B I O G R A P H Y - ( includes triggers )
Born in New York City, Karington Todd was the ideal infant, healthy and beautiful, born first to a couple by the name of Walsh that hadn’t quite figured out that their relationship was not built to withstand the addition of a child, forcing them to consider, and ultimately decide, to give their daughter up for adoption.
Despite the inability to deny that the two weren’t ready for children, or even marriage yet (not that it stopped them), Clarisse and Douglas Todd were nothing less than stoked to be parents. Clarisse, a young waitress just out of high school, was head over heels for Douglas, though, that wasn’t much of a surprise to anybody. He was four years older than she was, and while his position as manager at the local mini-mart was less than impressive, he was what every woman dreamed of finding one day. Dreamy and dangerous.
The only problem was the woman’s inability to create a child for the two, on her own. After nearly a year following their marraige and several failed attempts, Clarisse feared she would have to give up her dreams of a family, upon being informed that she was, in fact, infertile. That was when Douglas suggested adoption, while he was still in love with his wife.
When their letter of approval arrived from the adoption agency they had applied through, they were over the moon. It was as though the world was finally falling into place, the day they met their daughter, signing the final papers and taking the legal notions to change the young girl’s last name to their own.
Clarisse thought the world of her small family, believing that the three of them would be together forever. If only she had realized how mediocre the idea was, before Douglas had agreed to raise a child alongside her. When he stopped spending time at home, making new excuses each time, Clarisse turned to the arms of another man, ultimately getting caught in the act. The two made up, to much surprise, but not before he had impregnated the new checkout girl at aisle four.
By the time Clarisse had realized what kind of man Douglas really was, it was already too late. She was pregnant herself, unknowingly, and Karington was two years old and about to start day-care, when the phonecalls began. Her name had been Miranda, and most of her calls were to inform the young couple that she demanded child support; That Doug had a son, and he was to take care of him and his mother. Obviously, Clarisse wasn’t too fond of the man after finding out that bit of information, especially after a praternity test proved it correct.
She didn’t understand at the time, but this was when her parents came to terms with the decision of a divorce. To say that Karington was confused was to say the least, when her mother buckled her into her carseat and began to drive, the entire trunk full of all of her mother’s clothes and all of her toys, aside from Mr. Barnaby, a stuffed blue rabbit the five year old toted everywhere. Her mother had contacted a woman in Canada, whom Karington would later learn to call her grandmother, and they moved into her home for a while. It wasn’t much, and there were an abundance of new rules, but Karington liked the flower shop they drove past on the way to town, and that was enough for the child. Once Clarisse had gotten onto her feet, sending out application after application, finally settling on a position at the local hospital, answering phones.
That was when they packed up once again and moved into a far-too-small home just down the road. And so the small girl tugged her stuffed rabbit down the street, and that was okay too, because she had made a friend. As far as anybody could tell, her name was Emmy, because that’s what Karington liked to call her. The two were young, but inseparable. From the age of five, carrying into the pre-teen years, Karington and Emily were the best of friends. No matter the difference in the two families, primarily financially, they were impossibly close. The kind of friends that agreed to see things through until the end, and actually did.
Karington was in sixth grade when her mother was offered a teaching position in Virginia. In the time the only child had escalated her way through elementary school, Clarisse had managed to finish school, earning a teaching degree, with the help of her mother’s babysitting skills. So, unwillingly, Karington packed up everything, even that raggedy old bunny, and she and Clarisse were off to Prince Edward Island, where they settled into a slightly larger home than before, with the man her mother remarried - the father of karington's half sister. And, that wasn’t okay, because she missed Emily more than she missed her own father. That being said, she wasn’t going to let such a strong friendship slip through her fingers, only because of the many miles separating them. The two wrote letters back and forth, as well as emails, all throughout their high school lives.
