He sat outside in a lawn chair in front of the barbershop.
     
Mr. G wore a baseball cap, dingy corduroys, and a checkered shirt with a mustard stain on the collar. His skin was dark as olives and he smelled of motor oil. Even if you weren’t next to him, you could smell it in the air underneath all the cologne he sprayed on.
     
Lionel Robinson, the owner of the barbershop, had two kids about my age, both boys. They swept up hair, made store runs for the customers, listened to the stories people told in the barber chair -- everyone had a story, even Mr. G -- he had several stories, all from different narrators, and I got a chance to hear most of them while my mama got her hair pretty for Sunday morning.
     
There was a banging on the window.
     
Mr. G threw his hands up and peered into the barbershop, his eyes bloodshot.
     
“Mr. G wants some more beer. Somebody needs to go get it for him,” said Mr. Robinson to his boys. “I’ve got people waiting to get cut.”
     
They pointed fingers at each other. Mr. Robinson shook his head in disbelief.
     
“You boys should want to do right by your elders,” he said. “I thought I raised you better than that.”
     
“But he’s a drunk,” said his eldest, Simon.
     
“And he stinks too,” said Ray-Ray.
     
“He ‘sho do,” said the man in Mr. Robinson's barber chair.
     
His name was Grady Jones: a long time customer and friend of Mr. Robinson’s. He came for a hair cut every couple months or so; he traveled a great deal, and was always entertaining us with one story or another.
     
“Them kids is telling the truth, Lionel,” he said. “No refuting it.”
     
“Don't encourage them,” said Mr. Robinson. “Here,” he said to Ray-Ray, handing him the money. “I don't care who goes, but one of you's going to go and get that beer for Mr. G, and I don't want to hear anymore lip about it. You understand?”
     
“Yes, sir,” they said.
     
“Hey boys, hold up a moment,” said Mr. Grady. “You know why Mr. G don't open his mouth, don't you? Have you heard that story?” 
     
The boys shook their heads.
     
“How about you?” he said to me.
     
“No sir,” I said, “I’ve never heard it.”
     
“Then it’s settled -- I’ve got me an audience,” he said.
      
“Oh don't go telling that stupid story ‘bout Mr. G. You ought to be ashamed of yourself -- spreading rumors about that old man,” said Mr. Robinson.
     
“What rumor? Don't you think that's kind of funny how he don’t talk? Haven't you ever given that any thought?”
     
“He don't talk ‘cause he’s mute,” said Mr. Robinson, lathering Mr. Grady’s chin. “Everyone knows that.”
     
“But what everyone don't know is that he ain’t really mute at all. He's afraid it’ll slip and just come out.”
     
“It?” said Simon and Ray-Ray intrigued.
     
“The tongue,” said Mr. Grady.
     
“Here we go, Tales from the Darkside of the Ghetto,” said Mr. Robinson with a sigh. He took a razor from his drawer and began shaving him.
     
Grady made a face at Mr. Robinson then continued.
     
“This was back a long time ago, when Mr. G was a little ‘G’, you might say. It took months before he was able to convince his mama to take him to the local state fair. I mean months. She made him promise that he wouldn’t run off and that he’d never ask her again because it was too much for her to take.
     
“So they finally get there, and there’s lots of elephant ears and cotton candy, and his mama’s really starting to loosen up a bit -- they were having fun. Then he spies this roller coaster called the ‘Mixer,’ and he really wants to get on it, but his mama had told him he couldn't go on the roller coaster (her being so protective of him and fearful of what might happen), but he slips off anyway when she wasn't looking, and she spends the better part of an hour trying to find him. Her first thought was that he'd gotten snapped up by some pedophile or something. You know what a pedophile is don't you?”
     
Simon and Ray-Ray shook their heads.
     
“It’s a grown up that likes little children instead of other grownups,” said Mr. Robinson.
“Can you hurry the story up? These boys need to be gone. Mr. G's getting impatient.”
     
Mr. G was just standing there with the empty can in his hand looking in.
     
“Well, to make a long story short, Mr. G finally got on the roller coaster, and once it began to climb up the ramp, his heart went to fluttering -- that’s why his mama was so protective of him -- he was born with a bad heart.
     
