Name: Suzume Nakashima
Age: 18
Gender: Female
Zodiac Animal: NA, Normal
Deeper Description: Suzume would be described by many as nothing special or quite plain. Someone that blends easily into the crowds of Japan; the only thing that makes her stand out at times is when she wears her Miko robes and her long flowing black hair that spills down past the middle of her back. When she isn't wearing robes she looks like anyone else nothing extraordinary not ugly, not pretty just Suzume.
Her sense of style stems from her very traditional upbringing. She typically wears skirts and blouses since it was drilled into her by her mother that, that is how a young lady should dress. It doesn't bother Suzume too much because she has never really thought of her style and how it affects her looks. She wears very little makeup, if she does its a little bit of lip gloss.
Personality: Suzume, her name fits her personality well. A young woman who is petite and quiet who likes to keep to herself and is a little shy. In high school she was very shy in fact but over the past few years has come out of her shell a bit. Like many people her age school is very important to her, and she spends allot of her time studying. In her free time however she spends it at her grandfather's shrine helping the elderly man care for it. She does have one guilty pleasure, manga. Something she picked up very young and her love of reading.
The stories she reads in her many collections help Suzume escape from her frustrations even for a little moment. The heroines giving her sense of someone extraordinary something that she doesn't think of herself. She believes that she is nothing more than another face in the crowd. That no one would ever see the girl named after one of the smallest most plain birds, the sparrow. So in this sense Suzume can be a bit down on herself and at times think of herself as unimportant or useless. This was one of the reasons her parents encouraged her to start helping her grandfather at his shrine. So that maybe their daughter would come out a bit and maybe even find a husband. This coming from their traditional thinking, and the fact that they don't want their daughter living with them for the rest of her life.
This attitude of her parents is often makes her feel frustrated as though they are trying to pressure her into something she might not be ready for. Many times she quietly excuses herself from a meal when the topic turns to her love life. She feels as though that is something that should happen naturally and on in it's own time. Not something that she be rushed just because her parents don't want to look as though their daughter is unwanted by men. Perhaps that is why she spends more and more time with her grandfather who is more understanding. A man that believes in fate, magic and curses, who dotes on his grand daughter always telling her how beautiful she is. How she reminds him of her grandmother, Michiko. This always makes Suzume blush having seen pictures of her grandmother when she was young, she just can not see herself as someone that beautiful.
Special Skills: Suzume doesn't believe she has any special skills but she has noticed that when someone comes to the shrine who seems to be sad or upset. That after she has even spoken to them for a short time they seem to be happier when they leave, after paying their respects. She does well in school, and prides herself on her good grades. It's one of the few things she thinks she's good at.
Likes:
+ Manga
+ Reading
+ The shrine, especially early in the morning before people start to come.
+ The Sohma Estate, she has walked past the Sohma house for years and admired the beauty within the walls.
+ Fall, she loves the cool weather and the changing of the leaves.
+ Takoyoki, it's a treat she has loved since she was very young.
+ The color red especially fall leaves of that color.
+ Tonari no Totoro - a.k.a. My Neighbor Totoro
+ Her grandfather, he is the only person she feels that truly understands her.
+ When her grandfather plays the Shakuhachi.
Dislikes:
- Her parents pressuring her.
- Talking in front of a large group of people.
- Being embarrassed, something her grandfather does on a daily basis.
- Confrontation
- Her older brother bullying her.
- Not having the money when her favorite manga is on sale.
- Seeing someone sad, this happens allot at the shrine and she does her best to cheer them up.
- Being teased
History: Suzume is the second child to Daichi, and Hitomi Nakashima. She has a brother Hideki who is four years older than her. The Nakashima's brought their children up in a very no nonsense, traditional home. Suzume was expected to be very lady like, and Hideki, well it seemed to Suzume that he got to do what ever he liked. He constantly picked on her and teased her as a child, her parents doing not much more than scolding him and telling her that he didn't mean anything by treating her wrongly. Even when she was younger she could remember coming up with ideas or being imaginative thinking of magic or spirits. Then having her parents tell her that there are no such things as magic or spirits, and that she was was being a foolish child.
From an early age she had heard stories of the cursed Sohma's from other children at school. Living not to far from the Sohma Estate she was often told that if she got to close to the house that she would end up cursed too. Many times she would bring this fact up to her parents and they would say those children were being silly and she shouldn't have anything to worry about. But one experience she had told her other wise, she couldn't had been much older than six or seven, but she was following behind her mother walking as they were going to visit her grandfather at his shrine. They began to walk past the Sohma house as they had many times before, but this time something distracted Suzume and she fell behind. Her mother had run ahead to catch up to Hideki who was trying to run away from her. Before Suzume realized she was alone standing in front of the gates of the Sohma house. She remembers looking ahead and not seeing her mother than starting to break down and cry. It was then a young boy peeped his head out of the gate of the estate.
"Why are you crying, and why are you doing it here...?" he said.
Suzume wiped her eyes, and began to explain the situation to the boy who looked not to really be concerned. He soon came out of the gate and sat next to her on the walk.
"You're mother will come back just be patient and wait...", after that Suzume didn't feel so scared and the pair sat there quietly.
He didn't say another word they both just sat there, and soon her mother rounded the corner of the walk finding Suzume sitting next to a boy. Her mother began to spout off at how worried she had been and scolded Suzume for falling behind. Then unknown to Suzume she realized what house her daughter was sitting in front of, and that the boy was probably a Sohma. She snatched up Suzume once the realization came to her, and started to drag her away. Suzume waived as her mother pulled her other arm and thanked the boy, as soon as they passed the Sohma Estate and the boy was no longer in sight her mother stopped.
Floods of questions were thrown at Suzume as to where the boy had come from. When she told her mother that he had come from inside the gate. More questions than came as to whether he had touched Suzume. Suzume shook her head telling her mother that he had only spoken to her and then sat down next to her. Her mother sighed in relief and then told her from now on that if she were to ever pass by the Sohma house again to pass on the other side of the street. This dumb founded Suzume because her mother and father had told her that the rumors about the curse weren't true. If that was so then what was wrong with the Sohma boy.
As Suzume grew older, she only headed the advice of her mother when someone she knew would speak to her parents were around. She just couldn't understand why a place so beautiful and the people within could be cursed, if those sorts of things don't exist. It was around this time she started going to her grandfather's shrine on a regular basis to help him there after the death of her grandmother. She was sweeping one day and asked her grandfather about the Sohma's. He was playing his flute and stopped he confirmed what her classmates said, that the Sohma's were a cursed family and that often times strange things happen to people connected to the family. He chose not to speak anymore about and like her mother years before warned her to stay away from the Sohma's.
This only peaked her interest more, she knew that her grandfather was a spiritual man being a priest at the shrine. He also believed in many things that Suzume had as a child believed in. But she still didn't understand how the Sohma's could be cursed. So she decided that she would try to figure out a way to talk to someone from the family get to know them.
Anything Else: