Post by Jayden Griss on Mar 28, 2007 18:20:45 GMT -5
( I hope it’s alright. I’ve never done an application like this before. (: )
Original Character Audition
Name:
Mr. Jayden Connor Griss. He might possibly allow someone to call him Jay or Connie, if he was in one of his good moods. Otherwise, he would like to be acknowledged as Dr. Griss only.
Age:
35
Gender:
Male.
Occupation:
He is a doctor specializing in infectious diseases. As a child, he was fascinated with most insects, especially worms, and loved to play 'doctor' with his younger sister's various dolls and bears, which ultimately led him to study in said field.
Personality:
Jayden is extremely intelligent and that is his most prominent and prized asset. He graduated at the top of his class in high school and college but those achievements came with a price. Unfortunately for him, that means that he prefers books to social interactions with others which ends up causing him to become isolated from everyone else. His is, for lack of a better word, a loner of sorts and only speaks when it is needed, around his colleagues at least.
When around patients he changes. The ill people become a fascinating puzzle. The solution is the identity of the evil thing growing inside of them. Instead of his usual standoffish attitude, he adopts an encouraging one, an insightful attitude that soothes the patient's fears while also digging deep into their activities, their diets and their habits so that he could solve the puzzle and feed his desire to succeed.
When it comes to relationships with others, Jayden fails miserable. He does not think that he is or will ever be 'marriage material'. With the traveling to various countries searching for the origins of deadly virus' that could wipe out the entire east coast and the hours upon hours he spends at the hospital or in the laboratory, he does not have much time for flirting or dates or whatever people do to 'get to know each other'.
Jay also has trust problems. Growing up, he never had any real friends and had thought that going to college and meeting new people would change his lack of companionship but he was wrong. Once a nerd, always a nerd. And he found that even away from home, he still had trouble speaking to others outside of the scope of medicine. Sure, he'd have a nice long chat about the symptoms of Sub Acute Sclerosing Panencephilitis, but ask him how much he liked the football game last night or what he thought of the professor, he will most likely come up with a blank. His father was in the military and they moved around frequently when he was a child. He learned not to trust others – it hurt less when he had to move once more. Of course, that was a horrible quality to posses while in a medical field where a team is very important, and he knew that, but knowing it didn’t help push him to change.
Appearance:
He is of fairly average height, at five foot six, though he does wish himself to be taller for that would give him a greater feeling of authority and perhaps intimidate others. His eyes are a blue-green, very rich and deep and intelligent, tainted with a hint of arrogance. Jay's nose and mouth, both rather normal sizes, though one could not help but want the small hump on the bridge of his nose to disappear. His body is slightly muscular or toned, if you will, but rather normal. He does not work out or exercise regularly for he does not have the time. Usually, he would take the stairs instead of the elevators if a case was not urgent and that would serve momentarily as his exercise regime. Again. Jayden is not particularly stunning or drop-dead gorgeous. He is merely…acceptable and he surprisingly accepts that.
In a single day he could plan on having urine sprayed on him, vomit splashed across his clothing, spat at and/or have some sort of blood applied onto him be it by coughing, a spill or regurgitation. He had learned long ago that any patient's status could change from placid to sporadic and changed his attire to accommodate the everyday mishaps he encountered.
Usually, Jay could be found wearing the typical surgical scrubs. They were easy to dispose of if he so happened to get some sort of infection and transmittable substance on his clothing and much less hassle. When he had first started, he had worn the slacks and tie with the dress shoes and the white lab coat. Oh, did he look important. Well, at least he looked well until some young man vomited all over him while he observed his examination. Now, it was all about comfort. He stuck with scrubs and sneakers and planned on continuing his routine until the day of his retirement.
History:
Jayden Connor Griss was born on October 31 to Martha and Timothy Griss in New York City. His father worked as a laboratory researcher, always looking for a cure. A few years after Jayden was born, the HIV scare hit its peak and his father turned to the study of the AIDS virus as most labs in the country attempted to solve the mystery of the strange illness. He couldn’t remember much, but the ignorance of the kids at his school and his parents stood vividly in his mind. He /could/ remember his father telling him that you couldn’t get it by touching someone or by looking at someone with the disease or even if he kissed someone (which prompted a childish ‘ew’ from the boy). The TV was saying otherwise and the kid’s parents were buying gloves and strange rubber suits to ‘protect themselves’ but he adored his father and wouldn’t dare think that he was wrong. His father said that he’d help find the cure and that everything would be better.
His dad was one of the reasons he went into a science career. Jayden had always loved science but had never really considered the field of infectious disease until his father’s death which occurred while he was in high school. The man was a tough old bastard and did not notify his colleagues when he accidentally jabbed himself with a needle filled with infected blood.
He died a few years later from the pulmonary illness common in AIDS patients, PCP.