“So they start all the way up and he’s like, ‘Let me off! Let me off!’ And the kid next to him is telling him to shut up, and the next thing you know, they reach the top and the roller coaster car goes down real fast and everyone’s got their hands up in the air, enjoying it, but not Mr. G; he starts choking and gasping for air: you see, he swallowed his own tongue... and... Ow! Shit!”
     
“Sorry Grady,” said Lionel. “You gotta stay still when you’re telling wives tales in my barber chair.”
     
Mr. Robinson got some tissue and wiped the blood away.

“I say Goddamn, Lionel, you aiming for the jugular? Sorry boys, hold on a sec.”
     
“I said I was sorry, man. What else you want me to do? Wear sackcloth and ashes?”
     
“At least that’ll be a start.”
     
Grady frowned at the cut in the hand-held mirror, scowled and thrust it back into Mr. Robinson’s hand.
     
About five minutes later, he continued his story. He made sure Mr. Robinson was through shaving him first.
     
Once he was content, he said: “Where was I before I nearly bled to death?”
     
“Mr. G swallowed his tongue,” said Ray-Ray. “And then what happened?”
     
“People can’t swallow their tongues,” said Mr. Robinson, “because it’s attached to the bottom of your mouth, that’s why it’s a myth... that’s why you can’t swallow it. Any educated person knows that.”
     
“Don’t mind your daddy. He ain’t never had much imagination to begin with.”
     
Grady cut his eyes at Mr. Robinson.
     
“He swallowed his tongue, as in SWALLOWED HIS TONGUE,” said Grady getting back into his yarn. “And so you know mothers -- they have a sort of sixth sense about their children: she knew exactly where he was and was right there waiting for him when he got off. They had to rush him to emergency. 
     
“But you see, Mr. G’s mama was a spiritual woman, so she made a deal with the horse god Asasius to save her son, but when the horse god whispered to her the price attached, her face went white and she pleaded with him to undo what he had done, but he refused; it couldn’t be undone.”
     
Mr. Robinson gave Mr. Grady the mirror again. He looked at himself, decided he wanted a little more off the sides.
     
“So what happened?” said Simon, anxiously.
     
“I’m getting to that part...”
     
Mr. Grady closed his eyes as the hair clippers glided over his hair, the gray-black hair falling to the floor.
     
“The doctors were amazed -- the boy had grown another tongue to replace the one he’d swallowed; it was proclaimed a miracle. After a few tests, his mama took him back home. Mr. G was talkative and happy, unharmed for all that.
     
“'You ain’t gonna whip me, are you Mama? I learned my lesson,’ he says. ‘It’s a miracle what the Lord did, ain’t it Mama?’”
      
“‘No, I ain’t gonna whip you,’ she says. ‘I ain’t gonna whip you no more.’”
     
“'But it’s a miracle what God done, ain’t it?’ he says. ‘Giving me a brand new tongue and all...’
     
“Mr. G’s mama weren’t no different than anyone else. She went to church every Sunday, even sang in the choir, but like most Christian folk, she had a ‘thorn of the flesh’. Some folks it’s drinking, others it’s relations with women, or cursing, or gambling, or looking at someone else’s spouse: hers was idol worship... and voodoo -- you know -- old habits dying hard and all. Mr. G didn’t know anything about it. He just thought it was one of those miracles he’d read about in Sunday school, and his mama started crying ‘cause she couldn’t stop it from happening.
     
“‘It’s okay Mama,’ he says. ‘Everything’s fine now. I can talk again. Don’t cry Mama... don’t cry. I’m gonna be good for now on. I promise. I won’t be bad.’
     
“She put him to bed and kissed him. A few hours later she heard a scream that literally sent her into madness because it wasn’t just the sound of the boy’s scream, it was the visuals that went with the scream: he had three horses in his mouth; a tongue of horses, and they stampeded her to her death... from that day he never spoke again, except one time, but that’s another story. It seems the horses developed a taste for beer, during his time in the fifth infantry, so he’s got to keep them happy, otherwise they might run out of his mouth again and kill somebody else. Needless to say, he wasn’t honorably discharged.”
     
The barbershop was silent.
     
