YAXLEY, deucalion neoptolemus
Feb 23, 2014 10:13:53 GMT -5
Sebastian Nott and Astraia Yaxley like this
Post by Duke Yaxley on Feb 23, 2014 10:13:53 GMT -5
[presto]
22
MALE
EX-SLYTHERIN
PUREBLOOD
HETEROSEXUAL
SEAN O' PRY
DEUCALION NEOPTOLEMUS YAXLEY
 So, Mr Yaxley, thank you for joining us. Sure. My pleasure. Is it alright if I smoke? Well, we're outside, so I think that should be fine. So, tell me a little about yourself. ....There's a lot to tell. Where should I start? How about at the beginning? You're the eldest child in your family, that's correct? Indeed. [pause] I'm the heir, see? The oldest son. That's what my childhood was about, basically. Raising me to be the best heir possible. I had tutors as soon as I was old enough to learn to read and write, played about six different sports - even Muggle ones, just to keep me strong and fit. Hand-eye co-ordination is a big thing, apparently. I don't really understand why. I should be grateful, I suppose. I'm healthy now and I enjoy exercising so it's easier to take care of myself. How about the family side of things? How was your relationship with your parents? Your siblings? Good, I guess. I've always been cordial with my parents. I think I just see where they're coming from. They want to keep the family strong and running well, and I do too. It's the best way to make sure future generations are safe. I always did what I was told by them as a kid - I still do, mostly. They don't say things pointlessly, if they're telling me what to do it's for a good reason. I think I was happier for that growing up. Amara was the same. Amara's your sister, right? Yeah. It goes her, then Kol, then Astraia - she's the baby. We're lucky, us kids, we get on well. We're a tight unit. But there's always been kind of a division, you know? I mean I'm older than Astra by six years, I think a gap was inevitable. So even though Kol came along a few years after Amara, it's always been us two mostly. I adore her, to tell you the truth. She's the best thing in my life. Not your girlfriend? I've never held a girlfriend down for longer than a couple of months. They're exhaustible - Amara's forever. We shared everything growing up, you know? We just revolved around each other; probably why we were such content kids. We were pretty isolated actually, but we didn't really care. Especially once the younger two came along to keep us company. Right. So was it hard going off to Hogwarts and leaving that behind? It was. My first year was the hardest one of my whole life. I'd never been outside the environment of my family that way before, and I'd not been far from Amara for as long as I could remember. I was sorted into Slytherin - as expected - and I did fine. I mean, I knew my manners, and I was a strong kid from the way I was brought up so the couple of fights I got into I won, and my peers respected me a lot more after that. I made a few friends but I think I was always a bit distant. Some of the other boys were always getting up to mischief and clowning around together and stuff. I preferred to keep to myself mostly, just kind of observe. I knew most of the pureblood circle - I'm related to over half of them after all - and that helped, I think. I think it gives us an advantage over a lot of other kids, being that connected. You kind of have a pre-set social circle, so it's easier to settle in. They're all great people, I respect them a lot. I think I'd have been fine that first year if it hadn't been for not having Amara around. Did your studies suffer? Are you joking? Come on. Academics were what I was trained for. I'd had tutors from the age of four. It's probably conceited to say it, but I'm not stupid by any means. My first year classes were a doddle, I aced everything. It felt good, actually. I used to get teased sometimes for being sat writing an essay when the others were messing about in the common room, but then I'd be the one teasing them when they were in detention for being behind on work and I was lazing around with nothing on my plate. I did excellently in class right the way through Hogwarts, and I don't care if that makes me a nerd or whatever. I worked hard and I applied myself as any decent Yaxley ought. Like my dad always said, I had the brains for it, it would have been an insult to not use them to their full capacity. So did you have any fun? Of course. You have met some of those other pureblood kids, right? God do they know how to party. I mean, my life got better instantly in second year because Amara came to Hogwarts. She was sorted right into Slytherin beside me and everything was much easier after that. She was always the one I shared everything with, you know? Having to write to her just wasn't the same. I think my dormmates used to get annoyed because she was up in our dorm so much, but I couldn't have cared less. I couldn't go up to hers, after all. We stayed that close all the way through Hogwarts, we're practically even closer now. And she's always been the adventurous one out of the two of us, so when she got really into the social scene I followed her. I mean at first it wasn't much more than hanging out with a larger group, but as we got older it developed into much more. We were always the model children in front of our parents and in public, obviously. But behind closed doors we're much looser. In what way? All sorts. I mean I started smoking in sixth year, I never would have picked that up if Amara hadn't had me at all those gatherings where the cool kids all seemed to be smoking. I have to admit I just did it because it looked cool at first, but now... what can you do? I'm stuck with it. And Amara was just... well, mad, in the best way. She was so daring and funny, she was always egging me on. So you were with the cool crowd? Oh, I don't know about that. I highly doubt we were as cool as we thought we were. I got a bit carried away, really. In fifth year some girl told me I had the "fit and mysterious" thing going on, which threw me for a bit, but Amara agreed when she stopped laughing. I never thought it to