ShreyF
The full 50 page comic pdf is available on my patreon
Before the diamonds, the silk robes, and the toxic cloud of designer perfume, everybody on Fourth Street knew Clara for two things: her warm, unguarded smile and the longest, prettiest hair in the neighborhood.
At seven in the morning, the interior of Sweet Crumb Bakery was a sanctuary of golden light, sugar dust, and the comforting hiss of the espresso machine. Clara stood behind the glass pastry counter in a flour-dusted cream apron over a simple cotton blouse, her warm hazel eyes crinkling as she boxed up a half-dozen glazing-sticky pastries. Resting heavily over her left shoulder was her pride and joy—a thick, natural chestnut-brown braid that reached all the way down to her waist, swaying like a pendulum with every brisk movement she made.
“Fresh cinnamon rolls coming right up!” Clara called out, sliding the pink baker’s box across the counter before grabbing a damp cloth to wipe down the glass display.
On the other side of the counter, perched on worn wooden stools, her two best friends watched her with amused exhaustion. Maya, her dark curly hair bouncing around her shoulders as she gestured with a coffee cup, shook her head. “You’ve been on your feet since five in the morning, Clara. Sit down for five minutes!”
“Seriously,” agreed Zoe, pushing her glasses up the bridge of her nose so her practical auburn bob swung forward. “The croissants aren’t going to run away.”
Clara laughed, tucking a stray chestnut strand behind her ear. “I don’t mind! Once the morning rush clears, my hair and I are taking a long break.” Beneath the cheerful banter, though, the dull ache at the base of her skull was real; her braid felt impossibly heavy today, pulling at her scalp, and she couldn’t wait to let it down and brush it out.
Ten minutes later, the bakery quieted, and the three girls retreated to the cramped back breakroom. Clara sank onto a wooden stool with a groan of relief, reaching down to slide the tight elastic band off the tip of her braid. “Ahh, finally,” she sighed, working her fingers through the plaits. “Having it tied up all morning gives me a headache.”
She gave her head a gentle shake, and thirty inches of thick, wavy chestnut hair cascaded down past her lower back like a glossy waterfall. It caught the humble fluorescent light of the breakroom and turned it into rich bronze. Five years of growing it out without a single trim had made it an absolute marvel, and Clara secretly knew it was her best feature.
“Look at that shine!” Maya marveled, leaning against the breakroom table. “You could be in a shampoo commercial.”
Zoe stepped behind the stool, picking up Clara’s wooden paddle brush. With slow, rhythmic strokes, Zoe drew the bristles from Clara’s crown all the way down to the waist-length tips. “It’s like brushing silk,” Zoe murmured, admiring the sheer weight of the curtain in her hands. “Promise us you’ll never let anyone take scissors to this, Clara.”
“Are you kidding?” Clara giggled, leaning back into the soothing brush strokes. “I’d cry if I lost even an inch!”
That was the exact afternoon the brass bell above the front door chimed, and Julian walked in—bringing a world of easy money, sharp edges, and bad intentions with him.
He was late twenties, all razor-sharp jawline and slicked-back dark hair, wearing a bespoke charcoal suit and a heavy gold watch that cost more than the bakery’s industrial ovens. He had only ducked inside looking for a quiet little place to lay low for an hour, his dark eyes scanning the room with practiced detachment. Then Clara emerged from the back room. As she turned behind the counter, her loose, unbraided chestnut hair swirled smoothly around her waist like liquid satin.
Julian froze. *Well, hello,* he thought, taking in her innocent face, knockout figure, and that extraordinary curtain of hair.
“Good morning!” Clara beamed, her cheeks warming slightly under his intense gaze. “Welcome to Sweet Crumb Bakery. What can I get started for you?”
Julian strolled to the counter and leaned an elbow on the marble surface, flashing a practiced, predatory, yet undeniably magnetic smile. “An espresso—and the name of the girl with the most incredible hair in the city.”
Clara’s heart skipped a beat. Nobody who looked like a movie star had ever looked right at her like that. When she handed him his tiny porcelain cup, Julian didn’t reach for coins. Instead, his manicured hand dropped a crisp hundred-dollar bill into the glass tip jar alongside a matte-black business card embossed with silver lettering.
“Keep the change, Clara,” he murmured, his voice like velvet over gravel. “Call the number on that card tonight. Let me take you somewhere worthy of you.”
