Raf's Family

Raf's father comes from a family of musicians in a "serious history" kinda way. Grandfather was a musician, grandfather's grandfather was, grandfather's grandfather's grandfather...you get the picture. The Ephrems are a dynasty of musical excellence in the classical sphere and Ephrem Records had enjoyed a prestigious (albeit niche) reputation even before it began branching out into more contemporary scenes and sounds.

Raf didn't get to know his grandfather before the man passed away, but he was a known and liked virtuoso on the violin who preferred to keep a low profile and a maintained a very private life. He and his wife had two sons: Guillaume and Yves, the former being about 4 years older than the latter.

Guillaume, showed an early aptitude for music and, being the oldest son, was provided a lot of time and resources to pursue it to his fullest capacity. He took to the piano as a primary instrument, and found himself predisposed to enjoying the guitar as well. Guillaume's talent was well and properly nourished by his family, with the expectation that he'd be the musical face for his generation of the Ephrem family.

Yves, though he had the desire and passion, did not share the same raw aptitude for music as his brother did. Instead, Yves found himself obsessed with the technical aspects of music, while he struggled to understand and present the expressive aspects of it. He was provided the adequate resources to pursue music as he desired, and became an adept generalist able to pick up any instrument and play it well. But, he was not exceptional as his brother was and, between the two of them, Yves was never regarded as The up and coming musical talent in the Ephrem family. As such, Yves felt he it was a struggle to be recognized musically at all, and very much coveted the recognition, accolades and validations his brother had so effortlessly received.

Despite this, the two boys got along well, there was never any bad blood between them in any serious manner.

As they grew older, Guillaume very much followed his fathers inclination for being very a low key and private person. Unlike his father, he also has absolutely no interest in the affairs of the family business outside of practicing, preforming, and recording music for them under the family label. On the other hand, the same nature that helped Yves excel at mastering technical skill in music also granted him an aptitude for running business. He organized assets and balanced books with surgical precision, and was excellent at risk-reward assements so long as there were numbers and trends to go off of. And so, when their father's untimely death occurred, it was Yves who found himself picking up the business oriented responsibilities left behind by his father, and he was adequately equipped to handle it in much the same nature.

Ah--that was...until his met his wife, Evelyne.

Evelyne saw Yves in a manner that Yves had been craving: a competently excellent musician first and foremost, and everything else second. She also saw in him, via his role with Ephrem Records, a tremendous potential to build something incredible. Between her physical beauty, the wealth of validating words and experiences she provided him, and the passionate conviction with which she spoke of their future together, Yves had no chance of being anything but utterly captivated by her.

And so, they got married!

But even before that, they had already begun planning their future (and the future of Ephrem Records) to the tiniest detail in all that they could reasonably account for. And that is when Rafael was conceived--as a concept.

Ephrem Records would expand into popular culture, and together, Yves and Evelyne were confident that they could create an artist who could assist in ferrying the label towards a broader demographic. With Yves and his family resources available to identify and nurture any hint of musical aptitude their progeny might present, and with Evelyne's magnetic charisma and extensively network of social connections, they felt uniquely positioned to create a celebrity face for Ephrem Records from the ground up.

When presented with this plan, Guillaume was, in a word, repulsed. However, their widowed mother, who remained as the majority shareholder of the label, greenlit Yves proposal to move the company towards a more mainstream market for the sake of its longevity and relevance in the cultural sphere. Not included in this proposal of course (but what repulsed Guillaume the most) was their ambitious plans for their newly born son, Rafael.

And, well, we mostly know how that worked out for them. It worked out very, very well.

Rafael showed the same quick aptitude for music as his uncle and his grandfather, and it was Evelyne who pushed the violin on him as a fashionably marketable instrument with a photogenic charm and a genre versatility not quite on par with-but considerabley more unique than--the piano. The violin, she felt, was a trendy enough instrument to appeal visually to a younger contemporary crowd while still being iconic of Ephrem Record's classical history. And so, this is the instrument of focus.

By this point, Guillaume had long determined for himself that he really did not like his brother's wife. There was a lot that rubbed him wrong about her, specifically the manner in which she discussed people and the measures she evaluated them by. Guillaume and Evelyne had a fair handful of rather explosive arguments with one another, that escalated significantly once Rafael was brought into the picture. By the time the child was four, he was being made to play and practice under a scheduel that Guillaume thought unsustainable. The child was being socialized via scripts and interview rehearsals moreso than by interacting freely with children his age. With a reward system similar to that with which you might trick train a dog, Raf at six years old knew exactly how to talk about his hobbies, his likes, his dislikes, his dreams for the future, and how music feels like the single most important thing in his life to him. All of it contrived by Evelyne for the image she felt would be most marketable.

