The Death & Rebirth of Arjun by Xerxes

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I remember the morning starting slower than it should have. The kind of late summer morning where nothing feels urgent, where the house stretches itself awake instead of snapping into it. I was still half in that holiday version of myself, no uniform, no rules, no one telling me to look a certain way. Just me, moving around in shorts, barefoot, the fan turning lazily above.

I stood in front of the mirror longer than I needed to.

It wasn’t deliberate. I just… stayed.

My skin still had that pale, almost flushed look from sleep, too fair for most boys I knew, my grandmother liked to say, like it was something to protect. My shoulders looked narrower in the reflection, my frame still in that in-between stage where I hadn’t filled out into anything yet. But my hair, my hair always made it feel complete.

It fell exactly the way I liked it that morning. Slightly messy, but not careless. Thick, black, brushing just over my eyebrows, covering the tops of my ears, softening everything. When I tilted my head, it shifted with me, parting just enough to let one eye show more than the other. I pushed it back once with my fingers, watched it fall forward again.

That was the point. It always fell back.

"Mummy would’ve said leave it," I muttered to myself, almost smiling.

From the hall, the TV was already on. Loud. News or some random channel my grandmother watched without really watching.

Then her voice cut through.

"Arjun!"

I didn’t answer immediately.

"Arjun, come here!"

There was something sharper in it now. I walked out, still running my fingers absently through my hair, pushing it back again as I stepped into the living room.
She was sitting cross-legged on the sofa, eyes fixed on the television. Some military segment was playing; soldiers standing in formation, sharp uniforms, sharper faces.

One of them turned slightly, and the camera caught his profile.

Perfectly shaved sides. Barely anything on top.
My grandmother leaned forward, squinting.

"Dekha?" she said, pointing at the screen. "That is how boys should look. Clean. Proper."

I exhaled lightly, already half disengaging. "Nani, school hasn’t even started yet…"

"Exactly," she cut in. "Before school starts, everything should be set."

Before I could respond, she turned her head slightly and called out, louder this time "Rohit!"

My stomach tightened just hearing his name. My uncle walked in a few seconds later, calm as always, like he had already been listening. He glanced at the TV, then at me, his eyes pausing, just for a second too long—on my hair.

"Yes?" he said.

She pointed again at the screen, almost excited now. "Take him. Get this fixed. It’s too much now. School is starting."
There was a small silence. Not empty…decisive.

I opened my mouth. "I can go with Mumma when she comes back"

"They’re not here," my uncle said, flat. Not loud. Not aggressive. Just final.

He looked at me again, this time more directly. Assessing.

"It’s overdue."

I felt my fingers move to my hair again, instinctively, pushing it back, holding it there for a second like I could somehow make it look shorter, neater, acceptable.

"It’s fine," I said, quieter now. "They never…"

"They don’t correct you," he interrupted, stepping closer. "That doesn’t mean it’s fine."

There was no anger in his voice. That made it worse.

My grandmother had already gone back to watching the TV, the decision made, the responsibility transferred.

"Go shower," he said to me. "We’ll go after."

It didn’t feel like a suggestion.

The bathroom filled with steam quickly, the mirror fading out at the edges again until only a blurred version of me remained. I stepped under the water, letting it hit the top of my head first, and immediately felt my hair change, collapse, darken, grow heavier. I closed my eyes. My fingers moved through it slowly, almost carefully, separating strands, pressing lightly against my scalp before sliding outward. It felt thicker when it was wet, denser. Real.

For a moment, everything outside the bathroom disappeared. No uncle. No school. No decision already made. Just this.

I took more shampoo than usual, working it in deliberately, feeling it foam, watching the strands slip through my fingers, softer now, controlled only by my hands. I tilted my head forward, letting the longer pieces fall completely over my face, covering my eyes, my nose, my mouth.

I stayed like that for a few seconds. Hidden. There was a knock on the door.

"Done?" my uncle’s voice came through.

"Yeah," I said quickly, rinsing it out.

Too quickly. When I stepped out, the air hit me differently, cooler, sharper against my skin. I wrapped the towel around my shoulders and pressed another lightly into my hair, not rubbing, just holding it there, absorbing the water slowly.

"Come."

He was already sitting on the bed. There was a comb in his hand. Something about that, just that, made me hesitate.

"Just dry it a bit more" I started.

"It’s fine," he said.

I stepped closer anyway. The first stroke of the comb came from the front, straight on the side. The teeth caught slightly in the thickness before pulling through, firm, controlled. Not painful, but not gentle either.

"Stand straight."

