Nothing left to lose

Juliet Morhan had dreamt of being a model for much of her life. By virtue of growing up with two older brothers, she picked up sports out of sheer preservation of spending time with the boys she adored more than anyone else in the world. Out of respect for her parents, she attended college, and obtained a degree in marine biology, her second love. But still, she dreamed of being a model, one that little girls could actually look up to. One that a decent man could be proud to claim. It was a dream. No, it was the dream.

When Juliet was nineteen, she'd been discovered while working at a pizza parlor. With her sweet charm, and her pretty appearance, Juliet made a very good waitress, and it was how she met Harriet Faelings. The big-time agent had liked Juliet's smile, her build, her cute freckles and her red hair. Knowing how rare and hard it was to be found like that, she began to model part-time. Juliet had imagined becoming successful. She once pulled in two major contracts in a forty-eight hour period, something that Harriet told her was monumental in her career.

For the first five months or so, everything went well in the agency. Juliet was pretty and very, very good at what she did; however, Harriet began to notice that her young protege never volunteered to remove her clothing. She decided to push, and assigned Juliet a gig where she would be posing for an art class- nude. There were a lot of things Juliet would do, and while she wasn't an overly religious girl, she had her morals and there was no way she would do such a thing. She declined, and posed in her underwear, and covered her chest with her pose. Feeling like she'd proven to Harriet that she could work around her discomfort, Juliet returned to her normal state of self-confidence.

Juliet how no idea how low one's morals could be pulled by this career. At twenty-one, she graduated with her degree in marine biology, though under Harriet's orders, she didn't tell any clients that she had a college degree. So, Juliet hid her intelligence, and masked it with her smile and shallow answers. Along with this came a margin of success, though since she refused to pose nude, it cut down on her options. After not working for a few weeks, Juliet faced a choice: rent, food, or posing nude. Her pride was too great to go crawling to her brothers for assistance, and so Juliet posed nude for the first time.

Her face was flushed with shame, but apparently the photographer was loving the blushing virgin look, and so she was covered. Well, figuratively. Because she was stiff, the agency assigned a nude male to pose her. The pictures were practically still images of forced exposure. When the agency sent Juliet the proofs, she burned them. She would never tell her brothers, but it was the costliest bag of groceries Juliet had ever purchased.

Feeling stupid, like all that was left for her was naked pictures, Juliet tried to act cheerful for her brothers. It didn't take long for her to feel the strain of that, so she simply stopped visiting, or taking their calls. It was hard, but she found that it was a better and better thing. She couldn't burn the proofs anymore, or she wouldn't get work. Things were rapidly spiralling out of control. She knew that Theo was worried. He left her letters, asking what he'd done and apologizing. One time, he tried to break down her door when she wouldn't answer, but Nat and Evander dragged him away.

The day that someone from the agency told her that she was fat, Juliet decided that she needed to eat less. Her food intake dropped drastically, and she looked thin and awkward. Part of her hoped that she would be considered unsuitable for shoots, but Harriet decided that she was perfect for macabre shoots. This meant, that she was often bruised on set- either by design, of from being restrained by male models, or shackles being put on her delicate skin. Juliet wanted out. She needed to get out- but she felt trapped. Shame and fear prevented her from going to her brothers, and there was no one else she felt could pull her out.

One day, the final straw broke.
"Juliet, let Peter fondle you."
"Excuse me?" Her voice was barely above a whisper.
"You heard us, let him fondle you."
"No."

Harriet walked over to her, fury on those defined features.
"Excuse me?"
"I won't!"
Juliet stepped back, tears streaming down her face to fall to her exposed flesh.
"I won't! I am sick of being degraded, and treated like I'm nothing but a body. I am smart, and I am sweet, and I am more than just a body to be fondled and captured on image. What's next, Harriet? Penetration? It doesn't matter, because I won't be here for it. I am done, Harriet. Finished."
"You'll never model again!"
Juliet smiled, the first time off camera in so, so long.
"I don't care."

She walked home that night, feeling better than she had in a long time. She settled into her apartment, ready for a nice little holiday. Until the morning she awoke to an eviction notice. Juliet was stunned- how had things spiralled so far out of control? She began to sob, her thin shoulders shuddering. She'd been putting on weight, but not near to the point she had been. She had nothing left to lose. Packing her important things into a suitcase, she walked away from the apartment, and did what she should have done in the first place. Juliet went home to her brothers.

Neither was home, and she hadn't spoken much to them in the past three months. She supposed that they had a right- Theo and Lila had a little girl now, and Evander and Nat had lives too. Juliet sank to the floor outside of Nat's apartment door, leaning her frail weight against the door. She supposed a nap wouldn't be so bad...

Scarcely an hour later, Nat and Evander came home. Nat saw the bony heap outside his door, and raised an eyebrow.
"What on-" He paled rapidly. "Jewel?"
Rushing to his sister's side, he picked her up, and glanced at Evander, clearly wanting instruction. Though Evander was also worried, he stayed calm, and unlocked their door.
"Put her on the couch, Nat. Let's be glad we found her before Theo."

Looking at his emaciated little sister, who by now had awoken and was sobbing in his arms, Nat had to agree. And once Jewel had told him what was going on, and Theo was ready to plot, the two of them would pull off the most important prank ever.