I spent most of the day working on putting it together, but now I'm a bit unsure. I know there're already sort of damaged people in the cast of NPCs -- I'm not sure if Gabriel isn't a bit
much. Do you think so?
I'm not sure where he'd fit in clique wise. If he were female I think he'd fit in with the Library Girls but other than that I'm not entirely sure. God do I love going through eighties music, though.
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NAME: Luka Gabriel Fyodorov – His mother calls him Lucy, and mostly everyone at school calls him Gabriel. (Never, ever, Gabe.)
QUICK DESCRIPTION/BIO: Shy and intelligent, Gabriel was born into a morbidly rich family and spent most of his childhood in private schools. Pulled around and positioned as a symbol of his parents’ status, he was forced to smile his way through many a publicity event and informal meeting until, at eleven years old, he was molested by his mother’s partner on a combined family vacation. He was promptly sent away to boarding school and through a series of progressively unfortunate events ended up manipulated into an illicit relationship with the only adult he had been brave enough to open up to. Targeted by a group of vindictive boys and the teacher he thought he loved, he was thrown out of the school at the end of his sophomore year. He blames himself, and has wholly accepted the idea that he is inherently unlovable. Despite this, he is unstoppably kind and is often the first person to pick up another’s books or take the worst of any group or club’s split duties. Because of his appearance, his reticence, his wealth, and his relative newness to the school he sort of absently gives of a cool vibe to some of the less-observant school populace and he has unwittingly inspired some crushes. His near silence is often misinterpreted as cool disinterest, but, as anyone who actually talks to him learns, is actually a result of crippling awkwardness, low self-esteem, and a debilitating s-st-stutter.
AGE/GRADE LEVEL: 16/Senior
HEIGHT/PHYS. DESCRIPTION: With blonde hair and corn-blue doe eyes, Gabriel draws stares wherever he goes. Prone to blushing and fidgeting when actually approached, it’s a good thing most choose to leave him be. He stands a bit diminutive at 5’7” and, though whip-thin, hides a good amount of muscle.
BFF: Robby Sauveterre
ENEMY: Doesn’t really hate anyone, but Jesse makes him extremely uncomfortable.
DATING: Single
SECRET CRUSH: Has a bit of a ridiculous crush of Joshua Ashton since he’s the first person he’d met since he transferred who talked to him. Sort of how a duckling imprints on the first person they see.
BEST CLASS: Music and Science, though he’s strong across the curriculum. He’d loved Mythology & Folklore back at Hotchkiss.
WORST CLASS: Gym. While he’s very rather athletic, this class incites a good amount of social interaction and marks one of the only times during the day that multiple people try to talk to him. He’s also not that fond of being stared at and the locker-room can occasionally be uncomfortable, bringing back memories he’d rather forget.
HOBBY/EXTRACURRICULAR/JOB: Orchestra, Debate, A/V and Drama Club. Has played violin since six, piano since eight, and guitar for five years. Started Ballet at ten and pursued it and other forms of dance through sophomore year until expulsion. While he might actually die if anyone ever found out, he still practices at home. He’s on the soccer and baseball teams and traveled competitively as short-stop at Hotchkiss. Has an NES and a personal computer at home, but isn’t particularly good at videogames. He’s an assistant at the vet’s and volunteers at the Shelter on the weekend.
TOP 5 BANDS:
David Bowie
Talking Heads
The Rolling Stones
The Smiths
Beastie Boys
GUILTY PLEASURE: The J. Geils Band’s
Centerfold and Hall & Oates’
You Make My Dreams.VICIOUS RUMOR ABOUT THEM: He gave the principle a blow job in order to skip freshman year; is secretly a porn-star or male prostitute; sold his voice to a witch in exchange for his looks (that one is pretty imaginative and multi-faceted, actually); Was supposed to go to prom with Lucy Garfield but blew her off to follow the rock scene in London last semester.
FAVORITE MOVIE: Escape from New York; The Graduate.
FAVORITE FOOD/SODA: Cakes, milk shakes, ice cream and orange cream soda. (he has an almighty sweet-tooth.)
