her mind wasn’t at the carnival: it seemed as if it was a million miles away. thoughts flew her up and away into the clouds as they raced around her mind. maeve felt like she couldn’t catch a breath. a constant race was running in her mind and there was no break for water. or even a breath. the blonde barely noticed as she snapped the strap of her dungarees over and over and over again. a coping mechanism. she seemingly had a new one every day. “I’m sorry.” her voice meek and mild. “I promise I was listening! I just, you know, zoned for a minute. total space cadet right now.”a small smile offered to the other female as reassurance.
Pale blue eyes scanned the shelves of books, making Dakota’s head spin slightly. She was still hungover from the night before. Unable to keep down breakfast and running on an empty stomach, all she had to disguise how horrible she felt was a pair of ray bans, cracked directly down the middle of the right side of the frame. She almost didn’t notice when the other girl starting talking to her, head aching as she tried listening attentively. ❝No, you’re totally right. It’s an interesting choice.❞ She held the dark grey book up to a light, examining the worn out edges as she spoke, ❝Don’t crucify me for this, but I’m not actually gonna read it. I just think it’ll look cool on my book shelf. Maybe next to a candle and a little box of tarot cards. I’m a fucking poser.❞ Kota chuckled quietly, unashamed.
maeve’s eyes followed the book as the other held it to the light, chuckling softly at the almost artifact like inspection of the cloth-bound pages. “don’t worry. I don’t blame you at all. ‘i see satan fall like lightning’ is hardly light reading. or entertaining reading. had to read it for my literary criticism class and boy, is it so dense.” she stated with a light laugh as she continued to stack books. “never mind my professor was a man who idolized dead languages, like not latin dead but old gaelic, first human language dead, and would ask us questions in all these crazy languages. he also one time came in with a tambourine and sang an old celtic prayer hymnal. and on the last day of class, he came in in full 40s era russian winter garb.” realizing she may have been rambling, maeve shook her head. “all in all, I don’t blame you for using it as decoration. pretty kickass title for a tarot card holder.”
it’d been long enough now that the journalists had finally stopped trying to shove their paper and pen, desperate for any sort of insight into cain’s situation, underneath the door of the bookstore; they were grateful for it - but now there were a seemingly never-ending stack of donations from the store being shut for the time that it was. they were meant to be helping - categorizing, but of course - wound up thumbing through a particularly old book; pages practically on the verge of turning to dust. “yeah? n-never read it,” cain’s eyes lifted, briefly, to glance towards their employee, smile small, “interesting’s better than just g-good. rather be called interesting than it, anyhow. despite c-connotations. what’s it about?”
her eyes glanced over the weathered pages, wondering what kind of life the novel had had before ending up int the brick and mortar store. “hangsaman is a book that earns its interesting connotation for sure.” maeve let out a slight laugh as she continued to organize the shelf. “it’s about this seventeen year old who is unhappy with life and goes to college. however, when she’s at her college, she starts going down a terrifying path and you’re never sure what’s in her head and what’s exactly happening.” eyes glanced over them, making sure her rambling hadn’t bored them. “it’s actually loosely based on the disappearance of a real college sophomore, paula jean welden, in the 1940s.”
to most, stacking books all day would be mindless. for maeve: it was a second home. leave it to her when looking for a job while at college to find one at a little used bookstore nestled away downtown. she swore she could get lost in here for hours. each book had a history, each page had an owner. yes, the girl may have been one of those people who enjoyed the smell of books. as she continued to try and categorize the new donations, her eye couldn’t help but wander over to the person about a foot away from her fingering through one of the books. “interesting choice.” her voice small yet loud enough to be heard. “I mean, good choice. not interesting. well, I mean it’s interesting but interesting has such a negative connotation in this light because english is a weird language.”
( • & all the while • i know we’re • f u c k e d • & not getting • un f u c k e d • soon • )
IS THERE ANYTHING ON YOUR MUSE’S PHONE, COMPUTER OR SOCIAL MEDIA ACCOUNTS THAT THEY WOULDN’T WANT TO BE SEEN? IF SO, WHAT IS IT?: most of her texts, medical information, evidence for stories.
WHAT IS YOUR MUSE’S BIGGEST SECRET?: she’s been having an affair with her specialist doctor for two years. he’s engaged.
ARE YOU OKAY WITH US EXPOSING IT ON THE WATERSHED APP?: indeed!
