OC Application: Shrader Agnes Gallagher
OOC Name: Amy
OOC Age: 20
Time Zone: EST
Activity Level (1-10): 5-6 (I’m in film school so I have projects up the wazoo)
Character Name: Shrader Agnes Gallagher
Character FC: Jennifer Lawrence
Character Age: 21
Character’s place of residence: Outskirts
Character Occupation: Student (Athlete - basketball, University newspaper writer)
Quote/Gossip about the character: She cares for her two younger sisters, Dolly and Cammie, in the absence of her father and negligence of her mother. “You lock the door on me, I lock the door on you. Ain’t nobody come to save my ass.”Â
Sample Bio: Franklin. Fucking Franklin. F-Town. Anyway you say it, spell it, hear it, mouth it, spit it, it sounds the same. To the Gallagher’s, it always sounded like home. They were never very well-to-do. Just didn’t happen for them. The Gallagher family had never left Tennessee and probably never would. A family raising their children with the moral compasses of diehard Christians among the flocks of Christians of TN, “repent and serve penance,” “alert the church elders” and all that. Something went wrong when they started having children—that is, their daughters were quickly too smart for their own good. Shrader, Dolly, and Camella (call her “Cammie,” please). Three girls, all blonde, all strong personalities, all too big for the confinements of small town life. Shrader grew up as the athletic of the family, and the writer. This balanced well with Dolly’s interest in music and Cammie’s talkative tendencies. The eldest Gallagher loved sport, and she loved reading—most of both was basketball and that e. e. cummings guy. In her spare moments she either had a basketball or a book in her hands. She had a few friends. There was that boy from the football team, Terry, who liked to discuss poetry behind the Burger King. And Alfred, she gave the math quiz answers to him. Mario would play one-on-one with her in the church parking lot anytime she wanted. It was a good childhood, until she started to lose faith in the God her parents so dutifully constructed for them.
It started mostly at night, when she would come home from practice and find her house filled with strangers. Tall men, fat women, big-headed blacks and skinny-ass whites. “Living in the outskirts of town, Shay,” her father would say, swirling the whiskey around in his glass and huffing a breath of the smoking bud between his fingers, “makes you realize some things.” What things? she would ask. He would reply, “That no matter what you try, ain’t nobody come to save your ass.” He was a reverend. Well, used to be. When Momma started showing bruises on her face was when Shrader knew their lives together were changing. The tables, chairs, floor would be littered in liquor bottles and loose change by morning. She would lock her sisters up in their rooms and wait it out until daylight. At night, when it would get bad, men would pull her aside and ask her what she was doing there. Say they saw her picture in the paper, and why was a famous basketball player in a place like that? She’d reply that she lived there. Then they would leave her alone. Cammie was too little to realize when their father had gone and didn’t come back, and Shrader hasn’t brought it up.
Shrader stuck to her studies and basketball and made it through high school with flying colors. She was a tristate record, scoring over 20 points in under 7 minutes in her freshman semifinal game. Her writing was published in the school newspaper each semester. And she used the money from her two jobs at the diner and the paper to pay for notebooks for herself, new clothes for her sisters. Her athletic prowess earned her a scholarship to the only college she knew she could afford to go to—the one on the other end of town. So she took it. Basketball, the newspaper, and her family. What else could she want?
3 One-word personality traits:Â maternal, stubborn, loyal
2 Key details: (1)Shrader is a reflective extrovert, who likes to joke around but knows how to drop into serious conversation. Her sisters are the most important things in her life, and anybody who threatens the system they’ve got going better watch out, because the tomboyish, motherly wrath of Shrader is a force to be reckoned with. (2) She has no intention of leaving Franklin without her sisters, and plans to raise them until they’re both 18. This has forced her to be strong against following in her drunken mother’s footsteps, though sometimes she finds herself tempted when the goings get tough.
Character sexuality (if any) and any details regarding their relationship status or past: Shrader is heterosexual, and she is a virgin.
Do you plan on using gifs and paraing?:Â Yes.
Is there anything you would like to add?:Â Nope!
Password acknowledging that you’ve read the rules: johnnyandjune
Sample Para (At least 10 sentences as your character - 1st or 3rd person):
Shrader had always been a happy kid.
From the time she was small to all grown up, she smiled—the smile that used to make her father shine, the smile that told the world Everything’s going to be okay, the smile that reassured her that it was perfectly all right to roll with the punches. Happy-go-lucky, optimistic, bright-eyed. That was Shrader Gallagher born and bred, that was supposed to be college-girl Shrader, newly adjusted and getting on fine. She kept trying to smile just the same, knowing life was much better when it was seen through a positive, uplifted eye. She couldn’t blame anyone but herself for the way she was feeling, and that should have made it easier to smile. Ignore the bad thoughts and move onward, move upward, keep on moving. Just keep going. But there she sat with a bottle of wine in her hands, unopened and tempting, wondering what it was about this deep, rich drink that made her mother forget everything bad in the world.