Mr. Robinson snapped the gown from Mr. Grady. “Ten dollars,” he said. “Now get outta my chair. You’re nothing but a pseudo Crypt Keeper, you know that?”
     
Mr. Grady grinned, reached for his wallet. “Hell you ought to be paying me for my fine storytelling skills. Ain’t my fault you can’t appreciate a good yarn.”
     
He got his hat and paid Lionel. “Well I can’t take all the credit for it -- that’s the way his cousin told it to me, after we got married, but it’s a good story I think. Don’t claim to believe it myself, but it passed the time anyhow. You boys take care. See you in a few weeks Lionel.”
     
“Alright Grady. Take it easy. You’re next,” he said to the man seated next to me. The man got up and sat in the barber chair. Mr. Robinson used the foot pump to boost the man a couple inches. “I think you boys are late for an appointment.”
     
“But Dad!” protested Ray-Ray.
     
“Uh-uh. You wasted enough time. Take Paul with you if you’re so scared. He’s tall.” He was right. I was tall for my age but that didn’t mean I wasn’t scared, because I was.

“I’ll tell your mama you’ll be right back. The store’s just up the street. She’s still under the drier anyway.”

“Come on Paul,” said Simon, “let’s go.”

Reluctantly I got up and went with them. They wanted me to be the spokesman. “You do all the talking Paul, okay? You’re the leader.”

We went out the door.
     
Mr. G glanced at us, tapped his watch.
                                                                                                
I cleared my throat.
     
“We’re s-sorry,” I said. “We’re going right n-now, Mr. G. I had to ask for my Mama’s permission first.”
     
He nodded, turned his eyes to the street and the cars going up and down the intersection, settled himself back in his lawn chair and waited.
     
Mr. Robinson knew the owner of the store, so we got Mr. G a Colt 45 because Ray-Ray said Billy Dee Williams drinks Colt 45, and Simon said he didn’t drink it, he just pretended like he 'drunk it' to make money, and we all liked him enough in Star Wars since he was the only one in the movie that looked like us, and we started talking about black people in sci-fi, and why there weren’t enough of them.
     
“I guess the rest of the black race are extinct in Luke Skywalkers’ galaxy,” said Simon.
     
“What about comics?” said Ray-Ray. “We got Black Lightning, don’t we?”
     
“Superman’ll kick Black Lightning’s ass,” said Simon.
     
“Black Panther will kick both Black Lightning’s and Superman’s ass -- he’s the coolest brother in comics,” I said.
     
We had finally reached our destination. Ray-Ray and Simon waited.
     
“I ain’t giving the beer to Mr. G,” said Ray-Ray. “Screw that.”
     
“Well I ain’t giving it to him,” said Simon, popping some Boston Baked Beans in his mouth.
     
“I ain’t either,” said Ray-Ray.
     
“You said that already,” said Simon.
     
They both looked at me. “We out vote you two to one. You’re giving it to him.”
     
“Wait a minute. I thought we were supposed to do it together?”
     
Ray-Ray concealed his grin. “We out vote you two to one. I ain’t about to give him no Colt 45, and neither is Simon -- he don’t drink it. He hates Colt 45.”
     
“Then why’d you say we should get Colt 45?”
     
“Hey man, you were the one talking about Billy Dee Williams,” said Simon.
     
“I wasn’t talking about no Billy Dee Williams: that was Ray-Ray.”
      
“Don’t matter. You’re the leader. So you’re the one that’s going to give it to him. Go on. Look! He’s nodded off. Maybe you can slip it by him before he wakes.”
     
Mr. G was slumped in his chair like a dead man. His arms were thrown out, his head back.
     
Simon and Ray-Ray gave me the ‘go ahead’ sign.
     
I didn’t want to be called a chicken or a sissy, so I snatched the Colt 45 from Ray-Ray’s hand and slowly approached the chair.
     
Mr. G opened his eyes and I was terrified, frozen.

He took the beer can from my hand, opened his mouth wide and I saw it: the heads of the horses lapping up the beer. I wanted to yell out (I was so scared the sound wouldn’t come). And let me tell you something: the horses were worse than any horses you’d ever seen at any circus or storybook. To describe it would be too horrible.
     
I took a quick glance over my shoulder, hoping my support group would use a rescue-and-retrieve plan, but both Simon and Ray-Ray were in the barbershop staring out of the window at me.
     
