InsaneJournal

Character Details:
Name: Mary Roper
Your photo-credit/PB: Anna Popplewell
Age: 21
Nationality: English
Allegiance and why: England, not that she's ever thought about anything like that. And if she did, it probably would be more about individual people or possibly what made the more romantic story, or if the king were standing in front of her looking very magnificent.
Social Status and/or Occupation: Nursemaid in the household of Lord William Stanley, but she swears she spends more time dodging Lord Stanley and his drunken cohorts than she does actually minding the children.
Brief physical description of your character: Mary's about 5'4, with long dark hair, big blue eyes and porcelain skin. It's a lethal combination when your employer is older, lecherous and inebriated constantly.
Brief description of your characters history, including family: She's the younger half-sister of Harry Fisher but he left the family when she was about 6. She adored him, and he left, and never came home again. She figured he must have died because right after that, papa (or at least the man she called papa- with their mother you could hardly be certain) got in a fight in some pub or other and never made it home. They said it was pure luck they even found his body. Of course, Ma had already taken up with Jon Darby (good friends with a man named Slater) and some nights he was sweet, but he was always yelling at Mary, and like as not he'd take the belt to her just for being in the room. She told herself stories of The Time Before, when Harry was there and Father… When she was 9, Jon kissed her. After that he started coming to her room at night. Mary disappeared into her daydreams. She couldn't tell you much from those years even if she wanted to- real things and false things got all mixed up.
Age 12, she got taken up as a helper for the nursemaid in the household of Sir George Elliott who had 5 children all under 6 (the babies were twins to their mother's horror). Ma and Jon disappeared somewhere in there, and Mary thought it was best to just thank the heavens for small favors rather than ask questions. She spent seven years with the Elliotts and then took a position with Lord and Lady Stanley just after she turned 19. There were only two children- girl and boy, 3 and 4 respectively, and both sweet as could be once Mary got their trust, and it was as happy an arrangement as you might picture what with Lady Stanley too busy fussing after some young man and Lord Stanley having much more fun abroad (or at least elsewhere) than he could at home.
About a year back, Lord Stanley took sick and decided he should come home. Ill-luck won out and he made a full recovery. Lady Stanley brought the children and Mary along with her to town but too late- Lord Stanley had caught sight of Mary. Worse, so had his friends. Mary's life has been one long effort to dodge their attentions ever since. Mary knows she has got to get out and fast. There's no way to fend them off forever, and if she's going to have to sleep with men, well, shouldn't she at least get fancy dresses and diamond necklaces? Ma told her something like that once. And… it would be nice if the men weren't drunk, sloppy, and old enough to be her father (and considering her mother, she has to admit it's a valid point that one of them might be).
She has decided that she's going to try seeing if she can get a job as an actress. What if she takes another job as nursemaid and finds another Lord Stanley? Anyway, she's useless in the kitchen, she's got no family and no way to make a good marriage. She could marry a butler she supposes, but… well, no.
Mary does have a tendency to rewrite things that happen in her mind so that they're prettier (Jon wasn't so bad, you know, he wasn't even there too often. Sweet man, he was; just liked to drink sometimes…). She entertains the children with stories, and leads them in elaborate games of make-believe; sometimes she strays into the game-world and just sort of stays. She smiles more when she's pretending to be somewhere else- that's how you can tell she's doing it (usually she's got a sad look about her- a perfect air for a tragedienne). She's a frighteningly good liar when she needs to be but don't ask her to fib about little things, she always bungles that. She's got a pragmatic streak – she's not going to sob mournfully about matters, she's going to come up with a way to get through it or simply pretend it's not there, depending. She's good at reading people's moods and body language and playing to them- making herself into whatever they want- a skill picked up from those years with Jon, but it can make it seem like her whole personality shifts.
One or two plots which you would like to play out in the community:
- Well, Mary and Harry should run into one another- her asking him for employment not knowing he's her older brother and it could always end up with her taking a job under Slater.
- She's going to need some polish and guidance if she's going to turn into a courtesan- but how to get it? Moreover, how to get it without Harry finding out?
- Mary's got the possibility to go a little crazy. She's just a bit, ah, broken as it is, and she's got the possibility of snapping.
- The good old revelation about actual parentage. Wouldn't it be hilarious if her father was the infamous Slater?