driver's license back onto the passenger seat.
"Don't drive too fast," she warned with a wink.
They turned on their heels, got back into their respective cruisers, and sped off into the distance, leaving behind nothing but a cloud of dust.
I sat alone in the silence of the NH5 highway, completely stunned. I looked in the rearview mirror. A totally bald man stared back at me. I began cleaning the piles of shorn hair from my shoulders and brushing the stubble off my ruined T-shirt.
After dusting off the last of my shaved hair, I tentatively raised my own hand and ran my palm across my scalp from front to back. My eyes widened. It was seriously, incredibly smooth.
I started the engine and pulled back onto the empty highway. For the entire remainder of the trip, I drove with one hand on the steering wheel, while my other hand kept rhythmically rubbing my smooth shaved head. The cool air from the AC felt amazing against my bare skin. As the miles ticked away, a slow smile crept onto my face.
I think I really liked being bald.
