CECILY HALLOWAY

CECILY HALLOWAY

What is your name? Do you have any nicknames?
My name is Cecily Halloway. Yes, I know it's a girl's name. No, I am not a girl. I don't care how much you think I look like one, thank you very much. I don't really have any nicknames. My mother used to call me Celie but not anymore. In fact I probably shouldn't be using that last name anymore, either, but it's all I have left of who I used to be.


How old are you? When is your birthday? How do you celebrate it?
I'm eighteen. My birthday was two months ago, on the thirteenth. That's actually the source of my problems. As soon as I came of age my father insisted I wed some poor girl I'd never met.


What is your profession? Are you wealthy, poor, or somewhere in between?
I don't really have a profession yet. I'm trying to find one. I, uhm, think I'm going to have to resort to the worst and sell myself. I... well, you see, I've been disowned. I grew up very wealthy in a minor but longstanding noble family with not much prestige but plenty of land (and lucrative water rights). When I stood up to my father about the marriage, he cast me out. So now I imagine I am now even poorer than the housemaids I looked down on just a few short months ago.


What do you think of those whose social status is above yours? And those whose status is below?
God. I can't even begin to explain how much I've just had my perspective on the matter altered. I gues the simplest way to put it is that once upon a time, I thought I was better than anyone below me. Now I just know I was luckier. And when your luck runs out and you have no idea how to do for yourself... things get a little rough, to say the least. I guess when I look at the class I used to be, I see two kinds: those who are oblivious like I was, and those who know exactly how unfair everything is, and profit greatly by keeping it that way. One I pity. The other I loathe. As far as the merchant classes go, or even the peasants, right on down to the – the homeless rubbish like me... well. Can I just say that I feel guilty for looking down on the poor my whole life?


What is your relationship with your family?
Extremely estranged. I was officially disowned four days ago. My father made me sign the papers in front of my mother. I don't have any siblings or cousins, so there was a great deal of expectation on me to continue the family line, but I just can't do that, can't marry some flitterbrained girl just to – to BREED, not even if it means I die in the streets like a maggot.


Where were you born? Where do you call home now?
Our estates are up in wine country, but I spent most of my life at the home my family keeps on the upper part of town. For a long time I'd get sent off to the estate each summer to be drilled in archery and horsemanship, but I'm still pathetic at both of them. Thanks to long, boring, lonely winters here in the city while my parents circulated at court trying to curry favor, I can pick up a sabre without cutting myself, but I'm no fighter. Yet another of the million ways in which I disappointed my father. And now I don't know that I can even say I have a home. Is a patch of gutter a home? I won't be here for long. I know what I have to do, and with any luck, one of those brothels will hire me on. And no, I'm not ignorant to the irony of refusing to marry so I don't have to have sex with one woman, only to throw myself into a situation where I'll probably have to perform with many of them. I just have to be glad that one of the things I did learn from the rare occasion my parents interacted with me personally was how to lie convincingly.


What makes you laugh?
I don't exactly have much to laugh about anymore. Unless you count bitter, derisive laughter. Does that count? That seems to happen to me a lot lately. I laugh at how stupid I used to be. And I laugh at how desperate I've gotten. Not that it's actually funny, but... well. If I don't laugh I'll scream. I just keep remembering what my nursemaid Iris used to tell me, that I had to look on the bright side of the dark side. At least now I know myself for what I am, and know what I'm willing to do to survive.


… I think.


How would you describe your appearance to someone?
Ugh. Well, if I had my way of it I would try to ignore mentioning the fact that I'm scrawny and look like a girl, but seeing as it's the first thing people usually notice about me, I can't exactly skip it. The only thing I like about my looks is my eyes. They're almost purple. Other than that... I'm too thin and I can't keep much muscle, and my hair is the most boring brown that I can never get the damn curls out of. It's too long for a man, too, because my father told me that true nobles have a good tail and refused to let me cut it. Like these curls would allow for a proper queue anyway.

Oh, and may I add that after several days without a bath or clean clothes, I also look a bit like something the cat decided to play with and then leave in the mud. I have bruises from my father's “lecture” before my exile, and more from getting mugged out here the first night. But I heard about a public bath for the poor, so I'm hoping to polish up a bit before I put my (insane, ridiculous, idiotic) plan into action. I can't imagine anyone wanting to hire me like this for anything, least of all a night of, uh. P-pleasure. So I'd better polish up. ...And maybe find somewhere to throw up somewhere along the way.


What is your greatest desire?
To be clean, warm, and not hungry. Damn. I imagine if there's one thing to be said for my new life, it's that it's put my priorities in order, huh?


