Your Nickname: Nuri
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Vivienne Esquibel Thorpe
Character Birthday & Age: 16th of June 1979, 30 years old.
City & Country of Birth: London, United Kingdom.
Blood Purity: Halfblood
Alma Mater: Hogwarts School of Witchcraft & Wizardry
Job/Position: Healer (General and Janus Thickey Ward)
Wand: Lignum vitae, 13''. Supple and knobby. Ashwinder Ash core. Purchased from a private wand collection in Nice, France.
Physical Description: Vivienne’s eyes are grey, like damp tarmac. They are her mother’s eyes-- and the only physical trait that the two women share. The rest of her is very much like her father. At 5’7’’, Vivienne stands shoulder-to-shoulder with most witches (and a little bit taller for nights on the town in towering heels). Her build is fit and athletic, while her walk is graceful and quick. Vivienne’s arms are slender but surprisingly strong. She has a long scar along her right leg that she received from an accident in her adolescence.
Vivienne has her father’s dark brown hair and his slightly thin lips. A nick on her forehead is barely visible but makes a consistent appearance in all her pictures. Her wardrobe is full of practical clothes: midi-skirts, shirts, slacks, cardigans. All in white or pale colours. She dresses sensibly underneath her Healer’s robes. Her sense of style is minimal but fashionable.
In the evenings, Vivienne wears dark dresses, high heels and a playful smile. She wears a little jewellery but never when she is working at the hospital, where her appearance is plainer. On first impression, she appears to be attractive and decidedly foreign. Her accent is neutral: mostly British with gentle French vowels. It softens what might otherwise be a vaguely harsh and deep voice.
Personality Description: There is nothing exceptionally loud about Vivienne’s personality. She has always been a calm, open person with understated reactions and whimsical expressions. Her dominant trait is her resolve but you would have to know her well to notice it: Vivienne is not the sort of person who would disagree with you on the spot. If you advised her to take the train instead of a bus, she would nonchalantly shrug and then take whichever mode of transportation she had decided on in the first place.
Her stubbornness does not seek out conflict, although it has bred a small fleet of little white lies. Why argue when ache can be avoided by concealing parts of a worse truth? Vivienne has no qualms with being dishonest in order to circumvent unpleasant reactions. In her line of work, she has seen too many people hurt over minor squabbles. This non-confrontational behavior lends her normally blithe personality an undercurrent of sharper, unvoiced opinions.
For most of her life, Vivienne has been noted as a maternal persona. She always means it when she asks, “How are you?” and will immediately move to comfort those in need. She is an emotional person, attached to her patients’ stories and aware of their feelings. Her position at St.Mungo’s is appropriate to her manner and she approaches it casually but diligently. It is her calling and Vivienne considers Healing to be a field above all others, this mending of wounds brought about by the malevolence of the wizarding world. In her opinion, there is no choice in the matter-- it is this vocation or none at all. However, this contentment of profession has stifled ambition. Vivienne is happy where she is but possesses no further dreams, sometimes making her feel like she is caught in a tedious rut of daily rituals.
Outside of St.Mungo’s and work, Vivienne is a light-hearted and playful woman. Her smiles come easily and softly. She has an excellent sense of humor and expresses disapproval passively, usually in the form of unimpressed silence. Vivienne tries to be actively social with her friends and family. Her free days go by in bookstores and theaters, as she greatly enjoys the arts. Evenings are often spent in jazz clubs or music cafes, where she sometimes performs as an impromptu singer.
Vivienne both admires and pities her mother, who never remarried after divorcing her husband. The two are close and write to each other every one or two months, usually about literature or news.
At the end of any day, Vivienne will come home exhausted. She is romantically unattached and is currently tumbling through a chain of brief, shallow relationships. While quite committed to her patients and ideals, Vivienne can’t seem to settle down with a man (note: more in History). She does not quite realize it herself, but she scorns such commitment because she feels that she will ultimately end up like her mother: divorced and alone. As a result, Vivienne is frequently flirtatious but hardly ever in love anymore. She has no concrete opinions about politics unless they directly correlate with her profession, although it is important to note that she is against the concept of a pureblood elite and disagrees with recent reproach of the lycantrophy-infected.
When stressed or nervous, Vivienne tends to bite on her nails. For this reason, she tries her best to keep them extremely short and well trimmed. She enjoys singing to herself and is in the habit of swearing badly when surprised—remnants of a foul-mouthed adolescent phase. Viv is mildly allergic to chocolate (her arms break out into rashes) and she currently has a slight fixation on pumpkin pasties.
