Basil Marvin Wexler

[Background] [Personality] [Description] [Outfits] [Family]

• Name Meaning
  • Basil: king
  • Marvin: marrow famous
• Birthdate: October 4, 1894
• Role: Writer
• Former House: Gryffindor
• Wand: Supple Heather wood, medium-long, with a silver thread core
• Pet: Erron, Tawny Owl – Rather large for its breed, this tawny owl has feathers that are dominantly chestnut brown. It is streaked with darker colors, as well as the occasional streak of nearly white colored feathers on its front. The male owl has very gray eyes, as well as beak and talons, as opposed to the usual yellowish that owls of his breed usually have. The owl seems to have a bit of a temper and a habit of biting, as he takes after his muggle counterparts and prefers to fly only at night, despite his being a communicative owl.

Background

The class of 1889 at Hogwarts was not close-knit. In fact, many members of said class openly despised one another. Among them, though, several strong relationships were able to form, despite the animosity that was rampant in their peers. Jonathan Herbert Wexler and Elizabeth Lucille Rush became acquainted when they were paired in charms class during the study of Unhappiness Hexes. The two spent the remainder of that day in their third year relating stories of all the terrible memories they had. Though neither had any truly bad life experiences, the time spent was enough to create a connection that grew and blossomed into a strong friendship. ‘Lizzie and Jonny’ were an entity thereafter, about which the rumors flew. Gossips said they were snogging in the hall one week, fighting tragically the next. Both were painfully aware of the rumors, but each took a very different method of dealing with them. Jonathan would stoutly ignore any person who dared to insinuate anything which he did not represent as fact. Elizabeth took a more proactive way of quelling them. Most of the the people who she learned were spreading such ‘foul’ rumors ended up with the nurse, tending to bloodied noses and quickly forming bruises. For this, Lizzie lost Gryffindor more points than her housemates would have liked, but they could do nothing about this, of course, so the rumors persisted, perhaps in retaliation. It was a vicious, never-ending cycle.

There were many ‘I told you so’s in their seventh year when the two, while up ‘studying’ late one evening, fell asleep, cuddling together on a couch in the commonroom. Shrieks of laughter were heard when they were discovered the next morning and the gossiping tongues seemed to have become unhinged. It was helpless, now, for the two to deny the strong companionship. Empowered as such, Jonathan managed to procure a small, dainty-looking ring, and asked Elizabeth to marry him. She agreed to do so, and a late September wedding date was set. Jonathan was hired on at the Ministry of Magic as a file clerk in the Department for International Cooperation, and that fall, on September 18, they were married. After a short honeymoon, the two returned to their newly purchased home in Bournemouth, believing it to be the perfect place to raise children — right on the sea. True, there weren’t many other wizard families in the area, and the trip to Diagon Alley for needed supplies might be difficult when they had children, the couple decided that a rural location would provide the best setting for the family that the two hoped to have.

For a while, married life was bliss. Elizabeth stayed home, keeping the house and a small garden (her favorite hobby), and making the obligatory visits to parents and siblings. Life was pleasant during this time, as the couple had ample time to spend at their leisure (though Jonathan often was called upon to work extra evenings on the menial tasks that his superiors deigned to do). Jonathan worked very hard, doing everything he was told, and finally, after three years of toil, he was promoted. He was so thrilled with the new title and the bonus he received that he whisked Elizabeth away to Madrid for two weeks, reveling in the majesty and beauty of Spain. Not long after their return from this excursion, Lizzie found that she was pregnant with their first child. Jonathan was over the moon with this news, and while Elizabeth was thrilled to become a mother, she hadn’t time to revel in it. Aside from hearing her mother and mother-in-law talk at length about their pregnancies and child rearing, she also had to cope with her own already difficult pregnancy.

Despite the difficulties, Basil Marvin made his way into the world, big and healthy. Jonathan was thrilled to have a son and heir to his ‘line’, as he so frequently boasted. Though Elizabeth thought these ideas archaic, she found it mostly endearing in her husband.

Little Basil was finally toddling about and chattering to Elizabeth when she realized that she was once again pregnant. Logan Alexander joined the family just a month after Basil’s second birthday. He was smaller than his brother had been, but remained healthy, nevertheless. Home life for the children was pleasant. They had mummy’s attention at all times and often had one or both of their grandmothers around to dote on them. Basil was five years old and Logan three when Jared Aldarius and Gilbert Alan made their way into the world and the family, Gilbert being just a few minutes older than his brother. After their birth, Elizabeth was well run off her feet, trying to care for four rather energetic boys. Despite this, just under a year later, Frederick Herbert joined the family, to his father’s joy, as well as the welcome of four older brothers. Though she loved all of her boys, Elizabeth was at her wit’s end. Five boys? Though her mother had given birth to a boy, Lizzie never was to know him, as he died just before her birth. For a young woman who had no experience with boys and the way they grew up, Elizabeth managed as well as she could.

