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The invitation arrived at the manor on a bright afternoon, carried by a royal messenger in a blue-and-gold uniform. Cinderella paused with her broom held against her chest while the stepmother and her two daughters listened from their comfortable seats in the main hall. Cinderella’s blonde hair was neatly arranged in a single bun on top of her head, secured with the same blue headband she wore every day.

“By command of the palace,” the messenger announced, unrolling his scroll, “every eligible young woman in the kingdom is invited to tomorrow evening’s royal ball.”

“The prince!” cried the red-haired stepsister.

“He could choose one of us!” said the brown-haired sister, clasping her hands beneath her chin.

Cinderella lowered her eyes to hide her hopeful smile. Every eligible young woman included her.

That evening, dresses, ribbons, gloves and jewelry covered every table in the house. Cinderella carried freshly folded laundry into the room and found her stepsisters arguing over necklaces.

“Stepmother,” Cinderella began carefully, “if I finish every chore tomorrow, may I attend the ball too?”

The sisters stared at her before bursting into laughter.

“You?” the red-haired sister said.

“At the palace?” added the other, pointing at Cinderella’s patched sleeve.

The stepmother did not laugh. Her gaze moved slowly from Cinderella’s worn dress to the blonde bun on top of her head. A calculating expression appeared in her eyes.

“Perhaps,” she said. “But only after we make you presentable.”

The sisters immediately stood on either side of Cinderella. The red-haired sister placed an arm around her shoulders, while the brown-haired sister lifted a hairbrush.

“Mother is right,” said the first.

“You cannot possibly go looking like this,” said the second.

“Luckily, you have us.”

Cinderella was surprised by their sudden kindness, but she wanted to believe it was sincere. “You really mean it?”

“Of course,” the brown-haired sister replied.

“We’ll make you unforgettable,” promised the red-haired one.

They guided Cinderella into the dressing room and seated her before a large ornate mirror. The stepmother settled into a chair nearby, watching with her hands folded in her lap.

“Perhaps just a little styling?” Cinderella suggested.

“Naturally.”

The brown-haired sister removed the blue headband and began pulling pins from Cinderella’s bun. One by one, the fasteners clicked against the table. The bun loosened, uncoiled and finally collapsed. Long blonde hair poured down Cinderella’s back, reaching well below her shoulders.

The red-haired sister drew a brush slowly through it, starting at the ends and working upward. The dense blonde strands became smooth and glossy under the bristles.

“Oh, there’s plenty to work with,” the brown-haired sister said, lifting a thick section and letting it slide through her fingers.

“Far too much, in fact,” the stepmother replied.

Before Cinderella could ask what she meant, a black barber cape was wrapped around her shoulders and fastened tightly at her neck. Her long hair was pulled outside the cape so that it hung freely down the back of the chair.

“A cape?” Cinderella asked.

“We wouldn’t want hair on your dress,” said the red-haired sister.

Cinderella looked toward the table. Beside the familiar brushes and combs were several pairs of scissors, rows of tiny perm rods, towels, bowls, dye brushes and a large set of clippers.

Her eyebrows rose. “Why do you need those?”

The brown-haired sister picked up the clippers and activated them. Their sudden mechanical buzz filled the dressing room.

“Modern fashion.”

Cinderella stared at the tool in the mirror. “That does not sound like a trim.”

The stepmother rose and stepped behind the chair. Using the pointed end of a comb, she traced a narrow line from the center of Cinderella’s forehead across the crown and toward the nape. She created a matching line on the other side, isolating one central strip of hair.

“Keep this strip,” she instructed. “Everything beside it goes.”

The sisters separated Cinderella’s hair into three distinct zones: a thick left section, a narrow center strip and a thick right section. The center was clipped securely upward.

Cinderella’s eyes widened. “Everything beside it?”

“Don’t worry,” the red-haired sister said, lifting a large pair of scissors.

“You’ll understand when it’s finished,” added the other.

A thick bundle of hair from Cinderella’s right side was drawn horizontally away from her head. The scissors opened several centimeters above her ear.

“Wait,” Cinderella said, turning her eyes toward the blades. “How short are you—”

The scissors closed.

“CHRRR-SNIP!”

The pressure pulled briefly at her scalp before the entire bundle separated. The red-haired sister held the severed length triumphantly while Cinderella’s shoulders jerked beneath the cape.

“Ah!”

The remaining hair on that side ended in a rough, uneven shelf near her ear. Before Cinderella could fully process the change, the second sister gathered a section from the opposite side.