What is your happiest memory?
I don't know that I even have a happiest memory. I have a few that I consider to lie in the category of “not as horrid as the rest,” but I think even my happiest moments were the ones that I was just kind of ignored and left alone. Or they end like a bad children's tale. Like... when I was little, I had a really sweet, really wonderful nursemaid named Iris who raised me more than both my parents put together. I think I considered her more a mother than the woman who birthed me. When I was about seven she made me a ragdoll that I hid under my pillow for weeks before my father found it. I was so happy just to have that silly little thing... maybe that really was the happiest time of my life. Of course, when it was found, Iris was sent away, as it was determined that she had been turning me into a 'sissy' and I was old enough to not need a minder. That was the first time my father touched me in my entire life and it was to use his belt on me. Far from the last, though. But it hurt so much more to lose the one person that had ever cared about me at all.

Oh, damn, I'm sorry, you said HAPPY memories. Well. Unfortunately, any time I was genuinely happy in my life, I ended up punished for it. Even getting too attached to the first riding horse my father let me use led to him being sold off. He always told me he was trying to make me stronger, but I think he just liked hurting me – and everyone else around him. For a long time I would throw myself into whatever mindless social hobby I could just to keep myself from thinking about how lonely I was.


When I look at my life now, I have to say that I'm absolutely miserable, but somewhere inside I feel... I don't know. Peaceful, I guess. Like when I finally said no to him that... even though it changed everything and pretty much ruined my life, that I was better off for it. Like something inside kind of clicked into place and for the first time in my life I could stand up straight without having to work at it. Let me tell you, it was really weird to feel that way when huddled in a cold alley after getting beat and robbed of the few things I'd taken with, but that's just the way it was. Maybe I'm one of those people who just likes it when bad things happen to them. And maybe when you get hurt so much, you just learn to like it so you don't go completely insane, I don't really know. What I do know is that I am done being my father's puppet, and his more importantly, done being his victim.





Your character has an extended period of free time in which to indulge in a hobby or his/her most preferred fun activity. Write about it.

As awful as the last few days of homelessness had been, being able to visit that bathhouse had done more than Cecily could have imagined to make him feel a little more like a human again. He'd washed his clothing, too, and put it back on even a little damp, not caring how improper it was, or how uncomfortable. The harsh reality that had intruded on Celie's little world had left him very few illusions about what comforts he had left, but his sudden hardship had also brought out a core of determination he never would have known he had otherwise, and now that he'd formed his plan to get himself a safe job, he had to put it into action. The difficult part was just figuring out how, and that led to the next step of his little mission

It was only due to his passion, one not quite befitting one of such an old noble family as himself, that he even knew about the public library. When he'd been a child, he hadn't been able to go there much, but once he'd reached his teens and could go around the city on his own, it had become one of his favorite places in the world. More importantly than that, though, it was full of books, and books were full of knowledge. For a man who'd spent almost his whole life alone, he'd learned very young that books were an excellent place to learn things that no adult seemed the have time to tell him. Now, though, his mission was a little more vital than simply discovering something new. No, Cecily was here to learn how to seduce someone, or at least make it look like he knew how, because he needed to be able to get a job doing the one thing someone with no talents or skills could possibly do: selling his body. Being far from strong enough to do labor, that left prostitution, and as daunting a prospect as that was, it was pretty much all he had left. That knowledge was enough to keep him going on this insane little path that he'd decided he was going to take.

Therefore, he needed to learn about sex, and whores, and everything else that went with to make him look at least somewhat convincing when he went into one of those fine brothels to beg for a job. Leave it to Cecily to think that all of that could be found in books – especially books in a public library – but just stepping through the doors into the cool, dim interior of the library made him feel so much better all at once. If there was any place in the world that felt like home to him, this was it, surrounded by the smell of pages. Certainly he had felt a thousand times happier here than he ever had in any of the places in which he'd slept, and now it was doubly true. For the first time since he'd been disowned and thrown out, he felt the frozen, heavy twist of agony in his core start to thaw. Yes, the books would have what he needed to save himself and convince someone to hire him. That was one of the only things that Celie could rely on anymore, and as he headed for the racks he thought most likely to contain romances, he was grateful that even in the face of his whole life crumbling around him, that he could still feel so peaceful with a book in his hands.




Your character is being lectured by someone in a position of authority. How does s/he react?




Your character is faced with his/her biggest fear. What is that fear, and how does s/he react to it?
Your answer goes here.


Your character just woke up after a night's sleep. Describe how s/he starts the day.
Your answer goes here.


Your character comes face-to-face with his/her ideal partner. Describe the meeting, that ideal partner, and your character's reaction to him/her.
Your answer goes here.

EFFIE. 25. AIM: LAEIRYN