Faye Castle*

[Sister Grimm*]

Name:  Faye Riley Castle
Gender: Female
Age: 17
Grade: 12
School: Aurora High School
Hobbies and Interests: Art. Painting. Drawing. Video games (Member of video Game club).

Appearance: Faye Castle could be summed up in one word: fragile. Standing at 5'11 and rail thin, at around 130 lbs, she is pale and sickly-looking, lanky. Faye emits an air of vulnerability and delicacy. Though her height is a few inches above average, one would be hard pressed to notice. Faye has a habit of being constantly slouched, as if cringing inward or wincing away from an incoming blow. Her body is thin to the point that she looks almost anorexic, her chest only just pushing past A cup and into B range. Her arms are slight, possessing little to no muscle, her fingers long and slender, better suited to playing a piano than holding a paintbrush or a controller. Her legs are just as slender, and possessing about the same amount of tone, demonstrative of Faye's lack of anything resembling exercise. Her skin is pale, almost ghostly, giving one the impression of porcelain, often being likened to a china-doll.

Despite the almost unhealthy state of her body, Faye is facially attractive. She has high cheekbones, high enough to give her cheeks an almost sunken look, with a strong jawline and full, colorless lips, with a small, straight button nose above it. Her teeth are near-white, with the vaguest hint of yellow beginning to creep in. Faye tends to wear a small, hesitant smile that doesn't quite show her teeth. Her black hair is styled in a bob, cut at shoulder-length, with blunt bangs added across the forehead, low enough to almost cover her eyes. When nervous, Faye tends to take advantage of this, bowing her head and hiding behind that curtain of hair. Under her bangs, her eyebrows are straight and narrow, the same color as her hair. Her eyes are a light, ocean green. Underneath her eyes are heavy bags from lack of sleep, dark blue, looking almost as if someone drew them there with a purple marker. Her face is free of any acne scarring, remaining unblemished and unmarred by any painful mementos from her early teenage years. Her face features combined make her look appealing, attractive, yet meek and almost mousy, lending further credence to her fragile appearance.

Faye tends to wear heavy or baggy clothing, covering and hiding her body as much as possible. The one theme all her shirts have in common are long sleeves, often stopping just before the tops of her fingers. The cuffs of her shirts also tend to be dabbed and spattered with various colors of paint. Most often, her shirts are plain neutral colors, black, white or gray. Occasionally she'll wear of a shirt with some video game or another on the front. Around her waist is a plain belt, with the only noticeable thing about it being the belt buckle. Bronze, the buckle is rectangular, with an image of a horse shoe raised in the center of it, surrounded by a floral pattern. The jeans that she wears are straight leg, often spattered with paint in the same way as her shirts, albeit to a lesser degree. Like her shirts, she tends to favor neutral colors, mostly black and grey for jeans. Her shoes are plain black and white tennis shoes, and are often the part of her outfit that Faye spends the least amount of time thinking about. Most often she is seen wearing a long dark blue jacket, a winter coat really. The hood has a line of imitation fur running around the opening, with that same fur lining the inside of the jacket. The coat itself is a few sizes too big, giving the impression that Faye is wearing clothing designed for someone quite a bit bigger than her. The coat stops just past her waist, and the sleeves are long enough that they stop just short of the very tips of her fingers. Around her neck she wears two necklaces. One is a silver necklace, with a small pendant at the end in the shape of a shooting star. The other is a simple leather string, with a small imitation silver ring in the middle. The engraving on the ring reads 'Sic parvis magna'.

Biography: Faye Castle was born at the Bangor Air National Guard Base in Bangor, Maine on January 14, 1995 to Senior Master Sergeant Frank Castle and Staff Sargent Kathryn Castle, where they both were stationed. Both of her parents had been in the Air Force for at least six years each, nine in the case of her father, who had joined right out of high school. They both had designs as career military, but with the birth of their daughter, those plans had to be reevaluated.  Upon the birth of their new little girl, they both decided that an Air Force Base was nowhere for a child to grow up and pursued a new home off-base. They ended up buying a small town house and settled in the small town of Hermon, Maine, just down the road from Bangor. Hermon was a small town, maintaining the essentials but not much else. Shopping, convenience stores, and the like. A small Movie theater was in fact the towns crowning jewel in terms of amusement. Any inhabitants looking for real excitement would find themselves traveling to Bangor. It was a quiet town, lacking any noticeable crime or anomalies. To most anyone, it was a sleepy town, almost immediately forgettable once on the way to somewhere more interesting. This would be where Faye would grow up, spending the first fourteen years of her life.

Ever since she was little, Faye had been sickly. Cursed with a weak immune system, Faye was always suffering from some flu or cold or another.Her mother blamed all the years working on planes and the chemicals involve in that, but her Frank hadn't put much stock in that. Faye's parents were simple, uncomplicated. Simple, but not stupid. Her mother was a mechanic, her father a Intelligence Specialist. Combined, they brought in enough money that Faye would grow up comfortably, routine visits from doctors or no. In spite of any sickness she might be suffering from at any given time, she was a bubbly and bright little girl, with a penchant for art. It would start with finger painting, moving on to water colors, than pencil and paper. It was an interest her parents would nurture and encourage. Art aside, Faye was always a bright girl. Even going into the lower rungs of middle school, maintaining an A-B average was always child's play for Faye. Just as well, because anything else might have interfered with her arts. As soon as she was able, Faye was enrolling in every art class available to her. Some people find their passion later in life. Faye was already decided in sixth grade.

