CARDINAL, Rhys Hadrian

[rhys hadrian cardinal]

RHYS HADRIAN CARDINAL

FULL NAME: Rhys Hadrian Cardinal.
NICKNAMES: None
AGE: Thirty-four
GENDER: Male
SEXUALITY: Straight.
STATUS: Single.
GROUP: Citizen.
GRADE: N/A.
MAJOR: N/A.
JOB OCCUPATION: Architecture Professor.

HAIR: Golden brown, short, but with a bit of a curl if he doesn’t tame it with product.
EYES: Brown.
SCARS/BIRTHMARKS: He has a fair few scars that he wishes he could keep hidden, and a few more faded and meaningless. He has one on the back of his skull, peeking out at the nape of his neck. There are cuts on his chest and hip, but most prominently is the carving of “lose”, now a little distorted across his abdomen.
TATTOOS: None.
PIERCINGS: None.
PLAY-BY: Theo James!

LIKES: Draft sketches, woodwork, guitars, city skylines, peanut butter and banana sandwiches, working out weekday mornings, crossword puzzles, carnivals, cooking for himself, visiting his parents, dark rum, holiday reads, a good view, woodland cabins, herbal teas, marathon running (one or two a year – he’s not a fanatic), gingerbread, a hot shower, cherry yoghurt, Celtic music (helps him relax/think).
DISLIKES: His scars, impatience, yearbooks, maths, heavily scented perfumes, windy days, bad lighting, his hair growing out, sob stories, dating (the pressure is there!), ridiculous movie gore, short flights, commercial holidays, stammering, ice in non-alcoholic drinks, cheap beer, guns, bullies, his own sentimentality, orange juice.
FEARS: Driving on cliff edges, clowns, being buried alive.
SECRETS: Rhys showed up for his high school reunion, not because he missed friends (he’d had few at that school) but because he wanted to shove his achievements down the throats of those who had bullied him. He wasn’t the fat, acne ridden kid anymore. He wasn’t stammering in a classroom when he was an award winning architect. He went to show them all that their words had only driven him to be the best – and that they had nothing on him now. Rhys isn’t typically that arrogant, so he keeps it a secret since he doesn’t think it boasts his better qualities.
PERSONALITY: Rhys is incredibly driven and often times more enthusiastic than people expect him to be. He’s creative, but personally prefers a zen type environment to the madness and chaos typically associated with living in the city. One thing people come to learn is that Rhys is an anxious talker. If he’s not got his words written down he can be prone to telling people pretty much everything they never needed to know. He’s also not good talking about himself since everything tumbles out like word vomit at the simplest question. Rhys may appear charming on the professional front, but he’s pretty awkward in his personal life. He can hide it most of the time, but he’s a little bit dorky beneath the nice suit and drafted plans. Rhys is hard working and believes wanting something is worth putting the effort in. He’s patient and loyal to those he considers friends, but people have said that first impressions make him seem cold or distant; he doesn’t mean to be, but the bullying in his past makes him wary of who he lets into his life. He never used to be confrontational, but a bad moment with a former idol made him realise that underdogs needed that voice - so he found his. Rhys doesn’t like being angry, but he’ll speak up against injustice or even just when someone is being a jerk. He finds himself quietly reminding himself that he’s not the kid he used to be. That kid wouldn’t have thought of running the mile in gym class, let alone the annual marathons a somewhat athletic Rhys runs now. Working out clears his mind and sets him up for the day. Despite being told he’s attractive, Rhys has yet to find “the one”. He’s awkward, and oftentimes embarrasses himself in front of women he likes. Other times they’ve freaked out by his life story tumbling from his lips five minutes into a first date. However, Rhys can be sweet when given the chance. He’s a little spontaneous when it comes to love, planning things on the spur of the moment. Honestly, he’d like someone to share his dreams with, but he convinces himself that he’s okay being single; he’s busy enough.

MOTHER: Annabelle Raquel Cardinal, 59.
FATHER: Liam Jacob Cardinal, 60.
SIBLINGS: None.
OTHERS: William Beyers, 35, bully
Hannah Jane Grimsby, 34, bully/crush from school.
Javier Dominguez, 35, good friend.
PETS: Harry, bullmastiff of three!
HOMETOWN: Seattle, Washington.
HISTORY: Annabelle and Liam met during their college years. He was an architect student and she was going for Interior Design. A few of their classes overlapped and they met in a crowded lecture hall during spring semester. They hit it off from the start and finally hooked up during a trip to Mexico for spring break. Liam proposed at graduation and Annabelle accepted. They both had dreams together, wishes they had shared on nights when they didn’t get any sleep. Now it was about making it come true.

For the first few years before the wedding, they worked at different companies, getting the experience and reputation they needed to do what they dreamt of doing. By the time they were married they had all that they needed. The only thing that put their dream on hold a little longer was the discovery that Annabelle was pregnant.