Jayden attended the University of New York, determined to become a doctor no matter what the obstacle. Harvard didn’t particularly interest him and he ended up graduating from a so-so medical school in the Midwest. His fellowship and residency were fairly interesting, to say the least, and the young man was shocked at what he witnessed. Cadavers and photos in medical books could not prepare him for a little girl who whose skin was falling off her body, the HIV infected twenty year old suffering from Kaposi's sarcoma and covered in thick tumors or that young Olympic hopeful whose life was ruined as he slowly lost control of his body died from SSPE.
He left the hospital once the requirements of his fellowship and residency were completed and traveled with a previous professor to Africa. Supposedly, there was supposed to be evidence of an outbreak of smallpox in an isolated village. Jayden went for the AIDS, since Africa was a hot spot for the disease, along with the US for he did not want to believe the diagnosis given. It was a false alarm; some sociologist who had discovered the tribe had contracted the chickenpox from his three year old son ( he had never had the sickness before and suffered greatly through it as an adult) and had then given it to the natives whose immune system could not handle the foreign illness.
He traveled to that country again, a few years later, and this time nearly died from some horrible stomach virus. After his second trip to Africa he had to take a break and think. He had a choice - the hospital or the field. Both were very familiar to him and yet so very different. The hospital was safer, and yet still had the possibility of housing some interesting cases. His near death incident and the stress of the growing AIDS problem overseas were still haunting him so going back to Africa or any other disease ridden country was not preferred at the time. He chose the hospital, believing that settling down for once in his life would be the best thing for him.
Other: None.
Roleplay Sample:
In What Roleplay Will This Character Participate: House MD and Crossover. (:
Original Character Audition
Name:
Mr. Jayden Connor Griss. He might possibly allow someone to call him Jay or Connie, if he was in one of his good moods. Otherwise, he would like to be acknowledged as Dr. Griss only.
Age:
35
Gender:
Male.
Occupation:
He is a doctor specializing in infectious diseases. As a child, he was fascinated with most insects, especially worms, and loved to play 'doctor' with his younger sister's various dolls and bears, which ultimately led him to study in said field.
Personality:
Jayden is extremely intelligent and that is his most prominent and prized asset. He graduated at the top of his class in high school and college but those achievements came with a price. Unfortunately for him, that means that he prefers books to social interactions with others which ends up causing him to become isolated from everyone else. His is, for lack of a better word, a loner of sorts and only speaks when it is needed, around his colleagues at least.
When around patients he changes. The ill people become a fascinating puzzle. The solution is the identity of the evil thing growing inside of them. Instead of his usual standoffish attitude, he adopts an encouraging one, an insightful attitude that soothes the patient's fears while also digging deep into their activities, their diets and their habits so that he could solve the puzzle and feed his desire to succeed.
When it comes to relationships with others, Jayden fails miserable. He does not think that he is or will ever be 'marriage material'. With the traveling to various countries searching for the origins of deadly virus' that could wipe out the entire east coast and the hours upon hours he spends at the hospital or in the laboratory, he does not have much time for flirting or dates or whatever people do to 'get to know each other'.
Jay also has trust problems. Growing up, he never had any real friends and had thought that going to college and meeting new people would change his lack of companionship but he was wrong. Once a nerd, always a nerd. And he found that even away from home, he still had trouble speaking to others outside of the scope of medicine. Sure, he'd have a nice long chat about the symptoms of Sub Acute Sclerosing Panencephilitis, but ask him how much he liked the football game last night or what he thought of the professor, he will most likely come up with a blank. His father was in the military and they moved around frequently when he was a child. He learned not to trust others – it hurt less when he had to move once more. Of course, that was a horrible quality to posses while in a medical field where a team is very important, and he knew that, but knowing it didn’t help push him to change.
Appearance:
He is of fairly average height, at five foot six, though he does wish himself to be taller for that would give him a greater feeling of authority and perhaps intimidate others. His eyes are a blue-green, very rich and deep and intelligent, tainted with a hint of arrogance. Jay's nose and mouth, both rather normal sizes, though one could not help but want the small hump on the bridge of his nose to disappear. His body is slightly muscular or toned, if you will, but rather normal. He does not work out or exercise regularly for he does not have the time. Usually, he would take the stairs instead of the elevators if a case was not urgent and that would serve momentarily as his exercise regime. Again. Jayden is not particularly stunning or drop-dead gorgeous. He is merely…acceptable and he surprisingly accepts that.
In a single day he could plan on having urine sprayed on him, vomit splashed across his clothing, spat at and/or have some sort of blood applied onto him be it by coughing, a spill or regurgitation. He had learned long ago that any patient's status could change from placid to sporadic and changed his attire to accommodate the everyday mishaps he encountered.
Usually, Jay could be found wearing the typical surgical scrubs. They were easy to dispose of if he so happened to get some sort of infection and transmittable substance on his clothing and much less hassle. When he had first started, he had worn the slacks and tie with the dress shoes and the white lab coat. Oh, did he look important. Well, at least he looked well until some young man vomited all over him while he observed his examination. Now, it was all about comfort. He stuck with scrubs and sneakers and planned on continuing his routine until the day of his retirement.
