MARSHALL, fletcher.

[FLETCHER PEYTON MARSHALL]

- - FLETCHER PEYTON MARSHALL

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Try to realize it's all within yourself - no one else can make you change.
And to see you're really only very small, and life flows on within you and without you.
We were talking-about the love that's gone so cold and the people,
who gain the world and lose their soul - they don't know.
They can't see - are you one of them?[/size]

[/center]

FULL NAME:

Fletcher Peyton Marshall.
NAME MEANING:[/size] Fletcher - The name 'Fletcher', originally an English surname, means 'Arrow Maker.' Peyton - The name 'Peyton' is of English origin and means 'Village of the Warrior.' Marshall - The surname 'Marshall' is also of English origin and means 'Horse Keeper.'
NICKNAMES:[/size] Those close to Fletcher call him Fletch. Fletcher's brother, Sidney, calls him Fletchy - and Sidney is the only one who calls him that, because he is the only one Fletcher likes enough to get away with it.
BIRTHDAY:[/size] 13 August, 1943.
AGE:[/size] Thirty-three.
GENDER:[/size] Male.
PLACE OF BIRTH:[/size] Obvious.
OCCUPATION:[/size] Copy Editor, former novelist.
BLOOD:[/size] Halfblood.
SEXUAL ORIENTATION:[/size] Heterosexual.
PARENTS:[/size] Fletcher's biological parents, Franken Marshall and Diana Marshall {now Vickers}, got divorced when Franken Marshall came out of the closet. Fletcher was eleven at the time. Both parents are in new relationships now. Franken's partner is called Rocky Mumsford and Diana's new husband is called Patrick Vickers. Franken and Rocky are circus performers/folk singers/adventurers, while Diana is a house-wife and Patrick is an accountant.
SIBLINGS:[/size] Fletcher's only brother is Sidney Marshall; Sidney - or Sid - is an auror.
SPOUSE:[/size] None.
CHILDREN:[/size] None.
OTHER RELATIVES:[/size] None.
[/blockquote]

WAND:

[/size] 15 inches, Oak and Ashwinder Ash.
BROOM:[/size] Fletcher does not own a broom, because Fletcher is usually too drunk to fly without being seriously injured. During his school days, Fletcher had a Comet 180, which he flew often, though he was not on a school team.
HOUSE:[/size] Hufflepuff.
BEST SUBJECTS:[/size] While he was at school, Fletcher excelled at Charms. This, however, was the only subject that he excelled at - this is not to say he wasn't good at other subjects, he was simply average when it came to everything but Charms.
WORST SUBJECTS:[/size] Fletcher wasn't necessarily bad at any subjects. He did alright in every class he took, though - with the exception of Charms, as mentioned above - he never did well enough to stand out. He did, however, have a least favorite subject - Herbology. Fletcher absolutely hated Herbology throughout all seven of his years at Hogwarts.
AFFILIATION:[/size] Undecided; very, very torn.
BEST MEMORY:[/size] The first time he went into a bookstore and saw one of his novels on the shelves.
WORST MEMORY:[/size] Catching his long term girlfriend, Jennifer, in bed with another man.
PATRONUS:[/size] Cat.
AMORTENTIA:[/size] Chocolate chip cookies, patchouli, wild flowers, the scent of his old typewriter, the smell of books of all kinds.
BOGGART:[/size] The death of his loved ones - especially his father and brother.
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HAIR:

[/size] Fletcher has dark, curly hair. During the happier periods of Fletcher's life, he kept his hair short and neat, but over the last few years, as he has become more and more unhappy, Fletcher has begun letting his hair grow out until it begins to fall into his eyes and get on his nerves.
EYES:[/size] Fletcher has pale blue eyes. At one point in his life, Fletcher got a lot of comments from women he was pursuing about his eyes, but not anymore. This is because his hair is usually so long that his eyes aren't visible, and also because Fletcher no longer bothers to pursue women.
BUILD:[/size] Fletcher is 5'9" and weighs 156 pounds. When he is happy, Fletcher takes very good care of himself and his body, and is usually quite fit, though never buff. Fletch used to run every morning and this was usually how he kept in shape. However, since he caught Jennifer cheating, Fletcher has dropped running in favor of drinking. He is not over-weight or terribly out of shape by any means, but his friends - the few he has left - often mock him by pointing out that his body has got a bit 'soft.'
DISTINGUISHING FEATURES:[/size] Fletcher's most distinguishing features is his constant scowl. The only time this scowl fades is when Fletch is with people he loves, and even then it often remains in place. Besides that, Fletch doesn't have many distinguishing features - he has no tattoos or prominent scars, though he does have a piercing in his left ear, given to him by one of the women in the circus when he was a child. When he was a teenager, he wore a small stud in this piercing almost all the time, but he has since stopped doing so and really only puts an earring in now as a joke.
STYLE OF DRESS:[/size] When out in public, Fletcher dresses very formally - a nice suit, a tie, and occasionally suspenders simply because he likes them. His clothes are usually very obviously expensive, though this is not because he particularly thinks the price of his clothes matters, it is simply because he can afford to buy expensive things and so he sees no reason why he shouldn't do so. The exception to this is when he is out with friends or family; when out with those he is close with, Fletcher dresses much more casually - a jeans and a t-shirt, with a jacket and scarf if it's cold. His casual clothes are usually expensive, too, though less obviously so.
PLAYBY:[/size] Casey Affleck.
[/blockquote]