She stood blushing as he strolled out toward a parked luxury sedan, holding the black card delicately between her fingers while unconsciously running her other hand through her long chestnut locks. Instantly, Maya and Zoe were at the counter, their expressions darkened by immediate, worried frowns.
“Clara, throw that card in the trash,” Maya warned sharply. “Guys who flash cash like that in this district are bad news.”
“I’ve seen his face near the nightclub district,” Zoe added, lowering her voice. “People say he moves drugs for the syndicate.”
“You guys watch way too many crime dramas!” Clara laughed, clutching the card to her apron. “It’s just one dinner.”
—
That night, fifty floors above the smell of yeast and cinnamon, Clara sat at an exclusive rooftop lounge overlooking the glittering city skyline. She wore her best modest black dress, and her freshly washed waist-length hair gleamed straight and silky under the warm string lights, tucked neatly behind one ear.
“See?” Julian said, leaning across the table as he poured vintage champagne into her flute. “I told you the view up here was almost as breathtaking as you. Why waste your youth scrubbing counters for pennies? Stick with me, and you’ll never wear an apron again.”
Clara blushed deeply, twirling a long, silky chestnut lock around her index finger. *Hook, line, and sinker,* Julian thought, watching her eat every word right out of his hand. To Clara, Maya and Zoe had never seemed more wrong; he treated her like royalty.
Then Julian reached into his jacket and placed a plush velvet box on the table. Inside lay a pair of genuine diamond-encrusted hairpins. “A little souvenir for our first night,” he said.
“Julian, I can’t accept real diamonds!” she gasped.
He didn’t argue; he simply rose and stepped behind her chair. Both of his hands slid into the thick, waist-length mass of her hair, letting the heavy, silky strands slide slowly through his fingers before gathering a section into a half-up style and fastening the diamond pin. “Of course you can,” he whispered against her ear, sending shivers down her spine. “Hair this long and luxurious is a crown, Clara. You should wear diamonds in it every single day.”
Over her beaming shoulder, Julian caught his own reflection in the glass balustrade. His smile was ice-cold. Every man in the VIP lounge was going to stare when he walked in with a trophy like this on his arm.
It took less than three weeks for the poison of luxury to rewrite Clara’s soul. She stopped showing up at the bakery, and she barely remembered her old apartment. Every morning began in Julian’s sprawling penthouse bedroom, where sunlight poured over her emerald silk camisole as she sat at an ornate mirrored vanity. For hours, she would draw a gold-plated boar-bristle brush smoothly from her crown all the way down to her waist, admiring the thick, knot-free chestnut curtain that her new silk pillowcases kept flawless.
“Take my black card off the dresser,” Julian told her one morning, leaning against the doorframe as he buttoned his dress shirt with a faint smirk. “Book yourself the VIP package at Salon Lumière today—tell them to make you shine for tonight.”
Before heading to the salon, Clara made a brief stop at her old apartment to pack the last of her things, her waist-length hair held loosely in a gold claw clip with long tails cascading down her back. Maya and Zoe stood blocking the doorway, holding a tablet displaying a local news report about police raids in the nightclub district.
“Clara, look at this article!” Zoe pleaded. “Two of Julian’s associates were arrested with narcotics last night!”
“He’s a drug dealer, Clara!” Maya begged, watching Clara toss designer heels into a leather weekender bag without looking up. “Please come back to the bakery before you get dragged into something dangerous!”
Clara barely glanced at the screen, checking her manicured nails. “Oh, please. Do you really believe everything you read on local blogs?” Reaching up, she yanked the gold claw clip out and shook her waist-length chestnut hair loose with a cold, condescending sneer. “You two are just bitter because I moved out of this dump and you’re still scraping dough off counters.”
An hour later, reclining at a marble washbasin inside the ultra-luxury Salon Lumière while three assistants massaged golden argan oil through her wet, satin-like strands, Clara didn’t feel a shred of guilt. When the head stylist asked if they were trimming split ends, Clara snapped, “Do NOT touch the length! Just wash, deep-condition, and give me the biggest, glossiest blowout you can.”
When she strutted out the glass doors of Salon Lumière that afternoon in stiletto heels, a tight designer dress, and dark sunglasses, the sweet girl from Fourth Street was officially dead. Her waist-length hair had been lifted and curled by ionic dryers into a massive, bouncy, high-volume luxury blowout. She dramatically flipped the heavy waves over her shoulder, sneering down at ordinary pedestrians on the sidewalk. “Out of my way, please,” she snapped, convinced that with hair like this and Julian’s money, she was untouchable.
