Laurence Haver

Lord Jarke* · #1

Name: Laurence (nicknamed Laur or Lauren).T Haver
Gender: Male
Age:17
Grade: 12th grade
School: Bayview Secondary School
Hobbies and Interests: Model Building, Programming, Computers, Running, Wildlife and Debating.

Appearance: Laurence is 5"9' and weighs 144 lbs. He is well muscled in the legs and to a certain extent, in the arms. This is muscle is mainly kept up by his hobby of running and the everyday manual labour tasks he does. His hair is a light brown and is in a rounded and messy haircut that many people use to quickly recognise him at school. This has made him unwilling to have a haircut often. His eyes are a murky green. His skin colour is white and is fairly healthy with only some spots on his face. He has some facial hair above his lips and chin and other typical areas.

Laurence tends to wear a variety of clothing including polo shirts, normal shirts etc along with jeans. A lot of Laurence's clothes are tatty due to his interests. He can be quite smart and has a suit for formal occasions.

Biography: Laurence was born in a hospital in Boston, Massachusetts. He was the only child in what was a typical middle class family with his mother who worked as a receptionist at a health insurance company while his father worked as a train driver. The idea of a child had been on their minds for a while. The prospect of a child had been an exciting one for the twenty year married couple and as most parents did, they talked about what Laurence may become and what he'd be like.

For the most part Laurence lived the typical life of a young kid. He quickly loved to play outside even if it got his brand new clothes dirty or meant that he climbed an old tree stump that would probably result in him falling off. Despite any knocks or bumps Laurence had already fallen in love with the outdoors. He would explore around the garden and in parks, often making secret dens, finding discarded items or hiding from his parents for short spaces of time for fun. This love of the outdoors would never leave him.

As he reached the age of four he went onto Kindergarten. At first Laurence found it hard to get along with the other children there and it took him several months to fit in; much to the worry of his parents. He'd sit in a corner and not want to cooperate with anyone. Slowly and to the relief of his parents he became a lot more social and the problems they had were resolved. Eventually he even made some new friends that would stick with him for most of his school life.

After a couple of years Laurence finally moved onto Elementary School and the experience was good for him. He continued to be more social and was a very strong student in most areas except ones such as art. He simply could not grasp it as well as many others did. Laurence excelled in subjects like Maths though and could do it quite well for his age. PE was another subject he was fairly good at, being a good runner. His running talent was also something he used quite well with games in the playground. Laurence was not a problem free child however and occasionally got into fights with other students. He was overprotective of those he liked and any wayward mocking of them would quickly anger him.

Apart such minor issues life was good for Laurence. That is, until a bombshell was dropped that destroyed it all. One evening on the way back from a trip to a restaurant on Laurence's tenth birthday, his mother got into a car crash with a van, slamming into it. Laurence and his dad were not badly harmed yet his mother was. Laurence at the time did not understand much of what was going on yet the blood, the chaos, and the sounds of sirens and people shouting imprinted a traumatising set of memories onto Laurence. All three were taken to hospital and his mother was put in an intensive care unit. Laurence's perfect world had been shattered and his young mind simply could not cope which caused him to cry and have nightmares for many months following the crash. The memories the accident would never leave him and would give him many problems to this day including his Haemophobia.

Eventually his mother was deemed healthy enough to come out of hospital but was wheelchair bound for the rest of her life which put her out of work. Laurence's dad took a large amount of time off work to see to his wife's well being. This quickly put financial strain on the family and it became ever tighter for them which in turn, made the whole thing worse. Eventually an offer from his father's sister was given to live with her (given she was a lot more well off than them). She knew people that could quickly get his father work and had wanted to be closer to the Haver family in general. She lived St Paul, Minnesota. This meant that what was left of Laurence's world was whipped away from him. The move took its toll on Laurence and made him more stressed and upset. He did not even have his old friends to comfort him anymore except via occasional telephone call.

Soon after the move, therapy was arranged for Laurence. He was now a panicky and shaky person. Stress, no matter how trivial could quickly make him hyperventilate or tremble. Laurence would often drop glasses and other items due to this. Laurence had also became haemophobic with the sight of blood triggering immense panic within him. His therapist devised various ways to combat his new habits. One of these strategies was for Laurence to try and build model planes. This would help keep his mind of his worries and fears while helping him do something productive. At first he was reluctant. He thought it was boring and on top of that, it included painting which was something he was not fond of. In the end he started to like the hobby and it would stick with him.

As a strategy it had worked and he quickly used to relieve himself of stress. Another strategy that Laurence's therapist came up with was for him to learn more about common wildlife in his new area. This was done to help him get used to his new home while playing to his interest of the outdoors. Wildlife was something that Laurence had previously overlooked. He slowly started to gain and interest in it which gave him more incentive to go outside more like he used to.

With things starting to settle for him he eventually entered Middle School and slowly got back on track with his life. Despite this though his mother required attention often due to the injuries she had taken. Laurence took it upon himself to do a lot of the things she could no longer do in order to maintain the new household. He felt like he had to help in any way possible. Middle School was a slightly nervous experience with new faces and many differences compared to his previous school. He was a lot quieter than he was before and a lot more edgy as well. Any insult about his mother, even if it was in jest caused him to get enraged quickly and several fights broke out. On top of that due to the remaining stress and time taken by taking care of his mum, his grades slipped. He did gain some friends though, though not as many as he had before.

Finally he moved onto Bayview Secondary School. With a new school came a new chance to make friends and a chance to improve himself. His social skills slowly started to return to him in full after the initial shock of being new to the secondary school had faded away. He again excelled at his Math and PE like always. He also went on to jin cross country running club due to his love of running.

In other courses such as English and Geography he did moderately well. Yet did not show any real interest in the courses enough to really push himself in them like he did in his favourite subjects. . Despite that he did do well in some courses beyond his old comfort zones. For example he started to find the computer courses he had once done a lot more enjoyable and started to get a knack for programming (where his Math skill helped of course). He eventually joined a computer club. In some realisation of how quickly he could snap in some situations, Laurence joined a debating club in the hope that it would calm him down a bit and make him think more rationally.

Personality wise, Laurence is a calm person, happy to make jokes and jest but also knowing when not to make such jokes otherwise. He can be quite affectionate and protective of the ones he holds dear. On top of that, in a time of seriousness he often goes quiet and tries to hide his emotions from others in the hope that no one notices. Laurence will try and be diplomatic and calm in a serious crisis yet if this facade cracks, he turns into a panicky mess. On top of that he can get angry fast in some situations and not think about what he is doing. Often if someone hurts or insults someone is close to or he likes.

Advantages: Laurence knows a lot about wildlife and the wilderness in general. This can aid him, even in a place he is not totally familiar with (though within reason). Also Laurence can be quite diplomatic with people if he needs to be. This allows him to be able to talk his way out of things or argue his case for certain things. Finally, when calm, Laurence can be very precise.

Disadvantages: Laurence can panic quite quickly if under too much pressure making him shaky and panicky like a herd animal. On top of that Laurence also suffers from Haemophobia (fear of blood) and will panic in a similar fashion at the sight of it, even causing him to hyperventilate and sometimes in bad cases, vomit or freeze in fear. Sometimes Laurence can get a bit too over protective of the ones he loves or likes which can also make him angry and violent.