Lorikeet Pairbolt: District 3

Name: Lorikeet Pairbolt
Age: 17
Gender: Female
District/Area: District 3
Appearance:
That girl with the stringy light brown hair! Over there! She’s the girl who never bothers to comb or wash her hair, but it still manages to stay off of her face. She wears it up in some freakish beehive pony tail thing. The top sits on her head like a crown but the back is pulled into a loose ponytail that she swings around and grabs constantly with her hand. Does she think she’s pretty? I would hope not, with bugs crawling around on her scalp. Does she bathe? She’s always pulling on strands of her hair, draped over her right shoulder, like she’s stroking a dog.

She’s the girl with the ghastly pale skin, who never steps out into the sunlight. She’s like a vampire, with her blood red glasses and her atrocious red lipstick to match. Too bad for her, she hasn’t discovered any other form of makeup or mask for her face. I think her eyes are a strident bright green color that almost looks yellow but I never get a good look with her head down and her eyes hidden behind her square glasses, She lives in a house enclosed by a fence. She’s like a caged dog who has given up on trying to get out. Her ears are like a dog’s also, perched on the side of her head with abnormal hearing. Some people say she can hear you whisper from across the street with those pointy, beastly ears.

Her forehead is HUGE! Her eyebrows are like dead caterpillars and seem to have sunk after years of frowning and glaring. I bet you could fit your whole hand over her forehead without touching her eyebrows- that is if you dared to touch her. Her nose is fine I guess, nothing too god awful, just a little snarled looking; maybe because of the rest of her dog-like disposition. Maybe it’s my imagination.. Her neck is way too long, almost like some strange type of bird that had to adapt to reaching for food over the years and basically broke its bones to do so. It doesn’t look real, how she can be so tall and skinny. I often watch people go by and throw bread at her fence when she’s outside after school- basically every day, yelling “bird-face, bird-face!”. She just sits there on the steps and reads her bird watching books. She’s named after a bird you know.

From my house I can never get a good look at her upper body, but I think she hasn’t developed yet, hasn’t hit puberty. She always wears a black and red striped shirt that is too tight around her fragile body, almost like an extra layer of skin. I wonder if she ever takes it off? In the summer, I’d imagine the sweaty shirt sticks to her dirty body like glue. Even though it’s usually hot out here, especially in her sunroom window where she always reads inside her stuffy miniscule house, she wears her leather jacket. Everyone snickers when she wears it, she must have made it herself, a jacket that ugly could only be made by a girl that ugly. It has little uncomfortable looking circles and triangles of metal all throughout the lining, something how I’ve never understood how she could stand wearing. The outside is diamond pattern with a military style strap on both her shoulders. Several zippers run throughout her torso area and arms and stay open and dangling. It’s like she doesn’t care what people think, how could a person think like that?

Another quirk to her wardrobe problems is her pants, which I can never figure out whether they are leather or denim. They are bright white and smooth, like leather, but made like jeans. Well, she must have made those too, because the backs of the pants are completely red. She must think she’s a biker chick or something cool, because she also wears a leather biker glove on her left hand that is charcoal black colored. She only wears it on her left hand, too. I wonder if she has any tattoos, because nobody has ever seen her bare arms. Even when she takes off her jacket, her arms are covered with something, some skin colored sleeve type thing. You know what, I bet she has some flesh eating bacteria running down her arms, that’s why she hates to go out in public.

Whenever she goes to school, she stays completely silent and inconspicuous. Even though her alarming red lipstick, glasses, shirt and high heels, yes, she actually wears red stiletto’s, make her an easy target, she seems to fade in the background and vanish before and after classes. I’m in her math class, 8th period, and whenever the school day ends, she lets everyone leave the classroom and exits through the window, I’ve seen her do it before. It’s on the first floor, so she just hops right out and runs home. I have to hand it to her, the girl has excellent balance to wear those monster heels and not trip. She sits in the back stroking her hair and biting her nails, her giraffe like legs tucked under the desk crookedly and her head down. If I had to describe her in one word, I would have to just say Lorikeet. There’s just no other word to describe her. Not evil or nice, not funny or serious, nothing; just herself. Lorikeet Pairbolt.