History:
Jayden Connor Griss was born on October 31 to Martha and Timothy Griss in New York City. His father worked as a laboratory researcher, always looking for a cure. A few years after Jayden was born, the HIV scare hit its peak and his father turned to the study of the AIDS virus as most labs in the country attempted to solve the mystery of the strange illness. He couldn’t remember much, but the ignorance of the kids at his school and his parents stood vividly in his mind. He /could/ remember his father telling him that you couldn’t get it by touching someone or by looking at someone with the disease or even if he kissed someone (which prompted a childish ‘ew’ from the boy). The TV was saying otherwise and the kid’s parents were buying gloves and strange rubber suits to ‘protect themselves’ but he adored his father and wouldn’t dare think that he was wrong. His father said that he’d help find the cure and that everything would be better.
His dad was one of the reasons he went into a science career. Jayden had always loved science but had never really considered the field of infectious disease until his father’s death which occurred while he was in high school. The man was a tough old bastard and did not notify his colleagues when he accidentally jabbed himself with a needle filled with infected blood.
He died a few years later from the pulmonary illness common in AIDS patients, PCP.
Jayden attended the University of New York, determined to become a doctor no matter what the obstacle. Harvard didn’t particularly interest him and he ended up graduating from a so-so medical school in the Midwest. His fellowship and residency were fairly interesting, to say the least, and the young man was shocked at what he witnessed. Cadavers and photos in medical books could not prepare him for a little girl who whose skin was falling off her body, the HIV infected twenty year old suffering from Kaposi's sarcoma and covered in thick tumors or that young Olympic hopeful whose life was ruined as he slowly lost control of his body died from SSPE.
He left the hospital once the requirements of his fellowship and residency were completed and traveled with a previous professor to Africa. Supposedly, there was supposed to be evidence of an outbreak of smallpox in an isolated village. Jayden went for the AIDS, since Africa was a hot spot for the disease, along with the US for he did not want to believe the diagnosis given. It was a false alarm; some sociologist who had discovered the tribe had contracted the chickenpox from his three year old son ( he had never had the sickness before and suffered greatly through it as an adult) and had then given it to the natives whose immune system could not handle the foreign illness.
He traveled to that country again, a few years later, and this time nearly died from some horrible stomach virus. After his second trip to Africa he had to take a break and think. He had a choice - the hospital or the field. Both were very familiar to him and yet so very different. The hospital was safer, and yet still had the possibility of housing some interesting cases. His near death incident and the stress of the growing AIDS problem overseas were still haunting him so going back to Africa or any other disease ridden country was not preferred at the time. He chose the hospital, believing that settling down for once in his life would be the best thing for him.
Other: None.
Roleplay Sample:
( This is a best friend x best friend roleplay. )
Big fat raindrops flung themselves against the window pane while the wind danced with the nearby tree, forcing the branches to smack against the defenseless window of the rather spacious English classroom. A rather young looking woman as well as a thin, gangly seventeen year old boy sat on the carpeted floor, side by side, heads bent over test booklets, most of which were riddled with red marks.
A shiver would make its way up his spine every few minutes. Apparently the air conditioning was on...Or...or maybe it was just him. Maybe the school was warm and he was the only one who was freezing. A brief waft of soft wind softly, a draft from the vent perhaps, lifted and blew about his dark, nearly black curls for a few moments as if it was a charismatic child toying with its father’s hair. He was dressed simply in a pair of jeans and a red t-shirt with some sort of writing that he was too lazy to read printed across it.
Bright emerald eyes turned towards the clock, one bold, black hand of the bright red thing hanging on the wall moved once more, changing the time by a minute. He soon lost interest in the appliance and turned his attention to the raindrops falling outside. Listening to drops of rain being blown about did not require much thinking and so his mind let it roam, and think about other things. Primarily what would happen if it was discovered that he hadn’t taken any medication in the last week.
Nardil, Zoloft, Xanax, Klonopin, Valium, Inderal, and Tofranil were his daily medications which were all flushed down the toilet before school that morning. He wouldn’t take pills. Why? Because the possibility of him choking on one of those little capsules was higher than he would have liked (he did the math) and David was sure that the Hymlic maneuver would be at least a tiny bit painful. And...and what if he did take the pills and he did choke and the Hymlic thing doesn’t work? Would his brain cells die one by one from lack of oxygen until his body couldn’t command his heart to beat? Or...would some inexperienced person (his mother, maybe) try to dislodge the medicine by performing The Maneuver only to apply so much force that his ribs crack and pierced his heart and/or lungs, causing massive internal bleeding and eventually death? Anyways, they couldn’t really force him to take the pills since they had no control over his muscles controlling his swallowing. He was usually quite well behaved - even without the medication - but there were times that something would just set him off and scare him so much he would retreat to the safe corner of his room or have some horrible panic attack and scare the shit out of everyone.
