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 Excerpt from "The Barber of Deadsville"
A Feburary Finalist Submission by Mark Vanderpool

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For some situations I carry notes in my pockets. I am going to the dentist today, for example, and he will lecture me while I'm fat-lip sedated, and dental dammed.

He'll say, There's a chance we can save this one, but if today's work doesn't hold, extraction is the only option..

And I'll reach into my pocket for crisp, perfect words.

Extraction is what I'm used to... the note will say

... How much will this cost?

Yes, but preventative is better, he'll say back from between perfect teeth. Perfect shining white teeth will tell me, You should have come in sooner.

The next note is simple and good for many occasions. It says:

I was broke.

On the note I pull from my pocket, this comes across so much better than the way most people say it from a dental chair. The message gets delivered in a dignified way, at least, and all of my notes are Sharpied Big and Bold and look crisp—ironed like business shirts, my notes, blessed like virgins, my notes, and dry as a dental dam when it's first stretched on, dry as an un-lubed contraceptive, my friends, so pure and free of spit.

I'm sorry, the perfect teeth say, but we do have a payment plan. When we're finished, Karen up front can show you options for how to apply.

I reach into another pocket for this one, a special pocket. This note says:

Credit problems? Repossessions? Foreclosure? Call Broeker & Broeker, Attorneys at Law.

My dentist, his lips curling up, his perfect teeth, they say, Do you have a note or advertisement crammed into your pockets for anything I tell you? My fingers know just what to tell him back. And no, I mean more than just the middle finger. I mean, this note's been folded into my shirt pocket since morning coffee. It says:

The comprehensive and preventative plan you outlined on my last visit totaled more money than I made all year.

Sometimes people smile when you have just the right note waiting for them. And sometimes they cry a little bit. Sometimes both. My dentist, he's a both kind of guy. He's got perfect teeth plus tear ducts that work on demand. He could be in a soap opera, my dentist. Give me some credit, though. Having an excellent note already composed in advance, it says, I was thinking about you.

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Chuck Palahniuk's Feedback on
“The Barber of Deadsville”
By Mark Vanderpool

This story has a terrific opening, suggesting a simple but dramatic physical action – or, in this case, accident – and creating a very on-the-body sense with the depiction of blood. Then, creating absurd comedy by mixing this blood with shaving cream, and failing to react to the full horror of the situation. Yes, the botched, socially inappropriate reaction is usually very funny, to normal folks, if not psychologists.

All that said, please consider moving your second paragraph to the lead. It has such a gloriously compelling sentence: “The skin was the problem, not me.” Even Amy Hempel would be proud of that sentence. Beyond that, watch out for any form of the verbs “is” or “had.” For instance, the next sentence of that paragraph could easily change to: “He’d celebrated too many birthdays past the age of elasticity, and his skin hung and sagged in the folds of a squirrel that sublets storage space to other squirrels…” Again, look for ways to replace extra “is” and “have” verbs with more dynamic verbs.

Also, the absurd comic device of the notes – again, these qualify as socially inappropriate responses, thus occurring as comic – could be used or at least hinted at in the opening and closing portions of the story. For example, when you do cut yourself while shaving, you tend to stem the bleeding with a toilet paper patch. It would be easy and comic for the narrator to reach into a pocket and thoughtlessly grab some paper, pasting his own words to his father’s bleeding face. Thus the face becomes this hideous collage of the son’s statements, held together with blood, unseen by the father. Nasty, comic and kind-a literary. Consider it.

With this in mind, re-think your closing lines. A gesture will always trump a line of dialogue or a “big voice” rhetorical question. Your current “black-out” line is phrased very well. It has a repetitive, symmetrical quality I love, but on the next draft look for some physical gesture that might be stronger. You could put the printed slips of paper into the father’s dead mouth… Or, combine your current end with the note device – making your current black-out line into a note, and placing that into the dead man’s mouth. Look back through the whole story and find some physical thing you’ve already established.

 

Chuck Palahniuk