And it was. Raf's first appearance on a French broadcasted talkshow made ripples in the public discourse at the time, and it only marked the first drop of an oncoming cascade of publicity that would paint Rafael's career for the next decade to follow.

But Guillaume did not stay to watch it happen. Unable persuade his brother better than Evelyne, Guillaume failed to galvanize Yves into letting his own son experience the ease of childhood. Why would he? After all, while sure the boy complains when the work goes long, he loves the rewards of it--he even says so himself!

And so, it was after a particularly rough argument with his brother, that Guillaume decided he was out. But, not before he attempted to appeal to his mother, Raf's grandmother, in one last bid for the sake of his nephew's upbringing. To which she expressed some remorse at being unable to dissuade Yves from pursuing a more gradual, gentle course with Raf--but that ultimately, the boy was the son of Yves and Evelyne, thus not hers nor Guillaume's to raise.

Guillaume ended his working relationship with Ephrem Records and vanished across the pacific that same month. He was not quiet about his reasons for leaving, asserting that he wanted nothing to do with a business, much less a family, that lines its pockets via child exploitation.

In honestly, where career and finances were concerned, this was not much of a loss for Guillaume. He still maintained his shares and revenue pay, and continued to play for orchestras across north America. It was only his relationship with his mother and his brother that he had lost in his moral conflict against them--and by the time he started setting roots on the B.C coast, he felt comfortable with his choice and hoped that he would never have to see first hand what kind of a creature his nephew would grow to become. Guillaume was out of Raf's life before Raf's eighth birthday.

Raf's grandmother continued to conduct herself courteously around his parents. Her protests against Yves' Evelyne's agenda was a much quieter affair. She would be responsible for tutoring him some days of the week, and allowed him to explore concepts and ideas that he often wasn't granted the time to otherwise. In less curated term, she allowed him to play. Games and such, not instruments.

For this, Raf to this day credits his grandmother for providing him with some of his nicest, most carefree childhood memories, and feels he owes her a great deal for it.

Raf hadn't been told why his uncle went from being so present, to disappearing so suddenly. He only ever heard his mother describe Guillaume as "unreasonable", "stubborn", and "purposefully aggrivating"--the kindest vocabulary she would afford the man, while his father refused to talk about it, and his grandmother expressed only remorse for not doing more to make him stay. And so for much of his childhood and early teenagehood, Raf held the assumption in the back of his mind that his uncle must have had been somewhat an unpleasant and selfish sort, perhaps a bit of a diva about things.

And then, as Raf entered his mid-late teenage years and began scraping for some personal autonomy against his mother's oppressive scheduling and unattainable expectations, he began hearing her use the same words against him, "unreasonable", "stubborn", "purposefully aggrivating" and--some of the less kindly vocabulary she would afford to him. In the back of his mind, he did wonder a bit if his uncle's trespasses against her--whatever they might have been--were, perhaps, not so unreasonable at all.

Well, y'know, after a particularly hard year of touring following his 17th birthday, and almost being completely undone by the pressure and anxiety, Raf is able to negotiate a plan with his mother and escapes his stress by...attending Juilliard. Which...lol. Lmao.

Some years later, Raf emerges from the meat grinder with a degree, depression, and a personality disorder--and, while looking for an excuse, any excuse, not to go back to Monaco--he nervously gets in contact with his uncle in Vancouver. They agree to meet up.

Guillaume is expecting to meet a real shithead. He can't fathom what kind of shithead, but it's Evelyne's kid, it's gonna be some cosmic horror shit.

Instead, he meets a twenty-two year old Raf at his lowest point. Just a quiet, exhausted, overestimated, dissociating guy who's sorry for taking up too much space and time and doesn't wanna be a bother but is just looking for some options. A sweet, empathetic kid who's been ground down into dust and still manages to preform gestures of kindness in a manner that doesn't even require him to think about it first.

And Guillaume(Uncle Bill) is like, "ah yes, a decade of guilt has arrived to settle on my shoulders with a crushing weight, very cool. Very cool. Well, this is my son, now." and gives Raf a place to stay, and doesn't charge rent...and gives him an allowance so that he's not pressured to find work right away...and gets him a fucking therapist oh my god.

And Raf chills like this for like 6 months before he gets too antsy and nervous and finds a job and his own apartment in the city. But...as long as he's here, at least, Uncle Bill will definitely always have his back. Uncle Bill has got a decade of willful neglect to make up for. Uncle Bill doesn't think he can ever live this down, after seeing what he left and let the world do to this lad lmao