Madeira Mojarro~District One

Madeira Mojarro honestly does not care how she looks. Most days she just pulls her straw colored hair back in a loose ponytail to get it out of her face and puts on a dark, baggy shirt before going out for the day. Her watery blue eyes are always cold and have that quality where people feel like she stares through them. Maddie always has at least a couple bruises and bashes from her rough nights in the ring. Even though Maddie has a strong aversion to knives, she has been in a knife fight or two. It was in one of these fights that the young Miss Mojarro lost her left earlobe and got a nasty slash across her cheek. Madeira has thin eyebrows that crinkle when she gets angry and thin lips.

Maddie is not tall or particularly well built. Most of her skill with bare knuckle fighting comes from her ability to keep her balance and capitalize on weaknesses in her opponents’ defenses. Her wardrobe consists of whatever she saw first when she needed new clothes. After all, who really has time to worry much about what they wear? Her arms are disproportionately long. This was another topic of teasing for pre-career Maddie. But despite making her look slightly more monkeyish than the average teenager, her gangly arms serve her well when she wants to get a jab in without opening herself up to other attacks.

Subtlety is by no means Madeira Mojarro’s thing. She has a loud voice and makes no effort to sugarcoat anything she says. Madeira is a smart girl who loves to laugh and make jokes. She is known for snarky remarks to fellow careers and just about anyone who says something stupid. Maddie is proud and outspoken. She is often among the first to make her opinions known and among the last to change her mind.

Despite her spiky exterior, Madeira is also a caring person. She has taken care of her mother for years and is an amazing friend and confidant to the few people who she likes. She believes that having few friends who she can trust is infinitely better than having several friends who she cannot. Madeira is loyal and protective. She finds many careers to be over the top, boorish, or gaudy and prefers to associate with quieter, less abrasive companions. She fancies herself a defender of the mistreated.

Maddie has witnessed her mother waste her life with booze and sex and has decided not to go down the same path. But it is extremely difficult for Madeira—who has spent most of her life acting as an adult—to reject the temptations of doing what she considers “the adult thing” and having a bit too much alcohol. That said Maddie is much more fun after a few drinks. She gets almost giddy and spontaneous. Madeira very seldom laughs sober, but once inebriated, the serious, responsible career takes the backseat while an alien, fun-loving teenager takes control of Madeira’s body and she becomes the life of the party. This unnerves Madeira even more because she sees the similarities between her now and her mom several years ago.

Madeira is the illegitimate daughter of a successful vintner/prostitute and a peacekeeper who seriously lacked any form of moral decency. He left his pregnant lover as soon as he found out he was going to be a dad and went on to the next hooker in District One. The devastated Ms. Mojarro turned to alcohol as more than just a source of income, but also as an escape from her lonely life. Growing up with a single, drunken mother who is about as locally loved as Hester Prynne has been hard, but it has forced Madeira into the strong young woman she is today. Maddie has always been looked down upon and harassed by other children from her district for her mother’s disgraceful occupation and her father’s obvious disinterest in either of them. Maddie’s decision to begin Hunger Games training, at the age of eight, was to acquire the necessary skills to whip the other kids’ ass in a fight rather than to kill weaklings from across Panem. As far as the young Miss Mojarro is concerned, this mission is more than accomplished.

While many tributes in training capitalize on their combat skills by resorting to crime, Madeira has found a much more fun way to take money from people. She is no stranger to the bookie at the local pub and fight club. But Madeira is not just another gambler—that is way too pedestrian for such a bold young woman—she is The Mighty Mojarro, a vicious bareknuckle fighter. Madeira has focused a majority of her training on fighting without weapons because she is annoyed by girls who are too afraid to get their hands dirty to do anything but throw knives. Madeira always bets on herself and typically winds up taking home a substantial supplement to her mother’s profits from her winemaking and other…business affairs.

Now that she can, Maddie has taken on the uphill battle of defending her family—it is really just her and her mom—honor. Her mother, though manipulative and beautiful, is pretty much helpless in any kind of physical situation and needs her honor defended annoyingly often. Even though she is still the bastard child of an alcoholic, Madeira has managed to make a respectable name for herself as a formidable fighter. She works hard not only to train, but also to keep her mother from being too blotto. Despite the fact that Madeira is officially training for the Hunger Games, she has absolutely no desire to go anywhere near the arena. She has no problem with bloodying someone up in the ring, but Maddie would never descend to the rank of bloodthirsty murderer that is necessary to win the games. Besides, with her gone, nobody would be left to take care of her mom or to put the cocky career divas in their place on fight night.

When Madeira was young, she promised herself never to fall victim to her mother’s vices. This promise worked out pretty well until she was given some whiskey as a painkiller after a particularly nasty fight. Maddie has since discovered that a glass… or bottle of liquor helps with more than just a busted lip. In recent times, Madeira has developed a special fondness for her namesake wine and she is known to be inebriated slightly more often than a sixteen year old girl should. Despite caving to the allure of alcohol, Madeira clings to the idea that she is strong maintain her chastity. This desire stems mainly from watching how much sex has screwed up her mother’s life. She has been able to make good on this personal oath so far, but fears that while under the influence of her new favorite beverage, she may lose her inhibitions.