✦ RAYMOND ABLACK, CIS MALE, HE/HIM ✦ MARCUS SHAW the THIRTY ONE year old has been in Hidehill for HIS ENTIRE LIFE and was a FAMILY FRIEND to Miyeon Kang, the murder victim. Whispers on the streets are that the OWNER OF MINDFUL/THERAPIST who lives in HARTLEY AVENUE are said to be PATIENT and DISTANT but I guess we’ll find out for ourselves. { DANI, 26, SHE/HER, GMT. }
BASICS
Full Name: Marcus Shaw
Nickname: Mark
Age: 31
DOB: June 10th 1992
Parents: Tracey Shaw & Jonathan Shaw (deceased)
Siblings: Dean Shaw
Hair colour: black
Eye colour: dark brown
Piercings: none
Tattoos: none
Sexuality: Heterosexual
Occupation: Therapist
LINKS
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BIOGRAPHY
tw: death
Marcus was adopted by his parents when he was just a baby. He doesn’t know anything about his birth parents but he didn’t care to find them either, he accepted his life for what it was and his adoptive parents always kept things open for him if he ever did want to know more.
When he was younger he remembers living in Hartley Avenue at first, he remembered his dad working from home and people came and went all day long. He didn’t know what exactly his dad did because he was too little but as he got older he understood more. He admired him for the work his did, the help he gave people and knew as he got older it would be something he wanted to pursue.
As his dads business grew and became more successful they moved out of Hartley and into Horwick. He remembers his dad wanting to separate his home and work life more so he could be here for his family.
Growing up Marcus was a good kid, he always worked hard in school and kept his head down. What he didn’t expect was for Adriana Martinez to make him fell head over heals in love with her. They were high school sweethearts their entire senior year and broke up when Ana wanted to leave Hidehill to travel. He was broken by it but he understood as he was going off to college to study psychology.
He studied at Vanderbilt and worked at his dads office in the mean time to gain more experience, he worked extremely hard to get his degree and felt fulfilled once he graduated and started working with his dad immediately.
Marcus and Ana reconnected once she moved back to Hidehill again 7 years ago to inherit her dads business, of course he very quickly fell head over heels for her again and he proposed to her when they were 26.
TW DEATH: Jonathan Shaw unfortunately passed when he was 29 years old. It was unfortunate circumstances and something they couldn’t have predicted. One of his dads patients shot him dead outside of the Hartley Avenue home one day, it was tragic and it took a toll on Marcus. He admired and looked up to his dad and without him there he really struggled for the longest time.
When he was 30 his wife, Ana, upped and left him out of nowhere. She moved out, bought herself a home in Hove Lake and gave him no explanation. They’re not officially divorced and he hasn’t had much contact with her since.
featuring: @adrianamartinez, @deanshaws, @maximoxaguilar & @hidehillxshadow xo
The past few days had been tough on Marcus. His head was all over the place and he genuinely for the first time since his fathers passing did not know what to do with himself. He was somebody who fixed peoples problems yet he couldn’t fix his own. From bumping into his wife on valentines day to them looking as though things could be good again, to him feeling genuinely happy and content with Ana as things were starting to look up to the files being leaked and then the texts coming through. He felt as though the shadow genuinely had it out for him, as though this was personal but he couldn’t figure out why.
Some may call him stupid, some may say he was being a fool for wanting to make things work with Ana but she was the love of his life. Only a few know just how much it tore him up when she walked out on him and if he could make this work he would. Everything in him loved that woman and he’d do anything to make it work with her. She could walk out on him over and over and once all was said and done he’d let her walk back into his life each and every time.
That night Marcus had paid a visit to Roxy, this time though it wasn’t his usual visit he’d make. As much as he enjoyed their time together, the way she knew how to distract him from anything that was going on in his life, he knew if he wanted this to work with Ana he had to put an end to whatever they were. It wasn’t something that was easy for him.. In fact it was a lot harder than he thought it would be. He was putting something on the line for a second run with his wife who had walked out on him without any real reason, even to this day he still didn’t understand why she did what she did. He was willing to give this another go though.
