My first memory goes back to when I was five. My parents had decided to buy me a doll for my birthday. It was quite a beautiful doll and I was happy. They had never given me anything before. Then my sixth birthday, I received yet another one. But I was hopeful. Maybe they saw how much I'd loved her, so bought me another. How mistaken I was. Year after year, the same doll. Even when I was too old for them, it was all the same. This hope began to die slowly, as did the rest of me. Faded away into the nothingness that was my life.

But then, on my fifteenth, I received a pearl necklace. They spent time with me, my hope came back faster than lightning. They say lightning doesn't strike twice in the same place, what a lie. The day after, my arranged marriage was announced. To be more specific, I had been sold. It would have been better for them to not try the good parent act because the hurt deepened, the betrayal steepened and I was alone. The only thing I'd ever gotten from them was a pearl necklace. The ten identical dolls lay forgotten in their packaging.

So I ran. It didn't matter where the road led, I just ran along it. I ran and ran until I could no longer run, until the city became ashes and all was forgotten. Josephine Elizabeth Angelina Blythe, a pitiful young girl who had nothing, who was nothing. I'd fled from those who had wronged me but in the end, achieved nothing. I still didn't have the things I longed for and the truth was clear: I was never meant to be anything.

I had nowhere to go, nowhere to return to. People loved their money and yet were willing to spend it so easily. So I took it from them. For one session, I was given money, I was given shelter, I was given food. And customers came, time and time again. I was alone, I had nothing to call my own. But that didn't matter, I didn't need any of it. I was surviving through my own means, through the only means I had, and I didn't need any more than that. I didn't need parents to survive. I didn't need false hopes and broken promises.

Then the turf was taken over by one Alessandro Moon, who brought along easy targets. He himself was tough, a steadfast believer in honour and pride. It's no wonder we clashed upon first sight. He also was against prostitutes and quickly banned his men from any such behaviour. He was quick to realise that this sort of rule would result in people dying of starvation and offered me a place in his current dwelling, because supposedly it was his duty to look after the homeless, the unwanted, the nobodies.

An idealist. At the end of it all, no one could give me anything. Hope is a powerful tool that gets people through anything but I couldn't see what he sees. There was nothing here for people like me. It must feel wonderful to be like him, to just blindly trust the few kind words people say and forever hope that one day the world will be full of flowers. The soil on this side of the planet died centuries ago. Dry and barren, no amount of watering will ever lead it to bear fruit.

But no, the hopeful continue hoping. The next thing I knew, I was at a job interview for a card dealer at some casino. Not that I knew how to play any of these games but I know how to gamble and do it often. But why put all my eggs in one basket? People who go to casinos must have money in order to play. Those with money are worthwhile targets. I could deal cards all night long but its perks paled in comparison to what one session can bring me. The push it gave my body was integral to its survival.

The day I turned eighteen was the day the Blythe couple decided to launch their political campaign. The JEAB movement they called it, after their deceased daughter. Its aims were to unite all people together, to rid the derogatory labels of slum residents, to give everyone equal opportunities. Alessandro telling me that everything would be wonderful now, if only they get elected. Not everyone's blind like him. The slums weren't called a cemetery for nothing. The people here are dead, just like me.

And everything turned out as expected. But even so, the hopeful continue to remain blind. Sympathy for Blythe's hard work and taking the man as his idol, he decided that he'd be the one to change everything and realists could only smile in pity. Even if he managed to achieve his position of influence, power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Good intentions don't last forever, if they even last at all.

Which brings us here to today. A part-time casino card dealer who does prostitution on the side, lives in the residence of one Alessandro Moon, so idealist he has a completely wrong explanation for every incident. People aren't all born inherently good, like he so claims.

And that's that. This is basically character backstory for a story I'm debating whether or not to continue writing. So I thought I'd just put it up here and see if people actually can be bothered looking through it. If there are any grammar mistakes, feel free to flame me. I feel like half the time I used present tense instead of past.