Veronika Jewell - D3 - fin
Jul 12, 2021 20:11:29 GMT -5
Post by jupiterrising on Jul 12, 2021 20:11:29 GMT -5
[attr="class","w460"]
Name: Veronika Jewell
Age: Early 40's
Gender: Female
District/Area: District 3
She furrows her brow, purses her lips and blows upward, sending a lock of her wild, strawberry blonde hair floating away from her eyes as she folds her arms in front of her, lights a cigarette with a wooden match and takes a long drag. It's her first one of the day; they can be hard to come by so she rations them carefully. It's later than normal for her first smoke and her body wants a fix, so she is a bit more short-tempered than usual at the moment.
She takes another drag of her cigarette and her body begins to relax. She rolls her head over her shoulders in a circle, feeling the vertebrae in her neck pop and sighing quietly as the tension in her shoulders lets up. That same lock of hair has fallen again and she swipes it back behind her ear.
"I got my grandmother's hair, apparently. Everyone on my mom's side is either raven or strawberry. I've never been into beauty stuff so my hair kinda does what it wants. I wish it didn't, but I don't care enough to do anything about it. The few friends I have tell me they like my hair, that it's distinctive. That they can always see my hair coming before they see me. Not sure how I feel about that."
Veronika chuckles to herself, her grin showing off naturally full lips and strong cheekbones. But the smile is fleeting and her face resumes its normal, brooding countenance. She has a few wrinkles starting to take shape, notably the crease between her eyebrows from long hours spent concentrating at a desk, and a few small lines around her eyes.
"I'm getting older. Some days I'm okay with it; it's not like there's anything I can do about it. Wrinkles happen when you live in the districts and get old. I'm not Capitol so I'll never have the privilege of surgery and fancy face creams. But then again, I'm getting older!? What the eff is up with that? Wasn't it just a couple years ago I was in my twenties and sneaking off at all hours to who-knows where? What happened to that girl? I miss her sometimes."
She's leaning against the fence that surrounds the components factory, getting ready to go in for what will probably be a twelve-hour shift. Here they do precision work on the small pieces that make up the insides of the electronic gadgets that the Capitol holds so dear. Tiny relays and switches and sensors; some of them so small that they are assembled under high magnification by people with excellent vision and steady hands. She is not one of them; in her teen years, her aptitude tests showed that she was numbers-oriented and had a propensity for planning and scheduling.
"I got assigned to the factory offices. I sit at a desk and budget for the factory's production for the next day, week, year, eternity. I figure out how many pieces and parts will be needed and I order them from the factories that make them, so that our people can assemble them into other pieces and parts and send them on to the next factory. Peacekeepers are my constant shadow; my numbers always have to add up to the right answer for the Capitol. If they don't, the Peacekeepers automatically consider it to be employee theft and they might get around to asking questions later. Not a good time. Good thing this shit comes easy to me so I'm always accurate...knock on wood. Of course, having a Peacekeeper six feet away from you with a loaded weapon is pretty good motivation for accuracy."
Even though these things come easily to her, they still wear her down after so many hours, so outside of work she tends to go a little wild now and then, a sometimes-visitor to the grungy bars that exist on the outskirts of the district, and that the Peacekeepers generally turn a blind eye to, as long as things don't get out of hand. She doesn't stay out as late as she used to, but sometimes the need to let off some steam outweighs the desire for sleep and quiet. In truth, it's for the best that she keeps more distance between herself and those places. Alcohol is nothing but a fuel that ignites her quick temper, and things can get dangerous in the bars late at night.
She's chosen one of her shorter skirts to wear today, with black leggings underneath and black, lace-up work boots, paired with a grey collared shirt and a black jacket. Office work can be boring as hell, but at least you can wear whatever you want. A random male factory worker whistles at her as he approaches and makes an unwelcome comment about the way the skirt is accentuating a certain body part. She ignores it. He slows his pace and asks her if she'll have a drink with him at the bar later. "I seriously doubt it," is her deadpan reply, and she takes extra care to exhale some smoke in his direction. The man says something impolite as he turns to walk away, met with an obscene gesture from Veronika.
Even if he had been a decent guy, she's not interested in love any longer. She allowed herself to indulge in such things when she was younger. Even was sort of engaged to someone in her 20's.
"He was smart, and so handsome, and made me laugh. I felt safe with him, like I never did with anybody else. He died in an accident; the Capitol doesn't care much about safety if there's a high demand for something. For him...it was less than a month before that year's games and the Capitol couldn't get some torture device for the arena to work the way they wanted it to. Everyone was working around the clock to figure it out. High voltage electricity and sleep deprivation were never a good combination. It got covered up. The Capitol took his and all the other bodies away and buried them somewhere secret, I guess. Never told anyone, not even his mother, where they were taking him."
