"It's cold," said Luka, pitifully, to the other two deformities in the freakshow. She hugged her knees closer to herself and shivered as the wind blew past the open doors of the caravan, bringing with it snow that landed on her arms and hair.

The brown-haired girl in the cage to her, Meiko, shifted, raised her clawed, monstrous hand. "Don't complain."

Kaito, the blue-haired boy in the cage on Luka's left, sighed. "Well, we can't do anything about the cold..."

Luka nodded and lowered her head, staring at the filthy hay that covered the floor of her cage. She toed the wood around her, weak and rotting, like her face. Her face...She had been born deformed, or so she thought. She did not ever remember a time when she did not have this cursed face. She had no right eye - there was nothing there but a gaping black hole, with pus oozing out of it at times when she got especially filthy, and Luka was always careful to not touch it, for it would aggravate the ever-present pain there. Did she ever have a right eye? Luka didn't know - her memories only began at the point where she was thrown into the freakshow some months ago. Everything before that was blank, black...nothing.

Of course, having no right eye was only one of Luka's deformities. Although, roughly speaking, half of her face was more or less normal, the other half was not: papery, skeletal, demonic, misshapen. Her corpse-like skin bit around her nose, intruded onto her lips. She appeared to have only one nostril as well, although, Luka was certain that she had two - it's just that her right one was hidden.

Luka tried to cheer herself by thinking that at least her body was normal - Kaito and Meiko had to contend with dietary issues and misshapen arms. When it comes to opening time in the freak show, they were the ones who get the most jeers and insults - but Luka was the one who received the most fear. She was paraded as "The Living Corpse". Sometimes, smelling salts had to be administered for the more delicate ladies who fainted at the sight of Luka's face.

Luka coughed against her knobby knees - it really was cold. The snow showed no sign of stopping as the caravan's floor became streaked with white. Meiko bore it stoically, but Kaito's teeth were beginning to chatter, as were Luka's. Miserably, Luka wondered when the freak show showman would close the doors. She hoped she wouldn't get sick. The showman never spent any time caring for the freaks when they became ill, so mostly, the freaks had to take care of each other. Not that it helped, much - Luka recalled dimly when she became sick a few weeks earlier. It was terrible, her body wracked with weakness and uncontrollable shivers, sweating, fever, a throat so sore she couldn't eat or drink without intense pain shooting down her throat, deep, phlegm-filled coughs...Meiko was very poor at taking care of her, her morphed and twisted arms and clawed hands ill-fitted for such delicate things, and Kaito tried to help by giving Luka his food, but the thought of eating Kaito's food was disturbing - even though Luka knew that he was only trying to help, and appreciated that.

Thankfully, the showman (who was only ever known as Mr. M) came by and closed the doors, stopping any more snow from intruding into the confines of the caravan. He was a thin man, with a luxuriously black mustache and clever gray eyes. He didn't speak much to the freaks, and silently gave them their food. Meiko received stale bread with a pat of butter, along with a special, easy to grip bowl of water to accommodate her hands. Luka had a bowl of gruel with brownish vegetables in it, some his meat, and water. Kaito had a human hand and a few human fingers (of unknown origin) thrown into her cage, and water. Luka said nothing - she only hungrily dug into her gruel, using her hands to scoop the viscous fluid into her mouth, and chewed on her strips of dried meat after dipping them into some of the gruel to soften them.

After that, she wiped her hands on her rags and got up, searching for a relatively clean place to lay her head, somewhere that wasn't filthy with excrement or sweat or spit. Eventually, she found a place to the left, and, with a sigh, collapsed there to go to sleep.

-o-o-o-

Luka bore the shrieks and jeers, but they always pounded into her frail and delicate young mind. Everyone who saw her face treated her the same, no matter where the caravan traveled - like a demon or a grotesque, straight out of a horror novel.

It hurt, and the only ones who understood were her fellow freaks, who also had to bear with the endless flood of taunts and scorn. Luka knew that she spent more than a few days grabbing onto her friends' hands for reassurance.

