Name: Carter Maddox
Age: Twenty Two
Class Year: Fifth Year
Position: Striker, #20
Hometown: Hoboken, New Jersey
This character must be played as a trans man.
TW: abuse, implied transphobia
By the time he was ten years old, he was already somebody else. He remembers driving across the country with his mother, hardly stopping the entire way, remembers her peering nervously around every time they did, like someone could be following them; and then, he remembers his father sitting him down in their new house and telling him that, under no circumstances, was he to ever tell anybody his birth name again. In New Jersey, theyād been the Roscoes; in Los Angeles, they were the Vaughns, and they had to pretend that it was who they had always been. Everything depended on it.
Six months earlier, his father had beaten his mother so severely that the neighbors called the police. Carter remembered both of his parents being taken away that night: his mother in an ambulance, his father in the back of a cop carāand, as heād watched them being driven away, left behind with his neighbors to watch him, he didnāt know whether or not either of them would come back. Things happened so quickly after that: his mother came home, but his father didnāt, because the police wouldnāt let him. They wanted to charge him with attempted murder, despite his motherās lack of cooperation. And then, one day, he was in the backseat of the car, and all his mother told him was they were going to meet his fatherāheād paid his bail and ran, and convinced her to come with him, that all three of them could be a family again in Los Angeles. That they would have to lie, and to hide, but they could be happy. Ā
And maybe he was just young enough to, but Carter took it all in stride. He may have had a new name and a new house in a new city, but he had his parents and he had Exy, and that made everything seem alright. And Carter was good at Exy, something that had always made his fatherāwhoād played Class I in college, but failed to get draftedāproud. And though it went against everything they stood for, the carefully crafted rules meant to keep them all safe, his father never said no to Carter when it came to Exy, wanted him to succeed even though it was dangerous, even though it put them all into a bigger spotlight.
At twelve years old, Carter was playing Little League Exy on a team affiliated with the USC Trojans and Los Angelesā professional Exy teamāa team built for success. Arguments in his house were always loud, screaming affairs, but the night before he was supposed to leave for the national Little League championships his parents had whispered heatedly behind closed doors: Was it a good idea? Should he be allowed to go? Carter might have felt guilty, or selfish, for thinking that nothing could keep him from the game, if not for his father insisting for him that he be allowed to play. But maybe he should have stayed home, maybe he never should have played at allābecause they lost the championships, and when they got back to their hotel after the game, there were U.S. Marshals there waiting to take his father away, and Carter couldnāt help but feel that it was his fault, that heād led them right to him.Ā
When his father went to prison, Carter thought his life was overābut instead, when it was just him and his mother, he knew peace for the first time. There were so many things that heād accepted as normal, that heād never even questioned: the way he father couldnāt be disagreed with or questioned, the rages he flew into, the heavy-handed way that he treated Carterās motherāthe way that heād almost killed her, all those years ago. He questioned them then, asked his mother the things heād never thought to ask her before: Why are we here? Why did we run?Ā And, most of all: Why did you forgive him? And the answer he got was simple, but that didnāt mean he understood it: Because I wanted us to be a family. Because I wanted you to have a family.
And, when it was just him and his mother, he had the space to think about things he never had beforeāwho he was, who he wanted to be, why heād only ever felt comfortable in his own skin on the Exy court, when he was covered in armor and strong, and what it might feel like to feel that way all the time. It was then that he started testing out the name Carter, his motherās maiden name, as his own. And his mother supported his explorations, offering him a gentle acceptance that his father, always so certain that what he wanted was what Carter wanted too, never had. But when his father was released from prison during his senior year of high school, she warned him that he wouldnāt understand, that it was best to keep it just between them. And, as though intent on acting like heād never been away, his father took immediate control of their lives again, as harsh and uncompromising as ever, like they hadnāt lived five years without himālike, as Carter had finally come to believe, they hadnāt been better off without him.
SEIZE IT WITH EVERYTHING YOUāVE GOT
Is your father going to be a problem? Wymack had asked him, with uncanny intuition, when he showed up in LA during Carterās senior year of high school to offer him a contract. And Carter had smiled and said no, with much more confidence than he felt. Because even though it was a chance to play Class I Exy, his father was enraged when Carter told him: how dare some man who didnāt even know them suggest that he had failed in raising his child? I gave you everything, heād said. And this is how I get repaid? And he gave Carter an ultimatum: if he walked out of that house and onto that team, heād better never come back.Ā
Carter knew what heād be sacrificing if he left, knew that his father would keep his word, knew that his mother would choose him, as sheād always done, that those five years theyād survived together wouldnāt be enough to show her that they didnāt need him. But Carter also knew what heād be gettingānot just Exy, but freedom, a future and a chance to be himself for it, to not deny himself and cut himself down into a shape his father would accept. And so heād showed up on Wymackās doorstep the day after his high school graduation with a backpack full of Exy gear on his shoulder, and Palmetto has been his home ever since. What name should I be putting on the back of your jersey? Wymack had asked him, that first summer heād spent living in his apartment, trying not to doubt his choices. And Carter had been a Roscoe, had been a Vaughn, but it was then that he decided thatāthough he would keep his mother with him, he would keep Carterāhe was going to go into his future as his own man, with a last name that was just his own. And, since that day, heās tried his hardest not to look back, to take the Foxes as his family and Coach Wymack as the closest thing he has to a fatherāa family that would never keep him down or hold him back.
CARTER MADDOX is portrayed by LAITH ASHLEY and is OPEN