HISTORY:

[/size] Fletcher was born to Diana and Franken Marshall. He had a relatively normal childhood - he played with other kids, went to muggle school, was horribly annoyed by his little brother, Sidney, who like to follow him around. Fletcher was happy and kind and, though Sidney sometimes got on his nerves, he loved his kid brother and on multiple occasions Fletcher got in a good deal of trouble for getting into fights on Sid's behalf.

But, when Fletch was eleven, that normalcy was lost - and it wasn't because he found out he was a wizard. He already knew that. It was because his father announced to the family one afternoon that he was gay, and he and Diana were getting a divorce. Of course, Fletch had seen the divorce coming - they weren't sleeping in the same room, they were fighting all the time... it was obvious. But he hadn't seen the reason behind it. That part hit him like a ton of bricks.

Now, Fletch had no problem with homosexuality in the abstract. In fact, he was all for gay rights and all that. He firmly believed that people should be able to love who they loved and all that. But confronted with this - with his father, the man who taught him to walk and talk and ride a bike and who held his hand when he had to get his appendix out at the age of nine, announcing that he was gay... Fletcher wasn't sure how to handle it. And, as it happened, he didn't really have to figure it out, because less than a week after they made the announcement, Fletch went off to school.

At Hogwarts, Fletch was sorted into Hufflepuff. Though lots of people criticized his house, Fletch loved it. In fact, without Sid to defend, Fletch took to defending his house, instead. More than once he found himself sitting in front of his head of house, explaining that someone had called him a Hufflechump, thus implying that Hufflepuff was the house of chumps, and he couldn't just sit back and take that, could he? All in all, Fletch's first year went well. He made friends - most notably, John Williams, who would become Fletch's bestfriend, and would also become good friends with Sid, through Fletch.

Though it took some time, Fletcher eventually came to terms with the fact that his father was gay, and when he did, he asked to go live with his father instead of his mother and her new accountant husband. After a while, Fletch forgot he'd ever been confused by his father's sexuality. It simply was what it was, and his father was still his father, and why on earth should it matter if he liked other men?

During his school years, Fletch was simply average in most of his classes, with the exception of Charms, which he was very good at. He was a fiercely loyal friend and, though he did 'go steady' with a few girls, he never had a true girlfriend while at Hogwarts. Even then, Fletch had a gift for writing, and he would often entertain his friends with his stories. He spent a good deal of his time writing instead of doing homework - and that was probably why he was only average in most classes.

At any rate, it didn't matter whether he was average or excellent, because immediately after finishing at Hogwarts, Fletch began bartending at a muggle bar while working on his first novel. His first novel took him all of two years to finish and one year to get published, and after that, the books simply poured out of him. From the age of twenty to twenty-three, Fletcher wrote and published six novels - that's two a year.

It was then, at twenty-three, that Fletch met Jennifer Wilcox. He'd known her at Hogwarts and they'd been friends, but she was younger than him and they'd drifted apart. But now, meeting again, the two of them hit it off. She was a writer, too - a journalist. It wasn't long before they were inseparable, and Jennifer moved in with Fletch only a few months after they started dating.

Things went fairly smoothly for the next seven years. Fletch knocked out eleven more novels - it seemed he was a bottomless pool of books - Jennifer and Fletch were madly in love - or at least he thought they were - and Fletch was planning to propose.