One day, the caravan pulled into a clearing in the forest, after several days of travel. Luka had always enjoyed traveling. She did not have to bear with the insults then, and she did not have to bear with being treated like a monster by everyone outside. Luka liked to look outside from the small windows in the caravan and see the world outside. Sometimes the caravan passed through cities, big human-made buildings and towers, normality going around her without a care in the world, and sometimes the caravan passed through small, pastoral villages, where Luka would enjoy the peaceful sights of the fields and crops. More often than not, however, the caravan passed through long stretches of lonely road, and the scenery would change before Luka's eyes. Those were the places she liked traveling through best. In more populated areas, there would always be people, and Luka envied the undeformed. Even the ugliest human was beautiful in Luka's eyes, for no one was uglier than herself, born with the face of a monster.

In the clearing, Mr. M left the caravan unattended - he had no fear of the freaks escaping, for he would always carry the keys with him - to help the other people in the circus set up everything. Luka huddled in the corner and tried to mentally prepare herself for the inevitable flood of people hurling abuse at her. She was never prepared enough, but it gave Luka some reassurance to try to strengthen herself for the ordeal ahead. Maybe someday she would be strong enough to endure the taunts. Meiko and Kaito were silent - Luka knew that they were also mentally preparing themselves for everything.

When the circus opened, however, not many people came to the freakshow, to Luka's great relief. Mr. M only ever yelled at Luka to show her face when there was a crowd, so Luka was spared from insult by hiding her face in the corner. Although some people insulted her, they were insults based on guessing, and had no impact.

"What's wrong with this one?" a high, piping voice asked, young, sounding like someone around Luka's age. Luka frowned to herself. She hated it when people her own age insulted her.

"Something, I'm sure," said a more mature voice. "I'll wait outside, Miku - come back when you're done."

"Okay," the voice said, obediently - Miku, Luka guessed. She felt the weight of the girl's stare on her, even though Luka wasn't looking at the girl.

"Hello," said Miku.

Luka did not reply. To reply was to dare, and Luka did not dare with children, who she knew were much crueler than their adult counterparts. Children were the most frightening ones of all, in their innocence.

"Hello," said Miku, again, and again. Luka stayed silent. She was an expert at silence.

"Um...I guess you don't really want to talk," Miku said. Luka heard her put her hands on the bars. "That's okay. I'll talk then. Do you have a favorite food? Mine's leeks! It's really great! It's healthy and I like it with chicken, most of the time. Do you know what a leek is?" Miku paused, and after hearing no answer, launched into a detailed description of leeks and the various foodstuffs one could create with them.

Luka's stomach growled painfully as she became aware that she had not eaten in two days, and also, that she had never eaten any leeks, or any chicken, ever. She suddenly felt a surge of resentment towards the girl that galvanized her into action.

"Don't talk about food," Luka mumbled as she willed her weakened legs to stand. She darted her left eye over to look at Miku. Miku was a teal-haired girl, with wide, innocent blue eyes. She radiated purity and kindness. Luka warily stared at her, clandestinely hiding the deformed part of her face. She did not know Miku's intentions, so she could not trust her. Sometimes the most angelic children in looks were the most demonic ones.

"Okay," said Miku obligingly. "So, what's your name?"

Luka sighed. "Read the placard." She herself could not read, but she knew that Mr. M placed placards in front of each cage with the name and nickname of the freak in question.

Miku paused. "The Living Corpse, Luka...Wow! Are you really a corpse?"

"No," said Luka.

"Why do they call you the living corpse, then?" Miku was curious now.

Luka decided to not answer that, and shifted herself away from Miku and sat back down, feeling ever more intent on hiding her face.

"Nevermind," Miku said quickly, picking up on Luka's mood. "Let's talk about something else, then. So...how are you?"

Luka laughed, a short, derisive one. "What do you think?"

"Oh...sorry," said Miku, who sounded a bit cowed by Luka's laugh.

Luka suddenly found herself regretting her harsh tone and laugh. She had very no friendly human contact outside of Meiko and Kaito. Miku was an outsider, but she was an outsider who was actually talking to Luka, and to Luka, that was something that should not be thrown aside.

"No, it's okay," said Luka, taking on a gentler tone. "So, is this your first time in the circus?"

