Emmaline Mellier
"Emmie", October 2015, by Avery Carrington
NameEmmaline Mellier
NicknamesEmmie (since childhood)
Age23
GenderFemale
OccupationGraduate student, linguistic anthropology, Yale University, New Haven, CT
(plus, works in the library)
Sexual OrientationHeterosexual
Relationship StatusIn a relationship with Avery Carrington
AppearanceIn daytime, she's merely pretty, but in darkness, Emmaline is beautiful.
Looked on by sunlight, she could be considered less attractive: Very pale skin, sharp features, covered in freckles, with vibrant, curly red hair that flew from her head in all directions. She sometimes has it cut, or styled, and it remains that way for a few days, but eventually it always growslong again, like the tide going out.
But when Emmie's backlit by sunset, the sharpness softens. The paleness becomes a welcome contrast to the steadily dying light. Even when she's simply dressed, even when she wears no makeup, when her hair is up and messy and there are lines beneath her eyes, Emmie is still beautiful. It's something about the way she moves, maybe, or the way her expression wavers as her eyes search her surroundings. Not that she's bookish, exactly. Emmie would be equally at home in a bar, or at a party, so long as the light is low. The way she speaks, and moves, and laughs are all suited to the evening, to a time that isn't meant for work.
It's almost strange to see her serious, or focused, since her bearing still makes it seem as if she ought to be smiling. She isn't loud, or effervescent; rather, she comes across with a kind of quiet, steady friendliness, an unassertive charisma that makes you want to stick with her. She has a nice singing voice, a smooth alto, though she rarely ever uses it. Her speaking voice is low, but not harsh. She just doesn't reach the registers some girls could. She whispers a lot, working in a library, but she always knows when she's doing it. She'd never forget herself and greet somebody in a volume lower or higher than she means to.
When she can (so, when she isn't working, which is rarely, these days), Emmie dresses to flatter herself. She prefers vintage clothing, but she follows changes in style as readily as anyone. Certainly, she knows how to make herself attractive, when she has the time. Maybe she's a little bit vain, but never so much that it eclipses the other things she cares about. As with everything, she carries her beauty quietly, not
wanting or expecting that anyone else would want to care.
PersonalityEmmie always seems okay. Even in her most painful, vulnerable moments, it looks like she's relaxed. She always has that easy smile, that light behind her eyes when she sees you. Only in her most absolutely pitiful, vulnerable moments, does she lose her pacificistic guise. It's hard to see under Emmie's surface, unless she wants you to.
This is not because Emmie is a bad person, or because she particularly enjoys being obsequious, or because she doesn't want people to get to know her. None of those things are really true. It's because Emmie doesn't trust that people who saw the inside would want to stay with her very long at all. The mind of Emmaline Mellier has the wry intellect and fierce dedication that one can see on the surface, true, but it also has layers of turmoil and uncertainty Emmie would rather remain hidden.
Though she was never hungry, or broke, or totally desolate (at least, until recently), Emmie's upbringing didn't instill in her a sense of confidence in the people around her. She grew up with the understanding that relationships between people tended to be about resources, and if you relied too heavily on somebody, eventually, you'd be too much in the red, too burdensome, and they'd abandon you. She knows she thinks this way, and she knows it's probably not true, and that conflict bothers her - but it isn't about logic. It's more ingrained then that.
The best way for her to survive, she figures, is to find somebody who's willing to care for her, and return that an order of magnitude of that devotion back to them. She's found that, at least, in Avery. She really, genuinely loves him - because he's smart, he's thoughtful, he's cute, but in no small part simply because of how he's been there for her over the time they've been dating. Emmie isn't sure where she would have ended up without him, but it wouldn't have been a good place. She doesn't show this dedication by doting on him, or fawning over him; what would be the point? Her ways are more subtle. It's knowing what he wants before he does. It's looking after his interests. It's making sure he's got what he needs, when he can't do that for himself. Over the past couple of years, Avery's grown to be one of the biggest parts of Emmie's life. If that isn't love, Emmie doesn't know what is.
Lucky for her, she's actually pretty happy about that.
Most of this isn't going to matter to you, a Carrington sibling (or parent, or close 'associate' of whatever kind), at least not at first. The determination and devotion doesn't come across until it has to; as she always has, Emmie fronts very well. The lengths she's willing to go for what she believes in will probably come as a surprise to you - until you get to know her better.