Rhys was born in the heat of summer, and by the winter his parents had bought their first home to flip. It was a small apartment in an average building, but they had to start small to make it big. It was still in Seattle, so they could go home at night, and they had family and friends happy to babysit whenever they couldn’t take Rhys to the apartment with them because of the noise or the painting.

Annabelle and Liam both planned to have more children. They knew their dream would see them moving around a lot if it took off, and they didn’t want Rhys to be bored and alone with each move. Fate, however, had other plans. Annabelle suffered four miscarriages before her son was out of his toddler stage, and by that point she called time on the plan of the big, happy family. She couldn’t keep going through the losses, and her body felt tired from it all. Her and Liam decided that they would simply have to make sure Rhys was happy, that they kept him the focus of their life and did family things often so that he didn’t feel estranged or like an outsider with every fresh start.

When he did start school, they were in Wyoming. The house flipping business had been successful so far, and Annabelle and Liam were constantly on the lookout for more places that were selling for cheap that they could work their magic on. They had a good savings pot, not to mention some people invested in their work so that they could move in relatives or have it as a second home for themselves. It wasn’t uncommon for people to buy places based solely on Liam’s plans.

It wasn’t easy saying goodbye to friends and having to make new ones. Rhys sometimes switched schools twice in one year, other times he was in one place long enough to think it might be home. He parents explained time and time again that they never planned on staying anywhere, but sometimes Rhys just felt hopeful. He didn’t make friends easily. As a kid he had a pretty bad stammer, and was on the larger side compared to most kids. Liam always said he had been exactly the same as a kid, but that the weight fell away during high school. Rhys didn’t have that same confidence; mostly because kids had the power to hurt each other pretty bad, with words or whispers.

The family sold another house and moved to Rhode Island for another job. Rhys was fourteen at the time, a freshman just turned, and this move was the worst of them all for him. The kids at his new school were monsters. He had no friends, the one girl he was unfortunate enough to have his first crush on hated him and mocked him regularly after being nice enough to him to get more ammunition. Hannah had a “boyfriend” in William Beyers. He was some little league star who everyone thought would be the perfect jock in later life. At the age of fourteen though, he was nothing more than an arrogant bully whose father was part of the local police force. No one dared befriend Rhys because of William. William would taunt and threaten Rhys in the hallways, and wait for him after school. He slashed the tyres on Rhys’ bicycle, dumped garbage in his backpack, and made Rhys feel mighty insignificant.

It all came to a head when Valentine’s day rolled around. Some other kid sent a valentine to Hannah, but she thought it had come from Rhys. She told William who decided that Rhys needed to learn a lesson for going after “his girl”. William got some of his friends and together they jumped Rhys on the way home. The house his parents were flipping was at the end of a long dirt road, but there was a short cut through the woods that most people took. They got him there, between the trees where they were less likely to be disturbed when they beat Rhys up. William had a hunting knife which had been a gift from his father for their new hunting trips. With it, he threated Rhys, said he’d kill him if he ever made a move on Hannah again. His intentions were to carve “loser” across Rhys’ stomach while his buddies held the screaming kid down. William didn’t get to finish it, stopping at “lose” when a dog barked nearby. They fled, leaving Rhys bleeding and brutally beaten. He was found by the dog and its owner, who quickly got him to the hospital and contacted his parents.

Liam and Annabelle were horrified to learn of their son’s injuries. Beyond the cuts, and the bruises, he had fractured a rib in a fall, and broken a bone in his left wrist. They knew Rhys had been struggling at this particular school, but he had never mentioned bullies, and since they were moving on at the end of the next month, they had thought it would be better in their new place. Annabelle almost put Officer Beyers into the ground when she saw him next, and Liam had to restrain his wife before she got herself into trouble. William and his cronies were sentenced to a short spell in juvie, but it was really nothing more than a slap on the wrist when compared to what they had done and wanted to do. Rhys never returned to the school, but his parents ensured that the community turned against the board of governors and the district before they left town.

Rhys was permanently scarred from the encounter. Not only did he have the letters on his stomach, but there was a gash in his side from landing on some sharp rock on the forest floor, and a slice over his chest where William has first tested the blade. Needless to say, he was self-conscious of his body after they left Rhode Island. It wasn’t just his weight now, but also the scarring which stayed angry and stood out against his skin for some time. Rhys made excuses not to take his shirt off. He didn’t shower until everyone had left at school, and despite going to California at one point during his high school years, he wouldn’t strip down at the beach. There was always an excuse. Even when he started to lose weight at seventeen – just like Liam had predicted – Rhys simply ate more. People assumed his weight made him awkward when it came to losing the layers, and it was easy to stick to that.

