CLIVE SEBASTIAN. 53. CIS MAN. HE/HIM is here! They’ve lived in Cascade for 32 YEARS and currently reside in SHASTA HEIGHTS. BAZ is an OWNER & HEAD CHEF at SEBASTIAN'S and frequently hears that they look a lot like JUDE LAW. Funny, huh? If ever caught by Letterboxd, they’d say THE GREAT GATSBY (2013) is in their Top 4 and the theme song to their life’s soundtrack would be SUNDAY MORNING by THE VELVET UNDERGROUND.
basics.
full name: clive elmer sebastian
nicknames: baz, picked up in high school and dragged all the way into adulthood. depending on who says it, it can be fond, insulting or both at once. clive is mostly reserved for family, childhood friends and anyone who knew him before his big move to cascade, definitely more personal
date of birth: may 22nd, 1972
birthplace: portland, oregon
pronouns: he/him
orientation: unlabelled (probably pan or poly)
religion: somewhere between polytheist and pantheist (recognizing a pattern…)
languages: english, spanish, italian
personality.
positive traits: ambitious, audacious, gregarious, munificent, resilient
negative traits: hedonistic, manipulative, sanctimonious, self-centered, tactless
star signs: gemini ☼, libra ↑, gemini ☾ #whatdatmean
mbti: estj, the executive
enneagram: 3w4, the expert
love languages: words of affirmation, gifts
desires: to feel valuable, admirable and successful. equates his entire self-worth with his professional success
fears: regression, irrelevance, losing the room, not being admired once he's no longer impressive enough to distract from how awful he can be. also, embarrassingly, scary things. the bigfoot situation gives him the creeps in a way he finds deeply undignified, so naturally he's decided it doesn't exist
interests: travelling !! whenever time allows, experimenting with ingredients and films. #cinephile in the most insufferable way where three stars is a generous rating. he also has a thing for houses, meaning he owns a few properties in different places, rents them out when he is away and uses them whenever he’s passing through because of course he does
inspo: adam jones (burnt), jay gatsby (the great gatsby), tom ripley + dickie greenleaf (the talented mr. ripley) and maybe a little don draper
backstory.
triggers: classism, alcoholism, infidelity, parental neglect, s*icide attempt, hospitalization, dysfunctional family dynamics. (#damn…)
clive sebastian was born in portland, oregon, the middle of three in a family that worked hard and still never seemed to have much left over. he wouldn't call his childhood tragic because it wasn’t, and because he would rather die than sound like he was asking for pity. his father worked warehouse shifts, while his mother picked up diner work whenever she could. food was always around him and his siblings, only it came more through staff meals, bruised fruit, diner scraps and whatever could be brought home. very glamorous origin story for a man who would later become unbearable about tasting notes. he was not starving, but he knew what it felt like to be the kid without the nicer clothes or the family trips other people talked about. getting made fun of for it did not make him humble, obviously, and he was always trying to get ahead of the joke before anyone could make him the punchline.
being the middle child mostly made baz allergic to being overlooked. no one ignored him but he hated feeling ordinary in a house where everyone already had their role, so he started turning himself into the one people noticed. charming when it worked, impossible when it didn’t. by high school, he had made a whole personality out of it. charming, competitive, mouthy, and annoying in a way people eventually decided was entertaining. he started working at a small restaurant while still juggling school which started as a money thing but, the kitchen got under his skin quickly. he was not some legendary athlete, but he was good enough to be noticed. he got into college partly through baseball. the plan was something sensible like business or hospitality, while cooking stayed the job that paid for everything, except baz is baz and once he cared about something too much, it was over for everyone involved. sorry to the practical degree, you were never making it out alive.
he met his wife while he was still trying to become someone. she knew him before the money, before sebastian’s. she saw the hungry, messy version of him underneath all the charm, which he loved at first, right up until being seen started feeling a little too close to being held accountable. micah came along in his final year, and baz had no idea what to do with being someone’s father at first. he was young, broke, scared and pretended that none of those things were true, then she was there and suddenly he loved her in a way that caught him completely off guard. his first real achievement, probably, but you didn't hear that from me. he really did try to be a good father, with try doing a lot of work there. he showed up through providing, buying things, fixing problems and making sure the child had more than he ever did. the emotional part was harder, but he convinced himself that giving his family a better life counted for most of it. eventually, he and his wife moved to cascade, where he started over through better connections and bigger plans. sebastian’s began as a restaurant and slowly became proof that he had made something of himself, which sounds inspiring until you remember this is clive sebastian.
his wife was there through the ugly years and every promise that it would all pay off one day. then it actually did pay off, and somehow that made him worse. the parties, drinking and flirting aka networking, were easy enough for him to excuse as part of the job. while his wife was home with his daughter, holding the actual household together, he was out convincing himself that everything he did was for them. not fully a lie, but not fully enough either. when he was home, he could be affectionate, but he was also distracted, hungover or already thinking about the restaurant again. fights became flowers, apologies became gifts and real conversations became something he could delay as long as money kept showing up #BIGPROVIDER … i guess. she tried with him for years, first with patience, then honesty, then despair.
things between them had been getting worse for a while, though he dealt with it the way he dealt with anything he could not charm, control or pay his way out of. after her attempt, the family cracked in a way even he could no longer dress up as manageable. it scared him badly, even if he still handled it in the baz way, by trying to be useful after already being too late. after that, his relationship with his wife and daughter only worsened, especially when he slipped back into work and routine instead of actually dealing with it. it all ended eventually and she left cascade to stay with her sister. baz let himself believe the distance was better for everyone because the alternative was admitting he had failed at the one thing he kept claiming all of this was for.
a few years ago, his body started making its complaints impossible to ignore. a night of too much drinking turned into hospital lights, a doctor looking entirely too unimpressed with him and a very pointed conversation about habits, stress and the fact that he was not thirty anymore. deeply offensive, honestly. after that, he started trying to tone it down, more out of vanity and self-preservation than any sudden moral awakening. he still loves pleasure, attention, control and being admired more than any grown man should, but now there's at least some awareness that he cannot keep living like that. still, baz has the career, the money, the name, the restaurant and all the proof he used to think would make him feel secure. naturally, none of it is enough, so he has decided another michelin star will fix him. surely. definitely.
connections.
micah sebastian. his daughter, his biggest guilt trip and one of the few people who can still make him feel (and look) stupid. he loves her, but he has never been great at showing it without making things awkward or unintentionally superficial. their relationship is still strained after the separation and everything with her mother, but he does try. more tba. my dms are always open for plotting <33