Her brow furrows deeper and her eyes flash with anger. She looks at her feet for a minute and takes a few breaths to steady herself.
And besides, getting married would probably mean having at least one child, and her gut turns to ice at the thought.
"The reapings are hard enough to watch from a distance. Why bring an innocent soul into this world, only to have them go through that year after year after year... Me and my friends and family have all done it, of course. But what choice did we have? I was fortunate that my family were able to get by without having to put their children's names in extra times for more tesserae. I come from a long line of factory managers and higher ranking tradespeople who, by district standards anyway, get paid enough to survive. Some kids I knew from school whose parents were in the lower ranking professions had their names in twenty, thirty, forty times."
Good luck has fallen upon her family, as none of them have ever been chosen as a tribute, yet. But still, she has to work hard to suppress the memory of standing there with all the other children, hugging herself tightly, trying not to shake with fear as the names were read out. Eyes squeezed shut, heart pounding, hoping with all her might that it wouldn't be her brother or her two younger sisters, or her. It wasn't. But her siblings now have children who are "that age," or about to be. It is a path that she does not - can not - allow her brain to go down. The anger will just burn and fester in the deepest pit of her stomach and as she gets older, it gets harder to control.
She finishes her cigarette and carefully taps it out on the metal fence post. Cigarettes aren't technically contraband in her district but are also not for sale by any Capitol-approved means, so it's best to not draw attention to it. She turns her head and discreetly spits on the butt to ensure it is completely extinguished, then tosses it in a nearby garbage bin. A woman she's known since her early school days passes through the gate, sees Veronika and waves, and Veronika waves back.
The other woman is dressed in the grey smock and work pants worn by the assembly line workers, her hair pulled back under the grey cap they are made to wear. They walk toward each other and exchange a friendly greeting just as the loudspeaker announces ten minutes to start of shift. They join the crowd of workers queuing at the factory entrance and hold out their wrists so the Peacekeeper guarding the door can scan their microchips and count them as present for their shift. The women part ways after agreeing to meet in the cafeteria at lunchtime; Veronika headed toward the office wing, and her friend making her way into the massive assembly complex.
Another long day out of many begins for Veronika.
Name: Veronika Jewell
Age: Early 40's
Gender: Female
District/Area: District 3
She furrows her brow, purses her lips and blows upward, sending a lock of her wild, strawberry blonde hair floating away from her eyes as she folds her arms in front of her, lights a cigarette with a wooden match and takes a long drag. It's her first one of the day; they can be hard to come by so she rations them carefully. It's later than normal for her first smoke and her body wants a fix, so she is a bit more short-tempered than usual at the moment.
"If it weren't for this stupid hair, I'd be invisible...I'd fade into the background. I'm not tall or short, not heavy or slim. I have brown eyes like just about everybody around here and the same pale, bad skin that all of us factory rats tend to get from long hours under the artificial lights and heat. My nose looks like it fell off my face and someone just squashed it back on like a piece of clay right before I was born. People tell me I wear too much black. That I don't dress like someone who's my age should dress. They can go eff themselves. There's so much dirt and pollution around here that black is just easier. Constantly scrubbing the grime off of light colors gets real old, real quick. Even our Peacekeepers have settled for grey uniforms."
She takes another drag of her cigarette and her body begins to relax. She rolls her head over her shoulders in a circle, feeling the vertebrae in her neck pop and sighing quietly as the tension in her shoulders lets up. That same lock of hair has fallen again and she swipes it back behind her ear.
"I got my grandmother's hair, apparently. Everyone on my mom's side is either raven or strawberry. I've never been into beauty stuff so my hair kinda does what it wants. I wish it didn't, but I don't care enough to do anything about it. The few friends I have tell me they like my hair, that it's distinctive. That they can always see my hair coming before they see me. Not sure how I feel about that."
Veronika chuckles to herself, her grin showing off naturally full lips and strong cheekbones. But the smile is fleeting and her face resumes its normal, brooding countenance. She has a few wrinkles starting to take shape, notably the crease between her eyebrows from long hours spent concentrating at a desk, and a few small lines around her eyes.
"I'm getting older. Some days I'm okay with it; it's not like there's anything I can do about it. Wrinkles happen when you live in the districts and get old. I'm not Capitol so I'll never have the privilege of surgery and fancy face creams. But then again, I'm getting older!? What the eff is up with that? Wasn't it just a couple years ago I was in my twenties and sneaking off at all hours to who-knows where? What happened to that girl? I miss her sometimes."
She's leaning against the fence that surrounds the components factory, getting ready to go in for what will probably be a twelve-hour shift. Here they do precision work on the small pieces that make up the insides of the electronic gadgets that the Capitol holds so dear. Tiny relays and switches and sensors; some of them so small that they are assembled under high magnification by people with excellent vision and steady hands. She is not one of them; in her teen years, her aptitude tests showed that she was numbers-oriented and had a propensity for planning and scheduling.