He could just imagine his doctor bursting through the front doors of the school and sprinting across the lobby and up the stairs and into his mom’s classroom room while shouting curses in between scolds and brandishing a scalpel with his toupee tilted to one side. The reflection would have been quiet amusing seeing as though the doctor who attended to him was a bit on the chubby side and would have been nearly soaked ‘bout time he reached the front door, not to mention his shiny bald spot which he tried to conceal with that rag of a thing. But no. It was frightening to him and he pushed the thought away.
They said he had panic disorder, and then agoraphobia, and then a severe case of social phobia and then...they don’t know. Davie was a medical mystery, an enigma. He couldn’t concentrate for long periods of time...he...he was afraid of things a normal human being took for granted. Unless he was distracted, he wouldn’t ride in a car. What if it crashed? What if he got hurt? What if the wind because so strong that it flung up the car and smashed it into a building? What if his father got hurt..? What if he died? He would wake in the middle of the night when there was a thunderstorm, trembling, because he could just imagine the window bursting open, sending deadly shards of glass flying at high speeds right towards him and..and then the glass would embed itself in his eyes and neck and he'd be blinded and slowly bleed to death...Or he would imagine it flooding outside and the water crushing their home and carrying the mangled debris along a swift current. What would they do? He couldn’t swim and...and...he didn’t want to drown.
He wasn’t crazy, per se, just dysfunctional.
Hospitals were a big part of his life and he hated them. David had already been stuck with every kind of needle in every single size for millions of tests that were supposed to reveal what was wrong with him so that they could fix it. He was only seventeen and he’d already gotten more CAT scans than he could count, MRIs, tons of different types of medication, a quite a few spinal taps (which hurt like hell), every neurological test in the book, trillions of needles stuck into his veins, and had had his blood drawn exactly 356 times.
A typical day at the hospital would begin horribly. The short journey from the front doors to his doctor’s office was always a little fuzzy. He would be a bit lightheaded from all the hospital-y fumes floating about and would seriously want to leave. Hospitals made him uneasy. There were a bazillion and one ways he or his parents could catch a deadly disease. On the way to the room, some old lady in a wheelchair would be coughing so hard, David was sure one of her lungs would come flying out of her mouth any minute – there was no telling what contagious, infectious disease that woman had. And down at the end of a hall, some man would be going into fits screaming that everyone was gonna go to hell because everyone was a sinner and that they devil was in every person. Some nurse would run up and stick this huge needle (probably filled with sedatives) into the side of the guy’s neck to get him to stop. That place was too loud and there were sick, crazy people everywhere. But he didn’t really have to go much anymore (except for every other Thursday for therapy) since he was ‘stable’, as the doctor put it.
There were times that he envied others for being, well, normal. And he just wanted to be...gone. If he was gone, it’d be a huge load off his parents’ shoulders financially and emotionally. There’d be no more pricey prescriptions. No more arguments about why he needed to take the pills his mother shoved before him. Thousands of dollars wouldn’t have to be wasted on visits to shrinks and doctors who claimed they could fix him. The hospital wouldn’t be their second home and those expensive MRIs and CAT scans and experimental drug therapies would be no more. If David was gone, they’d be the perfect family - a young, intelligent wife with a hardworking father who wanted only the best for his family. The image wouldn’t be tainted with night terrors and anxiety attacks. Of course he never said anything about it; his mother would not her of such a thing.
But anyways, at the moment, he was sitting on the floor with a red pen poised in his hand just waiting to put a red mark on the little numbers running down the side of the test. He was stuck helping his mother grade freshmen students’ homework. Fun. It was the price he must pay – it was either grading 150 – 200 pages or clean his room (which wasn’t really messy at all, she just thought so.)
His room was usually dark. The blinds were usually closed and the curtains were drawn. A dim trickle of light from out from under the door as well as a few a very soft glow from a small lamp situated on a very cluttered desk would pierce the darkness. With the help from the meager light, one could see an odd and abundant assortment of dozens of posters glued, or tacked, or taped on the walls; posters of more than a dozen favorite movies, more than a few random rock bands, and one or two slightly modest swimsuit models, and tear outs of delicious looking food his mother probably never would cook from magazines.
Shirts, pants, and socks were strewn about the floor and if looked at closely enough, one could see that the carpet was of a light, neutral color. Two book shelves lined the wall opposite of the bed and were filled with every book imaginable. Medical books for a short I-want-to-be-a-doctor-and-save-the-world phase, dozens of fiction books that were either received as gifts or bought spontaneously, old library books that never made it back to the library, and quite a few books on film – a new phase of I-want-to-be-a-director-and-make-the-greatest-movies-ever. An electric guitar sat abandoned in a corner from that one summer when an attempt was made to learn how to play. The bed was a mess as well – blankets all tangled and strewn about messily.