But, luckily for Karington, she met a new friend in school. This one’s name was Marcus, and this time she was old enough to pronounce it correctly, as well as introduce herself under a new alias; Kari. She’d grown tired of her full name, and with the new location came the chance the recreate herself. Little did she know in that moment, exactly how much she would love hearing her new nickname roll off of the other boy’s tongue, as they grew older. Easily said, Marcus was her first everything. He was her first date, her first kiss, her first love, and the boy that took her virginity. They were inseparable, much like Karington had been with Emily. Both of their parents believed the children would end up together, and as time proved them correct, they hoped marriage would be next.
Up until the moment Kari packed her bags into the boy’s truck and made their way for Briarcliff University, the college they had agreed to go to together, she believed the same thing. Her dress had been picked out, and her life had been decided, and that was when the strawberry blonde realized just how deprived her life had been. She was selfish and curious. She couldn’t bare losing Marcus for good, but she had to know what else was out there. And that was when she suggested the two took a break. Obviously this didn’t go over well with the boy, being as he helped Karington unpack her belongings and drove off, skipping out on their college experience all together.
The first few weeks were harder than ever. Her best friend was nowhere in sight, and she was in this new, scary place with not a soul she knew. She started writing letters to Emily again, some of them stuffed into the desk in her dorm, never to be sent, praying that the other girls never found them. As time went on, Karington began to fall into the mold of college life, finding herself and her freedom along the way, with different men and even women, along the way. She was slowly beginning to realize who she really was, and with that, came her own string of messes to follow. Of course, she had made decent friends, like Dimitri, Mason, and Megan, but even friendship couldn’t help clean up the girl’s messes.
Among those disasters came one in particular. After hooking up with one of the boys on campus, not once but a multitude of times, something Karington hadn’t done with one person since arriving in Briarcliff, she agreed to become the boy’s girlfriend. And, thus began her downfall.
Things with Keith were great at first. He took her to the campus diner on Thursday nights, and bought her flowers when she passed her most difficult midterm. He brought her tissues when she was sick, and cried her name to high heavens in bed. Things were perfect. At least, they seemed that way, until the night he was pledged as a member of the Delta Gamma Fraternity. That was when everything changed.
He gave up his tightly bound dorm room, and moved into the obnoxious house of men, taking part in parties and events, and, no sooner than he’d settled in, cocaine. He was drinking more and it was evident that something about him was different. He was strung out, more than ever, and it seemed as though everything set him off. He didn’t spend nearly as much time with Karington anymore, and when he did, the aftermath usually resulted in the small girl’s tears against her pillow.
At first, it was only words, reminding Karington of what a horrible person she was. He threw everything she did in her face, as though there had been an accumulated list of wrongs the young girl had performed. Failed grades. Nights she hadn’t come to bed. The evenings she had spent with her friends. How Silas was right to leave her. How she’d put on weight.
Everything was an insult, and Kari didn’t know how to respond, other than cry and ultimately beg that he didn’t leave her, promising that she could fix it.
She turned to her schoolwork, burying herself in improving her grades, all the while making certain to put him before her friends, both in time and sexual regards. And, she began to eat, less and less, counting calories and watching the pounds drop. She had to prove to him that she was worth his time, that she deserved his love, that she could be better.
But, no matter how hard she tried, it just wasn’t enough. And, that was when the abuse began. One day Karington had come home late, after a night out with her friends. The two hadn’t made plans, but she had agreed mid-outing that she would see Keith when she got back to campus. This wasn’t good enough. After an interrogation as to where she had been and who she was with, not that the coked out jock believed her, he clocked her right in the jaw.
But, that was only the first time of many. And, no matter how much Kari wanted to leave him, she couldn’t, because this time, it was him who demanded love, despite the way he went about it, threatening that if she ever left him, she would regret it. Of course, the girl believed him. She had enough bruises covering her quickly thinning body than she knew he wasn’t joking. He wasn’t fearful of hurting her, and he didn’t intend to stop anytime soon. Between cruel words and painful punches, Karington couldn’t help what she had been reduced to; A less than adequate school student struggling with an impending case of anorexia, caused by an abusive boyfriend that hadn’t even noticed the harm she was causing herself beside his own, scars covering her inner thighs.
