Post by pepperpad on Apr 27, 2010 22:29:02 GMT -5
erika mackenzie henry
Oceanic Flight 192 Ship Manifest - - - -
Ticket purchased for ERIKA MACKENZIE HENRY, at the age of NINETEEN.
Her last residence was CHESTNUT HILL, MASSACHUSETTS
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age: nineteen
date of birth: august twenty-fifth
eye color: blue
hair color: blonde
height: 5'10"
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(The first great big chunk is just copy and pasted from my previous bio. If you'd like me to do it over, just say so. ^^)
Born on August twenty-fifth some nineteen years ago, Erika was the only child of Dr. Simon Henry and his younger wife, Elizabeth Morris-Henry. She was the blue eyed blonde baby of the couple’s dreams, and was showered with attention from the moment of her birth. Aunts, uncles, cousins, and especially her two living grandparents (Sawyer Morris and Therese Henry), doted over the child for the first few days of her life. The inexperienced couple had many more experienced family members to help them cope with the new addition to their family (Erika had seventeen cousins in total but only six pairs of aunts and uncles.)
Her situation did not change much as she grew older. Everyone spoiled her in her family, and even by her teachers who loved her calm but eager personality. Her classmates probably could have called Erika a teacher’s pet more than once, but she got along well with almost everyone and any rumors about the teacher’s supposed favoritism on Erika faded quickly. As she aged with her peers, Erika took a position of leader among them. She was never lonely, always invited to the parties that she herself did not host, and was absolutely never left out of anything.
High school didn’t change things much for Erika. Some of her closest friends went to different high schools for grade nine, but on the first day of school Erika could be seen going up to random grade nine’s and saying ‘Hi, I’m Erika. What’s your name?’ in the simple, perky tone that everyone who knew her knew so well. Probably because of her friendly nature on that first day of high school, Erika gained even more friends though her group of buddies was not as tightly packed as it had been in grade eight and lower because there were more students in high school.
When cheer leading tryouts came around in late September of grade nine, Erika was one of the first grade nines to try out. She had been in gymnastics when she was younger, and though she quit when she was in grade seven, her love for the sport still remained. When her flexibility from gymnastics was combined with her enthusiasm, Erika made a great cheerleader.
Throughout her high school years, Erika became increasingly aware of how much her parents expected of her. The grades expectations were not extremely hard. Erika had understood from a young age that her parents expected her to be diligent in school and to get grades that reflected her attention. What she noticed in high school was that the joking 'suggestions' her father had made as she grew up about her pursuing a career in medicine were not really suggestions at all. He wanted her to choose a job related to medicine, and Erika felt like she had no choice. At first she tried to jokingly make suggestions of other careers she could follow. She'd always been interested in art, and was more interested in art history than she had ever been interested in a medical field. However, whenever she brought up another career choice with her father, he took it as a joke and always made some remark on how her future career in medicine would be so much better. By grade eleven Erika had given in and chosen a career in nursing, the most interesting medical field to her, which satisfied her father's desires.
Grade twelve went by like a blur for Erika. The rush of being at the top of the school, or soon heading off to a new stage of life, overtook her and everyone else in her grade. The weekends were full of parties, and the weekdays were full of cramming for tests that would secure their future. Erika did well on every test, easily insuring herself a spot at Boston College.
This summer she decided to try something different, and so she signed up to go on the research trip to New Zealand. She though it would be a wonderful opportunity to learn and experience another area of the world (she had never left the U.S.). Unfortunately she has gotten a bit more than she bargained for...
(Hehe, I don't think that histories were especially needed, but I find it easier to get a hold of a character if I have a history for them set out.)
Erika is a very gentle individual. The stereotypical image of a cheerleader is often a cold ice queen, especially when they also happened to be popular at their school. Erika proved that image wrong, which might have been why she was so popular. She is probably the sweetest people you will ever meet; Erika is under one of those ‘don’t judge a book by its cover’ impressions that some people find endearing and others find annoying. She tries to include and interact with everyone, and doesn’t like anyone to be left out. She’s usually a pretty mellow person; in fact, she’s almost always a mellow person. Anger is not an emotion she shows rarely; even when she feels it she does her best to hide it. Some people might consider her ‘perfect’ personality to be entirely fake, but it’s not. Erika just looks at the best things in life, and tries to encourage and help others to do the same.
On the island I can see Erika trying to help out all the time to the point where her presence is annoying to some. She’ll always be eager to do anything others ask, especially if that other is Jay or (somewhat) Dorrian because of her feelings towards them. I don’t think that she would have any enemies, others may not like her, but she wouldn’t truly hate anyone. The only person that she wouldn’t put 100% effort into getting along with would be Sam because Erika resents her for the bond she shares with Jay. I can also see Erika being incredibly naive and oblivious sometimes. She wants to see the best of every situation, so she’ll often just ignore the bad points in life and miss some crucial facts while she does it.
I want to play Erika because I know from experience that the least dramatic characters are often the best to play. I find the idea of her, the more ‘innocent’ person among a group of people who all have a million problems and secrets in their lives, intriguing, which makes her my favorite canon. I also know, that as weird as it sounds, I usually have more muse for the more ‘normal’ characters, which is always useful in advanced RPs. Any extra bit of muse that leads to a better post counts, right?
