Isadora Escalante
- People who know her call her Isa
Age 22
Gender - Female
Occupation - Saloon worker
Appearance - Isadora is lightly tanned, with caramel-colored skin and warm brown eyes. She has dark, chocolate-colored hair that is naturally curly and falls in ringlets. Her thick hair ends just past her shoulder blades. Isadora is of an average height and is on the thinner side. She more often than not pulls her hair back into a high ponytail since it tends to get everywhere when left hanging loose. Isadora's hands are rough and calloused from years of scrubbing floors and washing dishes and doing the laundry. Her brown eyes are full of mirth and her lips are almost always quirked up in a playful smile.
Height - 5 feet and 5 inches
Weight - 115
Apparel - When she is not working, Isadora usually settles for a plain yet flattering dress made from linen or cotton. She favors lighter colors that go well with her skin tone and eyes/hair, especially a deep forest green that brings out her eyes. She also likes to add small ornamentation to her attire by embroidering hems and making something by herself. Isadora can also be seen in prairie skirts.
When she is working, Isadora likes to wear clothing that is brighter and more eye-catching, and on special occasions Isadora goes all-out. She likes getting all dolled up and jumps at any opportunity to wear something nice.
Weaponry - The only weapons that Isadora carries with her are a pair of plain, unadorned daggers-one is usually in the bodice of her dress, and the other one is concealed underneath her skirts. She decided when she first began working that it would be prudent to have some sort of weaponry with her in the case of more...unsavory patrons.
Equipment - Isadora usually carries a couple of needles and a bit of thread with her, as well as a scrap of cloth and a couple of plain hairpins that she typically ends up using to tie her hair back and to keep her curls out of her face. She also will have a couple of coins with her, just in case of an emergency.
Skills -
*Isadora is an expert in mending clothing, from silk dresses to roughspun aprons. She has plenty of experience with a needle and thread as well, and has a penchant for embroidery, although she does not frequently embroider due to her current circumstances
*Isadora grew up helping her oldest sister cook for three younger siblings and a handicapped mother. She can whip out a meal from anything and everything, granted that you don't mind the taste of it too much
*Some may call her sneaky, but Isadora thinks of it as having a "good sense of hearing". Isadora is a big eavesdropper and is quite skilled at remembering important tidbits of information and random rumors that she hears on the streets
*Isadora is able to clean and do laundry fairly well
*Although Isadora doesn't look like much at a first glance, she's quick and light on her feet-even in floor-length skirts
*One of Isadora's favorite past-times is dancing; not ballroom dancing, but spontaneous dances with fast music and faster steps.
Flaws -
*Despite what she might say, Isadora is downright nosy. Not only that, she is a gossip who couldn't keep her mouth shut if her life depended on it
*Isadora is rash and can be hot-tempered when provoked
*Isadora has never learned to ride a horse or shoot a gun properly. Her general knowledge of firearms amounts to "point the barrel away from you and press the trigger"
*Isadora is flighty and tends to have a very short attention span. People have also characterized her as "frivolous" and "shallow"
*Isadora hates being told what to do when it comes to her personal life. She can be headstrong and unyielding if she has set her mind on something, even if she sees how the other side could be logical
Personality - Isadora is generally an outgoing and friendly person. She always has a bright smile or cheerful greeting for people she knows. She can be rather impulsive and doesn't always think things through. Isadora lives life in the moment and would rather focus on the present than anticipate the future or brood on the past. She is lively and vivacious-she lives to laugh and loves to live. Isadora is quick to anger but she is also quick to forgive and forget, and she firmly believes that life is much too short to hold petty grudges. Isadora has a knack for remembering everything she hears, especially anything that she deems especially important. She is also quite the conversationalist, willing to talk to anyone and everyone-and she just can't seem to keep her big mouth shut. Isadora is an avid gossiper and knows the dirt on seemingly everyone in town, and she's not afraid to share the information she knows. Isadora can be witty and playfully teasing and even flirtatious and coy if the situation calls for it. Isadora is headstrong and willful and hates being told what to do when it comes to matters that concern her personal life, much to the vexation of her mother and older sister. She is perceptive and good at guessing the thoughts, feelings, and intentions of others, and Isadora is keenly aware of her surroundings.
