I write two pages for the magazine, for little more than beer money. I pitched them to the editor, Stev’n – ‘rhymes with seven’, he insists – when he was going on dates with my sister and briefly listened to what I had to say. Amy, who has been missing ever since our last argument, is sometimes attracted to awful men. (Is there another kind? she says whenever I mention this.)

In one of my pages I write about books. In the other I write about haircuts. I am paid twice the amount to write the haircut page as the books page, though it takes me less than a tenth of the time. I set forth in Hackney and Peckham, approach strangers, and ask if I can snap a picture to feature in the London Review of Haircuts. Alongside their picture in the magazine and online I award their hairstyle between one and five pairs of scissors – a system I developed personally and which as far as I know is unique. Hair criticism is not a hard science – it is more akin to the interpretation of dreams. Using the imaginative empathy you might find in an analyst or old-fashioned literary realist, I type a witty summary of what the person attached to the haircut is like, a précis of their secrets and longings, in fifteen to twenty words.

Increasingly, I am under pressure from Stev’n to be cruel. I understand the appeal snark holds to our readers, to our souls. I do my best to resist it. Before I approach the haircut, I have usually decided how many pairs of scissors I am to award; if it’s four or above, I will reveal my rating then and there. I have to consciously fight my attraction to women with fringes, whom I usually award four and a half scissors out of five. Technically, of course, that is nine scissors, but this is not a pedantic era, not in the basement discos of Kingsland Road. I never award five pairs of scissors. Perfect hair is impossible, but the quest for perfect hair provides the page with a sense of telos, something the readers of White Jesus crave, even if they don’t know they do. Hi, my name’s Paul and I write for White Jesus magazine. I love your hair, it’s totally four and a half scissors out of five – would you mind if I put you in the next issue? Sometimes the people I approach giggle and think I am joking. They are known to sneer and ask me if that is my best chat-up line. But that doesn’t happen often. I choose the ones who look friendly.

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