Post by Aussie on Apr 2, 2018 20:14:35 GMT -6
“You call that a blind stitch?”
NAME
Paige Patel
AGE
25
GENDER
(Trans) Woman, she/her
BIRTH DATE
July 9, 1992
OCCUPATION
Costume Designer
LIKES
- Fabrics, especially of unusual materials/blends/weaves/patterns. Her studio apartment is crowded with bolts and samples of costume fabrics that she never gets the opportunity to use, but someday she might need them, and that's what matters.
- Terrible horror movies. The ones with lots of cheap gore and latex masks. You know the ones. She likes to make popcorn and watch them on her laptop when she can't sleep. They make her laugh more than any comedy ever has.
- Black coffee. She started her love affair with coffee like most people do, by drinking it with cream and sugar and flavors. Ever since taking up costume design and creation as a full-time job, though, it's been more convenient (and necessary) to just make a big pot of straight drip coffee and drink it throughout the day. This is probably the cause of her insomnia, not that she particularly cares. On quieter days, she'll take the time to do a very meticulously perfected pourover to enjoy.
- Big dogs. She would love to own a Great Dane or something to that effect, but she doesn't feel like she has enough room or time. Alternatively, she's been toying with the idea of getting a snake.
- Indie and punk fashion. She loves making all the glitzy, frou-frou stuff, but would never wear it.
- Middle of the night jogs. If bad horror movies don't work, she'll take to the streets to get some running in and clear her head. Her endurance is terrible, so the jog pretty quickly turn into walks, but she's been getting better. She also used to be wary of going out alone at night, but so far she hasn't run (haha) into any problems, and she appreciates the eerie quiet of the empty streets.
- Her twin brother, Penn. He has, and always will be, her best friend.
DISLIKES
- Poor stitch-work. She has no problem letting you know that your handiwork is utter garbage, and she'll usually mend and fix the seams of clothes that she's just bought.
- Nosy people. If you start asking too many questions, even if well-intentioned, she'll start getting short and snippy. This goes double if you get too interested in her personal life, such as asking about her gender, sexuality, transition, etc. As far as she's concerned, it's not really any of your business, now is it?
- Her insomnia. But also she's learned to live with it.
- Her arms. In most ways she passes remarkably well, which she's thankful for, but she has particularly dark hair on her arms. She took to shaving them, but it was such a pain to do and the results were never really satisfying, so she usually just wears long sleeves to cover them up. It's usually the only thing that sparks dysphoria for her; in all other regards, she's very comfortable with her identity.
- Having to spend too much time with her parents. (We'll get to that in her bio).
- Credit card debt. She just has so much of it. It never seems to go away.
- Arguing with people she doesn't know well, especially over political and social points of view. Frankly, she just doesn't have the energy, and she knows she can't change the mind of strangers if they want to hold onto their beliefs. Instead, she'll just avoid those types of people like the plague. If you're a friend, though, she's more than happy to help you view something differently.
PERSONALITY
Self-motivated | Independent | Good-Humored | Perfectionist
Workaholic | Aloof | Critical | Often Sardonic
Paige is a hard person to get to know. She prefers to disappear in a crowd, and compared to her gregarious twin, she's never much liked sharing herself with the world or being vulnerable. Throughout her life, she's had few people that she would call a friend, and that's never bothered her. Unless she's really bonded with someone, she'll continue to think of people as acquaintances (friendly or otherwise), and she hardly ever reaches out to someone first. If someone wants to bond with her, it will take conscientious effort on their part. That said, if someone shows that amount effort on a daily basis, she will surprisingly quickly be their friend! She's just not an initiator.
As a friend, she can take a joke at her expense well, and loves letting others in on her sarcastic wit. She's oftentimes critical and dark-humored and is put off when others don't appreciate that. If she can't see eye to eye with someone either in regards to her humor or her world-view, she has absolutely no problem cutting them off without telling them why. This method is easier than getting into an argument and, in her mind, safer for her overall. Not so deep down, she really cares what others think of her, and for that reason, she would rather turn her back on someone without explanation than talk something out; she won't have to face their judgment, and she can assure herself that they don't really know her so their opinion doesn't matter. If, against all odds, you're still her friend after all this, she will annoy you death, especially whenever she just can't sleep.
Work always comes before relationships for her. Partly because she really needs the money, and partly because costume design and creation is such a big part of who she is. Finishing a project brings her a kind of satisfaction that another person never could (so she assumes), and she feels most at home when doing detailed embroidery and other stitch-work. She's a perfectionist in this regard as well, never really happy with anything until it's out the door and she literally cannot keep fiddling with it. For this reason, she sets harsh deadlines for herself, otherwise nothing would ever be finished.
BIOGRAPHY
- Family: Penn Patel (identical twin), Aditya Patel (father), Ruth Patel (mother)
- Paige was born and raised in Phlox Town with her brother and her parents. All in all, the majority of her childhood was pretty standard and boring, filled with the usual school field trips to the Printy Paper Mill.
- She and Penn (they/them) both knew they were trans when they were quite young, but didn't have a word for it until they were in their late teens. Penn is nonbinary, but they still prefer to be referred to as Paige's "brother" regardless of their gender. Penn has not come out to their parents, but Paige has.
