#accepted:barbara

[bloodinhershoesrpg]

Congratulations Becky, you have been accepted for the role of Barbara Donne with a faceclaim change to Kat McNamara! Your application was the first I read over and to say it provided a great start would be, quite frankly, an understatement. I am absolutely enamoured with how perfectly her struggles and reasoning for being who she is to date resonated within your app, how vividly you have portrayed the many facets of Barbie and how well they harmonise within your writing which I can’t wait to see liven up the dash soon! Please send in your account with 24 hours and have a look at the checklist before you do!

REGARDING YOURSELF

Name / Age / Pronouns: Becky, 19, she/her.

Activity: Activity is subject to heavy fluctuation (anywhere from a 4-7), depending a lot on my uni schedule and when my tests are. However, I always will ask for a hiatus when it’s necessary and let anyone playing with me know what sort of activity they can expect from me.

REGARDING THE STAR OF YOUR SHOW

Character name and faceclaim: Barbara Donne – with a FC change to Kat McNamara? :)

CHARACTER DISSECTION

BARBARA. Hailing from the Greek word barbaros, meaning foreign or strange - she’s always figured that she had been named aptly. Always an outsider, always a stranger, even in her own skin, she takes comfort in Saint Barbara, in her strength. She knows how the story goes: every wound inflicted upon her healed, every fire brought near her skin extinguished. But she knows how the story ends and sometimes, in the dead of night, Barbie wonders if she’ll end up like her: end up the martyr, end up the sacrifice, with the insides of her veins painting the ground. ANAIS. French for grace, her middle name always seemed like a taunt to her – in her former years, she had always been lacking grace, been too much raw power and not enough silk covered elegance. But in recent years, she has lived up to it, coating her movements with an old world finesse like a second skin, moving through the ranks without a ripple, leaving onlookers always confused as to where she came from and how she ascended. (Surely, she cannot deserve it.) DONNE. Rooted in Irish mythology as Donn, the god of the dead – her last name always felt like a little bit of a promise, and a little bit of a curse.

PERSONALITY. Who were you before the world told you who you had to be? Barbie thinks she remembers being soft, being kind in the beginning – and part of it stems from her looks. She was born with delicate features, handpainted on a canvas of porcelain, doe eyes that changed with the context of her background (green in the woods, golden on cloudless mornings, honeyed hazel in the pale afternoon light), and hair so bright it was only rivaled by her smile. When people saw her, small and lithe and fragile, flighty in essence, a little dove that alighted in the palm of their hand, it was hard not to trust her, an impossibility to expect cruelty from her. And because the world craves sweet things, beautiful little souls, because it aches in constant hunger for a minute kindness, it swallowed her up, turned her softness into a warzone and layered her edges into knives.

So she remembers her obsidian mouth, flinty and stone cold but still beautiful – tongue cutting through skin so thinly, down at a molecular level, that most of the time, people didn’t even notice blood being drawn until they left, drained and cold. But she believes that everything has a purpose, and this portion of her life is no different. She remembers that it feels just as empty, just as painful, to be throwing words like punches as it does to receive them, and how truly heavy lies the head that bears the crown. She dissembles her weaponized empathy, sheds her cloak of cruelty – it never suited her well anyway.

So here she stands, bearing kindness around her neck like a cross on a chain, letting it glint and dangle in front of everyone, takes the shattered glass hate and grinds it to dust beneath the molars of her smile. She tastes war, heavy on the back of her tongue, and everyone knows the innocents are the first to go. But here’s the beauty of being delicate: when she shatters, all her broken little pieces will cut them right back. And everyone leaves none the wiser; everyone thinks that it’s their fault for breaking it in the first place. Everything has a purpose, everything is by design.

BACKSTORY.

i. dig up the bones

Her father likes to talk about the day she was born – about how when her mother finally had her after an exhausting eight hour labor, she had said, half delirious, “She will have a hard time of it.” He likes to talk about how her mother had cried and held her close after that, rocking her gently as tears dropped from the tops of her cheeks onto Barbara’s forehead. “She is so beautiful, and the world will not stand for it. Don’t argue with me. Just answer me this, my love: why do flowers wilt? Why do they wilt, when they should bloom forever?”

He has no answer for that question, and Barbara learns early on not to ask it.

But her mother is right, in the end. She spent her childhood tucked away and loved, hiding like a little mouse from the rest of the world, spoiled sweet to the core. But the world finds you eventually, and everything will come all at once.

It starts because her hair gleams like a halo of fire around her porcelain skin, and the kids at school tug at it and make fun of her for the translucence of her cheeks when blood rushes to the surfaces and matches her hair. They call her carrot-top and throw the baby carrots from their neatly packed lunches at her, and she finds out everything can hurt her, no matter what it is.

