| Additional Info About Emmaline O’Reilly |
| Pronouns: |
She/her |
| Age: |
20 |
| Occupation: |
Scullery maid |
| Class: |
Lower |
| Origins: |
Blackwater, Yorkshire |
| Relationships: |
Agnes O'Reilly, mother
Matthew O'Reilly, father
Various siblings, siblings-in-law, nieces, nephews and cousins. |
| Sexuality: |
Asexual |
| Height: |
4’11 |
| Physical Description: |
Emiline has three expressions—a blank, empty look, a big grin or a small, crooked smile--though that one she wears seldom, as its a dead giveaway that she's been up to mischief. She has dark brown hair that’s naturally curly and often worn up, with loose strands framing her face. Her eyes are dark brown, and small. Her nose is large and somewhat beakish. Her chin, mouth, and all the rest of her besides, is small, almost elfin.
She usually avoids eye contact, and will look past the person whose speaking to her. Often she looks over their shoulder, but sometimes she looks at her feet. Occasionally, if she’s especially interested in something or someone, she will stare open mouthed at whatever or whoever it is.
Emiline's posture and gestures are unusual. Her shoulders are hunched, and she seems to skulk rather than walk. She twists her fingers together, bites her lip, tilts her head, and sways from side to side while having conversations. If she gets excited, she hops from one foot to the other, claps or flaps her hands, and—sometimes—squeals.
She dresses simply, but her clothes, though plain, are always clean. Most are a faded gray blue in color, but some are red or brown, or a mix of various colors. She dresses in layers when she can, and is rarely seen without a blanket or quilt wrapped around her shoulders. She insists on wearing the same pair of boots every day, rain or shine, even though she’s outgrowing them. She adores hats of all sorts, and is also rarely seen without the white mob cap, trimmed in lace, that someone gave her once upon a time prior to her entry into service. When she isn't wearing it, she's sleeping with it, cuddled opposite Tilly in her arms.
|
| History: |
TW: References to child abuse, institutionalization and ableism
Emmaline was born in a small village on the Yorkshire moors. Her mother said, Emmaline was special. Her mother said, she'd been blessed by all the angels, and the saints besides, and even God Himself. Silent and solemn eyed, she was content to sit before a fire and watch the flames dance, or stare at the late afternoon sun as it filtered in through a window, or look at the pictures in her siblings' schoolbooks, or sew clothes for her dolls. She rarely spoke unless someone else spoke to her first, and even then, her voice barely reached above a whisper. She was not rambunctious as other children were, preferring to walk sedately everywhere.
She avoided looking at people directly, and would often stare at her shoes while having a conversation. Sit her down with a book of pictures, or buttons, or ribbons, or her doll, and she could entertain herself for hours, arranging and rearranging the buttons, tying and untying the ribbons, and mumbling songs and stories to her doll.
To hear her mother tell it, Emmaline had been that way since birth. Emmaline, her mother always said, was as quiet and calm a baby as ever was born--and she should know, for her mother had five other babies before Emmaline. As a baby she so rarely cried, in fact, that sometimes her mother had to remind himself of the child's existence.
To hear her father tell it, she was not special at all. Her father said, she wasn't even human. She was a fairy changeling. She started out small and pale, with a squeaking, mewling cry that quickly faded. She was slow to roll over, then slow to sit up, then slow to crawl. Each thing babies did, Emmy did late—sometimes by weeks, but more often by months—or not at all.
By one year old she barely spoke, hardly walked, and would growl and cry if her mother or father got too close. By three she was no better. She rocked, chewed on her hands, and stared at the floor or the ceiling or the wall for hours. She spoke only one or two words. Most of those were repetitions of things someone said to her, spoken with no inflection or else identical to the tone she’d heard the words in originally. When she did say something original, which wasn’t often, she spoke in a sing song way, or shrieked, or ran her words together in a garbled mess nobody could understand.
