Bit by Bit

I kind of accepted a challenge to write this one, so it’s a bit darker than most of my stuff. Just consider yourself warned.

_________________________________

Alexandra shoved her phone back into her purse before her landlord’s voicemail had even finished. It was bad enough he had called to remind her about the rent due in three days, but to expect her to actually answer? A phone call? The guy really had to get with the times.

Taking a deep breath as she walked down the city street, Alexandra tried to find her zen again. She had a big job today for a very well regarded jewelry line’s marketing campaign being shot by the even more highly regarded photographer Donovan, and if it went well it could go a long way to putting her on the modeling world’s map. 

But first, she had to get the studio on time — and in a bit of a change of pace, she was actually just a bit early. With that in mind, she allowed herself a quick moment to stop and look at her reflection in the storefront along the busy Fashion District street. She flashed her incredibly bright smile, her trademark perfect teeth shining back at her, and lifted her sunglasses to make sure the hint of eyeliner she’d traced around her rich brown eyes hadn’t smudged. Then, with a well-practiced grab and sweeping tug, she let her long, soft, thick dark brown hair fall free from its temporary ponytail. It tumbled down her back in lush waves, bouncing lazily at just about bra strap length.

Her smile turned into a pout as she gathered the magnificent locks forward, the perfectly blunt-cut ends reminding her of how, just a coupe of days earlier, it’d been so much longer. Like, three whole inches longer, at least until that ravenous scissor-happy stylist her agency had sent her to completely ignore her instructions to only trim and neaten up the ends of her treasured mane. 

The hack job had been brutal, and would take half a year to grow out. And considering Alexandra’s head shots included lush locks that were clearly longer than they were now, she could only hope the photographer and marketing folks for the jeweler didn’t mind.

“Alexandra?”

She turned, and a woman with a super short pink pixie cut was looking at her from the studio’s doorway. 

“Yes?”

“Come on. I’m Miranda. We’re waiting for you.”

Alexandra cursed, realizing she’d somehow, once again, turned being early into being tardy.

______________________

Inside, everything around her seemed to be moving a hundred miles a minute. Fashion assistants were buzzing around with dresses and tops, holding them up to see how they looked against Alexandra’s olive skin tone, while the photographer’s assistants were checking the lighting and making sure the plain grey backdrop was falling perfectly.

Meanwhile, Alexandra was dressed in a robe and sitting in a chair before a brightly lit mirror, having her makeup redone as the pink-haired pixie ran a brush back through Alexandra’s wealth of dark locks. 

“Your hair is absolutely gorgeous,” Miranda commented.

“Thank you. I…”

“It’s a shame about how uneven the ends are,” she added, not even recognizing Alexandra had said anything.

Alexandra blinked. “What?”

“The ends. Did you just get a hair cut recently?”

“Yeah,” Alexandra said. She swallowed a nervous lump in her throat. “A couple of days ago. It was supposed to be a trim but she cut off a bit more than that… But I thought it was well done.”

“She cut off more than expected?” Miranda asked, making eye contact in tiger mirror with a curious expression. “You must have been pissed.”

Alexandra nodded, slightly relieved that Miranda didn’t seem to be angry. “I was!” She said, lifting her chin as the makeup artist put the last touches on. “I get a lot of work because of my hair, you know?”

“Well, fortunately it’ll be nice and easy to fix. Why don’t you stand up and I’ll call Donovan over to make sure we’re on the same page.”

Alexandra waited for her makeup to be done, and once the woman moved away has rose from the chair. At first, she didn’t want to look away form the mirror — her makeup was absolutely perfect and she couldn’t remember ever looking more dignified, regal, and high-class elegant. But then Donovan appeared next to her, a breathtakingly handsome man with light, cropped hair and beautiful blue eyes. 

“Alexandra?” He asked as he offered his hand. “I’m Donovan. Nice to meet you.”

She didn’t even get a chance to rouse herself out of her hot-guy stupor before Miranda stole his attention. 

“So I think we need to even up her hair a bit. Maybe to here?”

Miranda was clearly gesturing, and it didn’t seem to be too much higher than bra-strap length.

