beautiful disaster

Name: Cecilia Clarkson Age: 49 Sexuality: Heterosexual Gender: Female Portrayed By: Carla Gugino Availability: Closed

“It’s like I can’t even breathe anymore. This town is a curse.”

→ Background

Ceci was born and raised in Baberton. She was swept off her feet by her husband David when she was only sixteen. They dated for two years and, when high school ended, the two then went their separate ways. Breaking up after a fight about David going off to London for university and how a long distance relationship would work. Cecilia was pretty heartbroken but she found a way to distract herself by getting a job in a local clothing store. She’d always loved fashion and followed it pretty religiously. Having something to focus on took away the sting, just, and she found a way to keep going. Her friends helped too. She had a lot of friends around town as Ceci had always been a very popular girl. When David came back home to Baberton a few of years later, it was almost as if no time had passed between them at all. Seeing him in person (they ran into each other in a coffee shop) knocked the breath out of her. They caught up, staying in that cafe until closing, and then they went to a bar for a couple of drinks. Two turned into five and five turned into six and the two shared a passionate night at a nearby hotel. A night which brought their first daughter Hannah into the world, and brought the two of them crashing back together.

Cecilia has been a housewife the past few years. She quit her job to raise her two children Hannah and Layla, something she never regretted even a little bit. She loved her girls, who were always very different from each other. Layla was more like her father and Hannah was a bit more like Ceci, though… more high maintenance. And spoiled. They definitely spoiled her but Ceci and David adored her regardless. Cecilia was perhaps a little too lax with the rules when it came to Hannah, should maybe have been a bit harder on her, but Hannah had a way of wrapping her around her little finger with just a look or a pout.

When Hannah disappeared and then her body turned up in the woods next to Sarah Clarke’s (in an apparent murder/suicide) the Clarkson family was shaken to its core. Ceci fell apart, as did David, but they did so in different ways. It also tore them apart and the two are currently going separated, probably heading for divorce. David has moved in with his brother in Bridgefield, who moved to the neighbouring town years ago, and Ceci feels alone in that big house now. She also has come to the conclusion she needs to go back to work so she can take care of herself now David isn’t around to do it for her anymore. The loss of a child is a terrible burden to bear and they just didn’t get through it together like Ceci hoped they could… and she isn’t sure how to be there for Layla but she tries her best. She’s terrified that something will happen to her remaining daughter due to the serial killer plaguing town and she isn’t sure she could ever survive that. She’s not even sure how she’s managing to survive this as it is.

→ Back to Baberton

Ceci has been very strongly against Sarah Clarke getting any sort of recognition or memorial in town because she believes that she really did kill Hannah and doesn’t deserve it. She even had a massive argument and falling out with the Clarke parents when they wanted Hannah’s memorial service to include Sarah somehow and has been quietly raging ever since. She got it into her head that she had to do everything she could to get Sarah Clarke’s name pushed down into the dirt. She doesn’t deserve mourners or anything else. She murdered her daughter and Ceci decided she was going to do everything in her power to drive the Clarke’s out of town if she had to. She can’t bear to look at any of them anymore, all she sees is Sarah  and then Hannah, and it drives her mad. Anger is much easier than grief so she channels it all into this.

Problem is, it all came out that Sarah didn’t kill Hannah after all when a video was released that apparently showed Kelly Sharpe killing Hannah instead. Ceci didn’t really know how to feel when she heard the rumours. What about Sarah then? The suicide note she left confessing? Then the biggest bombshell of all was dropped… Sarah Clarke was alive. She’d come back, escaped captivity, her whole death had been staged… but Ceci can’t let go of the anger. She’s sick of mind games and how is it fair that Sarah gets to come back but Hannah doesn’t? She still doesn’t want Sarah in town and she holds a lot of anger and resentment despite the proof now that Sarah didn’t do anything to her daughter and was also a victim. Her anger also transfers over to the Sharpe family, and she feels intense stress on a near constant basis… which isn’t helped by her frequent sleepwalking episodes that started up shortly after David left.

→ What’s Her Secret?

She used to steal a couple of pills from her friend Lydia Baker’s handbag. The pills were super strong painkillers and Cecilia found that some days it dulled the emotional pain she was feeling too. Lydia lent her one freely one day for a headache and since then Ceci took to stealing them out of Lydia’s bag when the other woman was in the bathroom or something. She never wanted to become one of those addicted housewives, drowning their sorrows and grief in pills and booze (akin to the way Cynthia Hart presents herself these days) but she’s afraid that’s the road she’s going to end up going down. She doesn’t know if she has the strength to pull herself back from the edge or not. Not after losing Hannah like that. Then Lydia died in a tragic accident and Ceci doesn’t have her crutch anymore.

When she was younger, Ceci had an imaginary friend called Gretel. Her father was always furious about it and thought she was being ridiculous but her imaginary friend was due to her intense loneliness (her family wasn’t always the happiest). Gretel went away when she was a little older but, over the past while, Ceci has strangely started speaking to her imaginary friend again. Not all the time and mostly at night. She isn’t sure why or what to do about it, and it’s painfully embarrassing especially at her age, but she’s so caught up in grief and, again, loneliness especially now David is gone… it feels like Gretel is all she has other than Layla, who she wishes would spend more time with her.