Charmful: Kashmire Region

1. AVIVA SANCHEZ

Aviva Sanchez never pictured herself as a mother, yet she ended up being one nine months after a passionate night out with one of her best friends that had been missing for a half-decade.

She blames the alcohol.

She and that friend decided to co-parent the result of that night. Not a mistake per se, but a very unexpected, unplanned, surprise. Angelo.

Aviva grew up with younger siblings, she knew how to take care of children, and raising only one wasn’t very hard for her in comparison. It hasn’t been a complete picnic but she knew the basics–she actually had more of a hands-off approach with Angelo who is fifteen years old. She didn’t want to be controlling, she wanted him to learn how to make his own decisions with as little influence from her as possible. She is more or less satisfied with how her son has turned out.

There might have been a few rough patches, where Angelo came home with five piercings on his face after he handed her a permission slip to sign, and either she wasn’t paying attention or he didn’t tell her what it was for and she just signed it…trusting it was for a school thing. You can bet she thoroughly read the next paper he thrust at her to gain her signature.

Angelo doesn’t go out of his way to be deceitful but he does try to get her attention. Her very hands-off method of parenting has left Angelo wanting for approval and communication which he’s tried to navigate himself and is fairly good at by watching others. He wants to show himself off and have her know him, his likes, and his interests but she seems unconcerned if anything, which makes him sad because he would like to know her more.

It’s clear he’s taken on a rather laisse-fair attitude in his life based on her influence. Nothing has ever been urgent or important to Aviva, or so it’s seemed. Her hackles are hardly ever raised, neither is her voice, and any worrying she’s done has been in private. Since she has no expectations of him, he’s free to do as he pleases within reason, and while he does love that aspect of her parenting approach he still wouldn’t mind if she gave him a curfew or asked him how his day at school went.

2. SONATA GREYSTONE

It’s kind of ironic that all Sonata Greystone could think about was boys in her teenage years and now has ended up with a house full of them. Being the youngest of the Hart siblings by two minutes, she is the one who has had the most children.

Which has been a freaking roller coaster.

Her sons are Noah, Ryder, Kingston, and Gavin. Ranging in age from 3 to 17.

She’s moved towns twice and her fourth son wasn’t even planned! She’s had to relocate her eldest son to her brother-in-law’s farm due to space concerns and on top of that she owns a pottery business and her husband was recently laid off!

She’s done her very best to be loving and caring toward her family but there are days she just wants to lock herself out on the back patio with a bottle of wine and make vases without having to hear her kids fighting, crying, talking on the phone, or asking her for money.

She feels incredibly guilty for asking Noah to move out and live with people he didn’t even know very well but he makes sure to visit every weekend and she is at least happy that he’s made friends, and is learning to inspect crops on his uncle’s farm. Noah may have felt resentful and expendable at first but soon found having a room to himself and peace and quiet was a great thing he’d been missing out on at home.

She is so very thankful for Ryder’s willingness to lend a helping hand with his youngest brother; she considers him the child with the sweetest temperament. He’s always aiming to ease her burdens and is quick to see her composure unraveling.

Kingston makes her laugh the most and was her ‘baby’ for the longest time. One of her favorite memories was going on a camping trip with her family and listening to her sons tell ghost stories because they are creative and remarkable. She feels she can hardly keep up with all of them! Noah has a girlfriend, Ryder is dating, and Kingston is being bullied?

Then, along came Gavin, the cute bundle of ‘lets-shake-up-the-status-quo’, totally unplanned, yet totally needed in a sense. He at least made it so Ryder wouldn’t develop a middle-child syndrome. She dotes on Gavin, naturally since he is the youngest and Kingston was not used to sharing the attention.

She’s had to break up fights, patch up scraped knees, scold bad behavior, and she expected to when she and her husband decided to start a family–just not x4. But she loves her boys immensely and wouldn’t trade them for the world.