“Do we really have to?” Alexandra asked. “I just had a lot cut off.”

“How much?” Donovan asked.

“Three inches,” she answered, her voice sounding a bit more sheepish than she wanted.

The photographer laughed. “Oh, come on, Alexa. Three inches is nothing.” He patted her shoulder. “You’ll recover, I promise.”

Alexandra tried to correct him in regard to her name, but he was already walking away. Before she could call out, Miranda had reached up and forced her to look at the mirror again as the stylist ran her comb through Alexandra’s long, wavy locks. Most of them fell down her back, but heavy masses also cascaded down in front of her shoulders, resting against and falling just past her pert breasts. 

“Just stay still and will have this tidied in no time. “

Miranda walked around her to the table below the mirror and picked up a pair of long, silver shears, creating a sudden bursts of nerves as Alexandra began to fidget in place. She hadn’t agreed to having her hair cut, and she had no idea who this woman was.

“Do we really have to? Can’t we just put it in an updo? Wouldn’t that show off the jewelry better, anyway?”

Miranda gave a heavy sigh. “Look, if you want, I can call Donovan back over here and you can ask him again, but you kind of already have us running late, don’t you? A lot of people are working here today and every minute is more money this is costing. Do you really want to give them a reason to find someone more agreeable? This is a big city, you know.”

Alexandra’s eyes widened, her mouth suddenly going dry. “No, please don’t,” she whispered.

Miranda patted her shoulder. “I don’t want to scare you, but I’m just being honest. This is a cruel business. If you want to get paid for today, sometimes it’s best to just suck it up.”

The voicemail left by Alexandra’s landlord came back to mind, his gruff voice demanding the rent that was due in her mind until its gravelly notes were replaced by a long, slow, and unexpected crunching noise.

Alexandra gasped softy, struggling not to move as she felt Miranda behind her, carefully drawing her long, soft hair downward with a comb before trapping it in place to be shorn away by the silver blades. Again and again the stylist cut, carefully, tediously moving across Alexandra’s body before reaching forward, gathering back the long locks laying against her breasts and trimming them, too.

Schniiikt, schniiiiikt, schniiiiIKT. 

“There, done. That wasn’t so bad, was it?”

As Miranda asked, and before Alexandra could answer, the stylist flicked Alexandra’s beautiful hair forward, letting long, flowing looks cascade in front of her shoulders again.

Alexandra gasped when she realized her hair barely fell to the tops of her breasts, just a few inches past her collarbones in a perfectly blunt line, much less almost past them like it had earlier that morning. She turned around, looking down to the floor where six and eight inch lengths of lush brown hair had piled up behind her ankles. 

“Okay, come on now. Out of that robe.”

“Wait, isn’t there a dressing…”

“The clothes are right here,” another woman with a long, dark braid said. 

Alexandra was eyeing the woman’s braid, admiring the thick full length that was so much like her own had been just a week or so ago, and barely realized Miranda had taken hold of the robe and pulled it off her shoulders, leaving her standing in nothing but her panties in front of everyone there. Before she could gasp and cover herself, the dark-haired woman was sliding a lacy black bra onto her, followed by a white blouse, a pencil skirt, and a business casual cardigan. 

“God, you have so much hair,” the stylist said as she started taking pieces of jewelry from a tray her assistant held, placing beautiful diamond earrings on Alexandra’s lobes and a matching necklace around her neck. The woman paused, taking hold of Alexandra’s chin and forcing her to meet her gaze. 

‘Have you ever had your nose pierced?”

“What?” Why would she ever mar her afce like that, especially when she relied on it for her living? “No… I would never…”

“We could do something really elegant and subdued to show off a cute little stud.”

Alexandra was saved when Donovan coughed and waves her over. “Alexa, let’s get rolling.”

“Alexandra,” she corrected softly, but she could tell he either didn’t hear or didn’t care. It was a strange feeling she had when she took her place; she was a gorgeous woman and knew it, and always had since she started getting her first catcalls walking down the streets of New York with her friends, but now suddenly she seemed less sure of herself.