Alright. So maybe it was a mess – but he wasn’t infringing on her neat freak territory so it shouldn’t be a problem. Anyways, grading was kinda fun. Putting little red Xs next to all of the wrong answers and writing horrible failing grades at the top of the crisp white sheets was amusing.
One lonely sketch book sat on the floor of his mother’s classroom, turned upside down with a solitary dull pencil on top. One weekend, his mother had gone off to the other side of the country to take care of her sick aunt, and his father had difficulty juggling work, cooking, cleaning, and a teenage son who wouldn't sit still for anything. One trip to a craft store, a few colored pencils(and crayons, don't forget crayons) and a sketch book later, his father had found a way to keep him still and out of things he shouldn't be into. David wasn't the next Picasso, mind you, but he was a fairly decent drawer/artist and it kept him from getting into trouble or cleaning his room. There were already quite a few ‘attempts’ at pictures in his little book: Donald Duck with a machine gun, a shaky attempt at the Eiffel Tower, some sort of car and a few flowers here and there. Usually he was too busy doing stuff (school work, sleeping, thinking paranoid thoughts) that he didn’t really have time to stop and just...play around with his imagination.
Crayons. He liked them. A lot. Relatives (aunts and uncles and grandparents) had started making it a habit of sending him boxes of crayons for his birthdays. He didn’t use crayons all the time (alright, he did, but not everyday; not like he was planning to make a career out of it). They were just a fun, pass the time sort of thing – nothing serious. David didn’t plan on becoming a crayon artist; if there was ever such a person. Sure, crayons limited a person’s creativity since you were basically stuck with the colors they have and it was difficult to impossible to blend the colors. But he sort of liked the kiddy-ish look they gave to his ‘works of art’. And they were 'fun'.
Though drawing and art were a part of a long list of his intrests. At the moment, photography and film was his new love. (Even though, for the last few years, he’d been switching from art to film to photography and back again. Blame it on ADHD.) And now he was the sports photographer for the school’s newspaper and yearbook – which was kinda fun (except for the times he’d actually have to risk getting smacked with the ball because he’d have to get in close....).
Davie glanced at the clock once more. Yes. Time to go. He dropped the pen onto the floor (even at school he was messy!) and looked to his mother, waiting to see if she approved of him leaving now.....
“Have fun, alright? ” (Thank God) If he had to read another question about conjunctions he was gonna die. “Call me if you need anything...”
He nodded and she gave him a kiss on the cheek, to which he made a face, before he gathered his things and opened the door to the room, briskly walking from the classroom to the gym where he settled himself on one of the lower bleachers in the gym, near the area where the players were sitting on the bench. Never did he sit anywhere but the bottom three bleachers. Why? Because he was David, that’s why and because of all of the rowdy stomping and screaming the overzealous students insisted on doing.
It was a routine. He’d set up the digital camera on a tripod and let it record for the duration of the game. David would then use his camera (which was black and very shiny and pretty) to take more detailed-action-slam dunk pictures of each individual player as they moved around the court. And then out of the hundreds of pictures he’d take, three or four would end up in the school newspaper and one, possibly two, would be squeezed into the yearbook’s design. Usually, instead of throwing the rest away, he kept them in boxes and put the very best ones in a photography portfolio.
David was the sports photographer for the school newspaper and the yearbook and as a result he attended every kind of game from football to swimming and even golf. Since there were so many teams, he usually just ended up going to the big important games. But since Tod was on the basketball team, he went to every game they had. He knew a lot of the ‘popular/well know’ kids in the school (since they usually played sports) but Tod was his only real friend...just because.
He planned on becoming a photographer or a director for historical or comical movies. His father was all business – literally. He wanted his only child to go into a ‘business-y’ career like finance or management (basically something boring) which didn’t interest David in the least. Who wants to work 23 hours a day, go on month long business trips and never spend time with their family for their entire life? Seriously. If he was a photographer or a director, he could make his own schedule, work on his own time, and do what he liked instead of answering to some bossy boss.
There were colors flashing, noises blaring, bleaches shaking, people cheering, guys booing, laughing, talking, screaming, chanting, stomping, squeaking of tennis shoes, dribbling, buzzers, commentators, cheerleaders, music, and barking coachers; all of which were echoing and bouncing of the shiny floors and sturdy walls. Everything was a bit overwhelming and he was having a hard time concentrating (go figure).
But he did actually do what he was supposed to be doing, and that was to take pictures. A blonde cheerleader shouting out pointless chants that barely anyone could hear. Click. The red-faced coach waving his clipboard around dangerously close to the head of one of his benched players. Click. Anyways, he was sitting there, all nice and quiet taking his pictures when BAM, Fred lost the ball that could have won them the game. What the hell? Jeez. Didn’t he know anything? You can’t space out while playing basketball – that’s like sitting down in the middle of a burning building; it’s suicide. There goes another high school student’s reputation. Fred had just thrown it out the window of a sky scraper and down 50 floors to the concrete pavement; letting it shatter into a million pieces. How sad.