Things only changed when Rhys went to Florida for college. There he was roomed with a rising football star; Javier Dominguez. Javi was a great guy. He was friendly and confident and everything Rhys wanted to be. He also knew fitness like the back of his hand. He was studying Sports Medicine, and while Rhys was an architecture major with very little in common with him, Javier still wanted to give their friendship a chance. He talked Rhys into coming the gym with him – not to get fit or anything, but simply to blow off some steam during exam weeks. Rhys was surprised to find that it worked. It helped settle his anxious thoughts. Not that running on the treadmill was easy for him then, or that he was a pro like Javi. However, Javi encouraged him, and when he started losing a few pounds and feeling good about it, he approached Javi for more help. The football player was happy to take Rhys under his wing. He devised a fitness plan for him, helped him understand nutrition and balance better. Rhys began dropping the weight and his body became more toned and defined. He felt better about himself, and his confidence soared. However, he still wasn’t comfortable being shirtless. If he had dates who he brought home, he kept the lights off or his shirt on. Javi learnt of the scars when they got an apartment together just off campus in their junior year, but he could help little. Rhys told him the story and Javier told him how shit it was, but he couldn’t zap the scars away. The only good thing was that they were less prominent than they had been once upon a time. Rhys knew they would always be there, but they were thinner now, less angry looking. Plus, having abs had distorted the letters slightly so he didn’t look as though he had been branded like unwanted cattle.

Rhys got another confidence boost when he graduated college and had been offered a prestigious internship with a prominent architect company in New York City. His designs had earned him the spot and meant he would be working with some of his idols in the field. However, on the day he was supposed to start, one of his idols scoffed at him and said that he didn’t work with amateurs. He made reference to Rhys being honoured to fetch his coffee, and that would be all he was good for. Rhys was shocked, upset and ultimately angry by this. Part of the appeal of the internship was working on this particular project, but he hadn’t gone through four years of college, graduating near the top of his class, to be told he could be the coffee boy. Instead he shamed the man in question – and the company – before quitting. He took it online, to the papers, everywhere. He wanted it to be known that those trying to enter the profession were being looked down upon by the very people they aspired to be like. Rhys had been bullied for most of his life, but as a grown man he wasn’t about to let that happen.

A smaller company approached him and offered him a position. They didn’t have the high reputation, but they were promising, with plenty of contracts coming their way. Rhys jumped at the chance and a few years in a building he had designed and seen through to completion won a national award. Shortly after this the school in Rhode Island had a reunion. He found out through social media, and while he was typically a modest guy, part of him drove him to go. No one recognised him, not until William Beyers practically fainted at the handshake he offered. William, the rising jock, had been written out with a shoulder injury in college and now worked in a canning factory. He had never married Hannah like everyone said they would. Hannah was a mother to four, and as Rhys learnt during that special night, had lost two of them to foster care when her coked up sugar daddy had overdosed in their bathroom. Rhys didn’t particularly like to see people suffering, but he took a once in a lifetime moment to feel thrilled at how he was successful and happy and they were miserable. It almost made him believe in karma. Rhys didn’t rub it in, or make a big scene; just being there and making polite conversation was enough for that. He ended the night by buying everyone a drink – just because he fucking could.

Rhys didn’t actually let success go to his head. Back in New York he was looking at his next project while his award sat on a shelf in his study. The company he worked for – now very successful – had been offered a deal with NYU. Someone teach there and set up a placement programme, and they got an injection of cash and more work headed their way. The owner put Rhys forward for the teaching job after seeing him help the interns and those new to the company as the years ticked by. Rhys was already being offered a partner position, his own team, and pick of the contracts going forward. He was in no way obligated to teach, but he wanted to go out there and prove that not every college kid promised a shot would be greeted with assholes like he had been. He was thirty-one when he stood in front of the class for the first time, fumbling words and generally making an idiot of himself. Being imperfect made them like him, oddly enough. He was approachable and tried to inject humour into everything. Plus, years of bullying had thickened his skin to where he could heckle a heckler when they dared tease him about stammering a sentence or muddling his words around.

Thirty-four now, he’s on his third year of teaching. Another of his buildings is up for an eco-award and he’s got a lakeside retreat he built with his father. Rhys has always been close to his parents and will on occasion help them with a flip when he has the time to spare, though they’re both considering retirement now. Javier gets him rotten drunk whenever their paths cross, and he’s still the best friend Rhys never knew he needed until he had it. All Rhys is truly missing is someone to share his life with, who’ll take up the other half of his bed and steal his food. He does have that in the form of Harry, his dog, but it’s not quite what the rom-coms and fairy tales suggest that should be; too much bad breath and not enough conversation.

YOUR ALIAS: Kim.
RULE WORDS: kidnappedbykim.
WHERE YOU FOUND US: Between the stars.
SAMPLE:

Nope!

[kim]