She goes home and cries in her room, cursing her hair and her fair skin and her thin frame. She wishes she were big and burly and tall, so no one would dare hurt her. She begs her father to let her take self-defense over dance, but can’t find her tongue when he asks why. So she channels her hurt and her anger into ballet – it makes her feel beautiful and strong, this tulle-layered corner of hers, far away from playground wounds. (All this hurt and loneliness and spite bites her in the ass one day, when they say her dancing is too much the raw provocateur and too little of the soft princess they’re looking for.)

Either way, her wishes aren’t heard, and this is how she learns the casual cruelty of children.

It changes in high school – while she’s not big and burly and tall, no one dares pick on her because her beauty becomes her sword and her armor. Boys who used to pull her pigtails find themselves wanting to tug her hair for different reasons, those who laughed at the easy blush of her cheeks covet how naturally color comes to her, and with time, they want to press bruises into her skin with their lips and not the packaged contents of their lunches.

She is a stroke of lightning upon her childhood tormentors, just how a vengeful god smote St. Barbara’s killer where he stood after her death. She hides wolf grins behind demure hands, sharp teeth snapping, blood-hungry. Is she not made from the gilded dust of monarchs of ages past, sitting pretty with a crown tipped on a bed of curls?

Payback feels like freedom until you stop and realise you’re still just as pissed as before.

ii. but leave the soul alone.

In the end, it’s love that unclasps the years of trauma she wore swathed around her delicate shoulders, that pulls her down from where she played judge, jury, and executioner in her academy. They find her in an empty training room, lights dimmed and pushed up against the mirror, only it’s not any of the boys they find her wound around, and the lipstick prints on her neck attest to that fact.

Barbie is all little red riding hood to Isa’s big bad wolf, and she’s homesick for a sixty second love, hungry for the sink of her canines.

She is quickly and swiftly ousted from the uppermost echelons of academy hierarchy, but she can’t bring herself to mind. (What she does mind are the slurs pressed in whispers behind her back, dyke dyke dyke.) So she goes back to drinking venom insults and letting it drip off her lips like honey instead, lets herself be repainted kind-bubbly-weak-Barbie, kind smiles reaching welcoming eyes, the Sistine Chapel amongst a sea of sinners, a safe harbor in a storm. She pats the seat next to her and her quick taps sound like welcome home, stay for a while.

CONNECTING THE DOTS

LINDSEY DAVIES. Barbie offers smiles and hugs like an olive branch, offering a friendship. With all the attention driven her way, the whispers plaguing her have abided, instead bitterly haunting Lindsey. They’re a strange duo, abrasive as Lindsey is – but they work surprisingly well. Barbie tries to be a cushion, a buffer of sorts, in social situations, working to smoothing the edges of Lindsey’s demeanor, acting like a balm in hostile situations. While she comforts those left in the wake of Lindsey, a small part of them rejoices to see them put in their place by her words.

CRISTINA REYES. Like attracts like, no? Despite how the rest cage around Cristina like she’ll pounce at any moment, expecting the flower to sprout a pair of fangs, Barbie edges closer and closer, curious to see what sort of kindness the other girl offers, and for what reason. After all, there’s an explanation for everything, and nothing comes without a reason.

REGARDING YOUR INSPIRATION

HEADCANONS.

PICK UP YOUR HEART ON THE WAY OUT. Barbara’s always been in the minority (her name taunts her, foreign, strange little Barbie). Statistically, less than 2% of the population possess either red hair or green eyes, not to even touch upon having both – she honestly doesn’t know why she expected to be part of the majority when it came to love. Boys have wanted her since middle school – since they discovered redhead was a porn category – but she has never wanted a boy; not in the same way they want her. She’s tried, really, she has, to convince herself that she wants them – she’s kissed many a boy feral and left them to scramble in her wake as she leaves. But let’s just say it straight: she’s not.

FAIR FOLK. Barbara doesn’t lie – much like the mythical fae of fables long forgotten, she only speaks in truths or not at all. Of course, this doesn’t stop her from concealing the whole truth, letting others falsely assume their own truths or speaking poison edged half truths. But a full on lie, she cannot and will not do.

NICOTINE FROM A SILVER SCREEN. It’s a stereotype, rail thin ballerinas who have a cigarette for dinner; but it’s the truth. It’s not uncommon to find her outside, white Insignia hanging off her lips, exhaling tobacco smoke like it’ll cleanse her.

ANIMAL PERCEPTION. Ever heard of a saying that animals have a sixth sense? Barbie bonds with animals of all kinds, offering birdseed in her palm, petting every dog or cat she comes across, and those who look at her and see undeserving written across her hiss in anger. Fuckin’ disney princess or some shit.

Thank you for reading! i would have written more but i’m also really guilty of always writing last minute apps; best wishes & really great job with everything even if i don’t get the part x

MOCK BLOG. https://barbiemocks.tumblr.com