As Faye grew older, around twelve, she tended to become more and more withdrawn, prone to anxiety and sleepless nights, panic attacks, a severe discomfort in social situations, and a growing disquiet concerning physical contact with the world around her. The change hadn't happened all at once, but over months, as the once bubbly Faye grew more quiet and introverted. Her parents suspected bullying, but Faye was, if not popular, accepted by her peers. Failing to locate the immediate cause, they brought Faye to the Eastern Maine Medical Center in downtown Bangor. It was there that Faye was diagnosed with Generalized Anxiety Disorder, as well as mysophobia, a pathological terror of germs and contamination.

It was possible for the anxiety to be treated with medicine, but the treatment of her phobia would involve potentially extensive therapy. Seeing little other option, Frank and Kathryn Castle signed Faye up for the therapy and medicine prescription. The results weren't as encouraging as they might have hoped. The medicine would do it's job most of the time, but it's adverse affects often made them question if Faye would be better off without it. These affects included fatigue, dizziness, nausea, depression, and regular migraines. As for the therapy, the results were decidedly more negative, with little to no change. In the end, the decided to go with whatever Faye wanted in regards to her medicine. After some deliberation, Faye decided that she was better off without it.

Despite the changes in her life, Faye would continue her painting all through middle school. It would remain, aside from her parents, the one constant in her life. As word of her disorder spread, the older children, cruel like children often can be, decided that maybe they didn't want to associate with Faye quite so much. Her behavior didn't help her case. Plagued by a stammer when nervous and anxiety attacks, Faye was often considered more trouble than she was worth. This left Faye, aside from some of the more artistic students that she was still in contact with, alone. It was also around this time that her interest in video games grew. Because of the sorry state of her social life and the anxiety that crippled her from changing that, Faye sought escape in countless virtual worlds. No type of game could capture her attention like the Massively Multiplayer genre. They were worlds where she could have persistent characters that would never be weak or sickly, never hampered by panic attacks or irrational fears. It was a world where she could be strong and capable. It was world where she wouldn't stammer and stutter, and people would accept her for what she could do. It might not have nourished her artistic tendencies, but all the same, Faye would take to it like a duck to water.

As time went on, she would branch out to other genres, playing a little of everything. In fact, the only genre she ignored was that of sports. Faye adored video games, and her parents understood her rationale. As such, they spoiled her here, just as they had spoiled her in all of her artistic pursuits. She would always have the latest games and latest systems.

Despite her almost addictive attachment to video games, they would never displace her interest in painting. While video games might help  her visit another world, when she was painting, she was creating them. When she stood in front of blank canvas, brush in hand, nothing else mattered except the picture that she was creating. During those interludes, she would be a normal person, with no phobias, no anxiety. It was the one place where she felt like she truly belonged, the one time where the outside faded away and she was at peace.

Midway through her fifteenth year, her parents would receive their marching orders, and a transfer to Fairchild Air Force Base in Spokane, Washington. Some might have been concerned or upset to uproot from the place that had spent their whole life, but not Faye. Small town Hermon had already faded to but a background while she had been living there, all her attention going into the canvas or the computer screen. Faye had already moved away from Hermon mentally years before. The few friends that she still had would still be in touch. Optimistically, Faye viewed Washington as a new, fresh start. It could be a place where people didn't think she was weird. It would a big city, where people might not be quite so hampered by that small-town mentality like Hermon was. She might be able to fit in again.

Faye voiced her hopes to her parents, on one long plane ride or another. They would be more than happy to facilitate any chance her daughter might have of opening up again. Once her family reached Washington, they managed to pull in some favors and received a transfer to an office in Seattle. It was there that the Castle family would once again settle. Right away, Faye was almost disappointed. Her phobia didn't agree with the big city environment, nor did her anxiety disorder. That fresh start she wanted was lost amid the panic attacks that might strike any time she was among a tight crowd of people. Over time she managed to at least control those aspects, but the damage was done. By the time they had settled in, Faye was once again an outcast, that weird girl who would stammer and stumble and might even freak out if you talked to her. Faye once again fell into the computer, into her painting. In fact, that wide choice of options in new art classes was one of the few things that Faye did like about her new home. She would make some friends there, maybe even more than she had hoped, but she was still more of a loner than anything else.

Of course, that was something that she wished she could change. Faye desperately wanted to fit in. But whenever she came close, some quirk or fit would ruin whatever progress she might have made and Faye would once again be by herself. The fact that she would sink deeper into her online games in the aftermath of such defeats didn't help her. It did offer an unexpected olive branch that Faye would take advantage of, cautiously making friends with a small number of the gamers that also inhabited her new high school. While she considered herself incredibly lucky to make that break, her circle of friends never expanded much further than that. Despite her best efforts, she could never make those connections that she desperately wanted to make. Faye always has a nervous smile ready for anytime someone might approach her, but as soon as she opens her mouth, she might be once again struck by a stammer or stutter that could leave her struggling to grasp that word. She's friendly, even sweet, to those that do talk to her, and always ready with a kind word. Because of her desperation for approval and admiration, Faye can be naive and gullible, easily taken advantage of a misled. Because of what her phobia, Faye is terrified of most any physical contact. She uses this as an excuse to keep away from other people, something that she recognizes isn't helping her situation, but it also being something that she can't or won't change.

Advantages: She does have a small circle of friends that can rely on, and her meek nature could inspire sympathy in some of the softer-hearted students of Aurora. Faye is also intelligent, though that intelligence is mostly aimed at art.
Disadvantages:  To put it mildly, Faye has no physical capability to speak of. Sickly and socially awkward to the extreme, Faye might drive off even those who wish to help her. She is meek and cowardly, easy to take advantage of or manipulate, especially if done under the guise of friendship. On top of that is her phobia, and it's resulting fear of blood, dirt, and nearly everything else in nature.