be a mysterious thing, I just tended to play my cards close to my chest, and I was a lot more reserved than most of my peer group. I guess that whole "Yaxley heir" thing really stuck in my head. I could never quite kick the weight of the expectations, and so I never really let go apart from in private with Amara. I loved going to parties and having the odd dance, but mostly I just preferred to hang around the edges and watch people and smoke. I got much more enjoyment that way than bumping and grinding on a sticky dance floor. I think I played up to it after that, and now it's just kind of who I am. I think I would have been like this if that girl had never said anything, actually, I'd probably just be less conscious of it. Okay, so we've covered the Hogwarts years. What about post-Hogwarts? Well I left with exceptional exam results, obviously. I was Head Boy in Seventh Year, too, which I don't think was that much of a surprise to anybody. Apart from with Amara I was always responsible and put-together, and I only ever got a couple of detentions my entire school career. I did well academically, I was on the Quidditch team for a couple of years before dropping that to focus on my studies, I was always polite to the teachers - I was a model student, basically. I kept the wilder side of things really quiet - Amara was always the one who was more into them, anyway. I don't think I'd have been involved at all if it wasn't for her. I'm good with younger kids, too, I don't think people really know that. I mean I've got a baby sister, and I love her very much, so it wasn't hard for me to project that onto other kids that needed it. I'm not going to be first in line to get cried all over by some snotty first year, but I don't mind lending a listening ear or sticking up for them if they need it. So yeah with those credentials plus my family name, it didn't take much for me to find a job. I didn't really want to work in the Ministry of Magic, even though it would definitely have been the respectable thing to do. I knew that my main job would end up being managing the Yaxley estate after my fathers' deaths, and I thought it would be far more valuable for me to get a job that would prepare me for that in some way. So I got a job in a shop - lowly, I know - but they put me in charge of the shop floor pretty quickly when they cottoned on that I knew what I was doing, and now I'm back office, I manage two different stores. I like it, it's a different atmosphere than what I was expecting, and there's a lot less expectation heaped up on it. I don't think my father's too pleased, but he knew I would never do anything deliberately to sabotage the family image, and since I've worked my way up so quickly he's alright with it I think. I'm only a couple of rungs below the boss of the whole chain; not bad for a twenty two year old. And how about your love life? Ah, that's a dull one. My heart belongs to my sister, after all. I had a couple of short-term girlfriends at Hogwarts and have had a few more since, but they never say. They all get jealous of my relationship with Amara and ditch me after a while. I don't really mind, they're mostly distractions. I like girls, obviously, I love sex, but I don't feel the need to go looking for it. Alright, well, we're almost done. I just have to ask one more question - what's with the names? Your whole family have got some pretty weighty ones... Don't start. The amount of times I've had this conversation. My mother had some pretty big ideas about names when we were all little, so this is how we've ended up. I don't care what my siblings tell you, I've definitely come off the worst. I'm fond of Deucalion now, actually - I read up on both mythological figures called Deucalion in school, and they were admirable men. And Duke - which I've had as a nickname since Amara was old enough to lisp it - is fine too. But Neoptolemus? It's not the length or anything, it's the man himself. He was a truly awful human being. Have you read the Aeneid? Or any of the stories about him? I have, I went looking him up when I was about fourteen. He was appalling. He killed a defenceless old man, the king of Troy, on the alter of a god. Some of the legends have him killing the baby prince, too, Astyanax. Just a tiny helpless little baby. And he assaulted women everywhere, stole them, was generally awful and obnxious and murderous. I really hate him. It really pissed me off for a while, actually. Astraia had difficulties with her name too, actually. It was pretty adorable at the time. Astraia's a nice name though, yeah? I like it, I think it's pretty. But it's a bit of a mouthful, so someone - probably Kol - started shortening it to Astra, and we all picked up on it, and it just really cut the kid up. Our names are kind of a big deal with us, I guess? All their layers of meaning, and our mother was pretty obsessive over them. And Astra just really wasn't sure what to do with being called something different. I sat her down to talk it through eventually, told her that it didn't really matter what she was called so long as she was her. We all loved her, you know? No matter how we were saying her name, it was all still her. Astra and Astraia mean practically the same thing, anyway. Weirdly it was thinking about her name that helped me come to terms with my middle one - so Neoptolemus was a seriously bad dude, that's okay. I'm not him, I just happened to be addressed by a similar sounding set of syllables. And your other siblings are okay with theirs? I guess. Kol's never seemed too fussed. And Amara's - well, Amara means eternally beautiful, you know? Couldn't be more apt. And her middle name is something to do with a queen warding off storms, which suits her perfectly too. She's always the one sheltering me it seems, even if to other people it probably looks like we don't get buffeted by much. Right, we're just about out of time. Thank you so much, Mr Yaxley. You're welcome. Enjoy the rest of your afternoon. ELLIE 20 GMT+0 |
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