—
Over the next two months, Clara’s ego grew as lavish and suffocating as her wardrobe. She became a fixture in luxury fashion houses, her waist-length hair pulled into a sleek, razor-sharp high ponytail that swung like a glossy whip behind her back and made her cheekbones look killer. She barked at kneeling boutique assistants—”Hurry up! Do you know who my boyfriend is?”—and threw tantrums in neon-lit VIP booths. When a woman in a sequin dress accidentally snagged a single strand of Clara’s swinging ponytail at midnight, Clara shoved the woman back and screamed at the bouncers to throw the “clumsy idiot” out on the street.
Behind her in the leather booth, Julian watched the entitled meltdown over the rim of his whiskey glass, his eyes narrowing in pure irritation. *Christ, she’s loud,* he thought. *Used to be sweet arm candy… now she’s just a massive headache drawing way too much attention.*
Two days later, Maya and Zoe begged for one last lunch at a trendy downtown bistro to clear the air. Clara showed up forty-five minutes late wearing an extravagant white faux-fur coat and oversized sunglasses, her waist-length hair set in elaborate, cascading Hollywood curls. “Relax,” Clara drawled, using her phone camera to admire her bouncy waves. “My stylist took two hours setting these curls. You can’t rush perfection.”
“Listen to us, Clara,” Zoe whispered urgently, leaning across the table. “My cousin works at the courthouse—Julian’s operation is under surveillance. When he goes down, he’ll let you take the fall!”
Maya reached out, gently touching Clara’s wrist. “We love you, Clara. Move back in with me tonight. Leave his dirty money behind.”
Clara yanked her wrist away as if burned, her lip curling as she looked Maya’s sweater up and down. “Move back into your cramped apartment? And wear clearance-rack sweaters like that? Are you insane?” She stood up abruptly, tossing a crumpled ten-dollar bill onto the tablecloth beside her untouched water. “Here’s a tip for your little intervention: mind your own pathetic lives.” Turning sharply on her heel, she deliberately whipped her thick, waist-length chestnut curls right across Maya’s face. “Don’t ever call me again. We’re done!”
That evening back at the penthouse was the breaking point. While Clara sat at her vanity in a crimson silk robe, aggressively brushing her nighttime waves, kissing her own reflection, and whining loudly for a white convertible and for the maid to be fired, Julian sat in a dark leather armchair swirling a glass of scotch. His eyes were dead and cold as he stared at the back of her head. He had already decided to dump her tomorrow.
Then, watching her flip those prized waist-length locks in the mirror, a slow, wicked, sadistic smirk spread across Julian’s lips. Kicking her out was too easy. She worshiped that hair more than anything on earth. Why not see how high-and-mighty she felt when he took every single inch of it as a parting prank?
The next morning, while Clara stood blissfully under the steamy marble rainfall shower—singing softly to herself as she worked imported Kerastase lather down the heavy, three-foot length of her wet hair—Julian stepped out onto the private balcony and slid the heavy glass door shut. He dialed his private barber, Marco, and wired five thousand dollars straight to his account.
“Clear your salon schedule tonight at nine,” Julian said, grinning darkly against the balcony railing. “I’m bringing Clara in under a little cover story. She’s going to ask for a shoulder-length trim… I want you to shear it all off and bleach whatever fuzz is left.”
Inside, Clara wrapped her hair in a microfiber towel and spent an hour executing a flawless silk press with a ceramic flat iron and paddle brush until her waist-length hair shone like bone-straight dark glass. She was just running both hands down the silky strands, thinking how her hair was her entire signature look, when the bedroom door flew open with a violent *BANG!*
Julian rushed inside, his tie yanked loose, hair mussed, putting on an Oscar-worthy performance of sheer terror. “Clara! Pack a bag right now! Move!” He sprinted to the security console, slamming the steel deadbolts and peering tensely through the blinds. “The feds just raided my downtown warehouse! Somebody flipped on us!”
Clara’s heart plummeted into her stomach as Zoe’s warning echoed in her ears. Julian grabbed her by the shoulders and shoved his smartphone inches from her face, showing her a fake police bulletin he had mocked up in Photoshop in five minutes: *HIGH PRIORITY BOLO: Male suspect fleeing with female accomplice—early 20s, identifiable by waist-length dark chestnut hair.*
“They… they put my hair in the police alert?! Why me?!” Clara gasped, her face draining of color as she instinctively swept all thirty inches of her hair forward over her shoulders, hugging the silky mass tightly against her chest.