But then, Fletch came home one night to find Jennifer in bed with their mutual friend - Fletch's editor. The two of them fought and Jennifer told him it was his fault, he wasn't enough to satisfy her, he wasn't enough to make her happy, he just wasn't enough and Fletch believed every word of it. Furious and hurt, Fletch threw her out of the apartment and drunk himself into a stupor - an action that he repeated every night for the next two weeks. Then, when he realized he would eventually run out of money to buy booze, Fletch got cleaned up, went out and got a job as a copy editor.

Now, three years later, Fletch is still a copy editor and he's still drinking himself into a stupor most nights. He bought a cat shortly after breaking up with Jennifer, and the cat, Tybalt, has been his loyal companion ever since. He hasn't written a word in three years, except perhaps to write a grocery list. His brother, Sid, has been attempting to set him up on blind dates, but none of them have been particularly successful.

LIKES:[/size]

• SIDNEY MARSHALL

[/size] - Fletcher's kid brother, Sid, is one of the few people that Fletcher truly cares about. Though Sid often gets on Fletcher's nerves a little with his ragging on Fletch not to drink and his constant attacks on the character Fletch's cat, Fletch loves Sid and he would do anything for Sid - except stop drinking. He can't do that - or maybe he just won't.

• TYBALT[/size] - Fletcher's cat, so named because he is the king of cats. Though Sidney is sure that Tybalt is evil incarnate, Fletch is quite fond of the cat. Tybalt, much like Fletcher, is grumpy and a bit of a loner, and this might be part of the reason why Fletcher likes him so much. Though Fletcher very rarely holds Tybalt, he will often attempt to talk out his problems with the cat when he is alone, and if he walks past a spot where Tybalt is napping, Fletch will usually stop to scratch behind his ears or smooth his fur.

• JENNIFER WILCOX[/size] - Jennifer was Fletcher's girlfriend for seven long years. They started dating when Fletch was twenty-three and the relationship ended rather abruptly when Fletcher caught her in bed with his editor and friend. Fletcher still loves her. It's as simple as that. He loves her and he misses her and he would do anything to have her back in his life, in spite of the pain she caused him.

• WORDS[/size] - Fletcher believes with all his heart that words are the most powerful thing in the world. He believes that the correct word used at the correct time could do anything - end a war, start a war, make you laugh, make you cry, make you fall in love. Fletcher loves words. Fletcher cherishes words. And while he doesn't believe in God, he does believe in words.

• BOOKS[/size] - Fletch became a writer because he loved books and though he has stopped writing them, he has not stopped loving them. To Fletcher, there is something incredibly magical about a good book. Maybe it's the fact that they are filled with words or maybe it's the way they smell or maybe it's just the fact that you can escape your troubles in a book, but whatever it is, it captivates Fletch. Though he has forgotten his love of writing, he has never forgotten his love of reading.

• ALCOHOL[/size] - Before he broke up with Jennifer, Fletcher drank very rarely and when he did drink, it was in small amounts and only to celebrate. Now, Fletcher drinks almost every night (and most mornings and afternoons, too). Fletcher admits to being an alcoholic but refuses to admit he needs to change. If his habit is challenged, Fletcher will tell the challenger to back off, because he'd rather escape down the bottom of a bottle than face the reality of his life.[/right]

DISLIKES:[/size]

• JENNIFER WILCOX

[/size] - Yes, he loves her - but he also hates her. He hates her so much. He hates what she did to him, he hates how unworthy she makes him feel, he hates how easily she can manipulate him, but most of all he hates that he still loves her.

• ALCOHOL[/size] - As much as Fletcher needs alcohol, as much as he likes it, he also despises it. He hates it because his drinking habit it slowly messing up his relationship with his brother, he hates it because it is slowly making him sick, he hates it because he can't control it, and Fletch hates losing control.

• BLIND DATES[/size] - Specifically the ones that Sid insists on setting him up on. It isn't that he doesn't like any of the girls that Sid has set him up with; in fact, he's liked almost all of them. The problem is more that Fletch doesn't like himself enough to allow the girls to like him, and so he ends up sabotaging all of his dates. Add to that the fact that he is still torn between loving and hating Jennifer, and most of the dates end with Sid attempting to convince the girls to give Fletch another chance or with Sid showing up at Fletcher's flat at an ungodly hour and beating him with whatever his hand lands on first.

• INVASION OF HIS PRIVACY[/size] - Though Fletcher doesn't write anymore, his books are still well loved and his face is still plastered on the inside of each book jacket and the back of each paperback. He is often recognized from these photos and stopped in the street, and on several occasions more intense fans have found his home and arrived there. Though he is always very polite to these fans, Fletcher absolutely hates these invasions of his privacy.