"Yeah," Miku's voice was a little bit more subdued. "I've never seen freaks before. So I was curious. I know that that boy can't eat normal food, and that girl has weird arms, but what's wrong with you?"

Luka winced slightly. "...my face."

"Oh? Can you please show me your face, then?" Miku asked brightly.

Luka knew what would follow after Miku saw her face. Terror, and fear. She would be seen as a monster and Miku would never ever talk to her again ever and Luka did not want that. She shook her head. She knew that Miku was only talking to her out of curiosity, but Miku was at least somewhat friendly.

"Oh. Okay," Miku sounded more than a little disappointed. "So, what do you do?"

"Sit here and listen to people yell or throw things at me," said Luka. "After that I eat and sleep here on the hay."

"That's terrible!" Miku sounded shocked. "Really?"

"Yes," said Luka.

"I'm sorry," said Miku. "Does everyone else here have the same thing?"

"Of course," said Meiko, cutting into the conversation. "What else do you think we're here for? Our lives are just like this."

Meiko butting in also made Kaito talk. "It's bad, but it's not like we can help it. We were born like this, mostly."

Miku's voice filled with pity. "Wow...I didn't know...that's horrible..."

Luka found herself annoyed by the pitying tone in Miku's voice. "Don't pity me," she snapped. "I hate it."

"Ah," Miku's voice shrunk back as if stung. "Okay."

Once again Luka found herself regretting her harsh tone. She was terrible at this sort of thing, so it seemed. "So what do you do?" Luka's poor attempt at reestablishing conversation.

"My dad's a chemist," said Miku softly. "So he makes medicine for people. My mom helps. We live on the upper floor of the apothecary...I go to school..."

School? Luka was completely unfamiliar with the subject. "What's school?"

"You don't know...?" Miku sounded surprised. "It's a place you go to learn things. Like letters and 'rithmetic."

Learning things...that caught Luka's interest. "Teach me," she demanded.

"What?" said Miku, and Meiko at the same time.

Luka still kept her face hidden, although she was smiling now. "Teach me. I want to know more about things. Being stuck here in this cage...I don't know anything. I can't read or anything. I want to learn things."

"But I don't know if I can teach," said Miku. " I'm no good at school."

"I don't care," said Luka. "At least teach me how to read, and maybe you can bring in, what are they called...'books'?"

"Are you crazy?" Meiko sounded irritated. "If Mr. M catches you with a book, then-"

"Mr. M..." Luka glanced over at the chair where Mr. M sat. He was sleeping. "He won't know. Please teach me."

There was a pregnant pause before Miku finally answered. "I'll try."

-o-o-o-

Miku came over more often. The freaks would all cluster as close as they can to the bars of the cage, Luka included - although she kept to the shadows and kept her head down so that Miku could not see her face. Miku started out by teaching the freaks the alphabet - something that they all picked up on quickly. Miku then moved on to pronunciation and writing out the alphabet. She seemed surprised by how fast the freaks learned everything.

"Woww," Miku stared at Luka's careful writing in the dust. "It took me weeks to learn how to write my own name! Great job!"

Luka smiled proudly, although Miku could not see her face. Getting praised by Miku also brought a warm glow to Luka's chest, which only drove her to learn quicker and quicker.

Eventually Miku brought little booklets with little stories - readers, she called them. Luka struggled with reading at first - the words wouldn't organize themselves in her head. To Luka's small annoyance, Kaito picked up on reading very quickly, and Miku praised Kaito a lot more than she praised Luka, who was still struggling with reading simple sentences such as "The dog ran."

After Kaito delivered a stirring reading of the epic tale of the cat on the mat, Miku praised him to the high heavens. Luka frowned, although Meiko seemed very happy at Kaito's success, no jealousy at all. Luka didn't want to feel jealous - she was happy for her friend's success, of course, but she didn't like having Miku's attention taken away from her. So Luka delved even deeper into learning how to read. To her dismay, Meiko mastered her reader earlier than she did, and Luka saw herself rapidly falling behind.

She couldn't let that happen, so she spent hours practicing when Mr. M was away, reading to herself over and over. Meiko and Kaito tried to help, but their explanations were poor. However, eventually, Luka too managed to completely finish reading her reader.