Another loud crunch of the blades sent a heavy blonde lock sliding across the cape. More cuts followed. Thick sections fell over Cinderella’s shoulders, landed in her lap and slipped onto the floor.

“Much lighter already!” the brown-haired sister said.

Cinderella watched the pile grow. Within minutes, nearly all the hair on both sides had been reduced to a few uneven centimeters. Only the narrow center strip remained long, hanging from its clips like an untouched golden ribbon.

“You cut nearly all of it off,” Cinderella whispered.

“Nearly,” said the stepmother.

The brown-haired sister picked up the clippers again.

Cinderella’s head was tilted toward the right, exposing her left temple. The teeth of the clipper blade touched the short hair immediately in front of her ear.

“No—wait!”

The clippers moved upward.

A pale track appeared behind the blade. Short fragments of blonde hair spilled over Cinderella’s ear and scattered across the cape. The sister made another pass beside the first, then another, each one widening the closely shaved section.

The vibration travelled through Cinderella’s head. She squeezed the armrests while the clippers moved around her ear and toward the boundary of the central strip. What had once been thick, soft hair was reduced to an even layer of pale stubble.

When the left side was finished, Cinderella raised her fingertips and cautiously touched it. The texture startled her. It was soft in one direction and rough in the other, with the shape of her head plainly visible beneath it.

“I can feel my scalp.”

“Then we did it properly,” the red-haired sister said.

The clippers moved to the right side. Cinderella squeezed her eyes shut and scrunched her nose as the blade touched her sideburn.

“Hold still,” said the brown-haired sister.

“I am trying!”

The tool travelled behind her ear and upward toward the central strip. Loose hair drifted down like pale dust. Pass by pass, the second side became identical to the first.

Cinderella cautiously opened one eye, then the other. In the mirror she saw shaved sides framing the long strip still clipped along the top of her head.

“This is a mohawk.”

“Very observant,” said the red-haired sister.

“Not yet,” the stepmother corrected. “It is still much too long.”

Cinderella’s chin dropped toward her chest as the clippers reached the nape. The center strip was lifted out of the way, leaving the surrounding back exposed. The blade travelled upward from the base of her neck, removing the short remnants and connecting the two shaved sides.

“It feels cold back there,” Cinderella muttered.

“You’ll get used to it.”

The red-haired sister used the corner of the blade to clean around each ear and sharpen the outline at the nape. Short blonde hairs covered the black cape.

“How much is even left?”

“Enough for what we have planned,” said the stepmother.

The center strip was finally released. Its untouched length fell forward over Cinderella’s face and backward over the shaved nape, looking even longer now that nothing remained beside it.

“Now the important part,” the red-haired sister said.

She lifted the front section vertically between her fingers. Cinderella looked upward at the raised blonde hair, her mouth tightening into a worried grimace. The scissors began cutting rapidly above the sister’s fingers.

“SNIP! SNIP! SNIP!”

Short pieces scattered over Cinderella’s forehead and cheeks. One landed on the tip of her nose, making her pucker her lips and blow upward.

“Pfft—there’s hair in my face!”

The sisters worked from the forehead toward the crown, shortening the entire strip to only a few centimeters. When they reached the back, the last of Cinderella’s former length dropped onto the growing pile.

The brown-haired sister combed the remaining ridge straight upward. A short, narrow mohawk now ran continuously from Cinderella’s forehead across the crown and toward the nape.

Cinderella turned her head slightly, studying the severe silhouette in the mirror.

“You actually gave me a mohawk.”

“We’re only halfway finished,” the red-haired sister replied.

A tail comb divided the short ridge into many tiny rectangular sections. Cinderella crossed her eyes upward as the brown-haired sister wrapped the first section near her forehead around an unusually small perm rod.

“What is that?”

“Your curls.”

More rods followed. Each small section was wound tightly against Cinderella’s scalp. The rods continued in neat rows from the front of the mohawk to the back.

“Why are they so small?” Cinderella asked as the red-haired sister secured another.

“Because we want the curls very small.”

The sisters saturated every rod with perm solution. A sharp chemical smell rose immediately. Cinderella wrinkled her nose, pulled her chin backward and fanned the air in front of her face.

“Ugh! What is that smell?”

“Fashion,” the brown-haired sister said.

After the solution had processed and been rinsed, the sisters began removing the rods. The first released section sprang into a tiny, tightly coiled blonde ringlet.

“BOING!”

Cinderella’s eyes followed it as it bounced. “…Oh.”