I straightened immediately. He combed again, slower this time, pulling my fringe completely back first, exposing my forehead fully. I wasn’t used to seeing it like that.
It felt… wrong. Too open. He held it there for a second. Then let it fall. Again.

Each stroke more deliberate than the last, like he was mapping it out, understanding how it sat, how it moved, how much there was.

"Too much volume," he murmured, almost to himself.

My eyes flicked to the mirror across the room. I didn’t look like me like this.

"It’s fine like this," I said, trying to sound normal. "In school also no one.."

"What school?" he said, almost lightly, but there was something underneath it.

"That place is too relaxed. No discipline. Boys don’t even look like students."

I didn’t respond. He combed it flatter this time, pressing it closer to my scalp, holding it there.

"This is better already," he said.

It wasn’t. It just wasn’t mine. The car ride was quiet. Too quiet. I kept adjusting my hair, trying to bring it back to how it usually sat, but it felt different now, still damp, still slightly flattened from the comb. It wouldn’t fall the same way.

"Where are we going?" I asked finally.

"Nearby," he said.

That was it.

10 mins later, I looked outside the car, trying to recognize the route, but it wasn’t anywhere we usually went. Not the mall, not the place my parents took me for haircuts, the one where they would tell the barber exactly what to do, where I didn’t even have to think.
This felt… off.

When the car stopped, I looked up. A small barbershop. Glass front. Bright white lights inside. Functional. Not familiar.
"Come," he said, already opening the door.

My chest tightened slightly as I stepped out. Inside, the air-conditioning hit immediately, carrying that clean, powdery smell mixed with something sharper. A boy sat in one of the chairs, his sides already cut short, the barber running clippers up the back of his head in smooth, practiced strokes.

Hair, short, unimportant, identical, covered the floor. The barber looked up at us. My uncle nodded once.

"Short," he said. "Very short. Proper."

That was the first time the words were said out loud. I felt it land somewhere deep, before I could even react.

"Sit," the barber said.

I did. The chair was cold. The cape came around me quickly, wrapping tight at the neck, sealing me in. My hands disappeared under it, useless. I looked at myself in the mirror. My hair had already started drying, lifting slightly at the front, falling back into place, almost like nothing had happened. Almost like it could stay. Behind me, I saw my uncle take a seat. Calm. Watching. Waiting.

The barber reached for his tools. And I understood, this wasn’t going to be a trim. The first sound wasn’t the clippers. It was the scissors.

A soft, almost polite snip somewhere behind my ear, light enough that for a second it didn’t register as loss, just adjustment. The barber’s fingers moved through my hair, lifting sections, measuring them between his knuckles, the metal glinting briefly before closing again. Small pieces fell. Not chunks. Just ends. Familiar lengths shortened into something slightly neater.

I watched closely. This… this was normal. "Bas clean kar do," my uncle said from behind me. "Don’t leave it messy." The barber nodded. "Yes."
Another few snips. The fringe lifted, trimmed slightly, then allowed to fall again. It still touched my eyebrows. Still covered part of my eyes. Still… looked like me. My shoulders loosened just a little under the cape. Maybe this was it.

Maybe I had..

"No," my uncle said, almost immediately. "Shorter."

The word landed flat. Precise. The barber’s hands paused for just a fraction of a second. Then he reached down, and I heard it, click.

The sound of a guard being attached. Then…

bzzzzzz.

It wasn’t loud, but it filled everything. I felt it before I saw it. That low, steady vibration cutting through the air, approaching, growing closer until it wasn’t just sound anymore, it was presence. The barber placed his hand gently but firmly on the top of my head, tilting it slightly forward.

"Relax," he said.

The clippers touched just above my sideburn. And then they moved. The first pass was slow. Deliberate. Upward. I felt the pressure before I understood the result, the slight push against my scalp, the warmth of the blades, the hum traveling through bone more than skin. And then, something released. A thick section of hair separated cleanly and fell. Not like the small pieces from before. This was different. Heavier. Final. I saw it in the mirror as it dropped, sliding down the cape, gathering near my shoulder before disappearing out of view. My breath caught slightly. That was… shorter than usual.

"Good," my uncle said. "Continue."

The barber didn’t speak. Just moved the clippers again. Another pass, parallel to the first, slightly higher this time. More hair came away, exposing a line of scalp I hadn’t seen before, not fully bare, but close enough that it felt… exposed. The side of my head started to change shape. Less volume. Less softness. More… defined.
The clippers kept moving. Up, reset, up again. Each stroke removes something I didn’t realize I was still holding onto. I tried to focus on the mirror, to track it, to understand it, but it was happening too steadily, too evenly.