“Because you made a scene in every VIP club in town flipping that mane around!” Julian barked, tossing a trench coat at her. “We have a private plane waiting across the state line in two hours, but we can’t get past the highway checkpoints looking like this! That waist-length hair is a neon sign screaming ‘arrest us.’ It has to go tonight, Clara.”
“Cut my hair?! No! Never! I’ll stuff it under a baseball cap or wear a wig!” she cried, digging her heels in.
“Feds check for wigs at checkpoints, Clara! Do you want ten years in a federal prison cell?!”
—
Twenty minutes later, Julian’s black sports car slid down a rain-slicked industrial alley and stopped beside a discreet boutique barbershop with a buzzing red *CLOSED* sign in the frosted window. Julian hustled a trembling Clara through the side door and slid the heavy brass deadbolt shut behind them.
From the rear wash area stepped Marco—mid-thirties, muscular, tattoos peeking from rolled-up black sleeves, holding a pair of gleaming steel shears with a stoic expression. “Chair’s ready, boss.”
Clara backed up against the reception counter as her trench coat came off, tears welling in her eyes as she stared at the leather hydraulic chair like an electric chair. “Julian, please… look how long it is! It took me five years to grow! I can’t cut it!”
Julian stepped in close, cupping her trembling chin with fake tenderness to hide his grin. “Hey, look at me. Once we’re sipping cocktails in our villa in Cabo, I’ll hire you a personal stylist every day. Do this for us, baby.”
Greed for the villa in Cabo and terror of a prison cell overpowered her instincts. *Okay,* she told herself, swallowing hard. *A shoulder-length lob is still trendy. I can survive a lob.* “Okay… okay, I’ll do it.”
She walked on shaky legs and sank into the heavy leather chair facing the tall, brightly illuminated mirror. “Chin up for me,” Marco said calmly. He pulled a crisp white disposable paper neck strip from a chrome dispenser, stretching the tissue taut around her bare throat and pressing the adhesive ends firmly together. With a sharp snap, Marco unfurled a massive, heavy-duty glossy black vinyl salon cape, billowing the dark fabric across the air before draping it completely over Clara’s torso, shoulders, and lap. Reaching behind her neck, he snapped the metal fasteners tightly shut over the white tissue strip.
“Let’s get all this length out over the back,” Marco murmured, sliding his hands underneath her hair at the nape and lifting the heavy waist-length mass out from beneath the collar before folding the upper half of the crisp white neck strip down over the cape’s collar, locking her in. Clara gripped the leather armrests beneath the heavy vinyl, feeling completely pinned and trussed up, while thirty inches of pristine chestnut silk cascaded down the glossy black back of the cape.
Marco picked up a chrome water mister and sprayed her hair thoroughly from roots to tips, darkening the strands, then drew a fine-tooth barber comb from her crown all the way down to the waist-length ends in one slow, deliberate stroke.
Clara pushed a trembling hand out from beneath the heavy black cape, pointing firmly at a spot just below her collarbones. “Listen to me! Cut it right here below my shoulders! Do NOT go a single millimeter shorter than my collarbones! Do you hear me?! Just a long lob and maybe some curtain bangs!”
Standing behind the chair, Julian nodded soothingly while catching Marco’s eye in the mirror and giving a slow, unmistakable thumbs-down gesture. “He heard you, babe. Just close your eyes so you don’t stress yourself out.”
Clara squeezed her eyes shut. Behind her, Marco didn’t reach for her shoulders. Instead, he gathered the entire wet mass of her waist-length hair into one thick grip right against the nape of her neck, just above the white tissue strip. He slid heavy steel barber shears directly above his knuckles at the very base of her skull.
*Wait…* Clara thought, panic spiking. *Why does that cold metal feel so high up on my neck?!*
*CRUNCH—SNIP!*
With two powerful squeezes of the blades, Marco severed the entire thick bundle cleanly at the nape. “Wait—STOP!” Clara shrieked, her eyes snapping open just as Marco casually brought the severed, three-foot-long bundle of chestnut hair around the side of the chair and dropped it with a heavy *thud* onto the counter in front of the mirror.
“Bulk weight is off,” Marco said.
Clara’s jaw dropped in blood-draining horror. Three feet of her prized hair lay lifeless on the counter, and in the mirror, her remaining wet hair stuck out in jagged, butchered chin-length chunks barely grazing her jaw above the white neck strip. “ARE YOU INSANE?! Look how short you cut it! I said below my shoulders, you idiot!”