History:Adeline Thorpe was the daughter of two muggle-born wizards from a small English village in Cumbria. Jon Esquibel however, was an orphan Basque wizard from France. The two of them made a very charming couple for the first three years of their marriage. They lived in Oxfordshire and ran a bookstore together (with muggle literature at the front and wizarding books in the basement), as neither was inclined to a bustling city lifestyle or Ministry profession. Their home was small, their profits minimal but it did not seem to matter at the time—they were very much in love and had in fact married only a month after meeting one another on holiday in Wales.
In the years to come, their only daughter would have two things to ask them about this: (a) “Do people really go on holiday to Wales?” and (b) “Why couldn’t you have separated before you decided to have me?”
It evidently took three years, two affairs and (finally) one pregnancy for the loving pair to decide that a divorce was due. Vivienne Thorpe was unfortunately born just in time to fuel the tempestuous decline of her parents’ marriage. The aftermath left her in Adeline’s care, with summer trips down to her father’s home in Nice every year.
CHILDHOODThe years before Hogwarts were fairly unexciting for Vivienne. Her mother continued to run the bookstore in Oxford and although her income was not substantial, she had only to provide for herself and young Vivi. Mornings were spent checking the stock lists and organizing the book displays, something that the two Thorpes enjoyed doing together. In the afternoons Vivienne would pack her book bag and stroll down to Summertown, where a local witch had started private lessons for the magical folk in Oxford—it was a small class for children, all who would eventually find themselves in Hogwarts School of Witchcraft & Wizardry. They were taught muggle subjects and common wizarding knowledge. Vivienne has only faint memories of these lessons but at the time, they were a great source of entertainment and stories. She would return from class in the evenings in time to help Adeline neaten the bookshop. After dinner, mother and daughter would sit down to read until it was time for bed.
This was their routine almost every single day for Vivienne’s entire childhood. It was broken only once every year, when she was sent to live with her father in France for a month. The pair would stay in Nice, where the little Thorpe girl was constantly spoiled by sunny picnics and French food—Monsieur Esquibel dotted on his daughter in a way that his ex-wife would have disapproved. He loved her dearly and although she would never be terribly close to her father, Vivienne was (and still is) very fond of him.
On the summer that Vivienne turned eight, Jon Esquibel decided that it was time to marry again—his second wife (who everyone would only ever know as Madame Esquibel or ‘darling’) was a tall, gaunt witch who was much wealthier than him. And as a result, Vivienne’s consequent holidays were no longer spent at her father’s small flat in the city but at a Villa on the outskirts of Nice. Her stepmother treated her with indifference and occasional shows of affection—a pair of pearl earrings, a silk dress, a condescending smile. It didn’t bother her, as long as she was allowed to relax in the sun every morning with a good book and a tall glass of iced pumpkin juice.
The summer before the young witch would be placed on a train to Hogwarts, a pair of twin boys was born into the Esquibel family: their names were Francoise and Antoine Esquibel.
HOGWARTSVivienne’s years at Hogwarts were a medley of awkward and quirky incidents. Her French accent was very subtle and rarely commented on—it only resurfaced when she spent her summers in Nice, which was every other year.
The Sorting Hat had appropriately placed her in the house of Ravenclaw, and with so much in common, the new students got along fabulously. Vivienne was not especially smart but she was always with her books and whenever the student population caught wind of an exam, she was nothing if not diligent. Her first few years at school went by very quickly. She wasn’t actively involved in anything besides her studies and she mainly concentrated on getting to know people.
In her third year, Vivienne tried out for a position on the Quidditch team but lost to far more skilled players. She was an avid fan of the sport until her final terms at Hogwarts, during which the distractions of adolescent romance had quite drowned out other non-curricular interests. Viv’s favoured subjects were Herbology, Potions, Charms and Care of Magical Creatures—she excelled at all of them and, in spite of her indifference towards it, also performed well at Defense Against the Dark Arts. She did not share similar luck with her other subjects (including an ill-chosen class of Arithmancy, dropped after her O.W.L.s).
