Layla Caparelli - Wanderer

. E R S O N A L I T Y:.

Layla grew up a single child in District Nine. She lived in a small single story house along with her loving father, grandfather, and her distant detached mother. They lived a quaint and simple life, the four of them. Both her parents and even Layla herself worked in the factories that sprang up around the district. Only Papa stayed at home, being too old to travel such a distance. Even with most family working from dawn till dusk seven days a week, they only just made enough to put a three meals on the table each day. They all had to make a considerable commute - on foot - each morning, only to spend the day in dusty, dank and cramped conditions for a meager amount of pay. Poor as they were, and Layla in particular - young as she was at the time - took whatever work they could find.

Conditions at home were not much better. Layla and her family lived in an especially poor and shabby section of the district, where garbage littered the muddy streets and smog covered the rickety houses in thick blankets. Layla's mother suffered from depression, and when she was not slaving away in the factories she withdrew to her bedroom, moving, it seemed, only when Layla entered with a meal. Every now and again Layla managed to coax her mother out of bed. When she did, she tried her best to cheer her mother up. Layla would begin a song and eventually her mother - Evelyn was her names - would join. Layla had a lovely voice, something she had inherited from her mother, and loved to sing although she rarely did outside the walls of her home.

Her grandfather was often occupied with odd jobs around the house, cleaning and making minor repairs. Busy as he was, he always found time to spend with his granddaughter. Layla loved to sit by him as he spoke of stories his own grandparents had told him, about how the people of the district used to live off the wilderness before the Dark Days. When she grew a bit older, he showed her and old handcrafted hickory bow and quiver, complete with arrows. Layla had been fascinated. Never before had she seen a weapon of any sort up close, apart from the guns the peacekeepers carried. Sometimes, if the rest of her family weren't around, Layla would go into his room and take out the bow, studying it, pulling experimentally at the string. Eventually Layla found that she had grown strong enough to almost fully draw back the string. It had heavy poundage, a rather powerful bow, but she managed it in the end. Never did she find the trunk that held the bow locked, and in later years she came to realize that her beloved grandfather must've left it open purposely.

By the time she turned twelve, Layla had all but forgotten about the weapon, for her life had taken a nasty turn. Her grandfather fell gravely ill, and died of his sickness about a month later. Evelyn sank further into depression, refusing to get out of bed at all, even for work or meals. Her father, hard as he tried, could not shelter his daughter from everything. With the loss of both her mother's income and Layla's own, they barely managed to feed themselves. Then the unthinkable happened. Layla's father, though he worked long hours at the factory and often arrived late, did not return home one evening. Peering out a grimy window, she could see a chaotic scene unfolding in the streets. Dense looking black smoke drifted into the sky in the distance. More than usual, she thought uneasily. She wanted desperately to know what had happened to cause such a panic, but when she hurried out into the street no one spared her a glance, despite the questions the screamed at them.

With no other choice, she returned inside. Any attempt to rouse Evelyn failed miserably. Several hours later, as the summer sun sank below the trees, there was a knock at the door. Layla moved to answer it, finding a government official standing on the threshold. She listened in a stupor as the uniformed man told her of the events that had unfolded earlier that day. The factory at which Layla's father was employed had suffered an explosion. Other officials had searched the rubble for survivors, but there were none to be found. Her father, he informed her, had been killed in the blast. They would receive a sum of money in compensation. When he had gone, Layla collapsed into a chair, too stunned to cry. After a while, she worked up the nerve to enter her mother and father's room. She sat on the edge of the bed, and began to recite what the official had told her. By the end, she was sobbing. Her mother had barely stirred.

For several days Layla struggled to keep everything in order, but there was only so much a twelve a year old could handle. Her mother never left her bed, never spoke to Layla when she came into the bedroom. The food she left by Evelyn's side always remained untouched. She tried to find work, knowing that she couldn't continue to feed herself and her mother without a source of income. No such luck. She pleaded with her mother, begged her to get up. She could not do everything on her own, hard as she tried. After about a week, their meager food supply ran out. Layla took to begging on the streets, though she hated having to rely on other people. That desperate attempt failed as well. Poorer people could did not have anything to spare. The richer didn't bother.

Terrified, and left with no other options, Layla raced into her grandfather's old bedroom. Most of his possessions still remained. She yanked open the trunk retrieving the bow and quiver with its bunch of arrows. She slung the quiver onto her back and was about to slam the lid shut when she spotted something small and silver in the bottom. A pocket knife. She snatched it up, pocketed it, and bolted from the house. It was broad day light, but she didn't care. She sprinted toward the fence, not ceasing until her exhaustion forced her to halt. Amazingly, she was never caught. It was a miracle, too, that she survived that first year in the woods. Never before had she shot that bow, but she learned rapidly, and over the years turned herself into a fine hunter. It was a struggle, but she was determined.