AnOddGremlin Posted Tuesday at 01:15 PM Share Posted Tuesday at 01:15 PM (edited) This character story thread will showcase present and retrospective development of Alice Morgan. In short, Alice is on a physical and spiritual journey of processing grief after the loss of a loved one. After her world comes crashing down, she finds a reason to keep living in the face of loss and tragedy and embarks on a journey that just might bring her closure. Full story below: Alice Morgan's story began in the small but charming town of Port Townsend, Washington, about a year ago. She grew up an average joe in her hometown, never sticking out of the crowd a whole lot. Her peers would say she was on the quieter side, but was very easy going and kind to those around herself. Growing up in Port Townsend and the surrounding areas, Alice admired the close-knitted community feeling of her hometown -- The familiar, friendly faces, the familiar, colorful buildings and roads -- But also the beauty of Washington state, setting off for a camping or hiking weekend every now and again. Alice was a quiet bookworm, often reading, journaling, writing, scribbling something. She was a bit of a hopeless romantic, in love with the world, in love with nature. She loved her town. She loved the bay. She loved the sunsets and sunrises. She always found beauty in places others often overlooked. She was full of life. During her freshman year at Townsend High, she met Charlie -- An alluring, outgoing guy. She knew him, kind of. They've seen one another around town on various events and fairs, but somehow their paths never crossed and they never actually met. They met in a sociology class a few weeks into their freshman year at the high school. Having gotten paired for a class project, they hit it off, and the rest is history. One thing lead to another -- from class participation, to spending lunch breaks together, to weekend hikes, and so on. Very quickly, Charlie became one of the integral people in Alice's life. Soon enough, he proposed a relationship, and the ball kept rolling since. Over the years, they were inseparable, and what started off as a cutesy teenager romance turned into the realization that they found the one. This realization didn't protect them from the way of life. They rose. they fell, they stagnated, they got back up again; They stayed strong in the face of adveristy, both individually and as a couple, weathering every new storm better than the last one. Alice turned to working a few odd jobs here and there. Mostly grunt work as a cashier at a gas station or the grocery store, before delving into creative writing, and making some extra cash doing freelance work. Meanwhile, Charlie took a tad more amibitous path, eventually donning the uniform of a firefighter. Their lives weren't at all filled with turmoil. They both, again, were your average joe. Living life and trying to make a living. A few years down the line, the moment that everyone knew would come, finally came. She said yes! Life gave them lemons, and they knew what to do with it. Everything was sounding more and more like a fairy tale or a movie plot, and it was just like one, until the phone rang one day. Charlie had died in the line of duty. During an apartment building fire, a section of the roof collapsed, and in the way were him and his fellow colleagues. That day, three families were ruined, and Morgan was one of them. Alice was beside herself, and couldn't believe what she had just heard. She wasn't sure how to react. Surely it was some kind of nightmare? After she hung up, she was cool as a cucumber. What she heard couldn't have happened. She wasn't convinced. Charlie will be home any minute. The reality took an hour or two to set in, but once it did, it fell on top of Alice, much like the collapsed roof. Suddenly and without warning. Alice took the next week off work and returned to her parents' house for the time being. She knew she couldn't do this alone. Days passed by. Days turned into weeks, weeks into months. Alice didn't know how to process all of this. It became clear she needs to do something in order to get her life back on track. She sent a message or two to her close friends and family before packing a backpack and setting off towards the train station. Alice mustered up the courage to dive head first into her new mission and journey. She became a vagabond from that day on, but not just any vagabond. In the backpack, she carried her necessities -- Her journal and her old, used camera, as well as a mug. A small, chipped travel mug she refuses to replace. It's Charlie's. It was, at least. Even if a little counterproductive, Alice keeps it around. It comforts her now that life has lost all certainty. Alice has set on a mission to travel the country, meet people, and hear their stories. She roams from place to place, collecting and sharing stories. It might just be the thing that brings her closure. It certainly is a path that gives her life meaning once again. She's traveled through big chunks of Washington, Montana, Oregon, and other surrounding states. She kept going south, and right now her story keeps moving on through the state of San Andreas (( California & Nevada )). Over the past year, her sentimental attitude made marks inside of her backpack. She keeps small mementos of places she visits. Things like a dried flower, an old coin, and a note tucked into her journal from someone she had met while on the road. Alice's camera and journal have seen quite a few things. The leather-bound journal in particular became battle hardened, with marks of use, pages sticking out at odd angles, and a few ink stains here and there, as well as some pages taped in, however still in one piece. The journal kept capturing thoughts, ideas, tragedies, happiness, while the camera captured some ordinary moments -- like a cup of coffee on a windowsill or a shadow of a bicycle -- in which Alice saw beauty that most didn't. The journey amplified some of Alice's qualities, such as her curiosity and empathy. The vagabond's current stop is San Andreas. She's just over one year in on her journey. Will she discover or realize something that none of the previous states, counties, towns and people could show her? Edited Tuesday at 01:17 PM by AnOddGremlin Link to comment
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