For Moira, I was working off the following backstory, which I've copied and pasted from our email exchanges:
What if they were set up by mutual friends, and he went on dates with Moira and got to know her as they dated, and so Raven points out that he's done this before? And Charles is like, no, no, we were already dating first. ... Moira was a few years older than Charles and doing a study abroad at Oxford or getting a masters there, perhaps during his second year at Oxford, and when she went back to the states, they couldn't make it work but stayed friends. ... [They] dated for a little while, but then maybe they broke up mutually and they were out of contact for a little while, but each got over it healthily and so now they have no problem being good friends with no kind of lingering history (but Erik still is a little jealous irrationally, because he's Erik?).
There are no lingering feelings, and they're both fine with the breakup, and they've communicated (probably a lot, once it became clear Charles was going to join her there), but only via email, never in person. The weirdness that I see between them is simply the fact that they haven't seen each other in person since they broke up. So it's going to be a little weird, but when Erik returns, they're talking about some bar in the area that she recommended to him, and he's asks her if it's the one that some guy took her on their first date, so it's clear that most of it was just that they hadn't gotten together in person? And I'm happy to make it explicit it via Charles' conversation with Erik after she leaves, how he says that he's so glad the first meeting awkwardness was out of the way, because they're such good friends, and it's delightful to see her here, etc.
I just think that there's always going to be some weirdness when you first start spending time as friends with someone you once dated, no matter how platonic the relationship now is. Possibly based on my own experiences, but I really can't imagine it going any other way. And it'll wear off quickly, but I wanted a recognition of that.
Do you have problems with the entirety of the backstory we created for them?
I will admit that I kind of forgot about that and now I'm not sure I'm still on board with it, since it poses some problems. (I also feel like I said something different while we were watching Penelope [wanting them to have dated briefly but be close/fine with each other at the time of our AU beginning].) So, kind... of? or well, upon thinking about it there are ways it's problematic for me with some of the other character adjustments we've done?
Anyway, the first thing that comes to mind is, if Moira's older than Charles by that degree, is there a reason why she's just starting to get her Ph.D. at the same time now? I see her as being really focused and driven, so I'd want there to be a valid reason for her being a first year doctoral student at the same time as Charles. (and if she's not a first year, then when does the keg race take place/would she be graduated at that time/near graduating etc).
It also seems extremely bizarre to me that Moira would confront Erik at the second mixer, but she and Charles don't actually interact face-to-face until the birthday party. Would they be aware that they'd be going to the same school? If so, and if they are fine with each other, why wouldn't they just get the first meeting out of the way sooner than that, especially if they're going to be working in the same department?
And I agree that awkwardness can be there (putting aside personal experience, because for me it's been the opposite, unless the break up was horrible), but if it's just "I haven't seen you in person in a while" awkwardness, I'd want it addressed why they put it off (because I could see Charles putting it off, I guess, but I feel like Moira would want to be direct about it, knowing that they were going to be working together).
I also don't really like that part of the exchange between Charles and Raven the more I think about it, so I'm probably going to rework that majorly once I get to it. :/
I'M SORRY. I know I'm being difficult about this, I'm just not totally in love with the idea and can't entirely decide if Moira would actually want to date Oxford!Charles/I like the idea of Charles being arrogant at Oxford more than I do the ex angle, and I have trouble reconciling these two things.
From my recollection, you were really concerned about them being awkward, but I didn't know you had problems with the backstory itself. Which is neither here nor there, because if you're having problems with it now, that's what matters :)
Moira is at least a year older than Charles in my mind. So during the Keg Race, she would be near graduating, which is part of the reason that she's run it for forever. My mental backstory from her, which I believe was from an early conversation that we had, but which I now can't find, was that she did a one-year masters or study abroad at Oxford and then returned to start her PhD the year before Charles.
I don't think they put it off so much as I think that Moira didn't arrive as early as they did. She's probably living in the same apartment as last year, and she's already moved into her office, doesn't need an introductory meeting with her advisor, doesn't need to go to these oreintation-type meetings, etc. (Additionally in my mental canon for her, and feel free to disagree with me, since it's just my head!canon, she's the only child of a single mother, and she likes to spend as much time at home with her mother as possible.) So in my head, she only just arrived around the time of the second mixer.
Look, if it's really not working for you, we'll scrap it entirely, no hard feelings at all! So don't think that I'm annoyed. :)
But frankly, if we're going to have Charles be really arrogant at Oxford, I can't even see her being friends with him then. Because the sense that I got from her in the movie is that she only barely tolerated him until he toned it down and started proving his worth. I can see Charles liking her as a friend, because Charles is easy, and he likes smart people, but I can't see it the other way around, unless she had a relationship with him like Raven did in the movie, whether she barely tolerated him when he was out doing his thing in bars but then was friends with him the rest of the time.
Yeah, and I may not have expressed myself as well with that. I think I thought you really wanted it to be part of their backstory so I was trying to accommodate? Which was why I was really emphasizing it can be there, but not awkward. Then I kept thinking of ways it didn't work for me. Sorry!
I'm okay with that for Moira. (I just don't want her to be too, too much older? Since then I have trouble seeing her with Sean.)