There was no moment to interrupt. By the time he finished the first side, I could already see it. The contrast. One side still full, falling, familiar. The other tightened. Reduced. Controlled. It looked like two different versions of me stitched together. I swallowed.

"It’s already short," I said quietly, not even sure who I was speaking to.

My uncle leaned forward slightly, his voice calm, almost conversational.

"This is just the start."

The barber stepped back, switched off the clippers for a second. The silence that followed felt heavier than the sound.

"Shorter," my uncle said again.

A different click. The hum returned. Stronger now. Or maybe I was just more aware of it. The barber didn’t ask. He didn’t hesitate. His hand returned to my head, this time guiding it more firmly to the side, exposing the area he had just worked on. The clippers touched down again. Lower this time. Closer. The sensation changed immediately. Sharper. More direct. Less buffered by hair. The guard was smaller, I could feel it in the way the blades moved, closer to the skin, the vibration more intimate, almost invasive. The path they followed erased what had just been done, taking it even further down, leaving behind something tighter, cleaner… harsher.
Hair fell again. Shorter pieces now. Lighter. Less visible as they dropped, but more noticeable in their absence. The side of my head started to feel… cold. Air reached places it hadn’t before. I shifted slightly in the chair.

"Sit straight," the barber said, gently pressing me back into position.

"Don’t move," my uncle added.

I went still. Completely still. The clippers moved higher this time, blending into the longer section above, but the difference was obvious. There was no going back to what it was. Each stroke erased the memory of the previous length. Each pass… simplified me. I watched as the other side was reduced to match. The same pattern. The same slow, methodical removal. The same quiet, accumulating loss. By the time both sides were done, my reflection had already changed too much. The softness was gone. My face looked… sharper. Smaller, somehow. More exposed. More… boy. The barber stepped back again. For a second, I thought it might be over. That this, this version, would be it. I could still work with this. Maybe. It was short, yes, but not, "Back also," my uncle said. "And shorter." The barber reached for the smallest guard yet. I felt something tighten in my chest.

"No, this is already—" I started, my voice barely holding.

My uncle didn’t even raise his voice.

"Do it properly."

The barber’s hand returned to my head, pressing it forward more firmly now, exposing the back of my neck. I felt the first touch at the nape. There was almost no resistance this time. The clippers moved up, and it felt like they were cutting directly against my skin. The vibration was sharper, more immediate, almost like it was travelling inside my head. Hair didn’t fall in strands anymore. It disappeared. Reduced to something so small it barely registered as separate pieces. The back of my head felt suddenly… naked. Completely.

The clippers moved again. Higher. Smoothing everything down into the same unforgiving length. The line between hair and skin blurred until it was almost nothing. I could feel the air-conditioning directly now. A constant, cool presence against the back of my neck. I didn’t move. I couldn’t.

"Fade it," my uncle said, quieter now. Satisfied. "Clean."

The barber adjusted his grip, changing angles, refining it further, shorter at the bottom, slightly longer as it moved up, but all within a range that felt… minimal. Controlled. Disciplined. Like the boy on the TV. Like every boy my uncle approved of.

"Top?"

The barber finally asked. A small pause.

"Keep very little, keep going shorter, i'll tell you when to stop" my uncle replied. "Imagine...military school."

My fingers curled slightly under the cape. This was the last part. The part that still felt like me. The barber switched back to scissors first, lifting sections from the top directly with his comb, cutting them down quickly, efficiently. Not shaping. Not styling. Just reducing. I watched as the longer strands, my strands—fell away in uneven pieces, landing softly before being brushed aside. The length disappeared faster here. Too fast. Within minutes, what had been thick, layered, expressive… was just short. Uniform. But not enough.

"Machine," my uncle said.

The final click. The Clippers came back, now directed at the top. It was a Number 4. The barber ran them through from front to back. The sensation was immediate.
Everything that had been left, reduced again, flattened, simplified into something barely there. The fringe, the part I always adjusted, always relied on—was gone in a single pass. No fall. No movement. Just… absence. Another pass. And another. Until there was nothing left to adjust. Nothing left to move. Barely an inch remained. The clippers switched off. The silence that followed felt unreal. The barber brushed loose hair off my neck, my face, my shoulders. Light, efficient strokes, clearing away what was left behind. But there was nothing left to restore. I looked at the mirror. Really looked this time. The boy staring back at me, I didn’t recognize him. The sides were tight, almost bare. The back is clean, exposed. The top short, controlled, unable to fall, unable to soften anything.

There was no place to hide. No movement. No identity in it. Just… compliance. Behind me, my uncle stood up.

"Good," he said. And for him…it was.