Emmaline wasn't just peculiar in her behavior and speech. She had other oddities as well. She couldn’t see like the other children could. She missed all the details that made up faces and expressions and body language. She squinted in the bright sunshine but stared at candles. Though nobody bothered trying to teach her to read, if they had, they'd have discovered that she could not see normal print, but she could make out newspaper headlines alright.
Her ears did not work right either. She seemed not to hear when spoken to, but before what was said could be repeated, she’d responded. She could not understand anything in a crowd. Noises hurt her ears, or frightened her. Often, she mixed up sounds or heard entire words wrong, and then the mispronunciation got repeated when she tried to parrot others' speech.
She did not seem to notice or care if it was hot or cold outside, and would dart about bare headed and barefoot in winter or stand so close to the fire that sweat dripped from her. In summer, if the mood took her, she would go out of doors wrapped head to foot in a heavy cloak, and when her mother or father tried to take it off, she would throw herself to the ground, kicking and screaming.
She insisted on wearing the same few dresses again and again, no matter how threadbare and tattered they were. She would squirm away from hairbrushes, stockings and wool garments, or anything with high collars, seams, or a snug fit. New clothes were ripped off and thrown to the floor, and old ones rescued from the rag bin.
She was equally particular about her food. If its texture was not either puréed like custard or mousse, or as tough as tanned leather, she struggled to eat it. She was equally contrary about taste, and insisted on food being spicy or salty or sweet, and would turn her nose up at the bland, simple fare she was offered.
By three, though, Emmaline's mother was starting to come around to her husband's view of the child. While perfectly behaved if left to her own devices, Emmaline transformed into a biting, screaming hellion whenever her mother tried to dress her, or feed her, or bathe her, or brush her hair.
Her father said, “You’re too soft on her,” and the next time Emmy bit her mother, her father grabbed her mother's hairbrush and spanked Emmy with it. “She just needs more discipline,” he said, as he sat a still crying Emmy into the tub.
That’s what he’d been saying since Emmy was a few months old, and proving to be a difficult baby--at least as far as he was concerned. When Emmy was still in diapers, her father swatted her for crying, babbling or wiggling during Mass, thrashing about during diaper changes, or wailing at public outings. Later, when she toddled toward the the door, the fireplace, or anywhere else she was forbidden to go, her father paddled her with the flat of an old wooden hairbrush. When she turned her nose up at food, or clothing, or refused to change into proper clothes from her nightdress—and, later, when she forgot her chores and sat rocking her doll and daydreaming—her father whipped her with his belt.
Emmy minded him, he told her mother, and she would mind her mother too—she just had to be firm. It was the only way. They’d either get their real child back—or teach their wretched brat of a daughter proper behavior.
Her mother had nodded, and the next time Emmy put up a fuss, her mother had spanked her—and the time after that, and the time after that, and the time after that, til Emmy stopped fighting, and let her mother dress her and bathe her and feed her and do what she could with her matted, ever tangled hair.
But try as she might, Emmy could not stay out of trouble. Her father said Emmy was willful and manipulative and so he never listened to her pleading, or her apologies. Her mother shouldn’t either, he said, and so in time she stopped. More often than not, her parents punished Emmy for making a fuss, and gradually, her only form of protest was silent crying, and soon even that faded.
By the time she was eight, Emmy was her mother's perfect, silent doll. She was—except she couldn’t be left alone. She would sit, wherever she was told to, for hours, forgetting to eat or drink or use the toilet. She would stare into space, or rock, or hum. She didn’t seem to hear when she was spoken to, unless the speaker said her name a few times.
Her mother eventually managed to teach her a few simple chores—sweeping and mopping—but even this required supervision, or else she would stop in the middle of a task, lured away by some pretty flower or an animal she’d seen outside. Punishment only made her cry and hide when Ma tried to have her help, and after a while, her mother gave up.
When Emmy was ten, she got Tilly for her birthday. Tilly was a rag doll, with dark brown yarn hair and black button eyes. She wore a green and white plaid dress and a white apron. Emmy clung to the doll, and soon, “Tilly too?” was added to the handful of words and phrases Emmy would sometimes say.
