Name: Romaine Maartje Placide
Nickname: Mary, mostly. But she prefers to be called Romaine.
Age: 27
Birthday: January 25
Sign: Aquarius
Gemstone: Lapis lazuli
Blood Type: B-
Fav. Food: Wildberry poptarts, weak tea
Hated Food: Particularly rich foods, especially cheesy things
Occupation: Hobbies: Entomology -- Romaine really loves bugs, but only specific kinds: moths, beetles, and butterflies. She took to catching them and preserving them very quickly. Her collection is rapidly growing, lured in by her burgeoning collection of dried flowers. She hates spiders and aphids, though, and is very good at smashing them.
Poetry -- Romaine is a great lover of TS Eliot, Homer, and Housman--none of which have much to connect them, she knows--and spends a lot of her time in her local library branch with a giant volume cracked open in her lap. She has also stolen several anthologies from the library, which are stacked in bookshelves made of wooden milk crates that she stole from behind a bake shop. There are some books she has acquired legitimately, but they aren't many, and tend to be the Barnes & Noble Greatest Hits variety of the classics. She sometimes tries to write poetry, but though she knows a lot of words, her grasp of concepts such as rhyme and meter are off.
Abstract art -- But only some kinds. Seriously. Jackson Pollock can get ********, but Valerie Hegarty and Kevin Francis Gray are just her speed. While she also likes to look at classical paintings, she really prefers the more modern works--she feels they are meant to invoke deeper concepts than "and this is a portrait of the Marquise de Whoever and his sister, Lady Whatever, with their dog".
Virtues: Erudite -- Romaine's vocabulary, if written down, could probably wrap around the earth several times. She is a living, walking thesaurus-and-dictionary, with a head full of complex grammatical concepts and arcane word roots. She has a quotation for every occasion (though she can never source them) and can lie like a rug. While this sometimes makes her seem awkward and difficult-to-understand, it also makes her the ideal tutor for English assignments. In addition, she can use big technical words to bluff her way through pretty much anything (with prior warning). She sounds smart and confident, and that's really what you need to be a good con woman. So, if you need someone to bullshit and obfuscate you somewhere you shouldn't be, she's pretty much perfect for that.
Social - Romaine is still very much a people person. She likes to be around people, and genuinely cares for the welfare of those around her. She is pleasant and carries conversations well, and enjoys going to parties. Her confidence in her interpersonal skills doesn't come from a specific source, not anymore, but she's cultivating it and her knowledge of her peers. Romaine's idea of a good time is a classy dinner party and remembering people's birthdays. Right now, her ability to have classy dinner parties is limited to sandwiches on clearance plates, but she's working on it.
Flaws: Enabler -- She needs to be needed. Romaine considers it in her best interests to keep people reliant on her for whatever it is she has that they don't--so if she's helping you out by cooking, you having a meal with someone else will piss her right off. If you depend on her for money, she'll sulk when you get a job. While she might b***h and moan over someone always venting to her, she doesn't want them to cry on someone else's shoulder. Romaine would rather someone always came to her than to anyone else. She is the kind of person who would buy a friend crack cocaine if it meant that they needed her over anyone else.
Confidence Man -- Romaine has a big vocabulary and the kind of aura people trust from a woman. She comes across as someone who wouldn't wish harm on the lowest earthly creature. As she gains more knowledge and more confidence, though, her scruples--the ones that say she shouldn't lie to people to get them to like her--begin to disappear. If Romaine wants a job, she'll do the research and lie to get it. If she wants money, she'll play people against each other to get it. Romaine is of the perspective that since she's very much on her own, she's not responsible for others (unless she wants to be). Only idiots dive face-in. She can't be trusted to keep your secrets, and if you fall into her trap it's your own damn fault.
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