Personality:

DEAR DIARY

As I look into the mirror, I try to forget what I see. I go to a world where my hair is pretty, where I’M pretty. A world where my arm wasn’t amputated and replaced with a metal joint that barely fits into my sleeve. I wish for a world where I’m not 6 foot 5 and 90 pounds. I know, that sounds ridiculous, like I should be dead. With my arm, I would weigh about 120, but this new replacement is only a fraction of the weight and glides through the air.

I wish people liked me, gave me a chance to make friends. I don’t even bother, my reputation has spiraled so out of control that I am no longer in control of myself. Basically, my actions are dictated by my town in District 3, the only thing I can do for myself is read. I also love to make clothes; well, I’m forced to make my own clothes because we can’t afford any, but luckily I enjoy it. I love to read so much, but not typical books. I read bird watching books. This seems strange to people, seems how there’s pretty much no birds around here, but that’s not why I read it. I read it to learn about how the ugly, awkward, bright red and yellow birds can live with being so ugly. That’s all I feel like sometimes, an ugly red lorikeet surrounded by swans and eagles.

If I were a bird, I would be known for my extreme sense of hearing. I can hear things from a mile away, which I hate. I can hear every little fabrication and insult people say about me, even the nice genuine smart kids who whisper gently under their breath, trying not to upset me. Sometimes I feel like I can hear chirps outside, so I never leave the window. I’ve been waiting for years to see a bird come to my window and visit me, but it never comes. I wonder if they’re afraid of me too? I sit and read my Panem 1st edition book of birds to get away from my parents. My house is so small that I have no other place to go. If I go outside, I get assaulted by little kids with rocks and big kids with loud mouths. I feel like a rabid dog that the neighborhood stares at, a product of my terrible owners.

My parents are terrible for sure. They both are unemployed bums who sit at home and argue all day. My dad calls me terrible words that I can’t write here, things I should never repeat. They linger in the back of my mind like leeches sucking the life out of me. My mom doesn’t care about me either. I’m invisible to her and I feel like I don’t meet her expectations. She secretly wishes I were smart, shorter, beautiful, popular and stylish. She wishes I had died instead of my sister. I’ve always been a shy person, but over the years I’ve developed into a clam shell that’s glued shut. I don’t think anyone in all of Panem knows my favorite food, my attraction to guys, my love of birds. No one besides my parents knows about my prosthetic arm and my resistance to heat that I’ve developed from forcing myself to wear long sleeves in the summer. I wish for one day I could let my hair down, bathe, put on makeup, wear a fancy dress, walk home with my boyfriend and hold his hand in mine; not my metal hand, my warm coarse skin. This will never happen. I rarely ever talk out loud. I don’t even remember what my voice sounds like sometimes. I wonder if I even had one to start with.

History:
Flipping through the mound of ink stained paper, I quickly find the LORI poking out from the left hand corner that begins her name, just under the staple, and pull it out of the pile. Another essay of Lorikeet’s, I’m starting to really get to know this girl. I don’t think she’s ever spoken out loud in my class, but her papers have said more than she’d ever be able to orate.

LORIKEET PAIRBOLT
MAY 19th
MR. ORINOCO
ENGLISH 10
SELF ESSAY

LIFE IN THE BIRD CAGE

I am a bird. A bright red feathered beast. I don’t look like other birds, their beaks being perfectly shaped for eating and their wings being widespread and level for flying. I am a Lorikeet. I am a bird of true origin, a classic example of the past. In the midst of the government crossbreeding hybrids of beautiful mockingbirds and blue jays, the lorikeet remains alone, untouched, but hurt, in District 3.

