It was old. Carved from sandalwood, its prongs curved like the teeth of a smiling ghost. No one knew where it came from, only that it showed up one day in a junk seller's cart, wrapped in silk that smelled of burnt oil.

The seller didn't even remember putting it there.

The first to find it was Monu Das, a seventeen-year-old dropout with oily skin and a receding hairline. He had no job, no girl, and no confidence. But when he picked up the comb, he felt something strange—a warmth, like fingers caressing his scalp.

He took it home.

That night, Monu stood before his cracked mirror and ran the comb through his thinning strands. Once, twice, slowly. By the tenth stroke, he was shivering. It felt... divine.

By morning, his hair had grown.

Not just a little.

Thick, black, silken locks tumbled down his back, touching his waist. He laughed and cried. When he went outside, the neighbors gasped. Monu walked with his head high.

But the comb demanded.

If he stopped for too long, his scalp itched. Then burned. Then bled.

He combed. All day. Even during meals. Even in the toilet.

The village kids started calling him "Jadu Baal" — Magic Hair.

Then the change began.

His eyes sunk in. His lips shriveled. But his hair—it kept growing. Thicker, longer. Like roots wrapping around his body.

Weeks later, they found his body tangled in hair like ropes, twisted around his limbs, neck, and chest like a cocoon.

But when they cut him free—

He was bald.

No eyebrows. No eyelashes. No pubic hair. Not a single strand on his body.

The comb was missing.

The curse traveled. Only the weak, the insecure, the unnoticed ever saw it. It whispered to them: "You could be beautiful. You could matter."

They combed. They grew. They died in hair-webbed prisons, bald and wide-eyed, mouths agape.

And it fed.

It grew hungry for admiration.

But there was one it hated. One it could not control.

Her name was Arohi.

Arohi Roy was the jewel of Kokilabari. Her hair—thick, raven-black, flowing like ink in water—was her pride. She walked barefoot under the banyan trees with flowers tucked in her braid, and people turned to stare. Some whispered envy. Others, prayers.

But she was kind.

She smiled at beggars. Taught slum girls to tie ribbons. And she had Ritam, her childhood friend turned lover, who adored her not just for her beauty, but for her bravery.

Still, the curse watched her.

Victims of the comb began to attack.

One night, as she walked home from the market, a woman with floor-length hair lunged at her with garden shears. Ritam fought the woman off, only to see her scalp ripple and her eyes roll back as she shrieked, "She doesn't deserve it! Give me your HAIR!"

Villagers called them mad. Some said drugs. Some said jealous spirits.

Arohi began to cut her hair short.

But it grew back. By morning, always back to its full length. No matter what she did. As if it belonged to someone else.

She started to fear her reflection.

One stormy evening, they took shelter in the ruins of an old British tea bungalow. Ritam lit a fire. Arohi sat, brushing her hair with her fingers.

"I'm scared, Ritam," she whispered. "It's like my hair... is watching me."

He took her hand. "I'll protect you. From curses, ghosts, anything. I swear."

That night, he dreamt of a woman with no face, only hair—miles and miles of it. Smiling.

A week later, Ritam found an old journal in the town's temple library.

It belonged to a woman named "Sharvani." A village outcast from 1832.

She was born bald. Mocked all her life.

Her final entry read: "Let them all have hair like mine. Let them know what it is to rot from the root. I made a comb of my bones. I will gift them beauty. And take it back."

Ritam was shaking.

The next morning, Arohi was gone.

They found her in the riverbed, hair flowing like seaweed, her mouth open, whispering to the wind.

Her scalp was bleeding.

Around her floated five corpses—all bald.

Ritam ran to her, but she looked through him.

"They wanted it. They begged for it. I only took what was mine."

Her voice was not hers.

Her hair rose like vines. Wrapping around Ritam's wrists, ankles.

"You said you'd protect me, remember?"

"Arohi, this isn't you—"

"I am the comb. I was always the comb. The girl was just the shell."

His vision blurred as her hair tightened.

Then, in one flicker of clarity, he reached for the flame of the ritual lamp.

He thrust it into her hair.

The scream that followed wasn't human.

The hair turned to ash. The bodies sank. The river boiled for a moment, then fell still.

When the villagers came, they found Ritam unconscious, half-drowned.

Arohi was gone. Her body never found.

But weeks later, a woman in another village bought a comb from a wandering junk seller. Carved of sandalwood, warm to the touch.

She had always hated her frizzy hair.

She smiled as she combed.

Slowly.

Beautifully.

"You could be beautiful. You could matter..."

THE ENDING