3. RHAPSODY COSGROVE

Rhapsody Cosgrove is Sonata’s twin sister. Rhapsody is much more of a careful sim than her sister; she rarely takes risks and is meticulous with planning. She doesn’t get a thrill from the unknown like Sonata always has–and has seen Sonata go through some rough times because of it.

However, Rhapsody is exceedingly creative and despite her penchant for planning and dislike for plans going astray, she is significantly less high-strung because she has far less stress in her life. Maybe it’s because her children are so mild-mannered and well-behaved in comparison to her nephews, which was a concentrated effort on her and her husband’s part to be firm yet encouraging, stressing hard work yet making time to have fun on their adventure as parents. Her husband is very logical while her creativity evens out their influences on their children.

Caleb takes so much after his father, yet his interest in comics comes from his mother. She influenced that by showing him different types of art styles, and the printing process that rendered comics intrigued him immensely and before he knew it he started collecting them. He’s considerate, intelligent, and generous and she adores that he’s bloomed and sort of come into his own as a self-assured young man as he can be at sixteen.

Colleen has always been her mother’s little shadow and her look-a-like. A skittish little girl with a big imagination, Colleen wasn’t apt at making friends or putting herself out there and Rhapsody knows that all too well, being a late bloomer herself. She worried if her children would have as rough a time as she did at that age, and Colleen has just started high school. She wants to push Colleen to be more outgoing but also knows Colleen will put herself out there when she feels comfortable. For now, Colleen retreats into her studies, writing, and books to entertain herself but knows she can always talk to her mother about anything.

Both of her kids are close with her, and she loves sitting down with them on Saturday mornings and eating pancakes that her husband or she makes, secretly hoping her recipe is better but the kids won’t spill which they like better. Rhapsody is sure it’s a ploy to just eat more pancakes.

4. YASMINE KAPITHA

Yasmine Kapitha is of an entrepreneurial mind and has the philosophy ‘it can always be better.” She joined the large Kapitha family when she married their youngest son after meeting him as a young adult at school. She is not a native Kashmirian but was a transfer student at Sim State University. Her parents passed away so joining a large family was very comforting to her and she tries to give back to them as much as she can.

She’s contributed to the Kapitha legacy in more ways than one. Not only is she the mother to three bright, young, Kapithas but also started up the Calypso Cafe, a family restaurant naming it after the Kapitha’s matriarch, her mother-in-law.

She has a warm presence within her family overall but sometimes her serious and ambitious side is something to contend with.

Her twins, Shreya and Shalin are a handful and Yasmine finds trying to usher or corral them to do anything is nearly impossible. She sent them off to summer camp last year so they could expend that wild energy. They are both 10 years old–Shreya chatters endlessly about her favorite television shows and Shalin wants to learn how to skateboard which Yasmine has forbidden as of now since he can’t seem to walk up the stairs without tripping.

She demands more of Laika because Lai is the eldest and therefore has more responsibility. She may butt heads with her eldest daughter at times but it’s nothing a calm conversation in a few hours won’t smooth over when Laika is done being a dramatic teenager.

Lai is expected to have good grades, broaden her horizons with school activities, and under no circumstance is she allowed to date until she’s graduated. Yasmine nor her husband like the idea of Lai being distracted from her school work which she’s worked so hard to achieve the top grades in.

They’ve asked her numerous times to consider applying to the preparatory academy in order to bolster her scholarship opportunities yet can’t understand why Lai doesn’t take that initiative when she does with so many other things. Yasmine would never consider herself a nagging mother but Lai has sometimes accused her of it. Yasmine has considered just inviting the headmaster over herself but who has time when they are running a restaurant? The meal alone would score them enough points to get in, she has no doubt. It would be another feather in the Kapitha family’s hat to add students of the Academy to their long list of accolades.

5. MIA DENHOLM

(Old image)

If the world were less cruel and corrupt, Miaslava Molotova might have been a decent mother. Motherhood was forced upon her and as anyone knows, when one is given no choice, it often leads to resentment and bitterness.

When she was younger she imagined she would grow up, fall in love, get married, and have children, but that happy dream was nothing like what it turned out to be.