When I was born, my mother didn’t wait for me to learn how to fly, she forgot about me. My older sister Aquiline was a bird too. She took her time to learn how to fly, and when she took flight, my mom never looked back. I remained in the “nest”, alone, trying to fly. To this day, I’ve never flown, my mother has never remembered. Aquiline was 10 when she died. She ran out into the street while playing in the back yard. That’s all I know, my mother has never even had the decency to tell me how my sister died. You would think that in the nature of not just birds, but animals, the second oldest bird would take over if the oldest died. From that moment on, 12 years ago, I have never been the same. I’ve never loved my mother, never spoken kind words to my father. They are both lazy brainiacs with no jobs but arguing and fighting. I am truly the black sheep, being isolated not only from my parents, but from my distant relatives too. My grandmother thinks I’m crazy and wants nothing to do with me, my parents just have hated me since I was born. Sometimes I hate myself more than they do. I can’t talk to people, can’t converse, can’t gossip. I get stared at everywhere I go, people telling me I need to bathe, eat a cheeseburger, go back to the dog pound. They don’t understand me.

No one knows, but I don’t have one of my arms. When I was born, I had a deadly infection in the bone of my upper arm. They had to amputate it, or else I would have died. Sometimes I wish they would have ignored it, let me parish. Then I never would have dealt with this. . I’m surprised I don’t just walk around with a stub for an arm and let people stare all they want, maybe they’d feel bad for me and leave me alone. I am a girl who likes clothes, animals, jewelry, just like everyone else. I keep my hair pulled back in a pony tail most of the time with the top of my head held up like a bird’s nest. I think it looks beautiful, no matter what anyone says. I am way too tall, way too skinny for my height, and way too underfed. My parents should be arrested for how poorly they feed me, but I get by. A lot of people call me “Birdface”, due to my hair and my bird like features and my name. Others think of me as the dog girl, simply because I spend my time on the other side of a wire fence around my house and people throw rocks at me, tease, and harass me. I’m sick and tired of being abused.

Sometimes I wish I could be killed in some terrible accident. No one would care and I would be free in the afterlife. I have always secretly longed to be reaped for the Hunger Games, but never had enough guts to volunteer. My life is so empty, so terrible, that I would honestly rather not exist. If I was a tribute, I also would get a makeover, the amazing capitol like makeovers that make everyone look tip-top. A lot of people would be surprised at what I looked like. I wouldn’t have ugly hair, ugly glasses, unflattering clothes, terrible skin, acne, yellow teeth, claw like fingernails, or hand-made clothes. But do I really want to be murdered by a bunch of desperate evil teenagers? Well, what’s the difference between that and life right now?

So, what’s life like inside of a birdcage? There’s no food, water, gentle songs to sing you to sleep, words of encouragement from a soft motherly voice, a pat on the back of a cold, strong man’s hand, no bedtime stories about monsters and princesses, no presents, no inside jokes, no love. The bird cage is cold, empty, quiet. I sit and wait for someone to release me, to open the door and just let me fly out. But instead, everyone stops and stares at my strident color, my rough feathers, and my crooked legs. They laugh. The worst part is, I’ll never get to leave and meet another bird. No family, no kids, no future. I just sit here, flapping my wings, bobbing my head in shame, singing myself a lullaby, because I’m just an ugly red bird who’ll be dead before she even starts living.

I sit and stare at the blank bottom half of the second page. The words are all jumbled, messy and handwritten. But still, they’ve touched me somehow, even though in theory, all I’m doing is looking at a piece of paper. I get up from my chair and throw my hand over my mouth, watching as Lorikeet’s red high heels swiftly run through the grass, towards home, just like a bird returning after flight. She’s right. I think as I reach into my drawer and grasp a red pen. With the flick of my wrist against the smooth paper, I mark an A plus on the top. I wish I could give a higher grade. But the best grade in the world won’t heal her pain.
Codeword: <img src="http://i41.tinypic.com/16h2ibt.png">
Comments/Other:

Like a Bird with a broken wing, I’ll never learn to fly.
My arm will reach, but I’ll never touch the sky

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