Meet the Remaining Ones: Lily Hunter

Lily Hunter - Those Who Remain

NameLily Hunter

Age: 21

Birthday: July 26

Appearance: Tall, fit and athletic, Lily exercises daily and enjoys it. She keeps her sleek black hair in a ponytail and that’s about it. She cares very little about clothing, it just has to be practical and cheap.

Personality: Stubborn, intense and loyal, Lily is a complicated woman. She struggles with her own emotions and how to deal with others’ feelings. She wants to belong, but distrust and caution are second nature to her. To the people she cares about, she can be blindly loyal and dangerously protective.

Background: Lily is the daughter of Jacob and Margaret Hunter. And that’s not an easy thing to be. Her family life was a mixture of shouting and cold-shoulders. Between a paranoid father and a difficult mother, Lily managed to stay relatively normal, but the scars of their rocky relationship cannot be easily discarded. In school, she was the problem-girl, always sitting in the back and barely listening to the teacher. She would fight anyone who dared to insult or laugh at her father, especially after the heavily-commented and messy divorce. Faced with gossip and fear, Lily became even more reclusive and distant, preferring the company of her troubled Father over anyone else.

After the divorce, Jacob more dangerous tendencies multiplied: his drinking, his paranoia, his interest in preparing for the worst, all of it. Still young and believing her Father to be always right, Lily obeyed his every order. Soon, she was training daily, learning how to shoot, self-defense and how to hunt. And while this was happening, her mother didn’t even bother to visit her once.

Lily found out about her mother’s marriage by stealing the invitation from her neighbors mail. This last insult resulted in Lily deciding to forget her mother once and for all. Coincidentally, sometime later, Jacob got better. He stopped drinking and by focusing in training Lily, he distracted himself enough not to cause trouble around town. This improvement led him to encourage Lily to graduate and go to college.

Trusting her father to know best, she entered community college. Yet, Lily never felt like she belonged there, or anywhere else for that matter. Something was still missing.

Hobbies: Hunting, watching sports, running and reading. Lily enjoys the outdoors and her perfect day would be hiking in the woods early in the morning, swimming in a lake, eating a quick snack and watching the sunset while reading against a tree.

Bonus round: Lily picked fights with anyone she could. One day she tried picking up a fight with the school’s nicest and popular boy: Roger Gilmore. She provoked him all day, looking for the moment he would snap and fight her. He didn’t. Instead, Roger offered her his notes for the math test later that week. Confused and flustered, Lily took it. And so their friendship started.

Alignment: Neutral Good.

Name meaning: Lily is named after the flower, and Jacob’s choice. I thought it fitted what he wanted for his daughter: purity. It’s also related to the plant Lily of the valley which is sweet, but poisonous. Not that Lily is evil, but she’s certainly not defenseless. Hunter, of course, it’s a play on their hobbies as well their abilities as survivalists.

Trivia: Lily’s chapter was the first one I wrote, and while the core stayed the same, it went through a lot of edits and revisions. The balance between exposition, character’s emotions and establishing the setting was complicated, especially since of all five characters, Lily’s first chapter is not an action scene. Still, the ending is my favorite part of the whole book.


 

Hope you enjoyed this! See you on the next profile!

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