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gavin barker | district seven | re-sub | fin
Apr 5, 2014 10:21:31 GMT -5
Post by umber vivuus 12b 🥀 [dars] on Apr 5, 2014 10:21:31 GMT -5
G A V I N B A R K E R D I S T R I C T 7 |  "Let's start with the basics, shall we?" Cedric Barker was a very sought after young man. His father owned not one, but two very successful paper mills, and Cedric was next in line for the businesses. Yasmine Kane was power hungry. She was not attracted to people for their love, but instead craved the wealth they had in their pockets and stored in banks. She was highly aware of Cedric Barker, as he was only a few years older than her in high school, a senior when she was only a freshman. No one would have expected him to choose her as his bride. She hardly believe it herself, but Cedric found her strong will, her determination to always be a winner to be everything his heart had ever begged him for. After only dating for a few years, before Yasmine could even graduate her senior year, he asked her hand in marriage and she accepted, not even bothering to finish high school and opting instead to move into her new home with her groom. The house was lovely, two stories high, white walls, drenched in windows, and circled in by a picket fence, located directly in the center of some of the first patches of woods in District Seven, where they were close enough to town that it was only a short walk away, but close enough to nature that they could picks apples and peaches from their own front yard. They lived together happily, perhaps never more-so than when Cedric's father took a turn for the worst a few days after his twenty-fourth birthday. He took the businesses as a late birthday gift, sad to see his father go, but happy that the power of the company finally belonged to him. A year later, and their home was decorated with shiny trinkets and pretty things, and she was delivering their first child, Rory. From there, the picture perfect life the two had grown accustomed to, the life where they always got exactly what they wanted, crumbled to pieces. Late nights up with the baby, constant messes, new expenses that took from their own personal allowances, the Barkers quickly knew they were never meant to be parents. Yet, less than a year later, a new child named Gavin was born. Yasmine Barker was always one about appearances, about painting a plastic smile on her face and presenting herself to the world as a truly happy person, one of the luckiest in her district. So, when all those faces gleamed at her, wondering just how much she loved being a mother, she held her children close, kissed their foreheads, told them stories of her own childhood, but as soon as the doors of her home were closed, she rarely looked at them unless completely necessary. Rory could already walk when little Marianna, the couple's first daughter was born. She was small, even for a newborn, and it was later discovered that she had an illness, not one strong enough to ever kill her, but enough to make her wish it would. After her was Tove, born with a head full of hair and a devious nature, and the last of the Barker children was Delilah. "What do you mean? How have you grown up without it?" From the moment he opened his emerald green eyes, he was forced to trust his parents. He was forced to rely on them at all times, to call on them when anything was ever wrong. He had no choice. If he hadn't had their help, he would have had nothing. He would have withered away, faded with the ground, became a part of the sky. Looking back, he couldn't really say he was glad he had chosen to hold on to life. The latter seemed so much... simpler, held so much more promise. He did live, though. As did all of his siblings. Each of them grew up facing the cruel hand of their father's anger, his rage burning even brighter when he was under the influence of alcohol. His breath reeked of the stuff any time he was home. Once Gavin had pointed it out, and as a result, had to wear long sleeve shirts for almost two weeks to hide the bruises on his wrists from where the man grabbed him before throwing him down the stairs. Really, Gavin had been one of the more lucky ones. Not the most lucky, of course, that was Sophie, who had always been spared from their father's cruel punishments, why, he wasn't sure. The point was that, as bad as he had it, some of the others had it worse. Rory had been hospitalized once with hypothermia after Dad through him out in the cold and passed out on the couch before he unlocked the door. Marianna, the fragile girl, was perhaps the easiest for him to harm with her fragile bones and thin skin. So many scars covered her that Gavin was sure she didn't own a single pair of shorts or a short-sleeved shirt. Perhaps the most unlucky, however, was Rosalie, who was not born into the Barker household, but forced into it. She was eleven, if he remembered correctly, when she wandered to their doors claiming to him that her parents had run away with