- At age 16, Paige came out to her parents.
- At age 18, both she and Penn left home. Penn followed a scholarship to pursue music at a university out of state, while Paige went to KBU for a semester before dropping out.
- Shortly thereafter, she moved to Larkspur City, and distanced herself from her parents.
- She made money by working part-time at Starducks and making custom orders for cosplayers. Now she no longer works at Starducks and works on costume design and creation full-time.
- Her first reaction to the arrival of the Gru was: ".......Aliens are real. Penn owes me $20."
PERSONAL HISTORY
Paige grew up in a fairly typical middle-class family in Phlox. A naturally reserved child, she relied on Penn to keep her company, and for a long time the two were each other's world. They shared toys and secrets and at one point their own made-up language (which Paige claims not to remember now, but she does). As they grew up and started school, Penn was clearly the brighter, more social of the two, making friends with other children instantaneously. Paige, meanwhile, wasn't exactly friendless, but she was never popular either, and she knew most people only liked her by extension-- Penn usually insisted that she was included in every activity, and oftentimes she was confused for Penn. In a lot of ways, she felt like the knock-off version of her brother. The same in appearance, but lacking in quality somehow.She never held this against Penn, of course, since they were always there for her and knew her better than anyone. She did, however, hold this against the other children, her potential friends. Her resentment for them only grew as she got older and started to question her identity more and more; she thought others were simply incapable of seeing who she really was. Penn, in confidence, confessed a similar dissatisfaction. They found an outlet for these feelings in theater- Penn liked trying on different personas and giving themselves over to a role, while Paige found solace backstage, intentionally invisible, and surrounded by outfits she thought she would never be allowed to wear. This was the start of her interest in costuming.With the advent of the internet and social media, the twins soon had access to the vocabulary they needed for their identities. They had their own personal revelations separately, but came out to one another on the same night. They laughed so hard at the coincidence that their father knocked on the door and told them to keep it down and go to sleep. Once they were done snickering, their ribs and cheeks aching, they decided something had to be done about Paige's name. Penn was the one who suggested that she call herself "Paige" since it matched their name and, they reasoned, from here on out she was starting a new "Paige" in her life. She punched them in the arm for the stupid pun, but the name stuck.Paige came out to her parents soon after, while Penn hesitated. Their parents met her with a skeptical tolerance at first, which she took as a good sign, but they soon came to disappoint her by continuing to call her their son and misgendering her and showing clear contempt for this "phase" she was going through. She had always considered herself close with her parents, so this judgment put a deep wedge between them. True to her character, she never confronted them about it or tried to reason with them, and instead as she started to express her identity, she and her parents grew estranged. Penn tried to be a peacemaker, but by the time Paige moved out, she and her parents were hardly speaking.She went to attend KBU, while her brother went out of state, but dropped out after a semester. She found college wasn't the right path for her; she hated speaking up in class, hated working on group projects, and found she couldn't will herself to study or care about exams. After one round of atrocious grades, she was ready to move on and pursue her passion for fashion and sewing. For income, she worked at Starducks as she set up an online store and started making cosplay accessories. The accessories soon turned into full-on costumes, and costumes turned into custom orders, and after falling asleep underneath the register counter at work because of staying up all night working on orders, she decided to quit and make costumes full-time.Just kidding, she was fired. But in her heart, she had already quit.Besides working on her small business, she also started hormone therapy. Well into her transition, she agreed to have lunch with her parents and try to mend the relationship. When she arrived at the restaurant, her parents looked past her, not recognizing her instantly, and she quickly turned around and went back to her apartment. So far as her parents know, she never showed up that day.Penn still speaks regularly with their parents, but after seeing their reaction to Paige, has no intention of coming out to them. Paige resents this a little bit, since she does want someone, especially her best friend and brother, to show more solidarity with her, but she understands their decision and can't find it in her heart to blame them. Instead, she makes use of them to keep tabs on her parents, especially post-Gru invasion. She's not sure if her parents developed weird abilities, but she does keep encouraging Penn to quit their fellowship and come home just to see if they get a cool power.
EXTRAS
- At first Paige thought her new ability was incredible, but then she discovered that she couldn't change the mask designs at will, and they eerily disappear as quickly as they're summoned. She can't use her ability for work, so as far as she's concerned, it's totally useless.
- She's 5'10" and hardly ever wears heels.
- Thanks to medical treatments and trying to live on her own in the city before she could really afford it, she's accumulated a lot of credit card debt. Most days she just tries not to think about it.
- She is also prone to impulse buying, which doesn't help with the whole debt thing, but she refuses to admit she has a problem.
- She's a lesbian, but has never been in a relationship post-transition.
- Her only other relationship was with a girl in high school when she still publicly presented as male, but it lasted about a week before she found out the girl actually had a crush on Penn. So that hardly counts as dating someone.
- When other people bring up having a college degree, particularly one in the arts, she gets very defensive and assumes the other person is trying to brag.
- She's a vegetarian.
- When she sent Penn photos of the Gru ship, they wired her the promised $20.
LINKS
COMPLICATIONS
PVP: Yes, let's fight!Injury: Yes!Death: Yes!! I'm down for anything!