The process of taking photos started again: Fred losing the ball and standing there stupidly. Click. Tod dribbling the ball down the court with his left hand. Click. Tod still dribbling the ball down the court with his left hand. Click. Tod dribbling the ball down the court with his right hand. Click. (What? What’d you expect? They were best friends after all.) Tod making the winning goal. Click. Fred pouting. Click. People cheering until they were red and about to faint from lightheadedness. Click. The commentators sprouting off praises for Tod. Click. Basketball players jumping and running around happily. Click. The losing team frowning and pouting worse than Fred. Click.
Once the game was over he slowly turned off his camera, folded up the tripod and tucked the both of them as well as his manual camera into a black bag that had been sitting near his feet for the entire game; completely oblivious to Fred and Tod’s little spat (if he wasn’t paying attention to what he was doing, he’d probably end up dropping one of the cameras and that would be baaadddd). After zipping everything up nice and tight, he slung the back into his back and headed towards the locker rooms. David never really liked the locker room much – it was smelly and yucky and don’t get him started about the showers (Fungus, bacterial infection and mold? Enough said). But since Tod was in there, he’d risk his health and his life and his wellbeing to catch up with him. He pushed open the door, poking his head inside. (UGH. SMELLY.) Almost as if he was afraid something was going to jump out and attack him, he slipped inside quietly, looking around suspiciously. Spotting his friend almost immediately, he let out a very cheerful: “Hello!”
Big fat raindrops flung themselves against the window pane while the wind danced with the nearby tree, forcing the branches to smack against the defenseless window of the rather spacious English classroom. A rather young looking woman as well as a thin, gangly seventeen year old boy sat on the carpeted floor, side by side, heads bent over test booklets, most of which were riddled with red marks.
A shiver would make its way up his spine every few minutes. Apparently the air conditioning was on...Or...or maybe it was just him. Maybe the school was warm and he was the only one who was freezing. A brief waft of soft wind softly, a draft from the vent perhaps, lifted and blew about his dark, nearly black curls for a few moments as if it was a charismatic child toying with its father’s hair. He was dressed simply in a pair of jeans and a red t-shirt with some sort of writing that he was too lazy to read printed across it.
Bright emerald eyes turned towards the clock, one bold, black hand of the bright red thing hanging on the wall moved once more, changing the time by a minute. He soon lost interest in the appliance and turned his attention to the raindrops falling outside. Listening to drops of rain being blown about did not require much thinking and so his mind let it roam, and think about other things. Primarily what would happen if it was discovered that he hadn’t taken any medication in the last week.
Nardil, Zoloft, Xanax, Klonopin, Valium, Inderal, and Tofranil were his daily medications which were all flushed down the toilet before school that morning. He wouldn’t take pills. Why? Because the possibility of him choking on one of those little capsules was higher than he would have liked (he did the math) and David was sure that the Hymlic maneuver would be at least a tiny bit painful. And...and what if he did take the pills and he did choke and the Hymlic thing doesn’t work? Would his brain cells die one by one from lack of oxygen until his body couldn’t command his heart to beat? Or...would some inexperienced person (his mother, maybe) try to dislodge the medicine by performing The Maneuver only to apply so much force that his ribs crack and pierced his heart and/or lungs, causing massive internal bleeding and eventually death? Anyways, they couldn’t really force him to take the pills since they had no control over his muscles controlling his swallowing. He was usually quite well behaved - even without the medication - but there were times that something would just set him off and scare him so much he would retreat to the safe corner of his room or have some horrible panic attack and scare the shit out of everyone.
He could just imagine his doctor bursting through the front doors of the school and sprinting across the lobby and up the stairs and into his mom’s classroom room while shouting curses in between scolds and brandishing a scalpel with his toupee tilted to one side. The reflection would have been quiet amusing seeing as though the doctor who attended to him was a bit on the chubby side and would have been nearly soaked ‘bout time he reached the front door, not to mention his shiny bald spot which he tried to conceal with that rag of a thing. But no. It was frightening to him and he pushed the thought away.
They said he had panic disorder, and then agoraphobia, and then a severe case of social phobia and then...they don’t know. Davie was a medical mystery, an enigma. He couldn’t concentrate for long periods of time...he...he was afraid of things a normal human being took for granted. Unless he was distracted, he wouldn’t ride in a car. What if it crashed? What if he got hurt? What if the wind because so strong that it flung up the car and smashed it into a building? What if his father got hurt..? What if he died? He would wake in the middle of the night when there was a thunderstorm, trembling, because he could just imagine the window bursting open, sending deadly shards of glass flying at high speeds right towards him and..and then the glass would embed itself in his eyes and neck and he'd be blinded and slowly bleed to death...Or he would imagine it flooding outside and the water crushing their home and carrying the mangled debris along a swift current. What would they do? He couldn’t swim and...and...he didn’t want to drown.
He wasn’t crazy, per se, just dysfunctional.