her from another district, but had eventually been killed. Gavin knew his parents wouldn't accept the girl as she was, knew they would tell the peacekeepers and have her sent off to the Capitol to become an Avox, or perhaps even killed. So he helped her devise a new story, that her parents had been homeless and left her in her sleep. He told everyone about her, so caught up in saving her from a cruel fate that he didn't realize until it was too late that he was putting her in one of the worse ones possible. His mother with her plastic smiles and make-believe love for children couldn't turn the poor girl away, couldn't just let her rot on the streets, even though that was really what she wanted. So she took her in and gave her a new last name. Barker. The guilt was really over-whelming for Gavin. In fact, he proceeded to run into the woods and have one of the biggest tantrums he ever had. His ax digging into tree after tree, his ragged voice filling the quiet air, branches snapping in half and sailing through the air, dirt and fallen leaves sprawling in his wake until he could barely even move anymore. He just laid there, staring at the stars, genuinely hating what he had done to the poor girl. Whatever fate she would have suffered may have been better than the one he forced her into, and that was something he could never forgive himself for. "It gives you something to strive for. Something to hope for." Things got better once they were older. Gavin thought that maybe it was because they were scared of them. They could see the hatred in their eyes and they weren't little children anymore. Anyone of them could have destroyed them. For the most part, Gavin's father rarely comes out of his room. He leaves in the morning before they get up for school, gets home, grabs a bottle of spirits, and locks himself in his room. The mother brought him dinner, but they didn't see much of her either, except for when there was some sort of family function, or if one of her uppity friends came over. Gavin distracted himself from them, all of them did. They all had things they did to hide away from the world. Rory with his books, Tove with his friends, Delilah with her painting, and Gavin with whatever the hell he could find. Sometimes he would sing, sometimes he would go for walks and be gone hours. Sometimes he spent time with his friends since he had a good group of them, or borrowed one of Rory's books. He never understood how they were all so easily distracted, and he was always searching for something else, still trying to find that one thing that he loved to do. He craved adventure, dreamed of running away. Perhaps his biggest secret was that he actually hoped for his name to be called at the reaping. It was a final escape, something that would get him away from his parents once and for all. He could do it, win. There was always the chance of dying, but he did know a few things. He had been in the forest and read enough of Rory's books to know quite a few plants by name, and he could wield an ax fairly well. He knew it was wrong to want such things, even though people trained for them in other districts, but he didn't care. Once Gavin set his mind on something, he was far too stubborn and persistent to give up. Even if it was over a small thing, like if he disagreed with someone's opinion. He would sit and argue for hours if he had to until his point was made sense of and considered. His stubbornness was a lot of what got him in trouble as a child, but it is the one flaw that he'll always have. Gavin craved love. He saw happy couples walking down the street, their hands locked together, wore smiles for each other, and looked so happy. Gavin grew up in a house where love was almost nonexistent, so he looked for love at every corner. People were typically attracted to him only physically, however. Alexandrah Fallon and Jasper Kipling were only a few of the people that played with his heart and he let them, but then they both left. They vanished, and in their wake, only a broken-hearted Gavin was left behind. "You aren't a lost cause, Gavin." His hair fell in unruly curls of chocolate brown, swallowed his head in a mass of waves. His eyes were green and very bright, perhaps not as broken as he thought. He had rounded features: a soft chin, pouty lips, dimples, and a circular face. His jaw was prominent, but boyish. He had a long neck and frail shoulders. He was tall, though not exceptionally so, and lanky. He had some muscle, but definitely wouldn't be the first to be chosen to log lumber deep within the forests, so he stuck to the small business just within the face of the woods. His limbs were long, which made him look a bit animated at times. He wore scarves and sweaters in the winter and typically wore dark colors all year round. He had a few scars from his childhood, most of which were not really accidents, on his arms and legs. His skin was a canvas and with it, he painted the story of his life. Every cut had a story, every bruise. "Okay?" |