What I can bring to the table... Well, activity first of all. When I commit to a site I really do commit. Beat me over the head with a sledgehammer if I go missing for more than two days without any mention of an absence. I'm also friendly and supportive (at least, I like to think I am. =P I'm bound to be a bit biased seeing as I'm me) and actually, I can be really energetic and (my friends tell me) hilarious sometimes. As for why I think you should pick me... Well, basically all of the above reasons. Energy, activity, friendliness, humor... and I really love this character. I know, it's one of the most cliched reasons ever. "I like this so I should get it", but it's true. Anyway, anything else I say would just be repetitive, so I'll shut up before I annoy you.
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So, the only thing that I believe has changed now is why I want to play her, which now has the added extra bit of my having RPed Erika before. Honestly, I love this character to pieces. She, and the community here, are the reasons why I kept checking up on The Island even after it died. I'd really love it if you would give me the opportunity to RP her again.
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RP experience: nearly six years
how did you find us?: I have these website as one of my favourites, and I've been checking back on it every day for the last few months.
age: nineteen
gender: female
rp sample:It was too early to get up. That was the one thought in Erika's mind as her conscience began to prod her to life after rest. Her head was ringing with exhaustion, she couldn't form a coherent thought, and she was pretty sure that she had fallen asleep on her leg because it was screaming abuse at her to the point of mind wracking pain. She ignored the feeling, too groggy to even consider moving her body and giving her leg some relief. Once I fall asleep again, it'll shut up. Might be a bit stiff in the morning, but that's fine. She tried to focus on one thing, but her mind was jumping around from different topics and the only thing she could come close to focusing completely on was how her brain wasn't working right because of exhaustion. Hadn't she just gone to bed? Yes, she was sure of it. No one woke up only a few minutes after they fell asleep. If they did, that person had serious issues and might want to go see a doctor.
Erika lay completely motionless, her blonde hair was tied back in a ponytail but it had been somehow flipped during her sleep to hand across her face, clinging to her nose whenever Erika breathed in. She must have been exhausted last night. She never fell asleep with her hair tied back in anyway in fear that it would ruin her hair. What had she been doing last night anyway? Had there been a party? Erika was slowly adjusting to consciousness, now able to focus on more things than her exhaustion. Maybe she hadn't gotten home until the early morning last night. That would explain why she had fallen asleep in her clothes. The texture of the skinny jeans on her legs was much different and scratchier than the warm, soft neon green sweat pants she usually wore to bed. Must have been some party...
She was slowly becoming aware of an irritating buzzing sound in the air around her. It was some background noise that she was too sleepy to distinguish at the moment. Probably the sound of her parents moving around, getting ready for a day at work. Maybe it was only three AM and her mom was heading off to the gym like she sometimes did. That was possible. All thoughts disappeared from Erika's mind for a moment as she tried to fall back asleep and ignore the pain in her leg that was only increasing with every passing second.
Wait.
If Erika had been more alert, every muscle in her body probably would have stiffened with a sudden tension that went with her realization. She hadn't slept at her parent's house in over a year. She had her own apartment now, and her neighbor, an old lady with at least ten cats, never made any noise. Maybe it was the person on the floor below hers? No, that couldn't be either. Erika had never heard them make any noise. Whatever the source of the disturbance was, it was getting really annoying as more time went on.
Erika could tell that sleep was no longer an option. Her leg and current state of consciousness just wouldn't allow it. She sighed and relaxed her eyelids and was immediately startled by the amount of light that shone through. Did I neglect to turn my light off last night? She waited a total of three seconds to let her eyes adjust before cracking one open and immediately come to the conclusion that life did not make sense. There should not be a suitcase lying on her right with the top open and contents spilling out. There should not be another human with his eyes closed and a gash across his forehead lying only a few feet away from her. Most of all, she should not be lying on a sandy grass area with the sun glaring down on her body and an intense heat coming from somewhere nearby.
When those facts sunk in, however, the world fell to Hades.
In a matter of milliseconds the past day came back to her in a rush. Her excitement at this amazing trip and finally leaving the U.S.A. Laughing with a random person on the plane who sat next to her close to the cockpit as they took off, falling asleep with her seat belt off, waking up to panic and screams as the plane plummeted to the ground at increasing speeds, realizing a bit too late that she wasn't strapped in, a loud sound and a jarring jerk, and then nothing. It didn't take a genius, or even a fully conscious nursing student, to realize that there had been a plane crash, and a rather bad one at that.
Erika too a second to calm herself, to convince herself that everything here was a dream. No, it was a nightmare. Her body was stiff and sore, she must have been somehow thrown from the plane which meant that the plane had split apart in the crash. Erika closed her eyes tightly together and rolled her head back against the ground like she had when she was young and wanted to go back to sleep from a bad dream. It had always worked then. It wasn't working now. There was no way that this was real, though. Plane crashed happened in movies, on TV shows- but... weren't you not supposed to feel pain when you were sleepy? With every second that passed the pain in her leg was increasing, screaming for her attention. Erika opened her blue eyes again, squinting against the light, and lifted her forehead to look down at her right leg. It was bent at an odd angle that screamed 'broken!' Erika bit her lip to keep from crying out at the sight and immediately passed out.[/ul][/size][/font]