When he finished the drink, he tossed the can into the open grill in the street; his lips moved as if he were trying to say something to me.
     
I ran to the door of the barbershop, pulling and pulling, until the door finally gave way. My hands were sweaty.
     
“What happened?” said Simon.
     
“Yeah. Did you see it? Did you see the horses? What did they look like? Did you get a good look?”
     
“Shut up,” I said. “Just shut up talking to me. Bunch of pussies.”
     
My mama happened to hear the last bit, and I got it upside the head for using language like that, but I told her about Mr. G and what he did, and she wasn’t so mad about it after that. In fact she stopped speaking to him altogether and I felt pretty bad about it; it wasn’t his fault. The horses in his mouth were hungry.
     
Like I said, everyone knew Mr. G, and everyone had their own stories about him, but the Robinson brothers never asked me about mine again.

* * * * *

A lot of things change with time, but not the barbershops in black America. There’s still plenty of political talk, sex talk, sports talk, and music talk to go around, and yes, even a few horror tales, most involving some type of violence.
     
I hadn’t been back in the neighborhood since college, and it was around time that Ray-Ray, Simon and I drifted apart to our separate lives.
     
Mr. G seemed less frightening now that I’d grown up.
     
When you grow up, things look much smaller than you remember them being. I believe it has less to with growing up and more to do with perspective -- everything’s about perspective, just ask any photographer.
     
I decided to show my son the barbershop where I got my first haircut. It was still called Lionel’s Cuts and Beauty Shop, but Simon ran it now since his father moved back to Mississippi. Ray-Ray -- now Raymond T. Robinson, Esq. -- is a lawyer in Miami; a happy bachelor with no kids.
                                                                                      
I work in radio. I’ve got a syndicated show you might have heard of, if you’re familiar with black talk radio. NPR’s expressed some interest in it. But I ain’t holding my breath on that one.
     
I told Simon how I wanted my son’s hair cut.
     
“I didn’t see his chair outside,” I said, hearing the sound of his fists against the glass. The memory folded back on me.
     
“That’s because Mr. G passed away three years ago. They had a funeral. He has three daughters. Can you believe that? They fine as hell, and check this: dude had them by three different baby mamas. Mr. G was doing more than sitting in that lawn chair, I’ll tell you that, no wonder he drank so much.”
     
“It’s a little hard to believe.”
     
“Don’t even ask because I don’t even know,” said Simon, looking very much like his father. “There’s somebody for everybody.”
     
“Or some bodies,” I said thinking of those brown lips opening. “What killed him?”
     
“Liver infection,” said Simon. “The alcohol.”
     
“Did they do an autopsy?”
     
The horses, rolling about, charging forward...
     
“I know where you’re going with this... but no one knows anything. He looked real peaceful though. They said he died in his sleep.”
     
Simon changed the clippers.
     
“So, what did you see Paul? Come on, I know you’re not still mad about it.”
     
Eyes fixed, tongues lapping, twisted into his gums, between rows of decaying teeth...
     
“I’m not mad about it anymore. You want to know what I saw?” I said.
     
They wanted out of his mouth... they wanted freedom... Mr. G was a hero. He kept us safe from them.
     
Simon leaned forward a little.
      
“Nothing. Absolutely nothing,” I said. “He was totally empty.”
     
“Whatever you say man.” He started lining my son’s hairline. “Guess you’ll carry it to the grave, huh?”
     
“I guess.”
     
The yellow liquid burning them, boiling their skin, causing them to retreat... Mr. G was a hero...
     
“Who you voting for in November?” I asked.
     
Simon chuckled. “You didn’t see the signs outside?”
     
I shook my head.
     
“Who else? Billy Dee.”   

Author’s note:

“A few years back I noticed these boxes at my local video store with horror images and black characters on the boxes; heck, there was even one with Snoop Dogg. Problem is, you get the movie home and it’s utter nonsense. Urban horror isn’t taken that seriously in the film industry and perhaps a little more so in literature, but don’t see a lot of it. I figured, why not take it seriously? So I wrote ‘Mr. G’ because I wanted to write a story that I would have wanted to read (or see on the big or little screen).”