.// amethyst rose sparks

Everyone’s pushing for us to grow up
But everything’s happening way too fast
Everything’s changing it’s all rearranging
But you only live once

.// details

NAME -- [ Mari Carola Klein Amethyst Rose Sparks ]
NICKNAME -- [ Ame ; Rose ]
AGE -- [ Thirteen Fourteen ]
GENDER -- [ Female ]
DISTRICT/AREA -- [ District Five District One ]

.// appearance

[justify]To be perfectly―perfectly? Since when have I learned that word? You always have―honest, I'm a child. With arms and legs as thin as those twigs that I hit animals with play with, it's no wonder they would think that I'm eight years old. I'm a lot older, but I like to think that I'm younger. Some kids my age always complains that they want to grow up a lot faster, and I just don't understand them. I can only squint my eye, confused as I ever was with the world. But I wasn't, even though I could deny it over a hundred times each and everyday, I just knew how unfair shrewd evil the world was.

I hate to admit it, but I am actually pretty easy to miss, according to them. Everyone says (they're not saying anything, but I could feel it with their gaze, quickly moving from me to someone a lot more pleasing) is nothing special about me―boring, as the stuck-up girls with their painted faces and similar hair in my school says; bland, as my teachers would like to describe me. I don't know the meaning of the second word, but I wouldn't want to anyway. But who could blame them? My skin isn't strikingly white and pale to create any contrast, nor was it dark. Just... plain. So was my medium brown hair that was cut only a little past below my shoulder blades. My lips weren't too thin or too full, but average. They all fail to see the quirks that were present on my body. My forehead was wider. My nose was longer. My eyebrows were rounder, not sharp-edged, with a few unnoticed strays. Perhaps the most remarkable were my ears and eyes. My ears were big, and they stick-out the most. Instead of hiding them with my hair, I tuck my hair behind them and expose them the most. It was funny to see their reactions towards my ears. They were nothing else but a pair of ears, yet they look at it as if some kind of supernatural thing. Just right beside them were my deep-set large, large eyes. Of all parts of my body, I loved them the most. They weren't rimmed with thick, dark, lush and curled lashes, but it was lined instead with long, stick-straight, dense lashes. They were the size of marbles, as Pa liked to say. Pa always says beautiful things with his beautiful voice. It was hard not to notice the color of my eyes, which were a light amber. "Like melted gold," Ma said. See? I am not plain. Because everyone likes gold. They love it. So that means they love my eyes too, right?

Despite what they all say, I love to make myself stand out. Although my old and ragged clothes protests so, Ma had taught me long ago how to weave my hair, and I had been braiding flowers with it ever since. I have long heard and seen the Capitolites in the District Hall's old crackly television dress up with their gorgeous clothes and different-colored hair and longed for that. But no matter how much force I spend it rubbing petals on my hair strands, they just wouldn't stain. I wanted to believe that they would. I would spend classroom discussions drawing carefully-drawn swirls on my hands with my pen. Maybe that's why I'm not really good with school.[/justify]

.// personality

[justify]I never liked school. It was full of boring lectures with boring teachers and boring books. There were no pictures. So what was the use? And it was always about how to multiply this number to this number to get this number and it turned my brain 'round and 'round until I was basically crossed-eyed like that guy in front of me. I like throwing bits of eraser at him and it sticks on his sticky hair. And school never liked me, and those numerous letters that they give my Ma was only proof, but I could live with that. School was useless for me, because I strongly believe that as long as you know your proper change and how much money you should receive (and they will hopefully not know, because it can't hurt to have a little more) and you know how to talk and what words to say ― grammar and punctuation was never useful. Especially not in my point of view. So I may not have a wall full of diplomas and shiny shiny shiny medals, but I know my way around the dust- and stink-filled streets of Five. "You are unconventional," my English teacher said to me. I don't know the meaning of that word, but I have a strange feeling that it's true. Others rely on the age-old lectures for their knowledge, while I gain by experience. How else will I know if I haven't tried it out myself first? They all say that I'm too young for everything, but they only say that because of what I look like. How I look like a young, fragile child. I wanna be a child. I wanna be a child forever. I don't wanna grow up. Too bad. Because I know that I will and already am growing up. But deep inside I know and no matter how many times I try and cover it up with random squeals and widened eyes that I'm far beyond what I'm supposed to be.