It was her own fault for being so isolated. She was good at making friends—knew everyone in town, and they knew her, Miss B-Ball, but every time she left for class, she was wondering what was happening at home; what she was missing. What was going wrong. Tonight, she sat at home, in a rare moment of quiet, no dorm to speak of (couldn’t afford it), no roommates to chat with, no parties to attend. She tried sifting through her phone, seeing who in her contacts she could possibly call. For anything. A hangout, a hug, if she could cry to anyone. But Shrader Gallagher didn’t cry in front of people. She cried only by herself, where no one could see. No one could know she was unhappy. That was her secret and hers alone. If people knew she cried, they wouldn’t just leave her—they’d run away. She was Shrader. Happy. Healthy. Weird. That was who she was supposed to be. But that wasn’t how she felt lately. So she stared at the bottle, her hand itching to unscrew the cap and down it in one huge gulp.
It was selfish, wanting someone to put her first. It was desperate and it was self-pitiful and it was petty and it was wrong. But she needed it. She needed a person. Someone to lean on. Someone she didn’t have to be strong around. Someone to show her kindness and affection. Someone to listen, someone to laugh, someone to hold her and for once tell her that everything was going to be all right. So she stared down at the bottle, wondering, hoping, debating whether or not the drink was destined to be that someone. The someone to cradle her. And love her. And hear her. And dry her tears and whistle with her laugh. She wondered if her mother had ever thought the same thing.
She ran through her contacts for the hundredth time. Shrader felt something in her stomach hollow out, and she failed to suck in a breath, as if all the air had left the room. She wanted to go home. She wanted to go home.
The problem was, she was home.
She was feeling sorry for herself and she knew it. She was scared and she didn’t want to be. She wanted to be the one to barge into a room and force someone to be her friend, but she couldn’t. She used to be that person. She wanted to be that person again. She wanted to be happy and she wanted to smile and she wanted to laugh, dear God, she wanted to laugh. She didn’t need anything else. All she needed to make her happy was to laugh. But the joke was on her and the punch line was the bottle of wine in her hands. Maybe the wine would have to be the comedian. Then, maybe then, she would finally laugh.
Everyone had their vices. And everyone was allowed to have someone. A person. Her person just happened to be shaped in glass, with a long neck and a screwtop hat. Red blood on the inside, just like anybody else. It would keep her company, if only for a night.
The packaging cracked as she twisted the top off and tossed it into the garbage. She didn’t think twice. She knocked the bottle back with her lips pressed to the mouth of the glass and she drank. She swallowed. Once, twice, three times, four times. Until her mouth was fuzzy and half the bottle was gone. She inhaled. Exhaled. One thousand one. One thousand two. One thousand three. Then she downed the rest.
A few minutes later and the room was spinning. She laid on her bed, staring at the swirling ceiling, her hand resting over her churning, bloated belly. Her mind fogged, slowly, thoughts turning pleasant and body ultimately relaxed. Her heartbeat slowed to a calm thump, one after the other, eyes a hazy blur and glossed over. She snickered to herself. Euphoria. Only for one night. Bliss. Calmness, stillness, happiness. She didn’t feel burdened at all. She had escaped and tomorrow would be better. She giggled, taking out her phone and texting someone, she didn’t see their name, could’ve been anyone, really, someone from school, someone from another planet, I want you to fuck me. The text made her laugh and it felt good to laugh. Her apple blossom cheekbones turned a pretty pink, blue eyes shining. Her hands tingled and turned heavy. Her eyelids dropped. The room got warm and she stripped down to her underwear, laying over her bed, her limbs starfishing across the mattress and fingers curling into the bed sheets. Whoever she had texted, she thought with another giggle, she hoped they wanted to fuck her, too.
With an uncoordinated swing of her legs, she stood up and teetered. Music, she needed music. She kicked the bottle on the way to the stereo, just managing to slide Southside Johnny into the player and pushing the button. His earthy, gritty voice sounded through her room and she, in only a bra and panties, danced with the curtains open. Danced by herself, danced to make herself happy again. This was Shrader Gallagher. Smiling, laughing, dancing, pretending nobody else in the world existed. Even if it did take a little help. Wine was her catalyst. Her mother was the reminder not to let it become a habit. But tonight, she was an addict.
prguitarman
turnnoffyourmind
kianamaiart
pixelskylines