Loved this, especially the way you brought it back to the original here:

"Shut up, Sam," he says, and Sam does, watches the hair--some of it matted with blood, falling in clumps, some of it clean, floating away--and he thinks about all the cultures where shaving means starting over, becoming someone new.

so this and the original form a circuit in a really cool way. A great remix, not just a great story.

ps: also, hot