Likes- Avery
- Alt, punk, indie rock
- Those little tapioca pearl things
- Urban fantasy, graphic novels
- Sequels and reboots
- Feelings of unmitigated resentment
- The world being as it is, instead of how it ought to be
- Sardines
- Determined
- Impassioned
- Attentive
- Personable
- Self-deprecating
- Overzealous
- Uncompromising
- Self-righteous
- That she'll end up like her parents
- That she'll end up alone
- That she's weak
- That she's selfish
- Wears glasses or contacts
- Ambidextrous (cross-dominant)
- Preferred drink: Wine
- Preferred cocktail: Raspberry vodka tonic
- Favorite food: Pierogies (homemade)
- Favorite graphic novel: The Sandman
HistoryEmmie's parents, like so many others, never really got a long. The big difference between them and everybody else's families is that where one couple might have given up and divorced long ago, her parents always kept going. Emmie and her siblings (younger brother, older sister) never really understood why. Denial often reigned supreme in the Mellier household, to say nothing of passive-aggression: though her mother would rail against her father's long hours, she'd never complain once he was home. Though her father hated her mother's taste in food, clothes, books, and so on - everything, really - he never said a word about it. God help you if you brought the parents' disagreements up; nobody wanted things like that out in the open! It simply wasn't what one did.
When she was young, this state of affairs only bothered Emmie insofar as it concerned her. Family strife or no, she had a pretty decent childhood. She wasn't abused, or neglected; if there was one thing her parents actually agreed on somewhat, it was that they loved her. This state of affairs persisted until Emmaline became old enough to understand that the way her family behaved was far from universal. It was when she started to question the way things worked that trouble started.
At first, it was small things: She'd catch her mother in a hypocritical comment, or she'd remind her father of one of the many occasions or conversations he so often forgot. But over time, it got bigger, and Emmie became more and more convinced her family was an elaborate charade. Her parents, in turn, found her increasingly ungrateful - always arguing, sometimes spiteful, never showing them the friendly, lovely girl she was towards everybody else.
It got worse as Emmie got older. She grew farther from her siblings, too. They didn't want to see their parents splitting up. They were willing to sacrifice, in Emmie's words, sanity for harmony. (They called this phrasing melodramatic and unfair.) Emmie left to study at Yale, and that seemed like it would be the end of it. Confined to breaks and downtimes, she and her family could mostly stand each other. Well-off as they were, the Melliers didn't see a need for student loans. They funded Emmie's schooling directly; they'd done so for her sister, after all, so they had to treat her the same way, even if she didn't always deserve it.
Emmie's first two years of school were an incredible experience for her. She branched out. She learned things, met people. She joined a sorority. She might not have had all the answers - what was she going for, majoring in history, for one thing? - but there were enough facets and functions in her life that she didn't have to care. Near the start of her junior year, she met a boy at a party; Avery Carrington. They had one short interaction, as he was deciding to leave, up against the wall in a dimly lit back room, but Emmie was smitten. She knew next to nothing about him: She'd learned he was a photographer, a student, but that he was planning to stay in New Haven after he graduated, to work.
She didn't know about the money, or the family. She didn't know what it meant to be a Carrington. When she found out - which was only much later - she didn't really care. Avery, the person, was what mattered. Emmie was convinced from that first moment, but he wouldn't be so easily swayed. She found mutual friends, convinced them to set up a date. They met for coffee. She talked, he listened. On the second date, she made him be the one to make conversation. It was easier than he'd thought it would be. They kept going out.
They'd been dating for about three months when Emmie's familial luck ran out. A disastrous Thanksgiving ended with her practically outcast from the Mellier household. Even now, she hesitates to think on it, to go back over it in her head. She bottles it up, trying to ignore the things she said, the things her parents said. Trying to forget her father, cheating on her mother with a guest in their own house. Trying not to care that her mother, when confronted with this, had dismissed it. Had blamed her, Emmaline, for telling, for putting the truth first, for doing what she always did.
In her weakest moment, Emmaline had found her pity replaced with hatred, and she'd done and said things she couldn't take back. She'd returned to New Haven with nothing, all familial support withdrawn. No more tuition, no more board in the sorority house, nothing but her medicore scholarship and the return plane ticket. They'd have taken that, too, if they could have, but the reservation had been round-trip. In the days and weeks that followed, she wondered which of them were crueler: Her parents, for casting her out, or her, for believing them capable of doing it?