Usually the answer was yes. Yes, Tilly could sit at the table too—as long as she cleaned her plate. Yes, Tilly could go to Mass—as long as she sat still like a good girl, so she didn't get Emmy into trouble. Yes, Tilly could come to market—as long as she was a good girl and didn’t wander off or touch the goods on sale. Yes, Tilly could sleep in Emmy’s bed—but she had to stay in bed and not make Emmy get up to get her a drink, or keep her up by playing.
Sometimes Tilly was bad, like Emmy was, and so Emmy shook her and shouted and spanked, just like her parents did with her. Afterwards, Emmy would hug her and rock her and say, “Love you,” like her mother had when Emmy was little, and her mother had thought she could learn to be good. Tilly was better at being good than Emmy was, and soon Emmy just had to say, “No, Tilly bad girl,” and Tilly would be good again. Emmy often wished it was that easy for her.
Shortly after Emmy’s sixteenth birthday, her parents loaded her and Tilly and everything else Emmy owned into the back of a cart and headed into town. Emmy had hugged Tilly tight, tight tight at first, but after a while, she’d relaxed and started looking around. Where were they going? It wasn’t time for Mass—they’d done that already—and anyway, Emmy never took a suitcase and her Treasure Box with all her dried flowers and buttons and rocks in it to Mass. She only took Tilly.
Also, her mother had not taken her by the shoulders and her mother had not made Emmy look at her and her mother had not said, “Now you remember the rules, my girl. You sit still and you be quiet, you and Tilly both, or I will take you outside and spank the pair of you. Do you understand?” the way she always did before they went to Mass—or anywhere else besides.
Emmy did not like The Rules Talk. Emmy did not like it because her mother made her look at her. Emmy did not like it because her mother made Emmy answer with mouth words. Emmy had to say, “Yes, Ma. I will be a good girl. Tilly will be good girl, too." Emmy did not like it, because when she didn't answer, her mother smacked her bottom and said, “You answer me young lady. Right now,” and then Emmy had to answer the question and say sorry, too, and. that was a lot of words. Emmy did not like having to say a lot of words.
Twisting her fingers together, Emmy thought some more. Her parents had come all the way from Ireland to England before Emmy was born. Maybe they’d decided to go back! Ma used to tell her stories about Ireland and Emmy always wanted to see it, because Ma's stories always made it sound so pretty and nice!
Emmy had squealed and flapped her hands, til her father reached over and smacked her leg. “Stop that.” he said, and his voice had hurt Emmy’s ears more than his hand had hurt her leg. After, she sat quietly, hands in her lap, and watched as the land rolled by beside her.
The asylum was the biggest building Emmy had ever seen. It lay behind a massive iron fence and gate, and its chimneys seemed to disappear into the gray clouds overhead. She whimpered as she looked at it and hugged Tilly. Maybe, she thought as Ma led her inside, the building was going to eat her.
Inside, Ma and Da and Emmy and Tilly sat on hard wooden chairs, while Ma and Da talked to a man called Dr. Mitchell. Emmy stopped listening after a while. There were too many noises. Outside the room, someone screamed. Down the hall, someone else was crying. Emmy bit her lip hard. She wanted to cry too.
Though she wasn’t paying attention, a few words got caught in her brain anyway. Idiot and Uneducable and Best place for her and Can’t allow her to reproduce and Know you can’t watch her every second and See to it she doesn’t come to any harm buzzed around her head like flies. Then, Ma was hugging her so hard she couldn’t breathe and Da was telling her to Be good now, and then they were gone.
Several years later, Emmy left the asylum. It was an accident. A nurse had left a door ajar, and Emmy had wandered away. Out into the countryside she went. Eventually she made her way to Whitby, where she found work as a scullery maid. |
| OOC Preferences: |
I'm up for anything except things involving explicit sexual content. |
| Alias: |
BlueMarie |
|
Offline
Last seen 01-26-2024, 03:24 AM.
Local time is 04-28-2024 at 11:20 PM.
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Birthday: 03-12-1986 (38 years old)
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