She wanted an education but her father arranged for her to marry a highly beneficial informant called ‘Denhilov’ within the Rusklavan Underground. She was forced to wed or end up unsupported. Mia was beautiful, the only child of a powerful family, and she led a privileged life until she realized those privileges were born on top of piles of corpses and it could be taken away in a snap if she didn’t fall in line.

Her husband was kind at first, but her resentment of the situation soured their relationship and he was less so when she found out his secrets, often beating her until she pretended to be unconscious so he would just leave her be. The only times he did not was when she was pregnant–and to choose between pregnancy and physical violence is hardly a choice.

It didn’t help that her firstborn, a son named Alerik, is the spitting image of his father. She hated looking at him, especially as he grew more into his features. She was more agreeable to her daughter, Elenoire, but still wished she’d never had any children at all. Why would anyone want to bring others into this cruel world? Her husband clearly loved them more than her, the way he doted on Alerik made her blood boil as he never afforded her any affection anymore, only violence. She was jealous, she was petty, and she was the reason the Kashmire’s SCIA blasted into her house and took her husband out in front of Alerik when he was only 8 years old. She wanted to be free of monsters, and she didn't care what had to be done to get what she wanted.

After that, she fled Ruskslovia and from the influence of her father because if there was one thing she feared, it was her daughter would be forced to live the same horrors as Mia. Or worse, Alerik would be snatched up and groomed to be the next monster in her father’s empire of crime. Her plan was to use the fortune her grandmother had hidden and hoarded but that all went astray when the key to it disappeared with the SCIA agents.

Taking care of children without the support of a partner is hard but using manipulative tactics such as emotional blackmail, guilt-tripping, and gaslighting, she could at least make her son do her bidding, and since she believed it was his fault the key was gone she determined he would be the one to help her get it back.

Mia sustained head injuries and mental abuse during those years with Denhilov. Her judgment started to tailspin, as well as her temper, and her reality. It was a challenge for Erik to keep her tempered, and protect Noire. She refused to seek help, solely focused on the key to wealth–an obsession. This chase after it took them across many different countries while avoiding her father and looking for information until she could emigrate to Kashmire.
Her children were miserable moving around and unable to build any meaningful friendships, and Erik took the brunt of her anger in his adolescence–she was set off by his tiniest mistakes; resulting in verbal abuse that was scathing. She was softer on Noire, but Erik didn’t let that jealousy consume him seeing how clearly more positively she treated his sister than him. He also noticed her talking out loud to their father long after he was dead which concerned him greatly but he never mentioned it because he was also fearful of his mother’s reaction.

Erik never once hated his mother, he just felt sorry for her and knew she was sick, and felt helpless about how to help her–only could do as she wanted to keep her happy. He wanted to feel loved again and was just as desperate to get that feeling back, but it never seemed there was a light at the end of the tunnel of their misery or tension.

Noire was relatively sheltered from her mother’s episodes, mostly because Erik could persuade Mia to take a valium and lay down until they passed and made sure Noire never disturbed her. So Noire has a bit better view of their mother in her memories, remembering a lady who smiled and told her stories, who sang her songs to cheer her up and keep her from crying when she felt sad. Noire liked to poke fun at Erik as little siblings tend to do and she realizes it was because she witnessed Mia do it so often despite Erik’s discomfort at it.

After Mia put a bullet in Erik during a fit of psychotic rage after losing control of him, after convincing him to kidnap an SCIA agent's daughter–she was apprehended, plead insanity, tried and convicted of attempted murder and kidnapping, and is currently locked in a ward of women’s corrections in Kashmire.

Erik survived the shooting but has wiped his hands clean of his mother, rightfully. He now has custody of his little sister and despite their difficulties and trauma, still holds out hope he, as a 23-year-old, and Noire at fifteen years old can be a family. He has a deep fear that once she turns eighteen, he will never see nor hear from her again. Noire feels like at times Erik ignores her in favor of his girlfriend, and doesn’t feel like he would even miss her if she were to disappear from his life.

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