blanket disclaimer: i do not own anything but the plot.

I know I'm working on this other story, but I really don't like how that's going and I don't like the story in general and this one is sort of like - blah, alright, whatever. I dunno.

It's short, but it's an introduction. It's meant to be, at least.

I am a model.

I pose for a camera and millions of people who love to look at me and wish they were me because make-up artists make me look pretty and I know how to smile, and the clothes the costume manager picked out are made so I look thinner and more perfect than I am.

In reality, I am nothing of the illusion I feed to avid readers of fashion magazines.

I am a girl, only sixteen, and I am just the same as everyone else – maybe my physical features, such as my bright green eyes and soft pink hair and pasty white skin, aren't the same as everyone else, but I can relate to more than people think –

At five I was abandoned and sent to live with a girl with blue eyes and blonde hair that was cut short but she later grew long, long like Rapunzel's, and as sleek and beautiful as that princess' hair.

Her mother was sweet and her father was a strong man, always doing the heavy lifting and picking us girls up and swinging us around and telling us how pretty we were. And then he would cut us flowers and her mother would scold him for not paying, because the flowers belonged to their shop, not them, but he would just laugh and hand us little daisies and we'd smell them and it would smell sweet, and sweet was my life.

When we were seven, Ino and I, we met a boy and he was pretty – very pretty. He went to school with us and he had shockingly dark eyes and his hair sort of stuck up in the back – kinda like bed hair, except stylish and tempting.

We both fell in love.

The love tore us apart; we were no longer sisters but rivals, enemies, like Sparta and Athens, once allied but now turned against each other – and suddenly that little life where we painted each other's nails and brushed each other's hair and told each other secrets that belonged to us and to other people was gone, replaced by cold-blooded competitions and spilled secrets.

And throughout all of this, that pretty boy with his pretty hair and pretty face and pretty eyes and pretty everything remained oblivious and beautiful.

When I was thirteen Ino got a modeling opportunity and she was so, so happy. By this time we had sobered up and apologized and every night she'd braid my hair and I'd curl hers.

Both of us had longer hair but I thought hers was prettier, the way it just continuously flowed over her shoulders and down her back. It was a pity she kept it tied back, high on her head.

Ino had moved on from pretty, pretty boy, but I had not. I still watched him everyday at school, and when we went to the photo studio for the first time, I was shocked to find him there, sitting looking disgruntled in a corner as people bustled around. His face was perfect as usual, even twisted up so angrily, and a blush crawled up my neck and onto my cheeks and Ino elbowed me cheekily and I snapped at her.

Someone came over to us after that and grabbed Ino and stole her away and told me to take a seat anywhere – but then she did a double take and took in my pink hair and green eyes and me, and grabbed me, as well. I was pulled through the studio and a door and there was a long, long mirror, stretching across a wall. A woman smiled at me through eyes like that pretty boy's, and her dark hair was tied back in a loose ponytail.

Ino was already seated and getting make-up done by a younger girl, powder particles floating in the air around her already-pretty face and the woman introduced herself as I watched on – "Hi, I'm Uchiha Mikoto, in charge of make-up, costumes, the works." – and she led me over to a seat near, but next to Ino and her powder particles. I glanced into the mirror, blushed at my mediocre appearance, and turned back to the woman with the nice face and eyes like pretty boy's

She examined my face, turning it gently to each side and peering into my eyes and at my lips and memorizing the shape of everything, and she wrote as she did this, and then she walked over to a drawer and pulled it open and in there was make-up.

It was filled to the rim with different colors – blue, brown, pink, purple, red, black, even yellow and orange and bright, bright green. She pulled out some cases of eye shadow and blush and foundation and other things and handed them to a girl standing in a corner and looking out the window.

The next time I looked in the mirror I was pretty like that pretty boy.

When I was sixteen I moved up to real photography and not just modeling for clothing magazines like those department stores in the mall.

I could be found in fashion magazines all over the place, and often it was me and Ino, a little swirl of pink and blonde and everyone knew us when they saw us, even if they didn't read those magazines, and little girls were in awe when we walked down the street in expensive clothes I didn't really want.

I still went to regular high school and there I was considered no more than a student – and I liked that.

I also liked that every day I sat behind that pretty boy with that pretty grimace and pretty fingers and arms and clothes and hair –

I liked that the most.

kay so it sucked, whatever.

review and favorite and like this pls.