• VISITING HIS MUM[/size] - There are several reasons that Fletcher hates visiting his mum - she always makes him mow the lawn, her new husband bothers him, she refuses to turn the heater on in the winter to save money, she's too conservative... but most of all, Fletcher hates visiting his mum, because she nags him to start writing again, and he just wants to forget about that part of his life.[/right]

STRENGTHS:[/size]

• ARTICULATE

[/size] - Fletch is very articulate and he speaks very elegantly. In fact, his manner of speaking is so eloquent that people often think he is quoting books or poems, when in fact he is just talking. He does, however, quote literature a good deal. The exception to this is when he is drunk - which is quite often - or angry; when he's had a few too many sips from the bottle or lost his temper, Fletcher tends to lose that elegance, often to the point where all he can do is swear. When he was young, Fletcher had a bit of an accent, but he has trained himself to hide it, and so it only comes out when he is upset.

• OPEN-MINDED[/size] - Growing up the way he did made Fletcher very, very open-minded. He will approach any new idea with an open-mind, greet any new lifestyle without judgment. If there was one thing his father taught him, it was not to discriminate, and Fletcher certainly doesn't.

• IMAGINATIVE[/size] - Obviously, Fletcher has quite an imagination - he made his living off it writing novels for ten years. Though he has stopped writing now, his imagination still comes in handy and he's actually quite proud of it.

• FIERCE[/size] - Fletch's way with words makes him quite a fierce enemy when he's provoked. He is very good at using words as weapons, very good at turning people's words against them and even better at using words to cut people down and make them feel small. When he wants to, Fletcher can be very, very intimidating.
[/right]

WEAKNESSES:[/size]

• SHORT-TEMPERED

[/size] – It doesn't take much to set Fletcher off, especially when he's drinking. He loses his temper very quickly and once he's lost it, there are only a handful of people who can calm him down again.

• INSECURE[/size] – No one would make the mistake of calling Fletcher confident. Fletch hasn't been confident since he and Jennifer broke up. She did a very good job of making him feel like he wasn't enough, like he didn't deserve love, and even three years later, Fletch is still convinced of it. In fact, he spends a good deal of time sitting around thinking about how much he hates himself.

• HIS FAMILY[/size] – Fletcher would do anything for his family - even his stepfather, who he isn't particularly fond of. The way he sees it, his family has always been there for him, and he is determined to be there for them, too. There is nothing he wouldn't do for them. If someone wanted to hurt Fletch, all they would have to do was get to his family.[/right]

PERSONALITY: [/size] Once upon a time, Fletcher was an intelligent, happy, kind young man. During his school years, he was the boy who all the girls wanted to be friends with but none of them wanted to date, and he was perfectly alright with that. He was content to be everyone's friend. He was sweet and fun and caring. But then, when he was thirty, his girlfriend of seven years hurt him and she hurt him badly. Since then, Fletcher has been withdrawn and short-tempered and cruel. He snaps at people and broods and drinks. Very few people would recognize the boy he used to be in the man he is now.
[/blockquote]

ALIAS:

[/size] A.
AGE: [/size] 902.
EXPERIENCE: [/size] Four years.
HOW DID YOU FIND US: [/size] I STILL own this shit.
[/blockquote][/size]

Fletcher Marshall never liked blinking lights. He always thought they were unnatural. Strange. He might even go so far as to say that blinking lights were evil and – okay, fine. He didn’t bear any grudge against blinking lights. In fact, when he was younger, he’d quite liked blinking lights. Thought they were a certain kind of magic. It was just this particular blinking light on his answer phone that he didn’t like. It kept flashing at him, catching his attention from the corner of his eye, whispering ‘press play, press play, listen, listen, listen…’

The problem was, Fletch didn’t want to listen. He wanted to pretend the light didn’t exist, pretend he hadn’t come home earlier that day to hear the voice of Jennifer Wilcox, saying, ‘Well, bye’ coming out of the little speaker. He wanted to pretend there was no new message on the answer phone, because no message from Jennifer Wilcox could be good. So he was sitting at his desk, flipping through his latest stack of pages from a young author with an oral fixation and pretending the light wasn’t blinking.

But the little red light just kept going, on and off, on and off, on and off, steadily, just at the edge of Fletch’s peripheral vision. He turned his chair a bit so that his back was to the light, but the room was dark, and turning just made it worse – now his shadow changed with each blink. On – his shadow was thrown into relief against the wall, hair standing straight up, shoulders slumped, his head resting on his fist and the shape of a pen visible between two fingers; off – his shadow was just a blob of darkness, the room was illuminated only by the tiny reading light sitting above the pages in front of him. On, off, on, off, on, off, on, off, blink, blink, blink, blink, blink, until he couldn’t take it anymore.