Socially speaking, Vivienne was more outgoing than most of her Ravenclaw friends. She arranged for picnics on the grounds, started loud debates in lessons and never backed down from a trip to Hogsmeade. If anything, she was a little hyperactive. Her energetic tendencies gradually relaxed as she became older and as her subjects started to require more patience. It was not wise to rush the adding of ingredients to a potion and nobody benefited from the hasty treatment of magical creatures. In the summer after her fifth year, Vivienne had the unfortunate experience of falling down a ravine in the Galloway Forest of Scotland, where she had been visiting with her friends and a chaperone witch. The incident remains blurry in her memory to this day, though it had left the Ravenclaw with a great deal of bruises and a long gash on the outside of her right leg. It was nothing that a day at St.Mungo’s (and several lectures on caution) did not fix. Vivienne likes to think that the scar on her leg is a constant reminder of vigilance and forethought: never go running into the dark.
In her final year at Hogwarts, the young witch fancied herself in love with one of the Hufflepuff boys—Darren Wright. The two flirted for several months and were almost always with one another. By then, she had outgrown her awkward phase of puberty and appeared to be quite pleasant to look at: her Basque ancestry was more pronounced and her gestures more feminine. Darren had been an all right fellow—not handsome but boyishly endearing. In spite of their supposed feelings for one another, they did not resume affections after the tragedy of Dumbledore’s death. That year, Vivienne graduated and immediately applied to become a Healer-in-Training at St.Mungo’s hospital of London.
WORK AND ADULTHOODVivienne Thorpe’s first two years of training at St.Mungo’s were extremely exhausting. It required her to acquire healing skills while keeping up with the extreme cases coming in to hospital, caused by the events leading up to the second Wizarding War. She remained at St.Mungo's for a further four years after the end of that particular conflict.
Her six years in London were challenging for other reasons besides the war. Unlike many of her colleagues, Viv realized very quickly that she was not going to be a ‘natural’ at Healing. It was a great disappointment to her, as she had been intent on this vocation since she was a child, drawn instinctively by the prospect of caring for the injured. Prior to her training, Vivienne had argued with her parents about her career choices—they had taken note of her proficiency in Defense Against the Dark Arts and advised her to train as an Auror. Both mother and father had been worried about the outcomes of the war. Vivienne, however, disregarded any pressure they put on her. She was not interested in hurting people; she wanted only to heal them.
Adeline Thorpe finally gave in and collected her savings to lease an appropriate flat in the city for her daughter. Viv’s father had been disgruntled, although he did not choose to ruin his relationship with the daughter whom his twin sons were beginning to dearly love. And so Vivienne pushed through her difficulties: partially out of devotion to the hospital and partially out of pride (she would not give her parents the satisfaction of quitting).
Her diligence did not go unrewarded. As the seasons passed, Vivienne found her duties less difficult and stressful. More importantly, she began taking a real interest in the patients—this was ultimately a good thing but amidst the casualties of the second Wizarding War, it took an emotional toll on Vivienne’s spirits. The hospital had its conflicts with the Ministry every now but there had always been patients to treat. There were many instances in which she found herself having to step out of the wards, overwhelmed and uncomfortably close to tears. The work was like nothing she had expected and yet she found herself more attached to it than anything she could have imagined. It was a draining but satisfying job, the witch thought.
Once the war dwindled down to less trying times, St.Mungo’s grew less busy. It was still a disaster hub of accidents and injuries, of course. The difference was in the lighter atmosphere, like a great sigh of relief had overcome the corridors and they could all stop to breath for a little while. Vivienne did more than just breath. With more time on her hands and the realization that she was, after all, living in London city, the world became a much brighter place than before. There were parties to attend, pubs to explore, musicals to watch and music to discover. Vivienne’s four remaining years at St.Mungo’s had a hectic pattern: she partied hard, worked harder and slept in the hours between her two contrasting lifestyles. The wards required restraint and patience—her social life encouraged spontaneity and haste.
In the year 2002, Vivienne was unlucky enough to find herself in love again. The man was an older wizard from her father’s community in Nice: a tradesman by the name of Zacharié Roux. He had beautiful green eyes, a dark beard and an honest smile. Zacharié had come down with Vivienne’s stepbrothers to oversee a trade in enchanted cauldrons one summer and the two of them had been immediately attracted to the other. In retrospect, it was a foolish decision to move all the way to France for a man she had hardly known for a month—but such behaviour apparently ran in the witch’s family and Adeline Thorpe did not attempt to go up against her daughter’s stubbornness this time.