Clawing blindly from beneath the heavy black cape at the neck clasp, she tried to push herself out of the chair. “Get this cape off me! Don’t touch me again! Julian, look what he did!”
Julian stepped forward instantly, clamping both hands firmly onto her caped shoulders and shoving her right back down into the seat. “Sit still, Clara! Do you think a chin-length bob is going to fool facial recognition at the border?! It’s already cut! Let Marco finish taking it short and bleaching it so we don’t end up in handcuffs tonight!”
Before she could scream another word, Marco set down the shears, picked up heavy-duty black cordless clippers fitted with a short `#2` plastic guard, and flicked the switch. *BZZZZZZ!*
“Is that—are those clippers?! No, keep those away from me!”
Marco placed a firm hand on the crown of her head, tilting her chin down toward her chest, and pressed the buzzing clippers flat against the nape of her neck just above the white tissue strip, driving them straight up to the occipital bone. “AHH! Stop! You’re buzzing my head!” Clara sobbed as the ruthless vibration rattled her skull and thick, four-inch dark chestnut locks tumbled down the glossy black cape, leaving a pale, velvety `#2` buzzed highway up the back of her neck.
“Hold still or I’ll slip and take it to the skin,” Marco warned evenly, running the buzzing clippers right up over her temples and high above both ears, shearing away the remaining chin-length curtains. Switching to shears-over-comb across the crown and fringe, he rapidly hacked the top down into choppy, uneven one-to-two-inch tufts that rained across her forehead and onto the vinyl cape. When he snapped the clippers off and dusted her tear-stained cheeks and bare neck with a soft talcum brush, five years of vanity lay in floor sweepings.
“It’s all gone…” Clara whispered, staring hollow-eyed at her fully exposed ears, buzzed temples, and ragged short crop while Julian bit his lip behind her to keep from bursting out laughing.
“Cut’s done. Time for color,” Marco said, stirring a bowl of pungent, icy blue-white platinum bleach paste. He slapped the cold, stinging globs directly onto her short crop and buzzed sides, brushing it down to the raw scalp before stretching a clear plastic processing cap tightly over her head and swinging a harsh red halo heat lamp down over her.
For twenty-five agonizing minutes, Clara sat small, caped, and miserable under the burning lamp. Through her tears, she noticed Julian lounging lazily on the waiting sofa across the shop, feet up, scrolling through sports scores and sipping an espresso. “Julian… shouldn’t we be hurrying? What about the highway checkpoints?”
“Relax,” he said without looking up, waving a dismissive hand. “Can’t rush chemical processing, princess.”
The timer dinged. Marco marched her to the basin, ripped off the plastic cap, and hosed the bleach out with cold water, revealing blindingly pale yellow-platinum fuzz. Back in the chair, he didn’t use a brush—just blasted her head for thirty seconds with a hot blow-dryer while roughing up the tiny tufts with his fingers. With a sharp flourish, Marco unclasped the black salon cape, ripped off the damp white paper neck strip, and whipped the cape off her shoulders in a shower of short prickly clippings. “All yours.”
Clara stared at the mirror in stunned silence. Staring back was a stark, spiky, uneven platinum-blonde pixie-buzz—one to two inches on top with tight buzzed sides. She looked like a bleached-blonde hedgehog.
—
Standing up slowly amidst the mountains of her severed dark chestnut hair on the floor, Clara reached a trembling hand up to touch the prickly, bleached spikes on her crown. She turned toward Julian, her shoulders hunched and voice cracking. “Okay, Julian… I did what you asked. You can’t even tell who I am anymore. Can we go to the airport now?”
Julian looked up from his phone, took one full look at her spiky bleached head, and suddenly doubled over, bursting into loud, cruel laughter. “BWAHAHAHA! Oh, holy shit, Marco! Look at her head! That’s even funnier than I pictured!”
Pulling a thick wad of hundred-dollar bills from his jacket, Julian slapped it into Marco’s hand while Clara stood frozen. “Julian…? Why are you laughing? What about the police?”
Wiping a tear of mirth from his eye, Julian turned his phone screen toward her, showing the Photoshop app where he had mocked up the fake police alert. “Wake up, sweetheart! There’s no police raid, no checkpoints, and definitely no private jet to Cabo!”
The realization hit Clara like a physical blow. Both hands flew up to clutch her short, spiky bleached hair as her knees nearly buckled. “You… you lied to me?! Why?!”