With a sound somewhere between a grunt of annoyance and a whimper of fear, Fletch straightened up and took two steps towards the answer phone, and then stopped to look down at himself. He was shirtless, wearing nothing but a pair of gray sweats. Jen always hated it when he walked around in these sweats. For a moment, he just stood very still, remembering the way she used to threaten to burn them when he wore them while writing.

He walked off to his bedroom to change, hating himself as he did it - why does she have this hold over him? Why can’t he just play the damn message in his sweats? What the fuck is wrong with him? - because some sick, twisted little part of him feels the need to be dressed appropriately just to hear her voice. A few moments later he was walking towards the answer phone again, wearing jeans and buttoning up a white collared shirt. His palms were sweaty - he hates himself and he doesn’t want to play the message, he just wants to keep working on his pages, but now he’s sitting in his chair again and he’s rolled it over to the end table that the answer phone is on and he’s pressing play.

Hey, Fletch- Her voice cut off abruptly and it took him a moment to realize why – without thinking, he had reached out and jabbed the stop button with one finger. All she’d said was ‘hey, Fletch’ and he already wanted to vomit. Pathetic. The word echoed around in his head for a moment before he found the strength to hit the play button again.

-er, The last syllable of his name, cut off from his abrupt stop. He wondered idly when she’d started calling him ‘Fletcher’ as opposed to ‘Fletch.’ His wondering, however, was cut short when she continued talking. It’s been a while. I guess you’re not home. I just, uh… I wanted to call and… see how you’re doing and…

Like she fucking cares how he’s doing. He shut his eyes at ‘It’s been a while’ and his hands have been trembling since ‘I wanted to call.’

Look, Fletcher; I miss you.

Shouldn’t have slept with his fucking editor then. Fletch was momentarily distracted by a faint scraping noise; after a moment, he realized it was the sound of him grinding his own teeth.

I just… I want to see you. Can I see you? Can we meet for coffee? I… Please?

Fuck her. Fuck her! He should scream it, he should shout at the answer phone and smash it and be pissed off. His hand moved involuntarily for the receiver, his mind immediately called up her phone number.

Give me a call, Fletcher, please… Well, bye.

He definitely should NOT call her back. And if he did call her back, he should just tell her to fuck off, to get out of his life, to never call him again, and no, she can’t fucking see him, because she fucked his god damn editor. He’d already dialed the first four digits of her number when he realized what he was doing and slammed the phone back down, knocking the answer phone off the end table in the process.

A steady stream of curse words filled the apartment as Fletch rolled his chair back to his desk. He picked up his pages again – he had a deadline, damn it, he couldn’t be wasting time – but the words blurred in front of him until he realized he was crying and fuck him, fuck him, he’s so fucking pitiful, he can’t even hear her fucking voice without turning into a big fucking baby, it’s no fucking wonder she cheated on him.

He dropped the pages and jumped to his feet, wiping the tears away roughly and snatching his black jacket off the coat tree by the door. Within thirty seconds, he was shoving his feet into sneakers, wrapping a white scarf around his neck, and storming out the door.

And within thirty minutes, he was storming back into the apartment, returning from the liquor store down the street with a paper bag full of spoils. Without wasting any time, he kicked off his shoes, dropped his coat and scarf on the floor and sunk into his couch.

He ripped the bag as he pulled the bottle of whiskey out and he didn’t even bother with a glass, he just opened the bottle and took a long sip. His throat burnt and his stomach turned and who’s Jennifer? He didn’t even know Jennifer any more, and he didn’t know about blinking lights and answer phones and deadlines on pages, because all he knew was whiskey and fuck him, fuck him, fuck him…

WHO: Fletcher and Sid.
WHEN: Doesn't matter.
WHAT: Fletch is drunk, Sid is checking up on him. Shit will happen.
WORD COUNT: 1,114.
COMMENTS: This post contains large amounts of swearing. You have been warned. Also, I think it's quite likely that I switch from past tense to present tense several times. I just don't care.

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THIS APPLICATION WAS MADE BY ALICE WINS.AT.LIFE FOR MAGICAL MISFITS AND ONLY MAGICAL MISFITS.
IN OTHER WORDS, HANDS OFF THE MERCHANDISE.

[ALICE MICHELE ADAMS]