Rod after rod was removed. The narrow center strip transformed into a dense row of compact curls. Cinderella pinched one between two fingers and pulled it outward. When she released it, it sprang immediately back into place.

“PING!”

“They’re tiny!”

The sisters laughed behind her.

Then the brown-haired sister placed a ceramic bowl on the table. It contained a thick mixture the color of a clear summer sky.

Cinderella stared at it through the mirror. “Blue.”

“To match your dress.”

“How thoughtful.”

The brush pressed the color into every ringlet, coating the curls from their roots to their tips while leaving the shaved blonde sides untouched. By the time the dye was rinsed away, the mohawk had become a narrow ridge of tight light-blue curls.

Cinderella returned to the mirror for the final reveal. There was no long hair left anywhere. Both sides and most of the back were closely shaved, while the compact blue curls ran over the center of her head.

She pressed one hand against the stubble. A single tear gathered at the corner of her eye, but irritation was already replacing her shock.

“Perfect!” cried the red-haired sister.

“The prince will certainly remember you!” said the other.

“You said you were helping me.”

The stepmother crossed her arms. “We helped you understand that the ball is not your place.”

They dressed for the celebration and left Cinderella alone. At the door, the stepmother glanced back.

“Perhaps your hair will grow before the next royal event.”

The door slammed.

Cinderella sat beside the fireplace, touching the shaved side before pulling gently on one blue curl.

“I cannot decide which part is worse,” she murmured. “The shaving, the curls or the blue.”

A blue-white glow suddenly filled the room.

The Fairy Godmother appeared in a swirl of sparkling light and paused when she saw Cinderella’s hair.

Cinderella pointed at her head. “Please tell me you can put it back.”

“Put it back?” The Fairy Godmother lifted one curl and studied it. “No.”

“…No?”

“We are going to make it magnificent.”

Magic swept around Cinderella. Her patched servant clothes became an elegant pale-blue ball gown with silver details, but her haircut did not change. Instead, the shaved sections gained immaculate edges. The tiny blue curls became glossy and evenly shaped, with a few crystal pins sparkling among them.

“You didn’t change the haircut,” Cinderella said.

“I changed nothing about it. I merely showed you what it could become.”

For the first time that evening, Cinderella looked at her reflection without wanting to hide.

At the palace, guests turned as she crossed the ballroom. The stepmother’s eyes widened. One sister nearly dropped her drink.

“That’s our haircut!”

Cinderella raised one eyebrow. Apparently, it looked different when she was enjoying it.

The prince approached. “I don’t believe we’ve met.”

“We haven’t.”

They began to dance. As Cinderella turned, the polished curls caught the ballroom light.

“Your hair is extraordinary,” he said.

“It has had a very eventful day.”

“Then I hope the rest of the evening treats you better.”

For several hours, it did.

When midnight struck, Cinderella fled down the palace staircase, losing one glass slipper. Yet it was not the slipper that caught the prince’s attention the following morning.

At Cinderella’s home, he barely watched while the sisters argued over whose foot should be forced into the shoe. Then he saw Cinderella crossing the hallway with a laundry basket. Her gown and crystal pins were gone, but the blue curled mohawk remained.

“I don’t need the slipper,” he said, walking past the sisters. “I would recognize that blue mohawk anywhere.”

“You remembered my hair?” Cinderella asked.

“It was rather difficult to forget.”

“That was supposed to ruin everything!” the brown-haired sister blurted.

Silence filled the hall.

The prince slowly turned. “Supposed to ruin everything?”

Within minutes, the sisters were accusing one another.

“She chose the mohawk!”

“You chose the perm!”

“Mother chose the blue!”

“STOP TALKING!” shouted the stepmother.

By afternoon, two wooden barber chairs stood on a stage in the crowded town square. The sisters were seated beneath white capes while two barbers brushed out their long, carefully protected hair. On a nearby table rested scissors, razors and two heavy hand-operated clippers.

“Cinderella, please!” begged the red-haired sister.

“You know how long hair takes to grow!” cried the other.

Cinderella touched the shaved side of her own head and ran her fingers through one tight blue curl. They had never asked her. They had simply decided.

The prince looked at Cinderella while the barbers took their positions.

“Shall they proceed?”

The clippers waited inches from the first sister’s hairline. The second barber gathered the other sister’s long brown hair away from her neck. The crowd fell completely silent.

Cinderella looked from one terrified face to the other and opened her mouth.

“I think—”

Snip… or spare?