I like love want whatever catches my eye. Which are mostly all those beautiful things that sparkle, glitter, shine and colorful. I want them all. I want them all I want them all I want them all and I'm never going to give them up and I'll keep it forever. There was never anything pretty in school. Boring books, ugly notebooks and bland, black-inked pens and charcoal pencils and monotone voices. But I don't like the outside. Not at the state it is now. Not with the pigs and the chickens and the cows and now with the oil and the dust. It's gross sight, and those who don't live in Five better be thankful. It's ugly here. We had to live with the stink of living in a farm and now with the oil fumes that were as bad as animal poop. I have to run and run as far as the woods bordering the crackling fence (that I wish that I could just break to get away from everything and everyone and go somehwere beautiful for a change) to escape from all the ugliness that surrounds me. Take it away. And no, it doesn't make me feel guilty about leaving everyone to their work because if I want to get out, then I will get out. You can't stop me. And I will be around flowers and the birds singing (and I hope that some shooter comes) and maybe even a butterfly (and maybe I'll catch it and have it in a jar and the next day it'll be gone but who cares they might have their own heaven somewhere) will pass by and see? Everything's okay. That's what's wonderful with squeals and jumps and high-pitched laughter ― they hide what's really inside.

Most people describe me having a rabbit heart, but I wouldn't let a rabbit's heart get near me. They're fluffy and cute and with ears that are just so adorable alright, but how I can help it that the sticks that I happen to have in hand wants to strike them with and drive them away as far as it can run from me? I don't like them and they don't like me. And who needed animals for anything else, except food? Some people could live with only eating plants, but they taste yucky and I could only get my hands on a good piece of meat in record time. I'll climb a tree and be on the tippiest of tips and look at the land of what would've been. This land is a kingdom waiting for a master. I am the master. I am the ruler. No four-legged trotting, crawling, hopping, flying creature will get in my way. I'm the master of this land.[/justify]

.// history

[justify]You would say that I never lived a life similar to those fairy tale stories that my Ma always say. And I'm not bitter, really. I just wish that I wasn't born in the most disgusting place on Panem. My Ma was named Caroline and my Pa was called Frederick. They both also didn't live the fairy tale life. Believe me, no one in District Five ever has a happy life. I'm the first born, and I was born on the cruel month of December when the winters were its harshest and the cold wind stung your bare skin. You know the term 'Merry Christmas'? Well, my Grandma used to tell me that my name was from that. I couldn't see the connection between 'Merry Christmas' and 'Mari Carola', but I never said that our family's cleverness was well-appreciated. I like love hate my name. Christmas was the most wonderful time of the year, I couldn't agree more. But when you spend your whole life only being able to look at what you want and never ever ever have it then of course you would turn sour as those neglected candies at the bottom of the sweets jar. Well, I would am. But Ma and Pa would always try and cheer me up that this was my birth month, and I shouldn't be sad about it. But I have nothing. Why should I be happy about that?

I wasn't the only child in my family. Five years after, my younger brother Jack was born. He was a healthy summer child, and I loved him and cared for him the minute he was born. He would be what you would say my only source of happiness, but happiness is short-lived. He only got to live for three years. We had barely enough to scrape morsels for each day, and another child was making it hard for both Ma and Pa and with Grandma to feed everyone. Like I said, District Five was a tough place. Pa hadn't had the best job as a farmer, especially with the Capitol being greedy with everything that comes out of the earth. The Capitols are like animals in my eyes. They need to be put to death killed punished.

Things got worse recently. It was exactly three months ago when some Capitol land diggers dug up almost a third of our district. I hope they're looking for jewels. Only a week after and the Mayor announced that they found oil, and will be setting up factories and officially changing our industry. You think I would be glad, with the animals finally getting butchered out and replaced with something hopefully decent. But Pa loved his work and all the animals he cared for. He joined a secret group that planned on bringing back the original business, but a couple of Peacekeepers sniffed him out. We were having our dinner when they came in barging in the middle of our measly meal and electrocuted him with that tall, electric-charged baton. I will never forget that night. Ever since that day, I began to act harsh and cruel towards animals. My Pa fought for them useless things, and died receiving nothing in return. They too should die. The Capitol (and their colorful hair and sparkly clothes) should die.[/justify]

.// others

Peter Pan by Jacqueline Emerson

CODEWORD -- [ Odair ]

FACECLAIM -- [ Kristina Romanova ]

NARRATION -- [ 6D165A ]
EMPHASIS -- [ A0346E ]
SPEAKING -- [ EC5C8D ]
OTHERS SPEAKING -- [ FFABAF ]
THOUGHTS -- [ FF8C91 ]
CHILD VOICE -- [ FFC4A6 ]

*pounce* I will accept ALL of Ella's apps!

But I really, really love that you tackled the changing industry in District Five -- and the upheaval it caused its citizens. Lovely.