Julian picked up her single packed suitcase and dropped it at her feet, his expression turning cold and bored. “Because we’re done, Clara. You started out sweet, and then you turned into the most obnoxious, entitled, boring snob I’ve ever dated.”
“If you wanted to break up with me, why didn’t you just dump me?!” she sobbed, tugging hopelessly at the one-inch spikes. “Why did you take my hair?!”
Julian strolled to the door, jingling his car keys. “Why? Because you acted like having long hair made you a queen—and watching you beg to keep it was hilarious. See ya around, spiky. Have fun taking the bus.”
Seconds later, his black sports car roared away down the wet alley, leaving Clara alone in the eleven o’clock chill. When the night wind blew, she shivered violently as the cold air hit her closely buzzed nape and bare ears for the very first time. Rubbing her palm over the fuzzy `#2` buzz at the back of her neck, she sobbed into the empty street. As she dragged her suitcase back toward her old neighborhood, she caught her reflection in a dark storefront window. The haughty villainess with the waist-length blowouts was gone, replaced by an exhausted, humbled girl with a jagged bleached crop. She had treated her best friends like dirt out of pure vanity, and they had every right to slam the door in her face—but she owed them an apology.
At sunrise the next morning, Clara walked down Fourth Street wearing faded jeans and an oversized grey hoodie with the hood pulled low over her brow. Her hand trembled as she pushed open the door of Sweet Crumb Bakery. Behind the counter, Maya and Zoe looked up with cheerful smiles that instantly froze into cold, guarded glares.
“Forgot something, Clara?” Zoe asked flatly. “Or did you come back to insult our clothes again?”
Clara stepped up to the counter with her head bowed, tears stinging her eyes. “I came to say I’m sorry. I turned into a horrible, shallow monster. You two were right about Julian, right about everything… and I ended up being the biggest fool in the city.” With shaking hands, she reached up and slowly pulled the grey hood back—exposing her choppy, spiky, bleached-platinum pixie-buzz to the bright bakery lights. “See? Karma already collected.”
For five full seconds, nobody breathed. Zoe’s glasses slid down her nose as her jaw dropped. Beside her, Maya clapped both hands over her mouth, her shoulders shaking violently until she completely lost it, bursting into loud, uncontrollable laughter across the pastry counter.
“Where… where is the rest of your hair?!” Zoe gasped.
“PFFFT—AHAHAHA! Oh my god, Clara! You look like an angry dandelion!” Maya howled, wiping tears of laughter while Clara turned bright red, rubbing her bare, buzzed nape in mortified embarrassment. “What happened to ‘I’d cry if I lost an inch’?!”
“I DID cry! He tricked me into a fake disguise cut and dumped me!”
Still laughing, Maya and Zoe hurried around the counter and wrapped Clara in a tight, warm group hug. “Oh, come here, you idiot,” Maya said affectionately. “You definitely deserved the haircut, though.”
“I really don’t deserve you guys…” Clara whispered, burying her face against Maya’s shoulder in sheer relief before Zoe pulled back, eyeing the uneven bleached tufts. “Seriously though, who cut this? A lawnmower? We are evening those spikes out tonight.”
That evening in Maya’s living room, over takeout noodles, forgiveness came with relentless teasing. Zoe knelt behind Clara on the sofa, vigorously ruffling the short platinum fuzz like a tennis ball—”It feels like a fuzzy peach at the back!”—while Maya held up Clara’s old diamond hairpin next to a tiny one-inch spike, grinning wickedly. “Remember when you flipped your curls in my face at the bistro? Go ahead, try flipping your hair at me now!”
“Shut up, Maya! I have nothing left to flip and you know it!” Clara laughed, swatting their hands away as static electricity crackled in her spikes.
Two weeks later, the diamonds were pawned, the ego was gone, and the shortest haircut on Fourth Street had become a permanent fixture. Standing proudly behind the register in her flour-dusted apron, her spiky platinum-blonde pixie neatly textured with a dab of pomade, Clara handed a cappuccino to a regular with a genuine smile.
Leaning on the counter beside her, Maya grinned. “You know, Zoe, seeing how fast she gets ready in the morning makes me tempted… maybe we should get matching pixie buzzes to keep her company!”
“Careful, Clara,” Zoe teased. “If we actually do it, you won’t even be the edgiest girl behind the counter anymore!”
Clara ran a hand effortlessly through her ultra-short platinum spikes and laughed. “Don’t tempt me! Come on, I’ll walk you two straight to the barbershop after our shift!”
