Chapter 1: The Bronze Comb Heats Up

The heat from the boiler room, thick with coal smoke, smacked her in the face. He Xiaoman was woken by the stink.

The back of her head throbbed, dully, where it had bumped the edge of the coal pile. She propped herself up on her knees, sitting straight. She was wearing a faded blue cloth jacket, the cuffs ringed with black water stains, her palms caked in gray coal dust. Inside the hearth, the flame licked at the stove door; the tin kettle gurgled, white steam blurring the whole room into a haze. She’d definitely been digging through an archive box of eighty-hairdressing records—how did she end up here?

Before she could make sense of it, a wave of unfamiliar memories crashed in. Red Star Hair Salon, state-owned, on the busiest street in the provincial capital. He Xiaoman, eighteen years old, an apprentice who boiled water and did odd jobs, six months on the clock. Two nights ago, she’d taken too long washing the dishes and the Chief Technician, Qian Guifang, had sentenced her to three days of stoking the boiler—still had to sweep floors and empty spittoons during the day. The original owner’s resentment and sense of injustice sat thick at the bottom of her mind, like old grime on a pot.

He Xiaoman raised a hand to wipe her face; her fingertip brushed her chest, snagging on something through the fabric.

She fished it out. It was a copper comb, half its teeth broken. The comb was ancient, most of the tines gone, the copper surface polished shiny by wear, but the corners still held delicate, interlocking vine patterns. Memories told her this belonged to her grandmother—the original girl had carried it against her skin for five years. No one else was allowed to touch it.

Just as her fingers gripped the comb’s spine, it suddenly burned.

It wasn’t an illusion. The heat bored into her palm, crawling up her wrist, warm enough to make the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. Her vision blurred for a second—the coal smoke, the tin kettle, the damp wall peeling off were all still there—but another layer was laid over them, like someone holding a traced drawing right under her eyelids.

Someone was talking at the doorway.

“Water up yet? The whole shop is waiting to wash their hair.”

The curtain was lifted, and Qian Guifang walked in. Early forties, a navy-blue uniform pressed sharp, two shiny brass buttons pinned at her cuffs. She walked with her chin tucked slightly up, eyes sweeping down before snapping up. He Xiaoman had only seen people like this in archival photos before; now, standing just three feet away, Qian Guifang’s “I’m the Chief” aura pressed the moisture in the room half an inch lower.

And the copper comb was still burning.

He Xiaoman’s gaze landed on the top of Qian Guifang’s head, and suddenly everything was clear. Too clear.

It was Qian Guifang’s hairline. It receded from her temples up the forehead, retreating harder on the left side than the right, all the way to the crown. The remaining hair was combed strictly to the right, flat with hair glue, not a strand out of place. Then, covering the thin patch on top, was a thin, slightly darker hairpiece. The edges had been blended with the natural hair. To a normal person standing ten feet away, it looked like a thick head of hair. But through He Xiaoman’s eyes, the boundary between the patch and the real hair was razor-sharp. She could even see two faint pressure marks on the scalp underneath, etched in by wearing it too long.

The heat from the copper comb slowly faded. But He Xiaoman understood one thing: the comb recognized its owner. Keep it against your skin, it gets hot, and with a quick glance, it lays out a person’s bone structure, hairline, whorl, and scars for you to see.

“He Xiaoman!”

She snapped back. Qian Guifang was already standing in front of her, one hand on her hip, the other fanning the air with a handkerchief.

“What are you staring at, the top of my head?”

The boiler room went quiet for a beat, except for the kettle. He Xiaoman’s mind raced. She couldn’t admit it—admitting she was staring at her master’s flaws would get her in trouble when it spread around. But she couldn’t deflect too fast either; that just looked guilty.

She quietly shoved the copper comb back into her collar, looked up, and put on a stupid, honest face. “Master, there’s a speck of coal dust on your hair.”

Qian Guifang’s brow twitched.

“It’s smoky in here. You just came in, so it settled on your head.” He Xiaoman gestured toward the stove, her voice steady, not too loud, not too soft. “I wanted to warn you, but I didn’t want to reach for your hair. That’s against the rules.”

The answer worked. Qian Guifang was skeptical, but she reached up and pat her head. Her palm came away with a smudge of black dust. Her mood eased a bit, though she was still annoyed. “You’ve got good eyes. Get the water boiled and fill the thermos. Three customers are waiting up front. Keep it moving.”

“Yeah.”

He Xiaoman went to grab the kettle. As she passed Qian Guifang, she didn’t look up, but the mental “picture” in her head hadn’t faded. Qian Guifang had a square face, high cheekbones, a defined jawline. That kind of bone structure supported short hair, but she insisted on shoulder-length, thick hair, propped up entirely by the patch. It made her head look top-heavy and pushed her cheekbones even more forward. He Xiaoman almost instinctively thought: *If this hair were cut below the ears, layers raised forward, side parting to cover the temples, it would make her look ten years sharper.*

She pushed the thought down. She was the water-boiler, not the barber.

The thermos was full. She carried it to the salon floor. The Red Star Hair Salon’s front wasn’t small: eight barber chairs in a row, a wall of mirrors, white tile floors, two rows of fluorescent lights on the ceiling. It wasn’t busy yet; three chairs were taken, the rest of the stylists were clustered by the window chatting.

“Guifang’s hair, is that really thick?” a young stylist chuckled, keeping his voice low.