"So they went into the house. Frank's basket was soon filled, and he went home happy," Luka read to Miku.

There was a brief silence before Miku broke into a smile. "That's great, Luka! You did it!"

Luka could hardly believe it herself, and she felt the warm glow of happiness spread in her chest again. She dropped the book, her fingers trembling. She was so happy, so ecstatic, she almost lost control and let Miku see her face - but of course, she couldn't let that happen. Instead, she settled for taking hold of Miku's hand - something that Miku would usually only allow when Luka did well when learning due to the filthy state of Luka's hands.

"Do you have any more readers?" Kaito asked after some time passed.

Miku nodded. "Yeah, I have a few more."

"Great!" Kaito's eyes lit up.

"Wait," said Meiko. "What about arithmetic?"

Miku's smile immediately dropped, and she looked down. "I'm...not good at math...I'm sorry."

She looked so sad Luka started to feel sad herself. "It's okay, Miku," said Luka. "Do you have any math books? We can read those, right?"

"Oh!" Miku brightened up. "Okay, I'll show you that! But how long are you going to stay here? You're a traveling circus, right?"

Luka was immediately brought back into the world of reality. Even though the circus stopped for a very extended time in here, Luka wouldn't be able to see Miku forever. The circus would move on. She wouldn't be able to see Miku anymore. Luka's lips trembled.

"We're leaving in three days, I think," said Meiko.

"Three days," Miku mumbled.

Not three days! Luka felt the last remnants of her happiness disappear, and she tightened her grip on Miku's hands. That was so short, no time at all.

"That's not fair," said Luka, allowing herself to act her age this one time. "I want to see you more."

Miku smiled kindly at her. "I want to see you too, Luka."

"Ignoring us two as always," Luka heard Meiko say to Kaito in a loud stage whisper - necessary seeing how separate their cages were. Kaito only chuckled lightly in reply. Luka ignored them.

"I don't want to leave here," said Luka, her voice subdued. "You're my friend. My only outside friend. You're the only one who's nice to me..."

Miku rubbed the back of Luka's hand with her thumb. "I'll try to see you again."

"Okay," Luka nodded. "Promise?"

"I promise," said Miku.

-o-o-o-

It was the last day. Luka was very aware of the time ticking away, counting down the time she had left with Miku. Miku had become precious to her. Luka did not want her to leave at all - when Miku was there, Luka would feel happy and excited and at ease, but when she wasn't, Luka would always look forward to seeing her again.

"Remember your promise," said Luka firmly.

"I will," said Miku. "I always keep my promises!" She paused, and then spoke again, quieter. "Since this is our last day, could you please show me your face?"

That took Luka for a turn. Could she trust Miku to see her face? Would Miku be scared like everyone else? No...Miku was different, right? She was her friend. She wouldn't be scared of Luka, not like everyone else. Miku was good. Luka trusted her.

It was still scary, though.

"Please don't run away," Luka said.

"I won't," Miku said. "I promise!"

Luka smiled and believed her, and with that hope in her chest, she raised her head and let Miku see her for the first time.

Miku stared at her face, and then, she began to scream in complete terror. Luka suddenly felt rigid with shock. Miku was backing away from her as if she was a monster or a demon.

Immediately, Luka's expression contorted into one of anger as she remembered what Miku said. She promised. She said that she always kept her promises. Then...what was this? She broke it. She was just like everyone else! How could Luka have been so stupid? She should've known to not trust her. Outsiders couldn't be trusted. They were different. They were undeformed. Luka couldn't pollute them with her demonic imperfections. Miku's screaming was drilling into Luka's brain, confirming everything about herself - that she was a monster who no one would love and no one would treat kindly, not ever. Immediately, Miku's mother rushed into the room and took Miku away, just like that. Luka would never see Miku again, and their last meeting ended like this, with screams of terror and betrayal.

Bitterness filled Luka's heart, and she stomped away back into her corner, hating everything. Meiko and Kaito were silent. Mr. M walked in shortly after and blew out the candle.

The caravan was plunged into darkness.