Walking out of Roxy’s home that night he was feeling uneasy, he felt anxious and he’d be lying if he said he was confident in the choices he was making. If anything this was the most confused he had been in a while, he felt as though he was going against everything in his body that told him he was making a big mistake. The heart wants what it wants though. Pulling his phone out of his coat pocket he quickly tapped at the screen to write out a message to Ana. “Hey, I want to make this work. Can you come home tonight? We can talk about it all properly and I promise I’m done fighting. See you soon, babe. I love you.”
Once he hit send and slid the phone into his pocket he fumbled around trying to pull out his car keys, that’s when he suddenly was hit with an overwhelming pain in the back of his head. The keys dropped from his hand and hit the ground, he remembers the noise they made as they connected with the concrete below him and the way his vision blurred suddenly. His head was pounding and he remembered his hand reaching to touch where the pain suddenly appeared, he remembered the way his fingers felt wet upon contact with his head and how even through his blurred vision he could see the blood on his hand. After that his memory was foggy, it felt as though he was moving in slow motion as he tried to walk to his car still through the confusion even with his keys on the ground. After that he couldn’t remember falling to the ground but he did remember how cold it felt once he’d reached the floor and lay there. He remembered the noise of feet on the concrete around him, the muffled voices as they spoke to each other trying to figure out how to quickly move him from the streets. The rest? He couldn’t tell you.
The next few hours.. Days.. however long it was, were all a blur. It consisted of him going in and out of consciousness as he received several beatings, he felt as though he was being tortured and he didn’t know why. They didn’t ask for anything.. They didn’t want money, they didn’t want information, they just wanted to hurt him in any way they could. Whether it was down to the lack of fluids they gave him so he was dehydrated, the lack of food he had so that he wasn’t strong enough to fight back, the way he barely got any sleep because they wouldn’t allow it. He couldn’t even tell you how many people he was coming into contact with.. One.. Two.. Maybe three? By the end he felt as though he was going insane, he was delirious, he just wanted it to stop.
His body ached every second that they kept him there. If they weren’t hurting him physically it felt as though it was mentally. Locked away in a place all alone with nothing but his own thoughts to torture him. How was Dean? Was he safe? Did they have him? What about Ana? Surely they wouldn’t do this to her right? He was barely hanging on by a thread surely they wouldn’t treat her the same right? No, he couldn’t think like that. She was safe. Dean was safe. They just wanted him for whatever reason. They leaked his files.. Sure, Dean’s too but then the messages that followed.. That was to hurt him right? Whoever this was only wanted to hurt him right and not his loved ones?
Marcus woke up to the feeling of the cold floor below him, he had no idea where he was but he knew this room was different to the one he’d been in this whole time. His head pounding, his body tender and ached to the point that it was more comfortable to not try to move, his eyes shifting around trying to see where he was.. Who he was with.. Was he in a basement? He couldn’t tell.. It was somewhere he hadn’t been before that was for sure. Eventually he plucked up the strength to pull himself up even if it was just to sit up with his back against a cold wall. His eyes landing on the restraints making sure that he can’t move far, his head slowly turning and landing on someone else.. Max.
“Max?” He attempted to talk, his throat dry and sore from the past however long it had been without proper food and water, after however long of him calling out in pain for them to stop, the hours or days he’d spent crying when he had a moment alone to feel the pain his body was going through.. To think about his loved ones and what they could have been going through. One of those being Max even though he was suddenly put in a situation of whether to trust his best friend, his brother, or not. “Hey, are you okay?” He tried to call out.. Panic setting in as he couldn’t tell whether or not he was breathing.. He couldn't even reach him to check.. For his own sanity at this point he had to tell himself that he was alive.
