Chipped Nail Polish (Lashton)

Where Luke Wears Nail Polish

He didn't wear nail polish because he felt more comfortable being a little more feminine. He didn't really have it on his fingernails because he wanted to either. Actually, Luke had to have colors painted onto his fingernails. Luke wouldn't call what people thought was strange for a boy to do as an addiction but his reason could possibly seem that way.

Luke's felt different about the world he lived in once he turned 13. All of the sudden he had a fear of social interactions and a lack of confidence when it came to pushing himself to do things he didn't want to do, or thought that he shouldn't do. He had no idea where all of those thoughts and feelings in his head came from but he knew that they were there and they wouldn't leave him alone without a fight.

Other people could definitely tell that Luke was a very anxious person. When he had to order food at a restaurant or pay for things he wanted to purchase, he never made eye contact with the people he spoke to because once he locked eyes, his speech would have this nervous stutter or get mixed up when he said them and he'd even forget what he wanted to say, even after practicing it in his head over and over until he actually had to say them. It was embarrassing when that happened because he felt like an idiot and he also had it in his own head that everyone around him thought he was an idiot as well.

Then his body would start reacting, which had a scale from being flushed red to actually having anxiety attacks. He couldn't control himself as he started to feel his body become warm. Yeah, he's read all about breathing exercises that he could do to calm himself down but he didn't think that would ever help him. He's only had a few anxiety attacks in his life and somehow he had been able to get himself under control. He knew exactly how they felt as the attacks came over him. His ears would feel like they were burning and then he'd start pacing around, chatting to himself about how he was getting scared and he didn't know what to do with himself. Then he'd feel the inside of his body start to buzz. His hands would lock up, fingers crossing over one another, and his arms would curl as his twisted-fingered fists would stick to his shoulders, unable to move as a coldness ran through his body. Sometimes his legs would also give out and all he could do was roll side-to-side on the floor until he was able to break through. Luckily, he has never had one in public. Those ones would probably be much worse.

The nail polish came into play as a coping mechanism for him to try and deal with his nerves on his own. Picking at the layers meant something more to him that he didn't think people would understand, not that he would ever tell someone about it. Even having people stare at his nails and hear their hushed whispers made him nervous. That itch would crawl over his skin and he'd start biting at his lip until he was able to get himself out of the situation to pick away at them. To Luke, he couldn't pick away at his life and become an entirely new person and with the nail polish, he could pick at it and reveal his bare nail underneath. He was able to give his nails a new identity with a fresh new color.

At first, he didn't paint all of his nails. He'd just do a random one or a few. The first time he had done it, he took a red polish from his mum's makeup. As he stroked the brush along his nail, revealing a smooth shiny coat, he felt himself relax. Luke felt like he was in control.

Then his anxiety would start controlling him so he had to pick at it until he felt his anxiousness drain away from him.

His mum didn't understand why he would do it and she never tried to bring it up. Maybe she had this fearful conclusion in her head and she didn't have her own courage to try and figure out why her son wore nail polish on his fingernails. Luke knew he'd start picking when they'd really talk about it because he didn't want to. He knew she sometimes watched him closely, even if his head was done as he focused on really trying to get polish off of his thumb.

She once asked Luke if it drove him crazy to have chipped nail polish on. He shook his head and then looked down to his nails. He picked at them in his room, leaving the small colored flakes on his desk. Once he managed to get all of it off, he pick out a new color and paint them all over again.

He bought his own colors one day at a petrol station: bottles of black, green, and dark blue. When he had to go up to pay for them he was nervous that the cashier would assume they were for him and laugh at Luke in his head. So, once he paid for them, he sat on the pavement and painted his nails right in front of the small shop at the petrol station, letting them dry off before he picked the color off in only a few minutes.

They were cheap so they chipped off very easily, which led him to painting all of his nails because once he had nothing left to pick he'd start chewing at his lip and peeling the skin off around his nails, sometimes even bleeding because he just got lost in the action.

He knew that he had to do something different to help himself and fight off the strong desire until he really mutilated himself, but he could never bring himself to do anything about it. Luke just let it consume him and take over his life.

Luke didn't have any friends like he had before all of his anxiety. His mum told him that he was a child that wasn't afraid to do anything and he was very talkative. Luke had no idea where that child went but he does remember those days where he would do things he would only scare himself with thinking of doing now. He missed that boy and wanted him to come back so he didn't have to live like this anymore. It came on him out of nowhere so he wanted it to leave him in the same way.

In school, his classmates thought he was weird just because he didn't talk to anyone and he wore nail polish. Those people knew nothing about him and they didn't have any chance to because Luke thought it was easier to just keep to himself, to slowly disappear until it was like he wasn't even in the classroom. He did pick at his nail polish during classes and at lunchtime. He'd leave what he chipped off on his table, which he had to share with another person so they noticed Luke did that.

At lunchtime he would also paint them if he needed to get through the rest of the day, and that he knew he'd be anxious. Nobody wanted to sit near him when he did that and he couldn't ignore that fact. He'd think about it and not give the paint a chance to dry before he peeled it away.

Luke was easy to be picked on, just like his nails were easy for him to pick at.

Maybe he wasn't in as much control of himself as he thought he was.