Hospitals were a big part of his life and he hated them. David had already been stuck with every kind of needle in every single size for millions of tests that were supposed to reveal what was wrong with him so that they could fix it. He was only seventeen and he’d already gotten more CAT scans than he could count, MRIs, tons of different types of medication, a quite a few spinal taps (which hurt like hell), every neurological test in the book, trillions of needles stuck into his veins, and had had his blood drawn exactly 356 times.
A typical day at the hospital would begin horribly. The short journey from the front doors to his doctor’s office was always a little fuzzy. He would be a bit lightheaded from all the hospital-y fumes floating about and would seriously want to leave. Hospitals made him uneasy. There were a bazillion and one ways he or his parents could catch a deadly disease. On the way to the room, some old lady in a wheelchair would be coughing so hard, David was sure one of her lungs would come flying out of her mouth any minute – there was no telling what contagious, infectious disease that woman had. And down at the end of a hall, some man would be going into fits screaming that everyone was gonna go to hell because everyone was a sinner and that they devil was in every person. Some nurse would run up and stick this huge needle (probably filled with sedatives) into the side of the guy’s neck to get him to stop. That place was too loud and there were sick, crazy people everywhere. But he didn’t really have to go much anymore (except for every other Thursday for therapy) since he was ‘stable’, as the doctor put it.
There were times that he envied others for being, well, normal. And he just wanted to be...gone. If he was gone, it’d be a huge load off his parents’ shoulders financially and emotionally. There’d be no more pricey prescriptions. No more arguments about why he needed to take the pills his mother shoved before him. Thousands of dollars wouldn’t have to be wasted on visits to shrinks and doctors who claimed they could fix him. The hospital wouldn’t be their second home and those expensive MRIs and CAT scans and experimental drug therapies would be no more. If David was gone, they’d be the perfect family - a young, intelligent wife with a hardworking father who wanted only the best for his family. The image wouldn’t be tainted with night terrors and anxiety attacks. Of course he never said anything about it; his mother would not her of such a thing.
But anyways, at the moment, he was sitting on the floor with a red pen poised in his hand just waiting to put a red mark on the little numbers running down the side of the test. He was stuck helping his mother grade freshmen students’ homework. Fun. It was the price he must pay – it was either grading 150 – 200 pages or clean his room (which wasn’t really messy at all, she just thought so.)
His room was usually dark. The blinds were usually closed and the curtains were drawn. A dim trickle of light from out from under the door as well as a few a very soft glow from a small lamp situated on a very cluttered desk would pierce the darkness. With the help from the meager light, one could see an odd and abundant assortment of dozens of posters glued, or tacked, or taped on the walls; posters of more than a dozen favorite movies, more than a few random rock bands, and one or two slightly modest swimsuit models, and tear outs of delicious looking food his mother probably never would cook from magazines.
Shirts, pants, and socks were strewn about the floor and if looked at closely enough, one could see that the carpet was of a light, neutral color. Two book shelves lined the wall opposite of the bed and were filled with every book imaginable. Medical books for a short I-want-to-be-a-doctor-and-save-the-world phase, dozens of fiction books that were either received as gifts or bought spontaneously, old library books that never made it back to the library, and quite a few books on film – a new phase of I-want-to-be-a-director-and-make-the-greatest-movies-ever. An electric guitar sat abandoned in a corner from that one summer when an attempt was made to learn how to play. The bed was a mess as well – blankets all tangled and strewn about messily.
Alright. So maybe it was a mess – but he wasn’t infringing on her neat freak territory so it shouldn’t be a problem. Anyways, grading was kinda fun. Putting little red Xs next to all of the wrong answers and writing horrible failing grades at the top of the crisp white sheets was amusing.
One lonely sketch book sat on the floor of his mother’s classroom, turned upside down with a solitary dull pencil on top. One weekend, his mother had gone off to the other side of the country to take care of her sick aunt, and his father had difficulty juggling work, cooking, cleaning, and a teenage son who wouldn't sit still for anything. One trip to a craft store, a few colored pencils(and crayons, don't forget crayons) and a sketch book later, his father had found a way to keep him still and out of things he shouldn't be into. David wasn't the next Picasso, mind you, but he was a fairly decent drawer/artist and it kept him from getting into trouble or cleaning his room. There were already quite a few ‘attempts’ at pictures in his little book: Donald Duck with a machine gun, a shaky attempt at the Eiffel Tower, some sort of car and a few flowers here and there. Usually he was too busy doing stuff (school work, sleeping, thinking paranoid thoughts) that he didn’t really have time to stop and just...play around with his imagination.
Crayons. He liked them. A lot. Relatives (aunts and uncles and grandparents) had started making it a habit of sending him boxes of crayons for his birthdays. He didn’t use crayons all the time (alright, he did, but not everyday; not like he was planning to make a career out of it). They were just a fun, pass the time sort of thing – nothing serious. David didn’t plan on becoming a crayon artist; if there was ever such a person. Sure, crayons limited a person’s creativity since you were basically stuck with the colors they have and it was difficult to impossible to blend the colors. But he sort of liked the kiddy-ish look they gave to his ‘works of art’. And they were 'fun'.