Once she stood in place, Miranda was quickly in front of her to fluff and arrange her hair so it fell perfect into place with just a hint of a side parting. It didn’t take long for Alexandra to get in the groove, keeping her body in firm control as she let the emphasis fall on the jewelry rather than her enviable curves. Every now and then, though, with less weight to allow her to flick her hair behind her shoulders and have it stay there, her soft, lush locks would slip forward to block the glittering necklace she was trying to sell.

Finally, after a few disgruntled huffs, Donovan  handed his camera off to his assistant. “We need to do something different with her hair,” he said. He waved Miranda over, but waved Alexandra away. “Go have a seat in Miranda’s chair, Lexi. She’ll be there in a minute.”

Lexi? 

Alexandra wanted to offer a suggestion on how they could put her hair up, but the unwanted nickname and general dismissal of her presence caught her off guard. Knowing full well she couldn’t afford to lose this job, she did as she was told, taking her place in Miranda’s chair again.

While Miranda and Donovan spoke, one of Miranda’s assistants started brushing out Alexandra’s hair. 

“I wish I had hair like this, Lexi,” the girl said.

“Alexandra,” she replied in a whisper.

“What was that, Lexi?”

Alexandra shook her head. “Nothing.”

“Why don’t you take off the sweater and blouse while we’re waiting?” The assistant asked. 

“But then I’d only be in the…”

The petite assistant rolled her eyes. “Just in case they want to use a gloss or mousse or something that might get on them. It’s not like you have anything that hasn’t been seen here before. Plus, if I had yours, you can be sure as hell I’d be showing them off any chance I got.”

Alexandra did as she was told, shirking off the sweater and blouse and letting another assistant set them aside. Then a cape was swirled around her shoulders an pinned in place.

“Wait,” she said, “What…”

“Just in case” the petite assistant sing-sang again.

After a few minutes of sitting by herself, half naked, in the stylist’s chair with nothing but a cape to protect her modesty, Alexandra was finally joined by Miranda.

The stylist smiled into the mirror as she buried her hands into Alexandra’s thick mane. Miranda’s fingers settled in quickly but then moved slowly, gently caressing and teasing Alexandra’s neck and scalp and she calmly whispered that the morning was going great and this wasn’t a big deal. 

Miraculously, Alexandra felt herself relax.

“You’re doing great, Lexi. Don’t worry. Donovan just didn’t like how your hair kept blocking the jewelry, you know? For obvious reasons.”

Lexi… no, Alexandra nodded. “I was thinking we could just put it up…”

“Donovan liked the idea of bringing it up off your shoulders.”

Wasn’t that what she just said?

“Is that okay with you, Lexi? That’s such a cute name. Lexi. So much better than the stuffy Alexandra.” Miranda walked around to her table, picking up her comb and clips and such. “So that’s okay?”

Alexandra glanced to her left, where one of Donovan’s assistants was filming behind the scenes footage of the shoot. Her eyes widened at the thought of him having filmed her while changing, but then Miranda prodded her again.

“Lexi? Are you with us? You think off your shoulders is a good idea?”

Alexandra snapped back into the present and nodded. 

“Head up,” Miranda encouraged.

The stylist’s moved her comb through Alexandra’s thick hair swiftly, moving from root to tip with every pass as she worked her way around Alexandra’s head, careful not to catch her ears as she did. Miranda watched the process in the mirror, finding the even pace somehow soothing, the gentle tugs pulling her head back or to the side in an easy rhythm that was kind of soothing.

But then the comb was put away. Miranda ran her fingers through the long, breast-length tresses falling down past Alexandra’s left shoulder and then pinched one thick lock between her fore-and middle fingers. Her shears unexpectedly reflected the light and before Alexandra could react, another loud, slow series of crunching sounds filled the air. When the noise stopped, Miranda flicked her fingers and sent a long, shiny, severed lock sliding down into Alexandra’s lap. 

“What?” Alexandra gasped. “What?!?” She repeated, unable to form any other words.

“Off your shoulders,” Miranda replied, not bothering to pause in her work as she took another lock of Alexandra’s treasured mane and sheared it away two inches above her shoulders. “Just like we agreed,” she added, nodding toward the assistant who was filming.

