Today is one of my bad days. I literally spend most of the morning after breakfast laying in the backyard of the apartment building. Ugh. Even after five years, my bad days still make me wonder if I’m going crazy. Well, crazier, that is… No one else writes me over the summer, which doesn’t help, to be honest. Sometimes, I worry that I’m gonna wake up one day, and everything will just be… gone. Is that utterly insane? Who am I kidding – of course it’s completely nuts… We really ought to exchange cell numbers, one of these days, if you’re okay with that? If not, no worries; letters work fine, too.
Hoping you’re having a more fun summer than I am,
– Aoife.
((Éan = bird, Irish; a fitting nickname for Morrigan, I think. One that Aoife would definitely call her.))
Winter had always been Aoife’s favorite season. Though she herself was constantly cold, it was never a sense of numbness. Rather, she appreciated the feeling of biting wind and icy snow. It reminded her that she was alive; a welcome contrast to the off days she had. On those days, not even her medications could make getting out of bed any easier. On those days, she needed to lay in the blanket of white until all she felt was pain and wet. On those days, Aoife was like a shadow. On those days, she rarely turned up to class, though she eventually got together the motivation to do her homework. On those days, she spent most of her time not outside in the library.
Today was one of those days.
Though she had changed into a warm, dry uniform, the ravenette was still more chilled than normal. This gave her snowy pale skin an icy feel, should anyone be close enough to her to be allowed to reach out and touch her. The damp, dripping ends of her ragged black hair were the cause of this, not that she minded. Though her uniform hid most of the evidence, she was looking thinner than usual, as she had been having trouble eating of late. It didn’t bother her too much, mostly because she would slip down to the kitchens every so often, and because she kept a thermos of piping hot tea with her to keep herself alert and from fainting. It wasn’t the most perfect system, and had often gotten her detentions in the past until the staff realized that this as just what she needed to function at times, but at the very least it kept anything worse at bay.
The library, when Aoife finally slipped inside after the lunch period she hadn’t attended, was quiet and welcoming as always. However, the fifteen-year-old Wampus found her usual table – more or less secluded, but with the pale light from the nearby window keeping it from feeling isolated – already boasted an occupant. For a moment, the half-Irish girl hung back in a shadow of a bookcase. She wanted to study the other woman, to see what she knew about the brunette, before approaching any further. Call it paranoia, but Aoife liked to be as prepared as possible for any situation she found herself in. Even if that situation was as simple as speaking to another student.
From what she could remember, the other fifth year was in Thunderbird. Her name was Morrigan Greene, if memory also served, and the usually inexpressive teen smirked a tiny bit. Someone else with Irish roots; what an interesting find. Shaking her head to clear it, and wiping her expression clean, Aoife slid her cold hands into the warm pockets of her uniform pants, and approached the shorter girl. (Since she stood at 5’10”, most other girls were shorter than she was, not that it bothered her too much.) When she neared the table, Morrigan glanced up at her, grinned and began talking. Well, it seemed that Aoife’s memory had served her well; she had been right about this girl’s age, House, and name.
Shaking her head, the taller teen responded, her voice pitched just low enough to cast doubt on her gender. “Nuthin’ t’ worry aou’, lass.” Her accent might have been surprising, but it was what she had grown up hearing – as much as her father Glorified Sperm Donor despised the Irish, he had employed a good number of them for her servants and house staff – and what she had been immersed in, once she had moved to America with her grandfather, Father Liam McCoy. “’Tis jus’ this is usually me table.” Pausing for a moment, the Irish girl continued, introducing herself. “Name's Aoife McCoy, Wampus. Pleasure t’ meet ye, lass.”
Removing one of her boney hands from her pocket, Aoife extended it to Maorrigan in greeting.
Name: Aoife McCoy. Gender: Genderfluid female. Age: Sixteen. Date of Birth: April 10th, 2000. Place of Birth: Dún Chaoin, County Kerry, Republic of Ireland.
Appearance: Rather tall and rather lanky, Aoife is best described as skinny. Almost unhealthily so. Depending on how she moves, her ribs will stick out, as will the bones in her hands/wrists. As such, she is usually quite cold, and tends to wear long-sleeves, long pants, and a jacket if need be all year round. With her dark hair cut raggedly short – since she usually cuts it herself – and her pale, thin face, Aoife has often been mistaken for a teenage boy. Not that this bothers her; she doesn’t care what people think about her, aside from her grandfather. She tends to wear the pants form of the uniform, and is quite androgynous in general. Truth be told, her one striking feature happens to be her eyes. They are a dark grey green, and seem to be the one prominent trait in her otherwise plain countenance. Not that she cares, though.