At the core of her personality, Isadora is ferociously loyal to her family and friends. She may be blabbing about Jane cheating on John for all to hear, but you will never hear a word from her about her own mother and siblings if she doesn't want to talk about them.
Backstory - Isadora was born and raised in Soursprings. She has never been beyond five miles of the town. Her mother, Rita, was married to a white man who abandoned her not long after Isadora was born. Rita herself was born in Soursprings, although both of her parents were born in Mexico. Isadora never even got her father's name out of her mother, although according to her older sister who still vaguely remembered their father-Elena-he had blonde hair and brown eyes. Rita would always dismiss questions about her first husband with an impatient gesture and a "don't-you-have-anything-better-to-do?" glare. Rita married Manuel Escalante when Isadora was three, and Isadora soon had three younger siblings-twins Maria and Rosa, followed by Carlos. Unfortunately, Manuel died of a heart attack when Isadora was ten, and Rita succumbed to an unknown illness that left her crippled and unable to walk a year after Manuel died. It fell to fifteen-year-old Elena and eleven-year-old Isadora to raise their siblings.
Elena had always been the dutiful and obedient sibling. Isadora, on the other hand, was willful and wild. When they were younger, while Elena brushed her hair properly and followed all the rules like a proper young lady, Isadora was running through town barefoot with dirt streaked across her face and smashing the rules to pieces. After Rita fell ill, however, Isadora cleaned up her act. The Escalantes were far from wealthy, and with Manuel dead and Rita crippled, they had no steady income coming in. Rita took on whatever odd jobs she could to bring in some money. Elena herself soon got a job and spent most of her time working. Isadora, who was still too young to be hired, began to take over the household chores. She cooked, cleaned, and did laundry while yelling across the street for Maria and Rosa to "leave the poor horse alone, for Chrissake!".
It was not until Isadora was around fourteen or fifteen that she began to work herself. She very quickly found a job in the local saloon-Burnside-owned by a certain Joshua Darwell. At first, she was stuck in the kitchens washing dishes and scrubbing floors, but as she grew older Isadora was allowed to work in the dining area. That was when she became more conscious of her general appearance and began to take after Elena in her concern for her clothing. Isadora differed from Elena in that she found most of the "acceptable" clothing for her age and gender much too stuffy and boring. She was always looking for ways to spice things up a little, and she even managed to get the wife of the owner of the general store to teach her some basic embroidery.
The saloon was a whole new experience for Isadora. She had grown up living in a ramshackle house with cramped rooms and chaotic clutter and young children always underfoot. In the saloon, Isadora was faced for the first time with a sense of order. Isadora enjoyed working in the saloon-even if she
did have to scrub floors and wash dishes and wipe down furniture, at least she could do it without small children running around willy nilly and getting in the way-and she especially enjoyed listening to random snatches of conversation as she poured drinks and collected empty glasses. She silently listened to stories of the fantastical and the mundane and the morbid, filing away anything particularly noteworthy for the future. She listened to soldiers talking about the war, young women discussing the latest fashions from England, deputies and sheriffs recounting feats of extreme daring and courage and farmers predicting how good the harvest would be for the upcoming year. Isadora listened and remembered, and if there was a subject that was of a special interest to her, she would sometimes interject with a few sentences herself.
In the last couple of years, Isadora has begun to converse with patrons a lot more, and the people in town know to go to Burnside if they want to catch up on the latest news. The saying goes that if Joshua Darwell doesn't know, Isa will be happy to help. Indeed, Isadora may know much and more about matters of actual importance, but she always enjoys regaling listeners with tales of how Mary had been cheating on her husband Joe for ten years with a man who lived in Chicago, or how Sue and Beth are no longer friends because Sue made a snide remark about Beth's expensive brand-new dress imported from New York.
Recently, Elena and Rita have been getting on Isadora's case about marrying a suitable man and settling down as well, especially after Elena married the older brother of a family friend-Pablo-and moved in with him. Isadora scoffs at that. She certainly has not had a lack of suitors with her infectious laugh and lively eyes, but Isadora is by no means ready to get married and have children. She would rather have a taste of everything before deciding, so to speak.