Alexandra’s heart raced as another tress was shorn short, and then another. Her mind raced as well, her thoughts a lightning-speed mix of overdue bills, professional reputation, broken promises, and misunderstood phrasing. All she could do was sit there, almost paralyzed, as Miranda sheared away so much of the beautiful long hair that had gotten her so many jobs in the past. The progression was almost inevitable, with the sexy, siren waves she loved and always had being replaced by an abrupt, blunt bob.

Donovan approached stopping next to the chair just as the last long lock joined the remarkably heavy pile that had formed in Alexandra’s lap. He reached out to brush the backs of his fingers against the thick, blunt tresses teasing her left cheek. “That’s such an amazing start, Miranda. Lexi is looking gorgeous.” Then he focused on her. “Don’t you love how it looks so far, Lexi?”

Any thoughts of correcting the famous photographer left her as the phrase “so far” rang out in her mind. She looked at her reflecting, watching Miranda comb free thick sections of her lush hair before attacking them with her shears to add more texture and more layers and take away even more weight and length and body. 

Lexi looked back to Donovan, and nodded.

By the time Miranda’s work was done, the longest of Lexi’s thick, silky locks barely reached the middle of her neck. The rest had been shortened further and straightened within the blazing heat of two ceramic plates until Lexi could barely recognize herself anymore. Face framing layers teased her cheeks while barely-there bangs framed her dark eyes and, Lexi thought, brought more attention to her nose than anything else. The rounded back had a lot of life and movement as she dressed. Despite the far lighter weight she could still feel the style dance and swing as she pulled on her blouse again.

She avoided looking in the mirror any more than she had to, though, not wanting to confront the fact that her lazy-day ponytail had simultaneously become a thing of the past and something years away in the future. 

She was reaching for the cardigan when Donovan called out to her.

“You can leave that there, Lexi. The blouse is enough.”

Lexi nodded and retook her position. Once she was under the lights, Miranda rearranged her hair again and then one of the fashionista stepped forward to straighten her blouse and skirt, though in the process three of the blouse’s buttons were undone.

“Wait, I didn’t think…” Lexi started.

“It’s a more casual time of day, Lexi,” Donovan said, a small hint of annoyance coming into his tone. “You’re a professional, but home from work, so you’re cutting loose a bit. Just show us some relief that your day is done, but you’re glad your diamonds let you impress the people who needed to be impressed. Now show me.”

Lexi did as she was told, changing her expression from relief that the work day was done to being glad to being home to, as Donovan directed, being glad her lover noticed the jewels decorating her neck, to thinking of what that lover would do to her as he kissed along that necklace and maybe pinned her against the wall… 

Lexi wasn’t sure whether the red in her cheeks showed through her make-up, but she was definitely feeling herself flush as Donovan spoke. She wasn’t even sure she was comfortable doing it all, but any time she glanced toward Miranda the stylist would flash a thumbs up of support or a “Don’t you dare screw this up” type look.

Even though Lexi mourned the loss of her beautiful long hair, she had to admit that the shorter length did seem to move a lot better, masking her face without hiding the jewels and providing what she assumed was an amazing bit of seductive mystery. 

More importantly, the paycheck would provide an amazing bit of monthly rent.

It was after she lifted her hand to tuck her bobbed locks back behind her ear that Donovan stopped things again. 

“That’s what we’ve been missing,” he said. “He turned toward everyone who wasn’t Lexi and asked, “How many shots with the earrings do we have?”

After a moment, one assistant replied, “Not many.”

Donovan turned to Miranda and made a motion at the level of his eyes.

The stylist nodded, and approached Lexi. As she did, the model noticed the silver shears coming free from Miranda’s pocket.

“No, no please…” Lexi murmured. 

“Be a professional,” Miranda whispered back, turning Lexi’s chin so she faced forward again. At the same moment, the petite assistant undid the rest of the buttons of Lexi’s blouse and pulled it free again, leaving her standing in the bra and pencil skirt.