The cape came off with a soft flick, and suddenly everything felt lighter, but not in a way that relieved anything. Just… exposed. The fine, leftover hairs clung to my neck, my collar, and the inside of my T-shirt as I stood up. I brushed at them instinctively, but it didn’t help. The feeling stayed. I didn’t look again. Not properly. I stepped down from the chair, aware of how the air touched my head now, everywhere, evenly, nothing interrupting it. It wasn’t cold exactly, just… present. Constant. Like something I couldn’t switch off.

My uncle paid. I heard the notes, the small exchange, the barber saying something polite, I didn’t register. I kept my eyes on the floor, on the short, identical pieces of hair scattered around the base of the chair. It was strange how quickly they stopped looking like they belonged to anyone.

"Chalo," my uncle said. I followed.

Outside, the sunlight felt sharper than before. It hit directly, no filter, no softness. I resisted the urge to raise my hand to my head immediately, but after a few steps, I couldn’t help it. My fingers moved up, slowly, almost cautiously, and touched the side first. It was… rough. Not completely bare, but close enough that my skin registered before the hair did. My fingers slid upward, reaching the top, and even there, there was almost nothing to hold, nothing to push, nothing to shape. Just a short, uniform layer that didn’t respond.

I pulled my hand away. The car ride back was quieter than before. Not tense, just empty. My uncle seemed settled, like something had been completed exactly as intended. He didn’t look at me again.

"This is how it should be," he said after a while, almost like a conclusion. "You’ll understand later. Discipline starts with how you present yourself." I didn’t answer. I watched the reflection of the window instead. A faint version of my face looking back, unfamiliar in small, precise ways. My forehead looked bigger. My ears are more visible. My eyes… clearer, maybe. But not in a way I liked.

Just… uncovered. At home, the door shut behind us with a soft click. The TV was still on. My grandmother was in the same position, barely glancing up.

"Is it done?" she asked.

"Yes," my uncle replied.

She looked at me for a second, nodded once, satisfied. "That’s good. Much better."

Then she turned back to the TV. That was it.

I walked to my room without saying anything. Each step felt slightly off, like I was moving in a body that didn’t fully match what I expected. I closed the door behind me and stood there for a moment, just… standing. Then I walked to the mirror. This time, there was no hesitation. I looked. The haircut was clean. Precise. Technically perfect. The fade was smooth, the top evenly reduced, everything sitting exactly where it was supposed to.

But it didn’t feel like me. I leaned closer. Without the hair falling forward, there was nothing to interrupt the shape of my face anymore. No softness, no movement. My skin looked lighter against the starkness of it, almost too visible. My features felt… sharper, but not stronger. Just more exposed.

I raised my hand again, slower this time, and ran it across the top. The sensation was immediate, short, bristly resistance, nothing like before. No weight. No separation. No strands slipping between my fingers. I tried pushing it forward. It didn’t move. I let my hand drop.

There was a tightness in my chest, not loud, not overwhelming, just steady. Like something had been taken without asking, and now there was nothing left to negotiate with. I sat on the edge of the bed, staring at the floor for a while. I could still feel the way it used to sit, the way it would fall into my eyes, the way I’d push it back without thinking. Small habits, automatic. Gone now.

And the worst part was, no one else seemed to think anything had happened. For them, this was just… better. I don’t know how long I sat there before I got up again.
My parents’ room was quiet. Their bathroom door slightly open. I walked in without thinking too much about it, just following something that felt… unfinished.

The counter was the same as always. Their things arranged neatly, untouched. My dad’s razor. My mom’s skincare. And then, near the side…the trimmer.

I picked it up. It felt heavier than I expected. For a second, I just held it, turning it slightly in my hand, feeling the shape of it, the switch under my thumb. My reflection in their mirror looked back at me, short hair, clean lines, controlled. Not by me.

I pressed the button.

Bzzzz.

The sound was familiar now. But this time, it wasn’t coming from someone else.

I hesitated. Not out of fear exactly. Just… awareness. This would be the last step. There would be no version left after this. No adjustment. No partial return. Just a choice. I lifted it slowly to my forehead. For a moment, I could almost imagine the hair still there. The weight of it. The way it would fall. Then I placed the trimmer against my scalp. And pushed. The vibration was immediate, direct, but different this time. There was no surprise in it. No external control. Just a steady, even motion guided by my own hand. The remaining length disappeared in a single pass.

I watched it happen.
Not resisting.
Not stopping.
Just continuing.

Another pass. And another. Moving across the top, then the sides, then the back—until there was nothing left uneven, nothing left longer than the rest. No trace of what it had been. I switched it off. The silence that followed felt… clear.

I looked at myself again and saw what my uncle had created.

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