User Profile

This is the lj for Harvey Rourke, on X-Men Muck. His application is reprinted below.

CHARACTER'S FULL NAME:
Harvey Neil Rourke

CODENAME:
None

ALIASES/NICKNAMES:
Harv

SPECIES:
Human

GENDER:
Male

AGE:
34

ORIGIN:
New York City, Irish

ORGANIZATION:
Citizen

POWERS:
None.

HISTORY:
Harvey Rourke was born to Michael and Sarah Rourke in Brooklyn in the
early 70s; his father was a cop and his mother worked at a deli, and
he and his younger brother and two younger sisters went to the local
school (P.S. 142). His was a community family - they went to block
parties, they sat out with the local councilman, his mother led the
apartment complex's sewing circle and generally they were your average
lower middle class family. As a kid, Harv spent his summers playing
sandlot baseball and running around with the local kids, and while he
got into trouble here and there - usually brawling with the black kids
from a few blocks over - there was never anything serious until Harvey
was a freshman in high school.

In high school, Harvey fell into a bad group of friends, and they
started fighting a lot more with black gangs. Things got a little ugly
a couple times - knife fights, never any guns - but they came to a
head in December of 1986 when Harvey's group of thugs broke into the
baptist church and vandalized the place. In response, one of the black
gangs hit back, and in a drive-by shooting two of Harvey's closest
friends were dead and Harvey took a bullet in the shoulder.

Worse still, the cops linked Harvey to the church vandalism, and as
soon as Harvey was out of the hospital he was bundled off to juvenile
hall for a three-month stint. His father was deeply ashamed of him,
and their relationship - previously good - turned sour. He switched
schools, and largely due to his father's brutal attitudes he stayed
straight. After graduation, Harvey worked in the deli his mom worked
in for about three years before he was accepted to City College, and
then - still living at home - he went to school nights to get his
degree.

While there, Harvey discovered journalism; he worked for the campus
paper, got an internship at the New York Times, and when he graduated
in 1998 it was with a degree in journalism. He got a job at a
small-town paper in upstate New York - a town called New Scotland -
and prompty moved out of his parents' apartment.

At first, New Scotland was good to Harvey Rourke. He met a girl,
Elizabeth, and after a whirlwind courtship they were married - and
then, about a year later, they had a son, Neil. Things had already
started to go sour, however; Harvey started an affair with a fellow
reporter (Karen) while Liz was pregnant with Neil, and Liz found out
when Neil was about two months old. Harv broke it off with Karen and
he and Liz tried to patch things up; Harv slept in the living room for
about two months, but then things seemed to get better and soon a
second child was on the way.

Then things started up with Karen again; Harv kept it a secret from
Liz, but when his wife was six months pregnant his boss found out at
work; he was fired for violating company policy, and he tried to hide
it from his wife. He succeeded for about a month, but he began to
drink heavily; she found out, and filed for divorce a month before his
daughter was born. He broke up with Karen in a rage, but his life in
New Scotland was over.

Harvey moved back to the city to try to find a new job. He lived in
friends' apartments for a few months, but eventually started living in
a homeless shelter until one of his dad's friends on the force noticed
him during a routine sweep. An enormous argument between Harvey and
his mom and dad ensued - why hadn't he moved home? - but his parents
won, and at the age of 30 Harvey was again living in his parents'
place.

He got a job, however, as a copy editor for the New York Post; they
knew about his problems upstate, but the lead copy editor went to
church with the family. Harvey kept his drinking under control and was
able to move out from under his parents' roof two years ago. Now he
has a flat of his own, and better still he was just promoted -
promoted and transferred back into news writing, where he's got an
at-large job as a freelance reporter 'filling in' when a normal writer
can't cover a story.

PERSONALITY:
Harvey is an alcoholic, though he tries to control his urges, and he's
occaisonally prone to furious rages - both traits largely inherited
from his father. On the other hand, however, he's a sharp guy and he
has a nose for news as well as a gabby, conversational style that
helps with interviewing. He's generally kind, and he's got a lot of
regard for community, though he's a bit racist and he's rather
distrustful of mutants as an extension of the former.

MISCELLANEOUS:
Harvey has a smattering of Latin from when he was an altar boy and he
plays decent baseball - indeed, he still plays on a community team.

Friends (120):

Friend of (75):