“Thick?” another replied, even quieter. “Last time I saw her take it off during lunch break, you could see right through the crown.”

“Shut up—do you want to get fired?”

He Xiaoman set the thermos by the washing sink, eyes down, saying nothing. So the staff noticed, but no one dared say it. Qian Guifang bullied people with her seniority; she’d been doing it for five years, and the whole shop had learned to walk around the top of her head.

She turned back to the boiler room. As she passed the last chair, her steps slowed.

That chair stayed empty all day. A gray cloth hung on the back, and on the side table sat an old wooden box. The box was cracked open, revealing a razor and a half-piece of whetstone. An old man sat in the chair, hair pure white, cut short and stiff, sticking up in every direction. He was thin, but his hands were steady, gently swinging a razor on a leather strop across his knee.

Zhou Dehai. The retired master technician who came back for three days a month, shaving and grooming the regulars. In He Xiaoman’s memories, this old guy didn’t talk to anyone, didn’t accept favors from anyone; even Qian Guifang gave him a wide berth.

The old man’s eyelids lifted, shearing of her, then dropped.

“New around here?”

“Half a year, Master Zhou.” He Xiaoman stopped.

“The water boy.” The old man wiped the blade on the leather twice. “The water boy sticks around where the cutting happens?”

He Xiaoman didn’t answer. She’d actually just been looking—looking at the clippers, scissors, and combs stacked in the third drawer on the old man’s right, looking at the price board on the wall, and looking at her own reflection in the mirror above the empty chair: skinny, black-haired, hands soaked white from the water.

“I’ll stop sticking around next time,” she said.

Zhou Dehai snorted. He didn’t acknowledge her again.

He Xiaoman went back to the boiler room, closed the door, and pulled the copper comb out again. The copper was cool now, but that feeling of “seeing clearly” lingered in her eyes. She tried to recall Qian Guifang’s face; the comb didn’t react. She had to keep it against her skin, face-to-face. That was fine—better to keep her mind off the strangeness.

She flipped the comb over in her palm and froze.

Three images had appeared in her mind at some point.

First: Qian Guifang’s hair cut to three fingers below the ear, side-parted, a lock falling diagonally to soften the cheekbones, the thin spot on the crown perfectly hidden by layers. Second: shorter, straight to the ear, the nape pushed clean, making the neck look longer. Third: the longest, shoulder-length, but with the crown padded and the sides thinned, moving with a breeze.

The three images were crisp. She could even see which way the ends curled. He Xiaoman’s heart skipped. She tried to “adjust”—make the temple lock in the first image shorter—and the image shifted to match. She adjusted again; it changed again. On the fourth adjustment, her wrist went weak, and the copper comb nearly slipped. Her vision blurred. The flame in the hearth split into three.

She leaned on the stove and caught her breath. Her hands were shaking.

This thing had a price.

He Xiaoman tucked the copper comb close to her body and sat on the coal pile to calm down. When she recovered, the first thing she thought about wasn’t money. It was Qian Guifang.

Any of those three styles would be better than the heavy patch she wore now. But the one doing the cutting was her, and she didn’t have a say. Qian Guifang was the boss. And how do you even bring it up? “Master, your crown is thin, let me hide it with a new cut?” That was suicide. “Master, I want to cut your hair?” Was a water-boiler even allowed to ask?

Footsteps outside. The curtain lifted. Qian Guifang stood in the doorway, holding the broken-toothed copper comb.

He Xiaoman’s stomach dropped. She reached for her collar. It was empty.

“When you left the boiler room, this dropped by the coal pile.” Qian Guifang held the comb up, squinting at it in the light, her frown deepening. “A broken, half-dead copper comb? You’re an apprentice. Where did you get this?”

“My grandmother left it to me.” He Xiaoman stood up.

“Grandmother?” Qian Guifang sneered, spinning the comb between her fingers. “What did your grandmother do? What kind of family gave copper dowry items?”

The question was ugly. He Xiaoman didn’t get angry. Instead, she stepped half a pace forward and kept her voice level. “Master, my grandmother used to do face-tightening and hairdressing. She went from street to street. She used this comb for a lifetime. Even when the teeth broke, she wouldn’t throw it away.”

Qian Guifang’s eyes flickered. She knew what “face-tightening and hairdressing” meant—before the state shops existed, the people who didn’t make the cut worked the streets. Her grip on the comb loosened, then tightened again.

“Old junk. Dirty.” She shoved the comb into He Xiaoman’s chest. “Keep it safe. Don’t pull it out in the shop. What sort of impression does that give?”

He Xiaoman caught it. The moment her palm touched the copper, it heated up.

This time, faster. She looked up. Qian Guifang was turning to talk to someone outside. That half-face, the patch, the pressure mark—all of it lay bare before her. The three mental images floated up, too. The first one was the steadiest. The flow of the ends, the thickness of the layers were clearer than before.

He Xiaoman’s throat worked.

“Master.” She spoke up.

Qian Guifang turned back. “What now?”

“This hair of yours,” He Xiaoman gripped the comb, her heart hammering, but her face staying blank. “If you took it down to the ears, maybe it’d be easier to manage than it is now.”

The boiler room was quiet enough to hear the coal cracking.

The softness in Qian Guifang’s face receded inch by inch. She stared at He Xiaoman, eyes narrowing. Suddenly, she stepped forward and reached for He Xiaoman’s collar. “You, a water-boiler, have the nerve to criticize my hair? Pull out what you’re hiding in your pocket. Let’s see!”