Quackadilly Blip
“You’d be so much hotter if you had long hair.”
Dani thought back to five years ago, when Jack had said that to her. She should have known better. Should have dumped him on the spot. Instead she spent the last five years growing her hair longer and longer, to make him happy. She had never gotten used to being called a Rapunzel, but he loved it, and he praised her hair endlessly, and he made her feel special.
And he cheated anyway.
They had met in their last year of college. For the first 21 years of her life, Dani had never had long hair, she’d always been a tomboy. Even the closely cropped pixie she wore on their first date was longer than usual for her, it had been kept in some sort of buzzcut for most of her college years. Now it hung all the way to her ass.
How stupid Dani had been to believe Jack when he said he was “working late” these past few months. If Jack hadn’t carelessly left his phone unlocked on the counter, she might have even believed him that he was at a “work conference in Chicago” this weekend, but she knew the truth now. She checked the location on the Air Tag she had left in his car. It was still parked in front of a hotel on the beach, nowhere near Chicago. He was still with that bitch.
Dani surveyed the apartment one last time. Yesterday, her friends had helped her move all her stuff out. Jack could keep the furniture. It was cheap and trashy anyway.
She looked at herself in the mirror. The person staring back didn’t look like her, and hadn’t in years.
“I should change that.” she thought to herself.
The scissors were still in the kitchen drawer. Dani quickly tied her hair into a ponytail and gleefully hacked away until two feet of hair fell to the floor. She carefully tied and bagged it so it could be donated.
She looked again in the mirror. Now her light brown hair swayed just above her shoulders, ragged on the ends. She hacked off another chunk and threw it in the trash where it belonged. Another even larger chunk came off, and as Dani reached towards the trash can, she realized she was being too nice. Instead, she tossed it on the bed they once shared and spread it around. Jack had just been working on upgrading his gaming PC, and hadn’t bothered to close the case. The next handful of hair Dani cut off was a big one, and she shoved it all in there. He’d get a nice surprise once the fan turned on.
Now it became a scavenger hunt to see what else she could ruin with the detritus of her once-glorious mane. She shoved a handful of hair in the toaster, then another in a bottle of fancy whiskey, then another in the shower drain. He was always complaining about her long hair clogging the shower, even though he was the one who asked her to grow it out in the first place.
After a little more mild vandalism, she finally was starting to like what she saw in the mirror, although her head was a mess of unevenly butchered strands sticking in every direction.
Jack’s clippers that he used for his beard were still sitting on the kitchen counter, surrounded by a mess of his own little hairs he hadn’t bothered to clean up. Ironic.
After thoroughly disinfecting the clipper head and 1/8″ guard, Dani placed it at the center of her forehead. She walked around the apartment aimlessly as she buzzed the remaining hairs off her head, letting the short clippings fall in the carpet and furniture. She had already taken the vacuum cleaner, and wasn’t sure Jack even knew how to use one.
Now, was loved the way she looked in the mirror.
“I can go shorter.”
She popped the guard off the clippers, walked over to jack’s dresser, and started clipping her hair down to the scalp, making sure to mix the tiny, sharp pieces of hair into all of Jack’s clothes.
Dani looked in the mirror again. This was even better. As much as she liked having short hair, it had never been this short in her life.
“Hmm… but I can still go shorter.”
She ran some hot water over her head and then covered it in shaving cream. As she scraped away the remaining hair down to the skin, she used Jack’s prized hockey jerseys as towels. Unsatisfied with the smoothness, she coated her hair with the shaving cream again, the second time using Jack’s work clothes, which he hadn’t even bothered to pack for his “business trip to Chicago”, as towels.
Dani smiled like she hadn’t smiled in a long time as she looked at herself and caressed her smooth head. She stood hairless amidst a mess of hair that wasn’t hers anymore, and never felt like it was.
And she knew one thing for sure. The next time a man told her she’d be so much hotter if she grew her hair out, he could go fuck himself.