Elizabeth was filled with dread, as she fell pregnant for the fifth time. She was almost certain that it would be another boy, to add to her already large flock. Her joy was immense, though, as was Jonathan’s, when Eva Margaret became the first — and only — girl in the Wexler family.

With six children to care for now, Lizzie and Jonathan found that it was more difficult to make ends meet than they were used to. When Little Eva was five years old, and Basil had begun school, Lizzie decided that she would take in some sewing to help out with their ever-increasing expenses. Though this appalled her mother, Elizabeth was fiercely proud and would not hear of her children lacking in any way.

While Basil was not pleased at having so many siblings with whom to compete for the attention of his parents, he didn’t resent his siblings all that much. He did resent, however, the mess that his siblings began to make of his things as he grew older. If nothing else, his grandmothers instilled in him a need and a knack for cleanliness and orderliness, which he held to very strictly. His own part of the room he shared with Logan was spotless and meticulously organized. As he grew older, his younger siblings, particularly his sister, whose favorite game, it seemed, was to pick on Basil and prank him any way she could. Though the girl was seven years younger than himself, she always seemed to find the best ways to irritate him. Of course, Eva being the youngest child and only girl, Basil could never retaliate without getting into much more trouble than Eva ever would (while she received merely warnings, he received more intense punishments such as washing the cast iron pans with a toothbrush and trimming the grass around his mother’s garden, one blade at a time.

His family life was never dull, with four brothers and a sister to play with, if he ever so chose. He was closest to Logan, who was just two years younger than himself. The younger siblings all seemed to be close, and Basil often imagined that they conspiring to make him miserable, and that he was the least liked of all the Wexler children. To say that Basil stressed himself out would be to put it mildly. The boy often wound himself so tightly that his parents had no idea how to soothe him. He did have fun, though, on occasion. He enjoyed taking swims, and playing ground quidditch with his brothers sometimes (he always made sure Eva was not invited, believing that girls did not belong out playing sports with boys).

Basil never exhibited any overt displays of magic, his parents were never concerned, being of mostly wizard blood (with, of course, a muggle here and there in their past), they expected that their children would all be wizards, and never even considered the possibility that one of them may be born without the ability to perform magic. By the time Basil turned eleven, a letter arrived, inviting him to Hogwarts, which made him immensely proud. None of his other siblings had been invited to go! His parents didn’t bother about correcting his view of acceptance, letting the boy have his moment of glory.

Finally at Hogwarts, after what, to Basil, seemed like an awful wait, the boy was on pins and needles waiting to be sorted. Since both of his parents were in Gryffindor, the boy had strong hopes of being in that house, to carry on the trend, though he had not shown any inclination towards bravery or valor. The sorting hat, however, saw something resembling courage in the boy, and sorted him into Gryffindor. Several braggartly letters home were sent to his various siblings and his parents. While his parents were thrilled, his siblings reacted with indifference. So what if their most unlikely brother had been sorted into Gryffindor? Basil resented this indifference, and instead of sending any more letters of update to his siblings, he wrote only to his parents occasionally and threw himself into his studies. Basil was not an excellent student, but held his own, getting only mediocre marks for his first several years. As time went on, however, Basil found a talent for Defence Against the Dark Arts and History of Magic, on both of which he made a good showing in OWLs.

During his school time, while he was really ignoring his siblings, even after they came to Hogwarts. After Logan was sorted into Slytherin, Basil rather took this as a departure from ‘good Wexler blood’, and refused to speak to his brother for the entirety of his first term there. Upon arrival home for the Christmas holiday, however, his mother gave him a stern talking to, admonishing him for treating his brother in such a fashion. Basil resigned himself to admitting his relation, but keeping in closer with his friends henceforth than his brother. He did have a few friends – in particular, Digby Prior, Ben Bishop (both in Ravenclaw) and James Darling (a fellow Gryffindor who was a year behind him), and more acquaintances in Gryffindor, but Basil being as neurotic and somewhat difficult to get along with at times, often drove his housemates away. A few were able to get past his worrisome nature and befriend him for the caring young man he was, in particular, Sibyl Talbot, who seemed to be the only one able to soothe the boy. The two were very close friends, from very early on at Hogwarts, and remained so until their graduation and beyond.

While at school, Basil spent a lot of time worrying about what he would be able to do when he graduated. None of the careers that so enticed his peers seemed attractive to him, and he spent much of his time outside of classes looking over career lists, trying to find something, anything, that he might like to do. Even Sibyl had a career of choice, which worried him even more. Was something wrong with him? It was in his sixth year, when he had just barely scraped into the NEWT level Defense Against the Dark Arts, and excelled enough to easily get into the History of Magic NEWT class. He wasn’t able to achieve any other NEWT level classes than those, however, and this did concern him, though his parents were not at all bothered by it. During this year, Basil found what he wanted to do — he wanted to become a newspaper man. Quickly and without much forethought, he began perusing the Daily Prophet, and various other newspapers, trying to find some notice of job opening. He never found such notice, but just after graduation, he decided to go to all the buildings of operation and find out if any were hiring. His first stop was the Daily Prophet building, at which he seemingly hit the jackpot. They were looking for a young person to help with filing and letter post! Basil was hired on, for he proved quickly that he was just the person for the job, filing away meticulously what the editor asked him to do, and even reorganizing some of the things that were already hired. The man scheduled with Basil a time to begin, and the young man went not home to tell his parents, but to Sibyl’s house (proudly apparating into her backyard) to tell her the good news.

