Roland Capshaw-District One

Roland has dark blond hair. His nose is on the larger side, and his dark blue eyes are always rimmed with tired circles. He is muscular from training for the Games, and he has many scars from training accidents.

He is 5' 7", with square shoulders and a solid build. His skin is nicely tanned, because he likes to do his training outside. His pinky finger is at an odd angle because it accidently got cut off during training once. They sewed it back on, but he can't band his pinky and he doesn't have any feeling in its tip.

Roland is kind and considerate of other people. His parents got really mad at him for always sitting around the house doing nothing, so they told him to be a Career. And he didn't really have anything better to do, so he went along with it. He's never been as involved with it as other people. Training is more of a hobby for him than anything. he doesn't intend to ever actually volunteer for the games.

People like Roland because he is easy to talk to and always has something good to say about everyone. He is very good at encouraging people, especially young children.

Roland does have his bad points, too. While he likes to joke around with others, he can become serious very quickly, which tends to annoy people. He also tends to do and say things without thinking about the consequences.

He met Pettissa Arnold when he was training one day. She never noticed him, at least not until almost a year later. They started dating soon after they met. It wasn't long before Roland fell in love. He thought Pettissa felt the same way. But then they had a disagreement. Roland said something rash, and he lost her.

He kept training for the games, but only because he didn't know what else to do with his life. He became very sad after breaking up with Pettissa. It was his fault, and he couldn't forgive himself for that.

That was another thing about Roland. He was quick to forgive others, but he had a hard time forgiving himself. A small thing that he'd done wrong could take him weeks to accept. And his mistake with Pettissa was big. Huge. And Roland wasn't sure he could ever forgive himself for it.

Roland was very happy as a child. His family was close, they always had enough food, and he had friends. But after he finished school, he didn't know what to do with himself. He would sit around the house eating and watching T.V. all day long. His parents finally had enough and told him to be a Career. He liked the exercise, and he liked getting to socialize with the other people that were training.

He and Pettissa started dating when they were both fifteen. He always knew she was serious about being in the Hunger Games, but he thought maybe, just maybe, she'd change her mind. So when they were seventeen, Pettissa told him she was going to volunteer this year. Roland argued with her about it. The Hunger Games were murder. They were the worst way to die. Pettissa just laughed, saying she wouldn't die. And then she'd given him the choice. Say goodbye to her now, or say goodbye when she left for the Games. Without thinking, he told her he'd rather say goodbye to her face than to a corpse.

He was just trying to get her to understand that the odds weren't in her favor. That she would almost certainly die in the games. But of course, Pettissa had taken that as his answer. And Roland couldn't fix things.

He was glad when Pettissa didn't have a chance to volunteer that year. And now he only had one more year. One more year to convince her the Games were madness. One more year to figure out how to tell her he still loved her, and he always would.

One more year. He just hoped it was enough.