"I got assigned to the factory offices. I sit at a desk and budget for the factory's production for the next day, week, year, eternity. I figure out how many pieces and parts will be needed and I order them from the factories that make them, so that our people can assemble them into other pieces and parts and send them on to the next factory. Peacekeepers are my constant shadow; my numbers always have to add up to the right answer for the Capitol. If they don't, the Peacekeepers automatically consider it to be employee theft and they might get around to asking questions later. Not a good time. Good thing this shit comes easy to me so I'm always accurate...knock on wood. Of course, having a Peacekeeper six feet away from you with a loaded weapon is pretty good motivation for accuracy."
Even though these things come easily to her, they still wear her down after so many hours, so outside of work she tends to go a little wild now and then, a sometimes-visitor to the grungy bars that exist on the outskirts of the district, and that the Peacekeepers generally turn a blind eye to, as long as things don't get out of hand. She doesn't stay out as late as she used to, but sometimes the need to let off some steam outweighs the desire for sleep and quiet. In truth, it's for the best that she keeps more distance between herself and those places. Alcohol is nothing but a fuel that ignites her quick temper, and things can get dangerous in the bars late at night.
She's chosen one of her shorter skirts to wear today, with black leggings underneath and black, lace-up work boots, paired with a grey collared shirt and a black jacket. Office work can be boring as hell, but at least you can wear whatever you want. A random male factory worker whistles at her as he approaches and makes an unwelcome comment about the way the skirt is accentuating a certain body part. She ignores it. He slows his pace and asks her if she'll have a drink with him at the bar later. "I seriously doubt it," is her deadpan reply, and she takes extra care to exhale some smoke in his direction. The man says something impolite as he turns to walk away, met with an obscene gesture from Veronika.
Even if he had been a decent guy, she's not interested in love any longer. She allowed herself to indulge in such things when she was younger. Even was sort of engaged to someone in her 20's.
"He was smart, and so handsome, and made me laugh. I felt safe with him, like I never did with anybody else. He died in an accident; the Capitol doesn't care much about safety if there's a high demand for something. For him...it was less than a month before that year's games and the Capitol couldn't get some torture device for the arena to work the way they wanted it to. Everyone was working around the clock to figure it out. High voltage electricity and sleep deprivation were never a good combination. It got covered up. The Capitol took his and all the other bodies away and buried them somewhere secret, I guess. Never told anyone, not even his mother, where they were taking him."
Her brow furrows deeper and her eyes flash with anger. She looks at her feet for a minute and takes a few breaths to steady herself.
And besides, getting married would probably mean having at least one child, and her gut turns to ice at the thought.
"The reapings are hard enough to watch from a distance. Why bring an innocent soul into this world, only to have them go through that year after year after year... Me and my friends and family have all done it, of course. But what choice did we have? I was fortunate that my family were able to get by without having to put their children's names in extra times for more tesserae. I come from a long line of factory managers and higher ranking tradespeople who, by district standards anyway, get paid enough to survive. Some kids I knew from school whose parents were in the lower ranking professions had their names in twenty, thirty, forty times."
Good luck has fallen upon her family, as none of them have ever been chosen as a tribute, yet. But still, she has to work hard to suppress the memory of standing there with all the other children, hugging herself tightly, trying not to shake with fear as the names were read out. Eyes squeezed shut, heart pounding, hoping with all her might that it wouldn't be her brother or her two younger sisters, or her. It wasn't. But her siblings now have children who are "that age," or about to be. It is a path that she does not - can not - allow her brain to go down. The anger will just burn and fester in the deepest pit of her stomach and as she gets older, it gets harder to control.
She finishes her cigarette and carefully taps it out on the metal fence post. Cigarettes aren't technically contraband in her district but are also not for sale by any Capitol-approved means, so it's best to not draw attention to it. She turns her head and discreetly spits on the butt to ensure it is completely extinguished, then tosses it in a nearby garbage bin. A woman she's known since her early school days passes through the gate, sees Veronika and waves, and Veronika waves back.
The other woman is dressed in the grey smock and work pants worn by the assembly line workers, her hair pulled back under the grey cap they are made to wear. They walk toward each other and exchange a friendly greeting just as the loudspeaker announces ten minutes to start of shift. They join the crowd of workers queuing at the factory entrance and hold out their wrists so the Peacekeeper guarding the door can scan their microchips and count them as present for their shift. The women part ways after agreeing to meet in the cafeteria at lunchtime; Veronika headed toward the office wing, and her friend making her way into the massive assembly complex.
Another long day out of many begins for Veronika.