While Basil worked at his new job (which one would hardly call prestigious), he lived at home with his mother, helping to ease her feelings of ‘empty nest’, as the rest of the children were now away at school. For the first time in his remembrance, he had all of his mother’s attention to himself, and for the first time, found that it rather irritated him. Because of this that he spent much of his time with Sibyl, his long-time friend — and perhaps sweetheart? It wasn’t much longer however, just a year out of school, before he decided that he very much wanted to get married to Sibyl. At the end of her first year of internship to become a Healer, the two were married.

Early in 1914, Basil was promoted to organizing the adverts section, which meant not only a bit more seniority on the paper but a pay raise as well. It came none too soon, as they invited Briony Laurette into the Wexler family that July, just after Sibyl managed to finish her internship with the healer. While Basil felt a pang of disappointment for his young wife that she could not now become a healer as she had planned, both of them were thrilled about their young daughter and agreed that it would be best for Sibyl to stay at home and care for the little one. No new promotions came for several years, during which time Alden Harold and Alice Naomi joined the family, in 1916 and 1917, respectively. Finally, in 1918, nearly at the end of the Muggle war, Basil was promoted to writing features — he was now a writer of Muggle affairs! This came with another pay raise, of course, and with three children to support, he was glad of the help. The family was a tightly-knit one, Basil worrying about all of them more than what was necessary, and often becoming excessively stressed about his job and performance in it, and Sibyl soothing her husband and providing expert care and nurture for their three children. Basil was comfortable in their little world, living just outside of London, in Islington, and being how he was, was hesitant to let it change. One could imagine, then, how upsetting it was for the man when Sibyl expressed interest in taking the position of School Nurse at Hogwarts. He wanted what was best for his wife, who he was still very much in love with, and agreed to let her take the position. It would be a very hard year on him, the year of 1925, as it meant his oldest daughter and his wife would no longer primarily be living at home during the school year. Basil knew, however, that they could use floo powder often, and write owls, and for that purpose, while in Diagon Alley to get Briony’s school supplies, he splurged and purchased an owl for himself and one for Sibyl (as well as more floo powder than was expressly necessary). While it would be difficult on him, Basil knew this was for the best, and resolved, for once in his life, not to overreact. Only time (and perhaps the two younger children) would tell how well he managed that.

1926 would prove to be an even more stressful year than 1925 had been for Basil. With Sibyl and Briony both at school, Basil was left with Alden and Alice still. However, Avery Goden, the woman who had been caring after his children while he was at work, was headed to Hogwarts as well to teach Astronomy. This left him with no choice than to leave his children with his sister, who was starting to take more attention with the children than the running of her own shop. To say the idea of the situation stressed him out would be to put it mildly. However, after much coaxing, Sibyl convinced him that he would be able to take his children home after being with his sister, who, with four children now, was not such a bad mother after all. The coming year, he decided, was going to be an interesting year. And not in a good way.

Personality

To say that Basil is worrisome would be a grotesque understatement. The man has a real tendency towards worrying and towards stressing himself out. He is not a man entirely against having fun, however, so long as he deems it safe. Basil, however, is certainly not a fan of pranks or jokes. In fact, the man hates them, and often will shun those around him for a short time for playing them on him. Basil has never been much of an intellectual person, stemming from much of his failure at school. The man does enjoy reading however, and often stops at libraries or book stores for the express purpose of bringing home new reading material, be it muggle or wizard. While his placement in Gryffindor may have seemed erroneous, Basil is intensely protecive of his wife and children, and, if necessary, would put his life on the line for their safety. While he is neurotic and high strung, he is a loving and caring husband and father, and quite able to interact normally with society.

Description

Basil Wexler is a tall man, who has become rather robust over time. Resembling his father very closely, the man has dark brow hair and fair skin. His eyes are a dark shade of blue, framed by dark eyelashes and brows. He has a high forehead and rather unkempt wavy hair, which just covers his ears and is usually slicked back on his head as best he can manage (Which really is not very well). His frame shows hints still of what once was a well balanced, healthy looking form, but which has deteriorated, in a sense, due to stress, and many years of work at a desk. The wrinkles on the man’s face are more pronounced than one would expect to see on someone just turned thirty-one. His hair does not yet show any glimpses of gray, which makes the wrinkles look quite out of place. His face often looks harried, and a smile is seldom seen anymore outside of his home with his family.

Outfits

None saved.