enoch crowe {twelve} fin

[solo]

Enoch Crowe

Most of the time, I don't like giving out a whole lot of information about myself. I prefer to keep quiet, to observe, to only look and not to speak. But I guess I can make an exception here.

My name is Enoch. Maybe you already knew that, but there's not a lot of people who pay much attention to me, so I figured I should tell you. I like it that way. I like it when people mind their own business and keep their noses out of mine. Mom is always complaining about how quiet I am, how secretive I can be at times. She says I should get out more. I think she wants me to make some friends, but I don't really like having friends. Having friends means opening up to people.

I was a little more extroverted when I was younger. Lennie is always telling me that I was a brat, I think up until I turned ten. I believe her. I remember being loud and boisterous, pulling at the girls' braids in the schoolyard and laughing along when someone was getting teased. I guess I was kind of a bully.

I've closed myself off since then, built a sort of wall so I don't have to worry about people peaking in. It's nicer this way. All I have to worry about is myself and my family, instead of all the non-existent friends I've made and the artificial relationships I never want to create. It's too fake for me. Too much of a lie.

---

Dad died when I was two. I don't remember a whole lot about him, mostly because I was too young to remember much of anything, but also because my family doesn't like talking about it much. Lennie was just a year old, Judas was five. He remembers it better than the two of us, and he remembers what Dad was like. Apparently he had a warm smile.

I was never told a lot about how he died. I knew it was in a mining accident, but that was it. These days I assume it was some sort of explosion, because I remember when we went to the funeral, I never saw his body. There wasn't even a gravestone for him. I guess that's because we couldn't afford it, but really, it would've been nice to have one.

I wasn't very attached to him, as I'm sure you've already gathered. He's a distant memory in my mind, some blurry figure that I can't quite pull forward to see clearly. What I can remember from my childhood are days without a father, days when I didn't miss having one. I love my Mom. She cares about me, and she's always been enough for me. Her and Lennie and Judas and Marcus and Adeline. They're the people who matter to me now.

---

If you were to ask me who I most resemble in our family, I think my answer would be Judas. I'm sort of a mix, somewhere between his dark black hair and Lennie's messy, dirty blonde head. I've got his bone structure: the defined chin, the angular face, the long nose. We have the same bushy eyebrows and thick hair. Mom says our smiles are practically identical. I find it kind of cheesy, but I never complain when she mentions it.

I've always been tall for my age. When I was little, I'd walk behind Lennie in the school halls, laughing when she turned around and the top of her head barely reached my shoulder. I'm not exactly fit, I think mainly because I haven't started working in the mines yet. Even so, I started looking older than I actually was a couple years back. I think that was part of the reason I started acting more mature and stopped being a bully. People respected me more, I could have a conversation without feeling like I was looked down on.

When I was nine, I fell out of a big old tree I had been climbing in or backyard. One of the branches tore up my back. We couldn't afford a trip to the hospital, so Mom stitched me up herself. Of course, she didn't do nearly as good a job as the doctors would've done, so I've had a pretty nasty scar there ever since then. It's a thick, white line that runs from the left side of my lower back all the way up to my right shoulder. Mom has always felt bad that she left such a big mark on me, but I don't mind. I just have to remind her that no one can see it.

---

When I was thirteen, the money started to run out. Judas was working at the time, but somehow, we still didn't have enough to keep us all fed. I could tell because Adeline's ribs would pull against her skin, and Lennie's cheeks were hollow and grey. Judas always tried to give his food to us, but we never let him. We told him he needed it if he wanted to keep working.

I made bets at the Reaping that year. I didn't have much, and I suppose it was a bit of a risk, but it was one I was willing to take. We were so desperate, I think I would've been willing to do just about anything. Gambling didn't seem quite so bad anymore.

A volunteer for the girls. An eighteen-year-old for the boys.

Those were my bets. I went up against a couple older men, seniors who didn't have children to worry about, who didn't care about the names who were chosen. All they wanted to do was have a little fun.

Out of sheer luck, my guesses were right, and I doubled the money I'd come in with. The men were good and honest despite having cruel hearts, and they didn't give me any trouble when I asked for my money. After that day, I kept gambling and making bets, finding as many ways as possible to create extra money. I discovered one or two fight clubs in the allies, I learned to play poker, I placed bets during the Games on who would survive. Sure, it was human lives I was betting on, but my family needed food.

Judas found out a year later. Well, not exactly, considering I came and showed him the money out of my own free will. I think I felt like I needed someone's approval. he was surprised by how much I'd made, and I ended up taking him with me to play poker that night. I taught him a couple tricks and soon he was joining me every day, pushing back his hours at school in order to work and than join me.

The two of us never cared much about school. For all of us, I think, family has always come first. We're all independent, we could all take care of ourselves if we wanted to. But we love each other. And of course, that comes far before anything else.

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Word Count: 1163

[Baby Wessex d9b [earthling]]

I've also been drawn to the name Enoch. He'll be a solid addition to Twelve!

ACCEPTED!