constantly thinking about how crushingly helplessly lonely luke must have been in the months prior to last spectre and also just in general
throughout the series itβs emphasised that he struggles to make friends and connect with new people and based on how nearly every interaction he has [that i can recall, i might have missed something] with the other kids in misthallery ranges from stilted and unfamiliar at best to outright hostile at worst, itβs easy to infer that with the exception of however long he and arianna were still speaking to each other, he grew up without a single friend to his name - when you examine the stuffed bear in his room he straight up refers to that as his best friend for godβs sake
while itβs hard to ascertain how well he gets on with his parents under normal circumstances, we can infer that his relationship with clark deteriorated heavily while the latter was being blackmailed by descole [luke is convinced that his dad has been possessed, so severe is the decline in their relationship]. with brenda missing and clark as good as it from an emotional perspective, luke is completely alone, no friends to speak of, no family to turn to, all while the town heβs grown up in is being destroyed around him while he desperately tries to do whatever he can to stop it
how absolutely alone did luke, an evidently socially anxious kid at this point in time, have to be for him to reach out to a complete and utter stranger for help? none of the kids in town notice him as anything other than that rich boy who never works for himself, none of the adults will listen to him because heβs still too young to be important, the only thing he can trust is his hopes that this old friend of his dadβs will be as good as he sounds. heβs so accustomed to being ignored that he canβt even bring himself to ask for help honestly, he needs to pretend to be someone more important who he thinks will be worth listening to
also of note is just how quickly he becomes attached to hershel. heβs finally found someone who listens to him, who cares about how he feels and what he thinks, who appreciates his achievements - of course luke would latch on immediately, heβs gone so long without any sort of validation or affection from any other human and hereβs somebody whoβs here for him, no strings attached, just a person who genuinely wants to help and to be a friend. the cutscene in the hotel really sticks out to me as an example of this, particularly the way luke just clings to hershel so desperately; heβs only known the professor for a day and already the thought of something happening to him absolutely terrifies luke, to the point where heβs very obviously panicking just at the possibility that he might lose the first person in who knows how long that makes him feel seen and wanted and slightly less alone
i donβt know where i was going with this i started writing this post six hours ago but luke is just..... so despairingly lonely and it breaks my heart thinking about it. this is only a tiny piece of my neverending mental analysis on lukeβs emotional trauma and wide array of Troubles but this post has already overstayed its welcome a bit so iβll probably dump the rest of that at random intervals