Her reserves - emotional and otherwise - were gone. She didn't bother with classes; why should she, when she wasn't going to make it back next semester? She took a job in the library, making minimum wage, but most days, she could barely get through it. Most days, she wanted to curl up and do nothing. She wasn't herself, and she didn't see a way back to that girl again. The determination that had always burned inside her was gone, it had packed up and moved out, she thought, and there was nothing to replace it.
The only constant was Avery. In a time where everything was changing, where nothing seemed stable or certain, he was always there. He didn't complain, he didn't turn away. He stayed. By the end of it, he was the only one. There were more painful nights and wasted days than Emmie cared to think about before she began to reemerge, but Avery got her through them all. She still didn't know about his family, the realities of his life, until he offered to pay for her tuition.
She tried to refuse, but he kept bringing it up - more specific, and more unrelenting than she'd ever seen to be about anything - until finally, she accepted. It was three semesters. It was a lot of money. He hardly seemed to notice. They moved in together. In time, Emmaline felt the determination and drive returning. She started to care again. He was there to help her do it.
For those weeks, Emmie decided, she was his. Not for the money, that had only come later, but for all of it. He deserved to be given the kind of support he'd shown her. He deserved somebody who loved him that much.
Maybe she was romanticizing it. Maybe she was wrong, in her memories of that time, or in her appraisal of him. She considered these things, but she didn't care. She'd take that risk. If even a fraction of how she felt about him came from what was real, it would be worth it.
They'd been dating for a year and a half when the Christmas invitation came. It seemed bizarre to her: This much effort for the whole family? But Avery said they had to go - he didn't seem to think this was an offer that could be refused. Emmaline didn't know what to expect, and she wasn't looking forward particularly to finding out. In her experience, nothing good had ever started with family.
EducationHigh School - Caroline Edwins High School, Hopkins, Indiana
Undergraduate - B. A., History, minor in Linguistics, Yale University
A MemoryThe floor was hardwood, and the room was empty. Emmie sat in the middle, against the front window, and stared out over the rainy street. Their new apartment was spacious, and surprisingly cheap, not that Avery cared. That was probably because it was over a barbershop, on a busy, three-way street corner. The building was old, but well-maintained, and even unfurnished their new home was gorgeous. The floorboards were straight and polished, the walls smooth and clean. It didn't feel like a home, yet, but it certainly semed like a place that could become one.
Emmie ought to have been happy, she thought. Dayenu, surely it was enough. But she could hear her father's voice in those words, a prayer from a faith she'd never held. It was funny (sad-funny) how many little memories there were. So much of her life was tied to her family; reminders of them snaked into every facet of her day. She'd walk down the street, and see their faces reflected in store windows. She'd go to the grocery store, and hear her mother, cautioning this or that. Everything she did reminded her of them just a little, suffocating her with a thousand paper-thin layers of cloth.
There were things in this place that reminded her of them - but at least there were only a few. Mostly, this place spoke to her of Avery. She'd thought he would like it, even before he'd seen it, because it was like him: in the middle of everything, but above it, in this case literally. A place to watch and observe, but not participate. She didn't know how fair a representation of him that was, but she liked it. It felt right.
Of course, he probably would have agreed to whichever apartment she'd most liked. He was always doing things like that. It worried her, a little, because she wanted to see him happy, but mostly she loved him for it.
She heard him come in, his new set of keys turning in the lock. The movers wouldn't be far behind him, coming with a truck full of their newly combined possessions. Emmie stood up, suddenly feeling a tad childish for sitting on the floor, brushing herself off. She wore only a thin white shirt (with a black bra underneath) and leggings. She'd washed her hair, but wore no other makeup. She only turned around once he was behind her, so that she could fold herself into his chest and reach up for a gentle kiss.
"Hey you," she said.
"Hey," he said. He offered her a little half-smile, a sign she had learned to take as boding well.
"They'll be here soon?" Emmie asked.
"They said about twenty minutes," Avery said.
"Okay," Emmie said. She looked over at the window, and back down at the street. Avery was quiet. She used to be afraid of his quiet, his disinterest in idle conversation, but now she liked it. There was no judgment in his silence. "I was just watching the rain," she said. "Wanna sit with me?"
"Sure," Avery said. Emmie sat back down, and crossed her legs, and he went with her. She leaned back, pressing herself against him. He rubbed her shoulders gently. Together, they sat and stared and listened to the rain.
Birthday14th of February, 1992
Social MediaTwitter - @ohemmaline - inactive since August 2013
Tumblr - ohemmaline dot tumblr dot com - active. Mostly art and litrary stuff.
No Facebook or Instagram account since August 2013.
JJ Doe
