Evangeline Holbrook, District 11 {Done}

{What’s in a name?} E v a n g e l i n e H o l b r o o k

{A lady never tells her age} 12

{Gender} Diva (of the most feminine variety)

{District} 11

{Find out who you are, and do it on purpose.}

At first blush, Evangeline will tell you that she is a pretty little girl. She does not think that she is nearly as average as the rest of the girls in the district. They muddy their hands and pull at roots and don’t brush their hair. She has to brush her hair a hundred times a day, usually before bed. If she doesn’t brush her hair a hundred times a day, then how will she ever have flaxen locks as proper young ladies should? As for the dirt that collects under her finger nails, she is quick to point out that her hands are washed as well as they can be, noting the circumstances. Truly, it is a wonder that such a diamond in the rough could grow in such a barren district.

She is a shoot—a beanpole, with bony ribs and nobby knees. But she knows that this will fill out (not too much, she doesn’t want to look like some of the pig faced girls that get their hands on too much cheese and milk

[/color]). Her brown eyes are her father’s. She imagines that they were strong and burning, able to send men to their knees if he looked at them a certain way. Her lips are thin, pursed and often pouting. She believes they are from her mother, along with the freckles on her face. Demure and fine, just like the lily white her skin should be, were it not for the long days spent out in the sun. Truly it is such a waste for such a girl to go about picking and scratching at all the underbrush, ruining her nails and tanning her skin. She would much rather be holding an umbrella, and a nice set of white gloves, so that she can protect herself from the elements.

Eva ties bits of ribbon into her hair. She likes to add simple things to her dresses to make them more fashionable, or to appear nicer than they truly are. It has become a hobby of hers to hideaway, in the dark of night, with a small glow from a lantern, just so that she may sew a few stitches into the hem of one of her plan gray dresses. She’s gotten much better at it since the last time, when the boys and girls made fun of the zigzagged pattern she had done up the side of her skirt. Now one could hardly notice her shaky handiwork. If one didn’t know better, they might have thought her dresses were sewn in district eight. Not that she would ever tell anyone that she sewed her own dresses. Proper ladies don’t sew their own dresses, after all. And princesses certainly didn’t know the first thing about craftwork.

{Success is getting what you want; happiness is wanting what you get}[/center]
Little miss Princess Evangeline. She would much prefer to have a title, like the fancy Kings, Queens, and Ladies of the old stories she’s heard. There is something so wonderful and romantic about all of them—even with the war and bloodshed—that she aches to become a part of it. That men died for love, and women swooned and were rescued from their terrible circumstances—Oh, why couldn’t she have the same?[/i] She often spends time thinking about what her knight in shining armor will look like. Maybe it will be a victor from her district, in the future, seeing how fair and wonderful she is, they will marry and off to the capitol together. Or he’ll be big and brutish and mayor of the whole district, and they’ll marry with a big house on a hill. She’ll retire to having a servant or farmhand, with real glass windows and hot running water. This would be the life, not the common drudgery that she has to perform.

Her siblings are far less kind about her ideals. She is still young, and she knows that refusing certain things—helping others with their work, for instance—don’t carry as much danger. She is fussy, asking for more time to nap in the shade or to have to carry less on their marches through the fields. She would much rather spend her time wasting away in the house, scrubbing at the floors, doing work that a proper lady would know how to do, than the disgusting dirty work out in the fields. It was all so routine and mundane, all of it, that she simply had no interest. Why on earth did she need to know how to plant an ear of corn or how to sow wheat? She would be wearing a crown one day, or a beautiful dress like the ladies in the capitol. All of it would be hers, if she just had someone to rescue her.

She doesn’t talk about her parents. The pain of missing them—their disappearance, their casting off[/color] of her siblings still brings tears. She’d rather not think about it at all. If they were so much as going to disappear without a second thought than she could do the same to her memories. It was mean, she was certain, but she could think of other ways to dull the pain. Like thinking she was a princess, or deserved to be. There was no reason that she couldn’t hide behind this shadow. At first it was a fun game to play, then it drifted into an armor. Soon it was her livelihood, acting as a diva and throwing out harsh words to those that didn’t give her what she wanted.

She isn’t entirely without a heart. In fact for all the fussiness she cares deeply for her siblings. She is frightened of losing them, too, and throws gentle jabs as a way of keeping them at arm’s length. She doesn’t like to be told that she is wrong; asking questions tends to bring about a display of weakness by which she can’t abide. Better to pretend she knew something than not at all. She likes having others believe her intelligent, or more worldly than she truly is. That she can sometimes confuse words or meanings is just a side effect of her station. Princesses are not to be corrected, at any rate. It’s what brings about the fits, or so she likes to say.

She didn’t always scream. As a child she could get along with her brothers and cousins as easy as pie. But a switch was flipped not long before her first reaping. Evangeline felt a bubbling of anger; an outburst became more and more common over smaller and smaller things. Small errors brought about nasty words, from a sniping comment to an outright tempest of words. She’s never embarrassed—why should she be? The fact that she is so easily brought to rage should show her commitment to perfection. And yet a part of her wants to stay away from this anger that seethes through her veins. A part of her wants to not yell at her brothers and call them terrible bastards, a word that cuts deeper than a knife.

[/b]}[/center]
She never knew what it was like to have a proper mother and father. Dropped off at some strange Uncle’s home, with a patchwork of siblings and cousins, Evangeline was the youngest and the smallest. Her voice was prone to getting lost in the crowd of them all. Of all her siblings, she gravitated to Emery, the one that would assuage her fears. Iona was too quiet and too meek for Evangeline, who often had a streak of stubbornness as a child. She hated being told that she was too small or too young for anything—especially if it meant that she didn’t get her way. Adrian was the de facto head of all of them, though it didn’t stop her from throwing a glare or two his way.

She’s wanted to know what her parents were like for ages. She’s never questioned Adrian or Emery about it—she doesn’t want them to know that she’s starting to think about it more. Why on earth would they abandon Evangeline, anyway? She was a perfect little girl, she was sweet, she was everything that she was supposed to be. That they would abandon her made her head hurt. They were supposed to look after a good little girl, a princess. They weren’t supposed to toss her out like yesterday’s garbage. But here she was, sitting on a farm, sweating through her dress and collecting flies with the rest of them. It burns more deeply now, a bigger flame that threatens to tear through her when she thinks about it too much. It’s partly why she gets so angry all the time, and partly why she tries so desperately to hide behind the face of a princess.

The farm has been her enemy since the age of six, when she started to realize just how awful life in district eleven truly was. She has never forgotten the moment, when she looked at the endless rows of corn, and was told to pick until her fingers were covered in blisters. And the rest of them were content to do just as they were told, until some of their fingers bled. This was their lives, day in and day out, and would be until they died. But what about her? Was she just as doomed and condemned as the rest of them? Surely there had to be someone that was coming, someone that would swoop in and save her. This was the seed that was planted. She imagined a boy, riding in on a white horse, taking her away to where she belonged. After all, she wasn’t like the rest of them, was she?

She’s thought of the same dream since she was a child. Disappearing one night in the strong arms of another, she’d be carried off to her destiny. She’d have a big house with lots of nice furniture and dresses. She’d never be hungry, and she’d always have tea and cookies for dessert. When she was tired, she would fall asleep on goose down mattresses, with fluffy pillows and comfy sheets. She’d have hot, running water and a bathroom that she didn’t have to walk out in the cold to get to during the winter. And above all of it, she’d never be left alone and she would always be told just how pretty she was. It’s the dream she still has, that she’ll never forget.
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