Personality:
[/b] – Despite her issues with trust, Aoife is very genuine and kind with those that she lets past her numerous thick walls, leaving very little secrets between herself and those she cares for. Passionate – All or nothing has always been the way Aoife lived her life. If something wasn’t worth giving two hundred percent, then it wasn’t worth doing in the first place. She applies this same passion and drive to both her studies and her sports. Caring – Aoife is always willing to be shoulder to cry on, or to offer advice to those she cares about. She will be the first to stand up for her friends, usually in spectacular fashion. She is also very protective of the important people in her life, almost to a fault. Prideful – Of course, along with her passion and determination comes her pride. Though she doesn’t often voice it, Aoife is a very proud young woman, thinking very much (and rightly so) of her accomplishments both on the playing field and in the classroom. She is also very proud of her heritage, and will vehemently defend her roots. Distant – As much as she cares about and is open with her friends and precious people, Aoife is generally very distant. She keeps herself aloof, not wanting to let people close. It takes a very determined person to get through to her, without making her think they’re patronizing her. Cold – Her coldness goes hand-in-hand with her distance. Being cool to people will deter them, she has found, and if they don’t want to be around her, they won’t want to be close with her. Most importantly, if they don’t want to be close, then they can’t hurt or betray her.[/ul]
History: Reginald Smith and Líadáin McCoy met in the nineties. Both were Hogwarts alumni, though they hadn’t been in the same year (he was roughly three years her senior), Reginald an English Slytherin half-blood and Líadáin an Irish Hufflepuff muggleborn. Most said it was doomed from the start, but with love leading them, they married just a year after they had met. Their affections blinded them to each other’s faults – Reginald was controlling and self-absorbed, while Líadáin was frail and meek. It truly wasn’t meant to be, with him restricting and dictating her every move, and her gradually too weak to fight him. They hadn’t even been married three years, when their first and only child was born. The pregnancy was hard; the little one was born two months prematurely, and nearly all of what life remained within Líadáin had been sucked out.
As the child was a girl, Reginald turned up his nose at her. She would not inherit his position as Lord (he also carried muggle blue blood), she would not inherit his seat in the House of Lords, and she would not receive anything from his estate upon his death. Fearful that the beloved child she had almost died to bring into this world would end up with nothing, Líadáin committed her one and only act of rebellion. A few months after her daughter Aoife was born, when her husband was away on a business trip to the continent, she contacted her father. Liam McCoy had become a Catholic priest and moved to America between then and the time of his late wife Saoirse’s death in 1994, and was overjoyed to hear from his daughter again after over six years. Gladly, he agreed to take in Aoife, should anything happen to Líadáin; he was no fool, and would not delude himself into believing that his daughter would live much longer.
He simply resolved to love her and his granddaughter for as long as she was still alive. Leaving his post in New York, Liam was temporarily assigned to the local Catholic church in the city of Carlisle, allowing him to be close to his girls. This proved to be none too soon; by the time Aoife was a year old, Líadáin was spending most of her time in the hospital, and little at home. Less than four years later, during which time little Aoife and Liam bonded and became very close, Líadáin passed away. The next four years were spent negotiating behind closed doors to have Aoife’s guardianship transferred over to Liam, just as Líadáin had wanted. Reginald was not a caring man, but he did not relinquish his property easily, and so he made the process as difficult on the old priest as he could. Even if he only wanted simple things – Aoife would take her mother’s maiden name, and neither of them would ever contact him again; they would effectively cease to exist – the Lord enjoyed watching the old man struggle.
In the end, however, everything was decided, and Liam returned to New York with nine-year-old Aoife in tow. The first thing he did, was to register Aoife for her last two years of elementary school, along with working out special dispensation from the Church to care for her, as he was her only living (and only legal) relative. Their first year together was actually quite rocky, once all the paperwork (magical, muggle, and religious) was taken care of. Aoife was close with Liam; that wasn’t the issue. It was everyone else she refused to let close. She even once broke a boy’s nose by punching him when he tried to talk to her. Clearly, there was something wrong, and her accidental magic was reacting to it. Not wanting to have anything get any worse, Liam found a magical, woman psychiatrist for Aoife to go see, to try and help her cope with everything she had been through.
The second year went more smoothly; though Aoife retreated from her peers on the whole, she managed to gain a few acquaintances. Despite coming from England, Aoife quickly picked up the accent of their predominantly Irish neighborhood, something Liam always suspected that she had done on purpose to feel as if she belonged more, as if she fit in more. With the mild, time-release sedatives she had been proscribed helping her control her impulses, Aoife looked forward to attending Ilvermorny. Her first year was rough as well, as it was the first time she had been away from her grandfather for more than a few days for as far back as she could remember. When her outbursts became too much, Liam was informed, and Aoife’s psychiatrist was brought in once more. Though she finished out her first year on a bad note, the summer provided more intense therapy.
She returned to her Wampus House and cedar wand with a unicorn hair core for her second year more and better equipped to deal with both herself and her schooling. (A very mild, time-release antipsychotic and mood stabilizer had been proscribed for her to take in the mornings and in the evenings.) The next four years passed relatively quietly. Aoife got good grades, she excelled at Quidditch, and she had even managed to gain a few close friends who didn’t judge her for her past or emotional hindrances. Over the years her dosages of medication had stabilized as well, along with the kinds she needed to take; by the time she was fifteen, everything was smoothed out, and for he first time…
For the first time, Aoife felt like she actually knew what it meant to be happy.
