elisha 'eli' james king

The oldest brother in a tight-knit Jewish family from new Jersey, Elisha—Eli for short—has always held a lot of responsibility and has also been held on a high pedestal from a young age. It was a blessing and a curse, as he was forced to grow up rather fast and didn't get to have much of a childhood before his parents assigned him duties. Whether it was walking with his little sisters to the bus stop or landscaping around the house, he always had a job to do. After high school, his grades weren't good enough to get him into college, so Eli went into the military.

He served a couple of tours before retiring in the early 2000s. Back home with nothing else to do, he worked at a warehouse for almost two years before he got the offer to volunteer at the Hoboken Fire Department as a firefighter. With his sisters off doing their own thing and his parents enjoying retirement life, he was once again left with not much to do, so he simply sank into his work. He eventually became part of the payroll at the FD and served for almost two decades.

Most recently, Skip, Eli's best friend from the military, passed away. Skip lived out west in Wyoming and served as a lookout in a firewatch tower in Yellowstone National Park. Losing his best friend made him a bit of a recluse and to cope with the loss, Eli moved to Wyoming to fill in Skip's job. He has spent the last three months learning the ropes in that tower, mostly living in it except for the weekends when he gets to go home to a nearby motel. So much for home.

Eli is boisterous and a bit rowdy. In a big brother way, he’s always thinking about others before himself. He can come off goofy and have a roughhousing energy. His military background has given him a strong sense of protectiveness over the ones he cares most about in life. He isn't afraid to dish out tough love and tell it how it is. Grief has made him somewhat of a shell of himself, and he is working through regaining some of that energy as he accepts loss.