Vivienne’s father and stepmother had arranged for her to work at a private clinic in Nice so that she could stay in France to continue her relationship with Zacherié. The clinic, “La Maison de Lézard”, was an independent establishment of Healers who sometimes travelled around rural France to lend their expertise at less capable treatment centers. They were based in Nice for most of the year but went further south in the winter. Zacherié courted Vivienne for two years before they considered elopement—they had been on the train to Paris for no more than an hour whenthe argument began. Neither could say who had started it: by the time they had reached the city of lovers, neither cared. It was a stupid little fight, one of countless squabbles that couples were likely to suffer but it was the straw on the camel’s back. Vivienne panicked. All at once assailed by her insecurities and doubts, she could not help but wonder—what if he did to her what her father had done to Adeline Thorpe? What if she woke up one day, no longer in love with him? Would she able to endure the heartbreak, would she become trapped in a loveless marriage, would her children have to live between two parents like she once did? It was a torrent of questions that led her to only one result: Vivienne left her would-be fiancé in Paris almost as soon as they had gotten there. She never heard from him again—if he had returned to Nice, he made no move to meet her and there was never a reconciliation of feelings.
The Esquibel twins pleaded with their stepsister to stay on in France for another year so that they could return from Beauxbatons to tell her their stories. In previous summers, they had heard much of Hogwarts from Vivienne and the boys were eager to return the favour. As soon as she complied with their requests, Vivienne packed her trunks and finally bid farewell to her father’s family. Nice was no longer refreshing and romantic. It had become contrite with wasted recollections.
At the age of twenty-six, Vivienne returned to the city of London— and to St.Mungo’s hospital. Adeline Thorpe had made no comment on this homecoming; she had sent her daughter a small sum of money and a large shipment of classic novels… presumably gifts of condolences. Viv accepted them graciously and was quite comforted by the practicality of her mother’s sentiments.
Vivienne resumed work at the hospital on the second floor, where Healers dealt with the treatment of magical bugs. There was always a diverse mix of children and adults, all with enough complaints or symptoms to keep her hands full: people were either very sick or under the impression that they were very ill. It didn’t matter which because it would sometimes take just as long to treat a case of Scrofungulus as it would to convince a parent that her child was not really suffering the Dragon Pox. There were calmer weeks on the floor when she would sometimes find herself helping the Healers on the third floor—or more recently, the first floor, to treat creature injuries after the werewolf attacks.
However, after four years of telling wizards how to treat the flu and forbidding contagious teenagers from kissing, Vivienne finally applied to transfer from her post. The opportunity arose from a vacuum of staff on one of the upper floors. Many healers had either transferred or been called down to assist with the current influx of creature injuries in the wizarding world and the wards on the fourth floor needed more people to help care for the patients. Many of their patients were long-term residents and required constant observation.
Vivienne is the latest addition to the Healers of the fourth floor. Her tendency to become attached to her patients leads her to feel very strongly about their situations. Although not the most skilled of Healers, she is highly commended for her comforting bedside manner and social aptitude.
Clarewood Court is the name of the building where she presently rents a flat—the landlord is a middle-aged wizard who leases apartments to both magical and muggle folk. It is located on a narrow street off of Bakers Street.
Describe your job duties and how you go about them: Vivienne is a Healer on the fourth floor. Her routine consists of coming in during her allocated shifts (beginning either in the early morning or evenings) to check up on the patients. She makes rounds on the floor to begin her duties, mostly to see if anything drastic has happened since her last turn of the wards. The rest of her time is spent treating new patients. Vivienne also lends a hand at the Janus Thickey ward, where long-term patients are treated and cared for.
Her pleasant and calm manner makes Vivienne ideal for receiving patients on the floor: most people are reassured by her amiable, serene conduct. She is friendly with the other Healers and tries to ensure that they are always on good terms: it is important to Viv that she gets along with the wizards and witches who rely on her (as well as vice versa) for such long hours everyday.
Elaborate on your expertise in your field: Upon graduating from Hogwarts, Vivienne achieved her N.E.W.T.s in Herbology, Potions, Charms and Defense Against the Dark Arts. She was trained at St.Mungo’s throughout the second Wizarding War and altogether worked at the hospital for six consecutive years, usually taking her turns at different floors.
Vivienne acquired further experience by working with “La Maison de Lezard”, an independent group of healers in France who worked in Nice. In her three years with this clinic, she also underwent three month-long expeditions to the Basque territories to work for unprivileged hospitals. Most of her Healing experience in France dealt with common magical illnesses, accidents and the occasional creature attack. Vivienne also became a significantly more tolerant healer as a result of her work with the clinic.