WHAT ARE SOME SECONDARY SECRETS / REGRETS / SHAMES / SINS THAT YOU MIGHT LIST?: she’s using her status as a tier 1 shepard to write her big expose on the watershed app. also she might (she’s not 100% sure yet ‘cause she wants to be in the dark as long as possible) be pregnant. with her doctor’s baby. S C A N D A L
ARE YOU OKAY WITH US EXPOSING THOSE ON THE APP?: (x)
WHAT IS YOUR MUSE’S BIGGEST FEARS?: living in perpetual fear, never being truly happy, death.
IS THERE ANYTHING ELSE USEFUL YOU WANT TO SHARE ABOUT THEM THAT CAN BE USED IN FUTURE BY THE APP AND FOR PLOT DROPS?: just expose mai bean pls
your girl lo is back at it again with the haley lu. this is my muffin, maeve. her backstory is A LOT so warning you now but she is probably one of my most interesting characters to date. (if you guys remember phe, she’ll seem somewhat familiar)
•(more about the girl below)•
CISFEMALE — ever hear people say MAEVE ARMSTRONG looks a lot like HALEY LU RICHARDSON? I think SHE is about 22, so it doesn’t really work. The JOURNALISM major is a JUNIOR that is from GLOUCESTER, MA. They can be +EFFERVESCENT, but they can also be -GUARDED. I think MAE might be TIER 1 SHEPARD. They are living in MANON.
○ maeve’s family hails from germany. her father is a full blooded german who ended up failing in love with an irish student studying abroad. her father is a freelance artist and her mother is a music teacher. needless to say, her life was never that normal. they were always living paycheck to paycheck. she grew up in germany until she was thirteen when her mother got an awesome job offer in austin, texas. she lived there until she was seventeen, when she was sent to live with her aunt and uncle in glouster.
○ she has a twin brother, malachi, who is her partner in crime/best friend. the only other sibling she has is a half sibling from her father’s high school relationship. she doesn’t really know her that well but they try and keep in touch.
○ maeve has always been a sick child. she spent three months in the hospital after she was born due to her lungs being underdeveloped (something she’ll pick on her twin about, being a ‘lung hog’) however, when she was seven years old, she and her parents were hit with a bomb of a diagnosis: lupus. her body attacks itself relentlessly and though they are still trying suppress the symptoms, maeve knows it will never get better. only worse. she constantly feels ill and has undergone many surgeries. her scars make her feel ugly.
○ fluent in german and has a thick ass accent that’s an odd mix of irish and german. it gets worse as she drinks
○ april o’neal was her earliest icon and made her fall in love with the idea of being a journalist. though she has never encountered any speaking turtles, she has become somewhat of a rockstar journalist. if there’s a story, she’ll sniff it out.
○ now her backstory. gossip blog, feel free to have a field day with this. in texas, when maeve was in high school, she attended a graduation party when she was a freshman. maeve found herself in the bathroom that night, trying to get away from all the noise and the debauchery. while she’s looking at herself in the mirror, the door suddenly opened. it was lucas, the stereotype of an all american quarterback. someone she could say she had a crush on. maeve was a little tipsy and lucas tried to help her get her bearings. but it was all a facade. his hands helping her soon became his hands hurting her. he raped her and when he was done, he left her in the bathroom. crying and alone.
○ after a few months of suffering in silence, maeve finally told her father what had happened. obviously, her father was livid. and he had heard too many stories of boys getting away with actions like this in american, so he decided to take the law into his own hands. her father, bruno, lured lucas under the guise that he was a drug dealer. once he had lucas in the car, he brought him to an abandoned warehouse, beat him, then threatened to shoot lucas unless he confessed to raping his daughter, all of which he recorded on video. before lucas could respond, he died as result of his asthma.
○ her father was arrested after he tried to disguise his voice to 911 to get help for the dying boy. since lucas’ family was $$$$, they hired the best lawyers they could. bruno was found guilty of first degree murder and was sentenced to death. he remains on death row to this day.
○ maeve has a lot of guilt. she feels like everything that has happened is her fault and it causes her to be very closed off. she has told maybe one or two close friends what happened.
PLOT IDEAS
bring me: close friends who know, HER BROTHER, a relative of lucas, someone who finds out about the case from class or something, ANYTHING. I LIVE FOR THE DRAMA