Tears began to well up and Lexi’s vision blurred as she felt Miranda’s finger brush against her ear, about halfway up. A deafening SCHNIKT sounded. Again and again the noise assaulted her as she tried to keep the tears from spilling down her cheeks, but she could tell by the expressions of the photoshoot crew that she was failing miserably. 

Miranda made use of her comb again when she reached Lexi’s nape, lifting what remained of her once impressive locks to be shorn away close to her head up until it blended with a significant weight line along her occipital bone. Then Miranda worked around to Lexi’s other ear, free her earlobe and the earring that downed it from the concealing length of her beautiful mane.

Donovan stepped forward and flipped some setting so Lexi could see herself and her new, cheekbone-length bob in the viewfinder. 

“See?” He asked. “Beautiful, right?”

Only if tear-streaked mascara was considered beautiful. 

Without taking time to fix her runny make-up or even brush the shorn locks from her shoulders or sweep them from around her on the floor, Donovan started shooting again.

Biting back her disappointment and disgust, Lexi forced herself to begin working again, posing and looking at the camera as if she weren’t in the middle of an existential crisis, as if she hadn’t literally had her life-long identity and self-image broken down and stripped away from her.

She didn’t even realize she’d never put the blouse on after the latest butchery of her hair. It was the sort of thing she promised her mother she’d never do, but here she was, posing in her underwear, letting the necklace she was supposed to be presenting instead present here cleavage to Donovan’s camera.

Her heart broke when Donovan stopped the shooting again. 

“Her nape’s a bit messy. Can someone clean it up?”

This time, Lexi didn’t try to talk her way out of what Miranda had planned. The stylist approached with a set of cordless clippers. Lexi choked back the sobs that fought to break free from her chest as the clippers roared to life, their vibrating hunger pulsing through her as their plastic teeth were pressed to her neck and lifted up her nape. The tone changed drastically as they slid upward, only to be pulled away, placed a bit to the side, and then lifted again. They went right up to the weight line of her bob, dumping heavy clumps of clippings on the floor in front of her in between passes, until Lexi couldn’t feel anything against her neck expect the exceptionally cold studio air.

Eventually the clippers did go quiet. Miranda stepped in front of Lexi and fiddled with what remained of her hair, and then made a thoughtful sound.

Such things had started scaring the hell out of Lexi, and for good reason. Miranda’s fiddling continued, until a heavy curtain of cheek length bangs were blocking Lexi’s vision.

She felt a bit of pressure against her forehead as Miranda’s finger gestured about an inch above Lexi’s thick, elegant eyebrows. “About here?”

The clippers came to life again, and this time it was metal teeth Lexi felt against her skin when thick hanks of her hair began to fall away as they were carved into a brutally short, absurdly thick set of bangs.

Lexi did cry again, but silently, unable to fathom why these people would want to do this to her, but knowing she couldn’t do anything to stop them. Not at this point, anyway. To quit now would leave her unable to work for months, if not years, and the damage to her reputation could do more to end her career than anything they were doing to her hair.

The clippers fell silent, and Miranda cupped Lexi’s chin. “I think we could do something bold.” She looked Lexi in the eye. “Do you want to be bold with us, Lexi?Would you like to become famous for how easy you are to work with?”

She really, really didn’t, but Lexi nodded anyway.

And so the clippers came on again, and Lexi clenched her eyes shut as the whirring blades were raised to each of her eyebrows, slowly — torturously so — stealing away the carefully tended arches above her eyes.

Miranda blew on each brow once, and then placed the clipper head back on the clippers and placed them on the floor. Then she brushed the remnants of the massacred brows from Lexi’s cheeks. “You are a pleasure to work with, Lexi.” She smiled. “Say that for me. Say ‘Lexi is a pleasure to work with.’”

“I’m a pleasure…”

“No, no. Lexi is a pleasure to work with. Not Alexandra. Alexandra was boring and a dime a dozen. Lexi is fun and has a very unique career ahead of her.”

Lexi swallowed. “Lexi is a pleasure to work with.”

“Perfect.”

The stylist backed away and Donovan was in command again. “Okay, why don’t you get on the floor a bit, Lexi. 

She did, posing in several different kneeling and sitting positions, wondering whether any single photo at this point would ever see the light of day.