Finally, Vivienne returned to resume her work at St.Mungo’s, where she has been working on the second floor (Magical Bugs) for the last four years. Over this period, she has had the occasion to work at different floors for weeks at a time but her efforts went mostly into her chosen post. She brews potions at an exceptional level and has extensive knowledge of the hospital ingredients catalogue.
Writing Sample:
It was a quiet spring evening when Vivienne Thorpe had gotten off her final shift from the third floor wards at St.Mungo’s. The air was crisp, the sun was setting and London began its gradual descent into a more leisurely pace. On days like this, it felt like the gap between the muggle and wizarding world was a little wider than usual. An illusion, Vivienne thought as she made her way down a narrow street towards a dull, bricked building on the right. It was an illusion bred by a contrast between the tense politics pervading her hospital corridors and the peaceful sight of muggle families coming home from the parks.
“Good afternoon Miss Thorpe!” A loud, booming voice from Vivienne’s building entrance called out to her and she quickly looked up. Several passersby turned around but then looked away with disinterest; the owner of the voice was nobody extraordinary—it was an old, white-haired lady with leather-toned skin. A hardy and pleasant expression greeted Vivienne from a wrinkled face.
“Hello, Mrs. Clarke. How do you do?” The witch greeted her muggle neighbour with practiced politeness as she came to stop at the entrance of Clarewood Court. The two exchanged their usual pleasantries before Mrs. Clarke finally came to her point with all the shrewdness of a rambling old woman:
”Now you must tell me dear: who was that young gentleman you came home with last weekend? He had such polite manners…” She trailed off with a glint in those appraising brown eyes. Vivienne’s smile, usually so tranquil, became a little forced. It was like the woman kept a vigil every Saturday night.
“Nobody important. A friend I met down at the pub,” she replied haltingly and avoided eye contact. These minor interrogations were bordering on tradition. Vivienne caught a glimpse of herself reflected in the glass doors of her building: her beige dress was wrinkled and her hair disheveled. The reflection was comical—even with the difference in height, it looked as though the tiny Mrs. Clarke was sternly reprimanding a naughty child.
”…and you never know when you will need a proper man in your life. Are you listening Miss Thorpe? I’m not wasting my time trying to help you, now am I?” Even in the open air, her voice was loud and piercing. It grated on Viv’s already fatigued nerves. But it would not do to antagonize Mrs. Clarke: their flats were across from one another and Merlin knows what the old creature would say to the landlord if she were ever offended.
Vivienne schooled her smile and finally met her neighbour’s austere gaze, “Of course not, Mrs. Clarke. I’m very glad that you care about me enough to—“ Her reply was cut short by a derisive snort:
“Good! And I hope you take it to heart this time. It shocks me how you go around like that, no morals or modesty.” That tone of voice indicated the beginning of a rant that no sane witch, wizard or muggle would take pleasure in sitting through.
Quickly and as courteously as she could, Viv spoke up: “I do appreciate your advice Mrs. Clarke but it’s getting dark and I must be getting home soon,” She gestured at the building doors and the jingling keys in her hands. Her neighbour pursed her lips into a begrudging expression, eyes narrowed at the witch’s apologetic countenance, ”Well you seem to look very tired, dear. And I suppose you ought to be resting, with all the work you must do. Go on then. I will see you tomorrow evening, I am sure.”
The two women said their goodbyes and Mrs. Clarke continued down the street towards the shops. Vivienne watched her walk away before entering Clarewood Court. She closed the doors behind her with a loud clank and breathed out in relief. What an incorrigible hag!
But a pleased smile still played on her lips, in spite of the annoyance. The fourth floor shifts at St.Mungo’s were much different from her current wards—and Mrs. Clarke would not be seeing her in the evenings anymore!
Sum up your character in one paragraph: Vivienne Thorpe is a non-confrontational but stubborn witch in her 30s. She has lived between England and France for most of her youth and speaks with a decidedly foreign accent. In spite of being a rather attractive woman, she carries a substantial fear of entering into romantic commitments- a fear that goes largely unaddressed in her current relationship with auror Ed Pratt. Vivienne is a dedicated Healer with an excellent beside manner. She comes across as light-hearted, calm and friendly. Her friends know her to be a very emotional person who is attached to her patients.
Vivienne Thorpe: Healer In Charge at St Mungo's