#characterappreciationweek

Dead Boy Detectives

S1E7 | The Case of the Really Long Stairway

Alec Hardison - Leonardo

& It’s officially* a wrap on Character Appreciation Week!

Thanks so, so much to everyone who participated - everyone who made things, who drew things, who wrote things, who reblogged things, who added their own commentary to things - you were all so, so fantastic! We hope you guys had as much fun as we did this week, because we literally could not have done this without you <3

Sophie the actress is easy to write. We see a lot of her in the show.  This is the Grifter, the actress, the face Sophie chooses to show. As long as I am writing from someone else’s perspective she is not difficult, I can write what people see, I can write what she lets them see. And even from her perspective is not so difficult if the spotlight is on someone else.

But writing her, the real her, is another story. I don’t know where to start with the real Sophie, because even her name is an act. And that is part of her charm, the mystery.

Here is a simple truth about people: everybody wants something. The trick to a good grift, is figuring out what your mark wants, and then giving them a taste. Not all of it, mind you, just enough to awaken their apetite. Make them believe you can give them what they want. After that, they’re yours.

She’s good at figuring out what people want. It’s a split second judgement, more art than science, and she’s almost never wrong. Even as a young girl, she could sense flawlessly when she should be shy and quiet, or loud and boisterous, when she should be the perfect wonderchild, and when she should be the adorable rascal.

Between this carefully cultured skill, and her parents’ rich heritage, she never wants for anything, but somehow she always wants more. The problem is, she doesn’t know what it is she wants. She can figure out almost everybody around her, but her own desire of life remain an unanswered question.

She begins to grow unhappy with who she is, with playing the little games, being whoever people want her to be. She’s eighteen and already carrying too many masks, too many different versions of herself. She’d hoped to make a new start when she went to college. She’s studying Art History, something she really thought she was passionate about, but there’s still something missing. This still isn’t what she wants. 

Then one evening she ends up at some rich frat-guy’s party at his parents’ house. Looking around the room she realizes she doesn’t even know anyone there. Then she realizes the flip-side of this - no-one knows her either. And at that moment she decides to change. She slips upstairs, tries a couple of doors until she finds what she’s looking for -  a woman’s room. She steals a dress, lets down her hair, readjusts her make-up. When she comes back downstairs, she’s a different woman.

She realizes the difference immediately, in how the crowd parts before her, in the whispers that follow in her wake. She’s become someone else, someone who people stare at, talk about. She likes it. Someone comes up to her, asks her name. She hesitates, but the name comes easily.