DESCRIBE HOME/SIBLINGS/RELATIONSHIP WITH PARENTS: His mother and father have a tense, formal relationship. Mary Fyodorov-Mark is a fierce woman and her aggressiveness bleeds from her authority at her and her brother’s company to her interactions with her family. Pasha Fyodorov is a second-generation Russian-American and CEO of a media/booking company. Neither are around very much. Pasha loves his son, but is fervently homophobic and pretty much scarred by the events at Hotchkiss. Mary is remarkably self-involved and paranoid – both furious and frightfully jealous of the attention her son was receiving around the events she forced him to cut off his long hair and basically set the precedent for his two yearlong near muteness by blaming the entire situation on his actions. She spent most of Gabriel’s childhood convincing him his appearance was a sin and an affront and any form of affection towards him was invariably selfish, shallow, and ultimately fake.
TEACHERS DESCRIBE THEM AS: Remarkably accelerated, but socially silent. He spends a lot of time in the guidance and nurse’s office, to the point that he’s often asked to run errands for them.
GPA: approx. 4.0
MOST LIKELY TO: Have their face plastered on billboards from coast to coast.
CAR/BUS/WALK?: Has a sort of beat-up ’82 Ford Supercab whose cab is littered with tapes and paperbacks. Pretty much invariably
Come on Eileen is blasting through its speakers. It used to be if he was in a bad place mentally, he’d leave early in the morning and walk even though he lives miles away, but ever since he met Robby he picks her up on his way. He’d give anyone a ride, but he doesn’t actually have any friends outside of Sauveterre.
VICES/JUVENILE DELINQUENCY: He took up smoking during the Hotchkiss affair and even though he can’t stand how it makes him feel, he hasn’t gotten around to quitting. He was expelled from his Connecticut Boarding school at the end of sophomore year when a group of boys convinced the dean he’d been soliciting ‘immoral sexual favors.’
INVENTORY:
On his person: Dog-tags his grandfather left him after he passed away last year. (Gabriel had spent the semester taking care of him at his home in London as his cancer progressed.)
In his wallet: $40, a driver’s license, a picture of his grandparents and both his school and old Hotchkiss IDs, and the epigraph from Heinlein’s
Stranger in a Strange Land.
In his canvas messenger: Gore Vidal’s New Book
Empire, and old ear-marked copy of Atwood’s
Cat’s Eye, a few violin sheets he loves but doesn’t actually need to look at, a reference book on North-American Myths & Legends, four black gel pens, a five-subject notebook, a moleskin, some deodorant, a water bottle, mini-flashlight, and a replacement bow-string in a paper pouch.
In the cab: A pair of roller and ice skates shoved under the back seat bench; a green army duffel full of his sports uniforms and paraphernalia; a violin in a shell case; twelve albums in a neat pile in the back seat and countless cassettes; a small library in a box in the bed maintained by constant weekend trips to second hand stores; a change of clothes, some money, and some bare necessities in a ‘just in case’ bag thrown in the bed.
PRIZED POSSESSION: A first-run signed copy of Robert Heinlien’s
Stranger in a Strange Land; before his grandmother passed she wrote him a note on the epigraph and he keeps the ripped out page folded up in his wallet.
ALLERGIES/ILLNESSES/DISABILITY: He’s epileptic, but hasn’t had a seizure in over a year. After the incident at Hotchkiss he spent a stint in the hospital, but he swears he’s fine now. He’s always been prone to panic attacks, but finds both them and the fits to be mortifyingly embarrassing. He’s also asthmatic, which just
figures, really. According to past therapists, he doesn’t have a real concept of love and is predisposed towards abusive relationships. From his therapist’s notes: ‘He might have actually gone mute [after the event]… if he didn’t think it so awfully rude not to respond to my questions.’
SECRET: During the semester he left school he appeared one night in a London production of La Cage Aux Folles as a last minute stand in for one of the Cagelles.
IN SHORT, THREE WORDS: Innocently, Suspiciously Adorable.