She didn’t want to be like this, of course. Who would? But, she couldn’t help it, and Keith showed no signs of making her life any easier, any time soon. So, she continued on, battling with herself, and pleasing a man that cared so little for her, making excuses all the way around.
That all changed the night that Keith let things go too far, even for him. It had been the last day of the semester, letting out for Easter break, and Karington had agreed to make a big dinner for the two of them, not that she stood much of a choice. The girl had spent most of the day, baking and stirring, perfecting their dishes to the best of her abilities, wondering when he was going to be home.
When he did show up, his eyes were larger than usual, and he reeked of cigarette smoke and scotch, a deadly combination. Dinner hadn’t been done, and according to the male, that was unacceptable, being as he had given her ample time to do so. Though it was certain that his anger fell into something else; something he actually had a right to be angry about this time around. Kari had been cheating on him, spending her spare time with a man that didn’t love her or promise to, but made her feel safer than Keith ever could, even if it was only sex. When the topic arose, yelling and throwing pursued, and as one thing led to another, Karington was pinned against the refrigerator, struggling to breath as his fingers curled tightly against her neck.
In a moment of fear and panic, truly believing that this could be the end for her, she reached out for the knife she had left on the kitchen counter, after spending what felt like hours peeling potatoes and cutting up carrots, and without a second thought, stabbed the man. She could barely keep her hands from shaking as she washed the blood from her fingers, tears streaming down her face before dialing 911 and explaining her emergency.
With the loss of Keith entirely in her hands, and the stress that came with police conversations and witness confessions on trial, it was no surprise that Karington’s eating disorder worsened, as well as her self harm. Even after she was proven innocent in an act of self-defense, she grew worse. The realization that she had killed somebody, no matter the circumstances, was eating her alive and it was consuming her, to the point that she couldn’t take it anymore.
However, she hid it well, making it nothing short of a surprise when her roommate, Cynthia, found her in the bathtub, one wrist slit, incapacitated and barely holding on to her life. The next thing she remembered was waking up in the hospital, clad in a blue and white medical gown, bandages on her wrist and a lock on her door.
Thus began her stay at Southwood Psychiatric Hospital. It was a dull place, filled with people she didn’t understand and smells she wished she could escape. There were bed times and lock downs and at first, she wasn’t allowed to leave her room. That was when she started writing to Emily again. She didn’t send every letter, but the coping mechanism did wonders for her recovery, and after about a month, she was granted recreational passages, meaning that she could venture the halls and take part in the hobbies the other survivors did.
After six months of making friends with other suicidal victims, clinging to the companions she had made, she was granted her freedom, given the option to leave if she felt as though she was ready. She was eager to head back to school, to catch up with her old peers and fall back into the casual life of college, even if it meant leaving behind one of the good friends she had made in the ward, Marley. But, she knew it was for the best.
Upon her return, however, she quickly wished for her empty bedroom at the hospital back, as she faced the ridicule and rumors of the students at her university, the spread of her suicide attempt and talk of Keith following her everywhere. Not to mention, her grades were on a back burner due to how behind she was, leaving for six months. Afraid that her symptoms would soon return if this continued, Karington made the decision to drop out of school, leaving her undecided dreams behind her, moving into a small one bedroom apartment in the upper part of Lock Haven, where she had found a waitress job at one of the privately owned diners. That is, until she was fired due to the lack of business the place was bringing in.
Short on cash and low on spirit, Karington didn’t know what else do to. She sent out multitudes of applications and when she didn’t hear anything back, began to worry about the loss of her new-found home. She was falling apart, all over again. Her school experience was over, and she didn’t have a single friend to fall back on.
Or did she?
On a whim, she decided to call the one person she always remembered had taken care of her; Dimitri. To her luck, she located his phone number in no time at all, and off to a payphone she went, explaining her situation when the boy hesitantly answered.
Karington is now back at Briarcliff, and trying to readjust to the school, despite the many rumors about why she left, and what happened to Keith. She tries her hardest to cope with everything she has been dealt in life, but some times it is still all too much, and she slips back into self-harm and the ways of her eating disorder.