In-Character
Full Name: Eula Mary-Elizabeth BonhamNicknames: Eulie
Birthdate: December 12th, 1862
Current Age: Twenty-Five Years
Occupation: Irvingly Infirmary Nurse
Reputation: 10. Because she lacks education and status, she's made every attempt to keep her reputation spotless so no one has any other valid reason to deny her opportunities.
Residence: Irvingly, Scotland
Hogwarts House: Hufflepuff Dropout ('76)
Wand: Apple, 9¾ inches, Unicorn hair, Flexible
Blood Status: Halfblood
Social Class: Working Class
Family:
James Bonham, Father [1842-1873]Appearance:
A loving, family-oriented laborer whose determination to see his family stay afloat ultimately led to his early demise in a workplace accident. The loss of her father—and his high hopes for her future—would lead to her lifelong ambitions to better her situation despite the obstacles she's faced.
Deidre Bonham (née -----), Mother [1844]
She put her fate in her husband's hands and suffered greatly when he died too early. Now working thankless job with long hours, she cannot escape her past failures to move towards a brighter future.
History:Exceedingly average in almost every way, Eula stands at a normal five feet, three inches tall and has a figure that could be describes as curvaceous but not curvy, slender but not skinny. She has a dark, freckled complexion; plump lips, thick, dark brows; and overall mousy features. Save for the humble accessories she uses to decorate her hair, it remains in its natural dark curls.
Never one to dress to impress, Eula's outfits are nearly identical and all conform to the standards of her workplace. She prefers brighter colors to deeper ones, but has a soft spot for jade green and plum. She always carries around bag with her to stash her belongings. She is right-handed.
Personality:Early Days
The Bonham family was never wealthy, nor was wealth something they believed they would ever have. James and Deidre married young—very young, especially for a couple that could hardly afford to support themselves—and had a family within the year, leading to the birth of their first and only child in 1862: Eula Bonham.
Eula's memories of her early days are fine. Good enough. There was nothing better than watching her mother and father laugh and playfully shove each other around while making stew in the late evenings, but there were bad times she tries to forget. Memories of them screaming over money, accusing one another of wandering eyes due to their own feelings of inadequacy—all were pushed to the back of mind, but all have found their way to the surface at one point or another. Maybe she tries to hold onto the good ones because she never realized how chaotic their marriage was until she grew up and watched her friends deal with similar troubles. Or maybe she tries to hold onto the good ones because her opportunity to form new ones were limited.
Some of her best memories include the stories about her supposed "great-great-great- oh, you know, one of those" grandfather, Mungo Bonham, who founded St. Mungo's. She never knew if the tale was true, but it made for a great segue for her father to talk to her about dreams. Dreams of a better life; dreams of comfort and happiness; dreams of doing something meaningful and not wasting away in the London slums. He told her she had the smarts, but those alone couldn't bring her success.
Dark Days
It happened late one evening in 1873, and its the earliest memory she can remember when any amount of clarity. The constables came to the door with a notice that her father, James Bonham, had died in an accident. Artery sliced in a machinery failure. There was nothing that could be done to save him. Not in time.
Their family fell into ruin—not just financially, but emotionally. Deidre shut down and was incapable of functioning for days. Food was not put on the table. There were questions of whether she would be sent off to an orphanage so she could be okay. None of that happened, though. Life went on.
Eula's first sign of magic came a few months late after the incident in the spring of 1874 when a few boys on the street had the audacity to tease her about her father's death. A few racist remarks mixed with unsavory nicknames left her aflame with rage—literally. Her dark curls went up in (fortunately heat-free) flames, sending the group of troublemakers fleeing. She returned home in tears, but at least she had magic. Right?
Brighter Days
There were questions as to whether she'd be able to go to Hogwarts at all. Even with the scholarships offered by Hogwarts, the school supplies were expensive—even at a secondhand price. The summer of 1874 was one of the first times Eula saw that the people of the world were good rather than just hearing about it.
People—family friends, neighbors, shopkeepers who had heard the news about James' death the year before—all donated supplies so that Eula could attend school. While Deidre didn't want to be another charity case, she knew her husband would have sent Eula to school if he'd been there. It was his only wish.
So she went. She boarded the Hogwarts Express with the other students in September of 1874 with the other students and arrived at Hogwarts with wide, excited eyes. It did not take much deliberation for the Sorting Hat to place her in Hufflepuff. Her level-headed nature and gentle heart, combined with her practical skills made her a good fit for the house despite her competitive streak.
A diligent student, Eula quickly soaked up every ounce of information from her classes. She never slacked, never skipped, and never took time off for fun; however, even that was not enough to keep her in school. Her grades afforded her a full scholarship for school, but they could not afford her the growing expense of school supplies. That, combined with her mother's worsening state after working jobs she was not physically cut-out for, led Eula to leave school at the end of her second year in 1876. While disappointed that her dreams of a higher education were never met, her spirits never faltered.
Cloudy Days
Things were very lackluster for the first few years after school. At a young age and without the ability to use magic outside of school, her options were limited to lowly, maid-like jobs: cooking, sweeping, and laundering, mostly. She was never the sort to complain, but anyone who knew her knew that she wasn't happy.
She convinced her mother to move to Hogsmeade with the rest of the magical population in 1880, three years after the village was officially marked as a sanctuary for the magical population. There she was able to form connections with other magical people while avoiding the prying eyes of her nosy muggle neighbors. The isolation meant that factory work nearby meant that she was spared from her father's horrid fate, and her mother was able to reconnect with friends from her childhood who'd fled the muggle riots years earlier.
While her situation wasn't ideal, it wasn't awful.
Now of age and embedded in a village full of magical people, she was encouraged to seek jobs that included the use of magic. Much to her dismay, her numerous applications for Ministry positions were denied—she didn't have the required education, they'd said. It was most difficult to deal with the insinuation that less education made her less capable; she had skills that those donning their frilly suits could only imagine to have!
She was met with the same response at the Hospital, where she was instead offered lowly positions as a welcome witch and tearoom staff instead of the positions she wanted. The constant rejection started to take a toll on her, and she soon found herself working the same shop-keep jobs that her mother hated so much.
Better Days
The founding of Irvingly in 1882 afforded her more opportunities outside the limited Hogsmeade shops, especially once the Irvingly Infirmary opened up. Having long desired a career where she could make a difference (and that wasn't retail), she quickly applied for a nurse job and got it.
She moved to Irvingly with her mother soon after. It was definitely less bright and colorful than the streets of Hogsmeade, but it was much cleaner than London. Mother and daughter's reluctance to befriend their non-magical neighbor soon ended when they realized they'd suffered similar hardships to the muggles: some had lost husbands and fathers to the horrid conditions in factories, much as Deidre and Eula had lost James.
The Hogsmeade Laughing Plague in 1884 left the nearby village quarantined, and luckily neither Eula nor her mother suffered the same fate as many. Much in part to their quiet lives in Irvingly, both Eula and Deidre managed to dodge the numerous tragedies that affected the magical community throughout the decade—
Until 1888, when the fog came.
Other: —CHEERY. AMBITIOUS. DREAMER. COMPETITIVE. PERSONABLE.
Out-of-Character
Name: BreeAge: 19
Other Characters: Bee couldn't save me