“Listen.. Listen, I don't know if you can hear me right now..” his voice breaking as he tried to speak, his throat in pain but this time it was from the lump he felt forming in his throat. “I just want to say that I’m sorry..” he began to break down, tears slowly but surely falling from his waterline, “i’m sorry I didn’t trust you.. I should have listened.. I should have known you would never hurt me.. Not in that way.. Not with Ana.. you would never..” he paused as he tried to compose himself even a little, a loud exhale leaving his body, “if we get out of this.. When we get out of this” he corrected himself, “we can just put everything behind us.. We can get a nice cold drink together.. We can laugh at how stupid it was for me to even think you’d look at my wife that way.. I know.. I know you care for her, you look out for her..” Marcus shook his head and stopped talking, he felt stupid talking to himself like this. He cleared his throat and sat there in silence waiting for his friend to wake up.. He knew he had to save his energy and that didn’t involve him having a one sided conversation with someone knocked out.
Marcus was suddenly woken to the sound of a door swinging open, he must have finally dozed off at some point, he didn't have much time to react before he felt himself being dragged off by who he could only assume was the same people who had been dealing with him the whole time. He didn’t have the energy to fight. He didn’t have the energy to call out or beg for them to leave him alone. This was the same routine he’d been going through since they took him. The only difference was he was sure he heard his friend's voice.. He was just too exhausted to even take in what he was saying or if he was even hearing anything at all. His feet dragging along the floor as the two held him by his arms, “Max?” He pretty much whispered out to the best of his ability.
The next few hours felt like routine, the shadow beating him in and out of consciousness over and over again. Only this time felt a little different. This time didn’t feel like he’d be returning to a room alone again, or to a room with Max this time, this time felt as though his body was finally giving in. He couldn’t take anymore of this, he was tired of fighting, he physically couldn’t handle anymore. He couldn’t fight them back, he didn’t have it in him anymore. Marcus lay there on the ground quietly as he slowly breathed in and out. In a way he had accepted that he wasn’t making it out of this alive. There was just no way.. Why would they put him through this just to let him go? Surely not. Lying there a small smile formed at the corner of his lips as he thought of good times. Dean. Ana. Marcus. His mother. His father. Sad times too like the day he found out his father was killed.The day Ana left him. The good like the day he and Ana first got together. The day he proposed. His wedding. The day he graduated. The day Dean supposedly graduated too. There was a lot to think about from his thirty one years on this planet.
His thought process abruptly came to a stop as he felt hands around his neck though, suddenly every last bit of strength and energy he had appeared in fight or flight mode. He was fighting for his life.. Quite literally this time. He wasn’t ready to die. Not right now. He had too much to live for, he had people that he cared about. What about Dean? Would Ana take care of him? He was an adult but was he really? He didn’t get to have his talk with Ana, would she think that he had just left? Would Max be okay? Was he still alive? Would he be able to tell her that he didn’t leave her like she did him out of spite? His hands pushing against the body on top of him. Fingers gripping at the hands around his throat and prying at the fingers holding him tightly on his neck. It wasn’t working. Nothing was working. He was too weak. He couldn’t breathe. He felt himself becoming drained, he felt the air leaving his body, he felt as he slowly began to slip away. His hands pushed and hit whoever was on top of him, each one getting weaker and weaker as he slowly ran out of air and couldn’t fight any longer.
Just like he suspected, this time felt different. This time he wasn’t returning to be alone in a room again, he wasn’t returning to a room with Max. He wouldn’t see his family again, not Dean or his wife or anybody. This time would be the last.
Marcus: Hey, I want to make this work. Can you come home tonight? We can talk about it all properly and I promise I’m done fighting. See you soon, babe. I love you.
The whole Marcus and Ana situation was really hurting Dean's brain. It didn't help that it wasn't at all easy to come up with. One day Marcus sounded like he was ready to divorce her, and the next they were having record-time sex. The latter had kind of embarrassed him at the time, thinking to himself that the walls were super thin in their home, but he was happy for his brother nonetheless. But then those weird texts came out, and it was looking like it was back to square one. Dean was seated at the kitchen counter eating his fourth meal of the day, despite it only being 11 am, when he noticed Marcus entering the room. "So… what's going on with you and Ana?" he asked, figuring it had been enough time of him keeping his mouth shut about it.