Though drawing and art were a part of a long list of his intrests. At the moment, photography and film was his new love. (Even though, for the last few years, he’d been switching from art to film to photography and back again. Blame it on ADHD.) And now he was the sports photographer for the school’s newspaper and yearbook – which was kinda fun (except for the times he’d actually have to risk getting smacked with the ball because he’d have to get in close....).
Davie glanced at the clock once more. Yes. Time to go. He dropped the pen onto the floor (even at school he was messy!) and looked to his mother, waiting to see if she approved of him leaving now.....
“Have fun, alright? ” (Thank God) If he had to read another question about conjunctions he was gonna die. “Call me if you need anything...”
He nodded and she gave him a kiss on the cheek, to which he made a face, before he gathered his things and opened the door to the room, briskly walking from the classroom to the gym where he settled himself on one of the lower bleachers in the gym, near the area where the players were sitting on the bench. Never did he sit anywhere but the bottom three bleachers. Why? Because he was David, that’s why and because of all of the rowdy stomping and screaming the overzealous students insisted on doing.
It was a routine. He’d set up the digital camera on a tripod and let it record for the duration of the game. David would then use his camera (which was black and very shiny and pretty) to take more detailed-action-slam dunk pictures of each individual player as they moved around the court. And then out of the hundreds of pictures he’d take, three or four would end up in the school newspaper and one, possibly two, would be squeezed into the yearbook’s design. Usually, instead of throwing the rest away, he kept them in boxes and put the very best ones in a photography portfolio.
David was the sports photographer for the school newspaper and the yearbook and as a result he attended every kind of game from football to swimming and even golf. Since there were so many teams, he usually just ended up going to the big important games. But since Tod was on the basketball team, he went to every game they had. He knew a lot of the ‘popular/well know’ kids in the school (since they usually played sports) but Tod was his only real friend...just because.
He planned on becoming a photographer or a director for historical or comical movies. His father was all business – literally. He wanted his only child to go into a ‘business-y’ career like finance or management (basically something boring) which didn’t interest David in the least. Who wants to work 23 hours a day, go on month long business trips and never spend time with their family for their entire life? Seriously. If he was a photographer or a director, he could make his own schedule, work on his own time, and do what he liked instead of answering to some bossy boss.
There were colors flashing, noises blaring, bleaches shaking, people cheering, guys booing, laughing, talking, screaming, chanting, stomping, squeaking of tennis shoes, dribbling, buzzers, commentators, cheerleaders, music, and barking coachers; all of which were echoing and bouncing of the shiny floors and sturdy walls. Everything was a bit overwhelming and he was having a hard time concentrating (go figure).
But he did actually do what he was supposed to be doing, and that was to take pictures. A blonde cheerleader shouting out pointless chants that barely anyone could hear. Click. The red-faced coach waving his clipboard around dangerously close to the head of one of his benched players. Click. Anyways, he was sitting there, all nice and quiet taking his pictures when BAM, Fred lost the ball that could have won them the game. What the hell? Jeez. Didn’t he know anything? You can’t space out while playing basketball – that’s like sitting down in the middle of a burning building; it’s suicide. There goes another high school student’s reputation. Fred had just thrown it out the window of a sky scraper and down 50 floors to the concrete pavement; letting it shatter into a million pieces. How sad.
The process of taking photos started again: Fred losing the ball and standing there stupidly. Click. Tod dribbling the ball down the court with his left hand. Click. Tod still dribbling the ball down the court with his left hand. Click. Tod dribbling the ball down the court with his right hand. Click. (What? What’d you expect? They were best friends after all.) Tod making the winning goal. Click. Fred pouting. Click. People cheering until they were red and about to faint from lightheadedness. Click. The commentators sprouting off praises for Tod. Click. Basketball players jumping and running around happily. Click. The losing team frowning and pouting worse than Fred. Click.
Once the game was over he slowly turned off his camera, folded up the tripod and tucked the both of them as well as his manual camera into a black bag that had been sitting near his feet for the entire game; completely oblivious to Fred and Tod’s little spat (if he wasn’t paying attention to what he was doing, he’d probably end up dropping one of the cameras and that would be baaadddd). After zipping everything up nice and tight, he slung the back into his back and headed towards the locker rooms. David never really liked the locker room much – it was smelly and yucky and don’t get him started about the showers (Fungus, bacterial infection and mold? Enough said). But since Tod was in there, he’d risk his health and his life and his wellbeing to catch up with him. He pushed open the door, poking his head inside. (UGH. SMELLY.) Almost as if he was afraid something was going to jump out and attack him, he slipped inside quietly, looking around suspiciously. Spotting his friend almost immediately, he let out a very cheerful: “Hello!”
In What Roleplay Will This Character Participate: House MD and Crossover. (:
