YOUR OC’S BACKSTORY
WEEK I: FAMILY
@yourocsbackstory
Some romances would benefit from ending when the credits roll after the final kiss. The love story between Casimir's parents is one instance in which this is true. Isolated and lonely after her family's move to England, a teenage witch met a century-old vampire who was poorly adjusted to modern life. Courtship followed. It was far from the healthiest premise to a relationship (Lord knows that everyone around them disapproved) but they were stubbornly committed to each other and remain so thirty years down the line.
But for all they may have been deeply, passionately in love, their following desperation to start a family came with a price – poisoned fruit in their apple-pie life. That would be Casimir, the unfortunate progeny of life and death. He was planned in full knowledge of the fate that would befall him: thirty years, with no hope of a matching happy ending.
It makes it difficult to see his mother and father in a positive light on his darkest nights.
“Casimir? God, how am I supposed to see the screen? Cas, love, can you hear me?”
“Yes, Mum. I can see you as well – it’s a video chat,” Casimir replied dryly, watching the screen as a sudden rush of movement distorted the picture of sun and sand and a shaded parasol, settling on his mother’s smiling face instead of her ear. “What’s up?”
“Your father and I just wanted to wish you a happy birthday.” She laughed at what must have been visible confusion on his face. “I know, I know, we’re a week early and then some, but here’s the better news: we’re coming home to tell you that in person.”
“Mum–”
“Is there anything you want in particular for it? The big 3-0. It’s no small thing. A holiday? Ooh, what about a car?”
“My bike is fine,” Casimir hit back on instinct. The number of complaints he’d had about ‘death on two wheels’ and the ‘one-way ticket to organ donation’ that was his bike prepared him well for instantly shutting them down. Not that the doctors would ever want to use his organs. “And I can’t take time off work. Look, you don’t need to get me anything. You don’t even need to come back for it – stay in Ibiza. Enjoy your holiday.”
“Don’t be silly. It’s your big 3-0,” she repeated. “Your thirtieth. We don’t want to miss it. Besides, we only planned to be gone a few months. I bet the house is getting lonely.”
To swiftly avoid repeating a discussion of why he chose his own dingy, top-floor flat in Faraday Heights as opposed to living it up in his parents’ stately townhouse, Casimir let his head fall back against the back of the couch, and when he looked up again, asked, “Where’s dad? What does he think about you coming home?”
“He’s not one for the hot weather, and you know how he doesn’t like phone calls. It’s letters only, if it can’t be face-to-face.”
“We did tell him about Skype, right?”
“In one ear and out the other,” she confirmed. “Anyway, he said, ‘Call, and let him know we’re coming back. And give him my love.’“
“It’s not that important.”
“It’s a milestone. I think that he thinks that it’s his duty.” A pause. “It’s mine too.”
They brought you into this world. That vicious voice long-since drowned in drink and buried in self-help books reared its head again. And it’s their duty to see you out of it.
It wasn’t like he would drop dead on the day. Odds were good that he’d see his thirty-first and maybe even his thirty-second before that happened. So they intended to stay in Britain for a few years. To put their un-life on hold. For him.
“Fine. Whatever.” It was hard not to sound like a teenager again. “I’m not planning on doing much for it anyway, ‘cos it’s a weekday – I’ve got work and all. We could go to dinner?”
“I’ll make reservations,” his mother said, victorious. “Are you sure you don’t want a new car?”