"What about us?" Marcus looked at his brother as he began to make himself a coffee, "you want one?" he offered the younger of the two. He knew what he was referring to he just enjoyed dragging things out longer than necessary, especially when it came to his love life. "Me and Ana are uh.. in a weird spot right now. I've had time to think about it all though and figured I should at least get it a real go with her. She seems to want to make it work and I'm not entirely sure I believe those texts you know? What do you think?"
Watching him just stand there in silence in front of her, she didn't know what to expect next. She was almost surprised by what came from his mouth. "It doesn't mat-..." She stopped herself in the middle of her sentence, knowing that he wasn't going to accept that for an answer. "Campbell Ford." She admitted, "Like I said, it was one time, and it was a mistake." Adriana hugged the sweatshirt in her hands tighter to her chest, almost as if she felt if she lost any grip on it, she was letting him go too. "I don't want to fight with you anymore."
His brows furrowed at her as she spoke, the name leaving her mouth was not something he expected to hear. He half expected Max to finally come out, hell even Orlando, Viktor, Atticus or Carter.. just somebody closer in age. The gap wasn't huge but it still surprised him. Campbell Ford. The two didn't even have any similarities.. Marcus was a therapist who shared his home and business with his brother, Campbell owned a gym and a home and was a complete different person to him. They were not similar in any way shape or form. "Campbell?" He asked as he scratched at his beard trying to wrap his head around the information. "Ana.." he trailed off with a sigh, "i just need time.. I can't do this today.. I'll call you in like a day or two okay? Right now I just need to be alone while I figure out what I want and I can't do that with you here. "
Adriana truly expected to be able to back home when she was ready. She didn't think there would be this many speed bumps along the way, she was too in her own world to have thought about it all. "Everything can be fine, if you would just not listen to the stupid shit some bully is sending us." She sighed, feeling angry and sad from the conversation. "There was one night, and it was something that never even mattered, and it wasn't with Max. I made a mistake back then, but I love you and I want to be here with you, not with anyone else." When she pictured coming home this evening, she definitely didn't picture it like this. "You haven't made any mistakes this past year? I can look past whatever you have done, I just need you to look past mine too."
Marcus didn't know what to expect when he said what he said, if anything he assumed more denial would come out of her mouth and not the honesty. Instead he stood there in silence for a moment as he felt his stomach sink, the thought of her with another man made him feel ill. He had no room to talk, he had been sleeping with Roxy and if anything didn't regret it either. He couldn't say it was a mistake because it wasn't. He'd never have even consider it if his wife hadn't walked out on him, it took him a while to even look at somebody that way. "Who was it?"
"I'm telling you the truth right now. I was so happy to be coming back home today, I'm trying to make things right between us after everything." Watching him take back the photos she had pulled from the box, Adriana reached in and grabbed more out before setting the items on the bed. She pulled out an old sweatshirt she had bought him all the way back in high school, holding it close to her. "I know that I'm not someone who deserves to be believed right now, but I'm telling you the truth. I have never ever had sex with Max. I literally cried myself to sleep that night, Marcus."
"Well I guess things aren't a simple fix" Marcus watched as she began to unpack her belongings from the box, his eyes rolling in frustration. "I guess i was stupid to think you could come back and everything would be fine and we could pretend nothing happened. I just don't believe nothing happened and no matter what you say that is always going to be in the back of my mind.. if it isn't Max it was somebody else." He stood there looking at her feeling defeated, he really hoped they could just continue on like nothing happened after their night together but the shadow had other plans.
roxy: the dead dawg has some strong ones
roxy: my treat?
roxy: kinda seems like ya need it
marcus: ana just showed up
marcus: gimme like 30 mins and I'll be there once I get her to leave
marcus: sound good?
