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Luka is beautiful.
He knows this. How could he not? Everyone has commented on it, with their words and gazes and leers and hands and hands and hands.
Luka is beautiful.
His parents know this. That's why he’s been modeling since he was three, posing in onesies and shirts and swimsuits and nothing at all.
Luka is beautiful.
His manager knows this. Has him dressed in skimpy clothing. In tight pants not made for dancing and revealing shirts that chill his starved body.
Luka is beautiful.
It's a known fact; with his lush mop of blond hair, big, doe eyes, lean body, so beautiful, so frail.
His group members never seem to want to include him, despite them being part of the same idol group for years. They whisper about him when they think he doesn’t hear, about how annoying he is. How stupid, how insufferable, how perfect.
They don’t know. They don’t know why Luka gets called to hang back with their manager, why Luka gets extra attention in the dressing room, why Luka gets hugs and high-fives and pats while all they get is the cold shoulder; they just know that he does, and that's enough.
Luka doesn’t know why, either. Looking into the mirror, he can’t distinguish anything that makes him look like a target, makes him look easy. All he sees is a kid, 16 years old and tired. Dull eyes, pale skin, protruding ribs. Weak. pathetic. Disgusting. Beautiful.
He tries sometimes, after particularly harsh sessions, to make himself ugly. Untouchable. Safe.
He can’t gain more than half a pound a year, lest his supervisors have him throw it up. He doesn’t know how to instigate fights, doesn’t know how to rile someone up enough to hit the golden boy. So he does the only thing he knows he can.
He cuts.
On his thighs, his wrists, his stomach, his legs, there isn’t a surface of skin left untainted. (He’s never been untainted.)
They don’t care. They kiss his scars and lick his wounds and call him pretty. They laugh like they find his attempts of freedom funny, like he’s just a silly little doll, so stupid, so beautiful. Always beautiful.
His parents stare him down in disappointment when they find out, lips pursed in disgust and words clipped in contempt. They never bother to do anything more than telling him off. Who will find him pretty now that he's so disgusting? (He felt joy at those words, then overwhelming shame, because who is so twisted that they find joy in the concept of being unlovable?)
His groupmates snicker when they realize. They gift him knives for his birthday.
The only one truly upset had been his makeup artist; all the extra work she had to do to cover the scars had left him with bruises.
Luka wonders, sometimes, what's stopping him from slitting his wrists entirely.
He realizes, when he saw the director ask Ivan, their newest recruit, to stay after practice, that he simply couldn’t pass the burden on to him.
And how disgusting is Luka? How horrible, how inhumane is he to even think about it? To think, for even a moment, to taint someone, make them impure, just because he couldn’t handle some touches? Because he was too cowardly, too weak to play into the only role he had? The only role he’ll ever have?
So he lets them touch. Lets them watch and film and take and take, and he will give and give and give.
Because Luka is beautiful.
Luka is beautiful.
He’s not sure if he wants to be, though.