occupation: executive recruiter
length of time in atlanta: one year
faceclaim: emily ratajkowski
trigger warnings: – sibling death
Born in Seattle, Washington to a stay at home mother and an insurance salesman father. Colby’s elder brother, despite initially being unhappy at the idea of having a younger sibling, adjusted easily to his new role of big brother. The two had always been close and Colby will still insist that Jaxon was her first best friend. Growing up, Colby wasn’t blind to the unhappiness that plagued her parent’s marriage. Truthfully, she was convinced that her birth had meant to be some sort of last ditch effort to save their crumbling marriage. A few months after Colby’s eleventh birthday, her mother and father announced that the two of them would be getting a divorce. The news hit Colby hard, while Jaxon hardly seemed phased by the news.
The divorce spanned over eighteen months and it, at that point in Colby’s life, had been the most traumatic experience she’d ever gone through. Had it not been for Jaxon, Colby’s isn’t entirely sure she would have made it through the experience in one piece. Over the years, Colby had grown used to splitting her time between her mother and her father. Jaxon had gotten out of the arrangement earlier than Colby had, the five-year age difference working well in his favor. When Jaxon had gone off to college, it flipped some sort of switch in Colby.
By fourteen, the term ‘acting out’ would have been far too generous given the antics Colby had gotten up to. Drinking, drugs, and plenty other things that most parents would blush at. Throughout her high school career, while Colby excelled in her academics, it was her personal life that was often the talk of the hallways. By graduation, she had garnered a reputation for herself, one that Colby felt no shame about. College had proven to be a nearly identical experience for Colby, at least until her senior year when Jaxon had come to visit. Cleaning up her act had been easy when her older brother had asked, which resulted in an almost completely sober and celibate senior year of college. While her social life had taken somewhat of a hit, academics had always been Colby’s main priority.
Graduating in the top of her class, six months after graduation Colby had moved to San Francisco, the same city her elder brother lived in, and began her career as an executive recruiter. With minimal contact with her parents, Colby’s life was approaching near perfect. And then she’d gotten a call one late night at the office that Jaxon had been in a car accident and hadn’t made it. To say Colby’s world had been completely flipped upside down would have been an understatement. The guilt she felt, given that her brother had been on his way from San Diego to San Francisco come and visit her, was almost unbearable. So, when her employers had offered her a job across the country, Colby had been more than willing to make the trek.
After her first year in at Atlanta, Colby has grown comfortable with the locals and the few friends she’s made throughout her time. Still, it’s a rarity that anyone knows anything about her brother’s death, and even rarer that they know Colby had a sibling at all. She’s grown quite accustomed to telling people only the information they wanted to hear rather than the truth. Despite her slowly developing comfort of her life in Atlanta, Colby can’t deny she’d more than willing to relocate had that right person asked.
assertive, determined, vibrant
Colby blames herself for the death of her brother. In her mind, had she not been so adamant on Jaxon visiting, he might still be alive. She has a tattoo of his initials and his date of birth and date of death on her left wrist. If anyone asks, Colby makes up a story.
Colby hasn’t spoken to either of her parents since Jaxon died. She’s sure that they probably expected her to reach out, but Colby refused and aside from a few meaningless texts on Mother’s Day or Father’s Day, she rarely mentions her parents unless directly asked.
