Lore

0 yrs old
Lindsey is born October 31st 1997, to a lawyer father, Garett; and a doctor mother, Annika; each of them with their own practice.
He is adored by his father, while his mother struggles to care about him due to post-partum depression.
Well, he's only a baby. He doesn't understand why his mother wont look at him.

4 yrs old
It only takes a few years for Lindseys brother Jake to be born, and the family dynamic is flipped up-side-down:
Jake is born nearly fully deaf and has to spend weeks in hospital as an infant due to an infection.
Annika is completely occupied with her youngest son, and Garett is fighting a vicious legal battle to
gain ownership of his childhood home. Lindsey is left to his own devices.

8 yrs old
Eventually, Jake gets better. Lindsey works hard to learn signlanguage, and is fluent in it by the time Jake is discharged from the hospital.
But Jake could care less. He hates his brother. He's healthy, he can hear, hes good in school. Jake despises him, and he shows it.
Lindsey quickly realizes that its pointless to try and get along with his brother, something that pains him greatly,
if he could, he would take on every burden his brother faces, but he can't.

10 yrs old
Lindsey has very little control in his life:
His mother is dismissive of his ailments, and any attempt to talk to his father about how cruel Jake is, just has the aura of an interrogation.

12 yrs old
His parents divorce.
Its been a long time coming, and Lindsey looks forward to moving in with his father, getting away from the other half of his family.
He moves into his fathers childhood home in a village of 500 people, two hours away.

14 yrs old
The house is huge, and in disrepair. Garett spends most of his time working, or fixing the house. He doesn't pay attention to Lindsey.
This isn't necessarily purposeful on Garetts part, he just doesn't want to do anything wrong.
Lindsey spends most of his time alone in his room studying; school is one thing he has control over.
He has perfect grades in every class, and maintains those grades rigorously.
Failures are becoming less and less bearable. He gets agitated quickly, and struggles to keep his composure when things don't go his way.
Lindsey resorts to conventional and unconventional forms of self-harm, anything to get him out of his own head.

16 yrs old
He enrolls in extracurriculars to have a better chance at attending prestigious colleges; He runs the theater club like its the military,
and is part of several different school tutoring programs.

18 yrs old
His graduation is only attended by his Father. Jake is sick in the hospital. Jake barely spends any time at home, and if he does, he is bed bound.
How is Lindsey meant to celebrate? His resentment towards his younger brother is palpable.

Oxford: REJECTED;
Cambridge: REJECTED;
Harvard: REJECTED;
Yale: REJECTED;
Lindsey is crushed. He loses his mind, he tears his room apart. It feels like his life is over. He worked so fucking hard, and for what?
To go to some no name piece of shit regional university?!

He takes a gap year to "think". He spends the time living with one of his friends in the netherlands,
where he does nothing but smoke weed all day, indulging in the pleasures of life. He refuses money from his parents, he doesn't want their help, he doesn't deserve their help.

20 yrs old
Lindsey enrolls in University. He would have studied something useful (aka either medicine or law), but as an act of rebellion (but not really), he studies Lingustics/German Studies.
He knows he won't get a job in that field, but his desire to think that far ahead has been lost a long time ago. Anything other than instant gratification is a pain, and not worth pursuing.
Thoughts of becoming an actor or a musician are chocked up to being just another stupid pipe dream.

21 yrs old
He finds an apartment, he gets a job, he gets perfect grades on his assignments; he has to, otherwise he'll get his only scholarship snatched away, and he desperately needs every cent he earns.
On the surface, his life seems completely normal, he seems completely normal.
But under his carefully curated, laid back stoner façade, is the same high strung and neurotic child he grew up as, now with all struggles of adult life piled on top as well.
He is helplessly dependent on weed to function even remotely.

The guilt he feels towards his since chronically ill brother is eating him alive, and his double life is stretching him thin; Occasional overeating to deal with stress,
turns into Lindsey shoving food down his throat until he can feel his heart beat in his ears, and his vision blur from nausea.
Its a feeling like no other, to let go of social convention, to not have to be hyper aware of how he walks or talks or acts: To just mechanically shovel food into his mouth.
A temporary escape, with permanent consequences.

But his eating disorder only adds a putrid layer of shame to his already convoluted network of emotions that he has to hide by all means necessary.

22 yrs old
Hes in his third semester. He doesn't have any future plans, all he can look forward to is his next joint, and his by now almost weekly food-binge.
But his pink-haired, biomedical engineering student new next door neighbor, changes things ...

* smile for the camera!, 2019 [No ulterior motive]

* smile for the camera!, 2012 [If you stop fighting, we're gonna get ice cream]