Adriana walked up to the box that he had set down, looking at the content inside of it. "Marcus, this is ridiculous." She pulled out the framed pictures and put them on the bedside table. "What did you want me to do? You told me you wanted a divorce that night. Was I supposed to say, 'sounds good, take me home sugar.'? I went to his house because I was too drunk to be alone." She crossed her arms over her chest, "I went to his place and slept in the bed, and he slept on the couch. Nothing fucking happened, you need to believe me right now." She felt like she was getting nowhere with the whole thing, like he wasn't going to believe her no matter what she said. "I was coming home tonight; I have most of my shit packed. I wouldn't be coming home if I was fucking someone else."
"Is it ridiculous?" He asked genuinely. Nothing about it sounded ridiculous to him. "What I thought was ridiculous was you walking out on me, after a day or two I figured you'd be home soon. Then weeks went by.. months.. now after a year you come back into my life and I'm supposed to believe you didn't fuck Max after our argument?" Marcus walked over and snatched up the photos off of bedside table once again. "That's really not something that is unbelievable, things change after that much time so God forbid that I'm a little untrusting of you now."
She knew he'd be upset, but she didn't think he'd be upset enough to try to get rid of every last piece of her in what was their home. "I didn't sleep with him." She tried to defend herself. "Max is just my friend, nothing more. I love you, I want to be with you." Adriana didn't know how to prove it to him or how to fix things this time. She stepped closer to him, trying to stay in contact with his eyes. "Please listen to me right now, I need you to believe me when I say I have never been with Max like that and it's just a misunderstanding."
"Yeah, just a misunderstanding don't worry Max already explained. He took you back to his place to sober you up." He started to explain as he placed the box onto the bed and turned to her as he made air quotes with his hands. "I mean I don't understand why you had to go back to his place when you have two homes to go back to already, Ana. The home with your husband and the home daddy bought you when you wanted to run away from your husband a year ago." He laughed after speaking because if he didn't he had no idea how he'd react.
The last thing Adriana thought would happen in her day was her private texts getting sent to the entire town. At first, she wasn't sure who to call first about the matter, Max or Marcus. All she knew was that this look bad. She grabbed her keys off the counter and was at the home within minutes, letting herself in through the front door and up the steps to where Marcus was. "Marcus, before you say or think anything. I know that it looks bad, but it is not what you think it is." Adriana knew the truth; she knew that nothing had ever happened between her and Max. It was just a matter of what Marcus would believe from them.
Marcus may have been a little dramatic in what he was doing, he felt stupid and as though his wife and best friend had been making a mockery of him this whole time. As Ana walked in the door he was boxing up the remaining things he'd kept of her in his home for the past year. Photos of her and of the two of them were in the box, any decorations she had picked out herself, gifts she had given him and clothes, he was just walking over to his side of the bed and picking up his wedding ring to throw in there too as she walked in and spoke. Marcus turned to look at his soon to be ex wife with the box in one hand and the ring in the other. "I don't want to hear it, Ana. I'm done, we're done."
roxy: i know you and adriana were giving things a second chance and i respect that
roxy: but that doesn't mean i don't care
roxy: i saw the forum
roxy: i'm here if you need anything. even if you just need someone to talk to.
marcus: i need something strong to drink
max: no.
max: i said this in the forum but you muted it, rightfully so, so i'll say it here.
max: she pulled me out of the valentine's day party, wasted. i'm guessing that's after you told her you wanted the divorce.
max: i tried to help her sober up, but it wasn't working.
max: i gave her some clothes and slept on the couch.
max: i didn't sleep with her. i swear on my life.
Marcus: Right..
Marcus: I don't know what to think.
Marcus: I need time.
Marcus: [ Marcus Shaw blocked this number ]
ana: yes, even after the other night
ana: it really wasn't a big deal
ana: I'm sure you'll make it up to me anyway
marcus: I will I promise
marcus: It had just been a while you know..
marcus: and you looked so good
Emmeline: I'm sorry i can't call like i can't speak. i'm sick.
Emmeline: i don't feel safe at all and i don't know what to do. i need help.
Emmeline: something's really, really wrong and i'm scared.
Marcus: I would love to help, I really do wish that I could right now but I can't not after what happened.
Marcus: Have you tried speaking with somebody else?
