Bilquis [D4]

She looked across the shore seeing others stretched across the sand taking in the first rays to grace them since last summer. Bilquis had an all year tan that varied in degrees of brown: light brown almost pale in winter and a golden bronze in the summer. Bilquis found herself standing out among her peers, among everyone in her district. She wasn't incredibly skinny nor exceptionally fat, about 5 feet, 2inches, and her face was pretty plain: small button nose, full pink lips and vibrant sea green eyes set in a heart shape face. However, her shock of incredibly curly, blood red hair set her apart no matter how much she tried to ignore it. People didn’t really know what to do with her, she seemed exotic yet plain; interesting yet bland and sometimes Bilquis used this indecisiveness to not say anything and automatically she was labeled mysterious.

Bilquis didn’t put much stock in appearance, she wore decent clothes, maybe a nice sundress or romper when she was going out, but she preferred the outfit she had on at the moment: a thin, short- sleeved hoodie in her favorite color yellow, rolled up jeans, and her favorite brown pair of boat shoes. Today, her hair was down from its customary bun, flapping around her in the breeze looking more haphazard than usual. She had to stop herself from biting her nails into jagged edges and looked around to see if her mother was around to scold her.

Bilquis found only three things important: her family which included her mom, dad, 4 older brothers, and her best friends, the twins Cordelia and Caspian; her books, and the gentle, rolling waves of the sea. Outside of that, she wasn’t much interested and that especially included the Hunger Games and any of those kids that trained for it. She found them quite cocky and arrogant, thinking themselves above the others because they could successfully trap and kill as many people as possible to win. Sure, the rewards were glamorous, but Bilquis could care less about the Games or Panem for that matter; as long as the three things she loved were not affected.

Speaking of love that was her one vice, whether it was in the books she read or the possibility of something happening with whoever her recent crush is. She wanted someone that swept her off her feet and made her forget about any of the troubles she may have. Idly, she flirted with the idea of some handsome guy sitting with her, whispering sweet nothings in her ear. She felt a blush come to her face as she thought about it.

Love and logic, she could see, were the only things worth living. Many people saw them as warring ideals, but Biquis saw them as two halves of a whole, melding in a harmonious blend. She found it ironic that her love of logic would make her ineligible for love with any of the males in her school. She is socially awkward and is sometimes too blunt. She is naïve when it comes to people because she believes that they should be honest like her, which sometimes puts her as the butt of jokes but luckily Cordelia and Caspian are there to defend her.

Bilquis never caught much slack for her name, even though it was somewhat unusual. Bilquis, her mother once told her, was an ancient queen of a land that she never heard of. Their last name, Nawfar, meant water lily. She liked her name, it wasn’t mundane, but not too radical.

She came from aquacultural researchers, her mom one of the head researchers. They found ways to genetically reproduce fish for the Capitol. Bilquis remembers seeing a tank full of koi fish in bright pink and purple hues and she asked why they were so colorful if they were just going to be eaten. Her father explained that those fish were for purposes of decorating houses in the Capitol before rolling his eyes; He found these projects to be a waste of his talents. Her brothers were dispersed within the aquaculture business, being aquatic system techs and specialists- even one fisherman. However, her parents had other plans for her, she was to be trained under one of the few healers in town and take up that profession. Her grandmother used to one of the best healers in town and Bilquis’ mom was supposed to take up the profession, but she said it “wasn’t her cup of tea”.

Bilquis loves reading about the human body and all the ways to cure it, she finds it fascinating, but sometimes she wonders what it would be like to just sit and weave great tales of love and betrayal like in the tomes she reads. She cast a look back to the “House on the Shore”, the name everyone gave her home because it came the closest to the beach. Her mother was calling her inside, telling her dinner was ready. She took a moment to look up at the glowing sun and picked up her small pile of books before running into the house.