“Now look at your hair. At the sacrifice you made to show off the gorgeous jewelry you’ve been given.”

She looked down at the clippings on the floor around her, prompting more silent tears to flow. But she kept moving, kept posing… lowering her forehead to the floor almost in prostration to her former crowning glory.

“Now pick up the clippers.”

With growing fear and realizing, and resignation, she did. 

“Okay. Go on, now. Take the final step to bring all of the focus to your jewels — take away the last of what had been competing with them for everyone’s attention.

Lexi held the clippers in her trembling hand, looking from person to person in the room, waiting for anyone to object, for anyone to say anything. But no one did, they all just watched on silently.

So she turned the clippers on. 

She lifted them to her front hairline. Their whir was deafening and their hunger obvious, but she didn’t let herself think about either as she pushed them back into her hair. The whirring became an even louder churning as she pushed them further and further back. When they wouldn’t go any further with ease, she pulled them away and watched a massive, dark cloud of her silken locks fall to the floor before her.

“Come on now, show us you’re enjoying it,” Donovan demanded as his camera continued to click. 

And so she did, putting on expressions of shear joy and bliss as the clippers ravaged her hair, transforming a sleek, ultra short bob into a field of brunette velvet. Inside, Alexandra screamed, while outside, Lexi smiled and licked her lips, letting the straps of her bra falls off her shoulders and come dangerously close to baring her all. 

Again and again she fed her hair to the angry clippers, again and again sacrificing all she had left of her glorious pride in the name of this one job. Clump after clump, lock after lock fell around her, as if symbolizing the dignity she was shedding at the same time as her hair.

In time, both the clippers and the camera fell silent, and Lexi was left on her knees in a bra and a skirt, surrounded by the remnants of her pride and joy. A pride and joy years in the making that she sacrificed for just a few minutes of work and a couple months rent, possibly ending her career as she knew it.

But had there really been a choice?

“Come on,” Miranda said, crouching down and patting Lexi’s shoulder. “Let’s get you cleaned up.”

And so Lexi found herself in Miranda’s chair again, her face being wiped clean of tears and runny makeup as the clippers ran across her head from front to back and left to right and up and down and down and up again and again, replacing the soft, raggedy brunette velvet with nothing more than a darkly shaded sandpaper. 

Once Miranda finished, she ran the palm of her hand in circled around Lexi’s crown. “You were amazing today.”

Unconvinced, Lexi replied, “I’m never going to work again.”

“Oh, don’t be silly.”

Lexi would have raised an eyebrow, if she still had one.

“You’ll make plenty of money as an alt model if you want.”

“An alt model?”

“Yeah. You’ll just have to get over some of your prudishness, but you have a beautiful body for it.” The stylist stepped behind the chair.  “I know some piercers and tattoo artists that’ll help. In fact, I already set you up with an appointment tomorrow.”

“I don’t…”

Miranda touched two fingertips to Lexi’s pouty bottom lip. “A couple of snakebites here. A septum ring, for sure. One in each brow.” She cupped Lexi’s breasts and lifted them, pinching her nipples that were already stiff from the cold room and eliciting an undeniable moan. “These, of course, and your belly button.”

Lexi looked at her reflection, already unable to recognize the woman it showed her. Miranda was tugging the black bra down, baring Lexi’s nipples as if looking for confirmation. 

“Look how perfect these are, Donovan,” she said. “What do you think would look better? Barbells or rings?”

Donovan stood next to the chair. “Rings,” he said. “Models always looks better in photos with rains between their piercings.”

“But I’m not,” Lexi began as she squirmed, “I’m not one of those models, I don’t want to be…”

“Do you realize how much they make?”

Lexi shook her head, and he told her, causing her eyes to widen.

 “All it takes is a little dedication,” he assured her. “You have dedication, don’t you, little Lexi?”

Alexandra looked at herself. The beautiful, elegant woman she had been this morning was gone now. Instead, she was a buzzed, browless remnant of what used to be.  If what Donovan said was true about how much money she could make, then… maybe it’d be worth giving herself up, just for a little while?

–End–

+62