I'm good with that mental canon for her mother. and that makes more sense, but like I said, I was then kind of confused by her presence at the second mixer.
If you don't mind I think I'd prefer that? Because I feel like it would be easier than me trying to resolve backstory for them to work in my mental canon? :D?
Yeah, exactly that, too, which I was kind of thinking about. Maybe it can kind of be that they know each other from Oxford and then they become like actual, good friends while at our fictitious university? I kind of feel like it might be more IC that way? Because yeah, I totally see Moira as having zero patience for Charles doing his bar thing, and I think in my head I definitely see him acting that way, especially since he's just like, young, with an ego, and very smart? but he's really good when put into a mentor-y position, which I think he would be in more at grad school than undergrad (or at least more significantly), and that helps ground him, so he and Moira become better friends from there? (maybe like in the movie the first time they meet he drunkenly hits on her and she just shuts him down? but then they start to become closer friends more during grad school and such?) IDK, I think that fits in more with my characterization of both of them?
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For Moira, I was working off the following backstory, which I've copied and pasted from our email exchanges:
There are no lingering feelings, and they're both fine with the breakup, and they've communicated (probably a lot, once it became clear Charles was going to join her there), but only via email, never in person. The weirdness that I see between them is simply the fact that they haven't seen each other in person since they broke up. So it's going to be a little weird, but when Erik returns, they're talking about some bar in the area that she recommended to him, and he's asks her if it's the one that some guy took her on their first date, so it's clear that most of it was just that they hadn't gotten together in person? And I'm happy to make it explicit it via Charles' conversation with Erik after she leaves, how he says that he's so glad the first meeting awkwardness was out of the way, because they're such good friends, and it's delightful to see her here, etc.
I just think that there's always going to be some weirdness when you first start spending time as friends with someone you once dated, no matter how platonic the relationship now is. Possibly based on my own experiences, but I really can't imagine it going any other way. And it'll wear off quickly, but I wanted a recognition of that.
Do you have problems with the entirety of the backstory we created for them?
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Anyway, the first thing that comes to mind is, if Moira's older than Charles by that degree, is there a reason why she's just starting to get her Ph.D. at the same time now? I see her as being really focused and driven, so I'd want there to be a valid reason for her being a first year doctoral student at the same time as Charles. (and if she's not a first year, then when does the keg race take place/would she be graduated at that time/near graduating etc).
It also seems extremely bizarre to me that Moira would confront Erik at the second mixer, but she and Charles don't actually interact face-to-face until the birthday party. Would they be aware that they'd be going to the same school? If so, and if they are fine with each other, why wouldn't they just get the first meeting out of the way sooner than that, especially if they're going to be working in the same department?
And I agree that awkwardness can be there (putting aside personal experience, because for me it's been the opposite, unless the break up was horrible), but if it's just "I haven't seen you in person in a while" awkwardness, I'd want it addressed why they put it off (because I could see Charles putting it off, I guess, but I feel like Moira would want to be direct about it, knowing that they were going to be working together).
I also don't really like that part of the exchange between Charles and Raven the more I think about it, so I'm probably going to rework that majorly once I get to it. :/
I'M SORRY. I know I'm being difficult about this, I'm just not totally in love with the idea and can't entirely decide if Moira would actually want to date Oxford!Charles/I like the idea of Charles being arrogant at Oxford more than I do the ex angle, and I have trouble reconciling these two things.
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Moira is at least a year older than Charles in my mind. So during the Keg Race, she would be near graduating, which is part of the reason that she's run it for forever. My mental backstory from her, which I believe was from an early conversation that we had, but which I now can't find, was that she did a one-year masters or study abroad at Oxford and then returned to start her PhD the year before Charles.
I don't think they put it off so much as I think that Moira didn't arrive as early as they did. She's probably living in the same apartment as last year, and she's already moved into her office, doesn't need an introductory meeting with her advisor, doesn't need to go to these oreintation-type meetings, etc. (Additionally in my mental canon for her, and feel free to disagree with me, since it's just my head!canon, she's the only child of a single mother, and she likes to spend as much time at home with her mother as possible.) So in my head, she only just arrived around the time of the second mixer.
Look, if it's really not working for you, we'll scrap it entirely, no hard feelings at all! So don't think that I'm annoyed. :)
But frankly, if we're going to have Charles be really arrogant at Oxford, I can't even see her being friends with him then. Because the sense that I got from her in the movie is that she only barely tolerated him until he toned it down and started proving his worth. I can see Charles liking her as a friend, because Charles is easy, and he likes smart people, but I can't see it the other way around, unless she had a relationship with him like Raven did in the movie, whether she barely tolerated him when he was out doing his thing in bars but then was friends with him the rest of the time.
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I'm okay with that for Moira. (I just don't want her to be too, too much older? Since then I have trouble seeing her with Sean.)
I'm good with that mental canon for her mother. and that makes more sense, but like I said, I was then kind of confused by her presence at the second mixer.
If you don't mind I think I'd prefer that? Because I feel like it would be easier than me trying to resolve backstory for them to work in my mental canon? :D?
Yeah, exactly that, too, which I was kind of thinking about. Maybe it can kind of be that they know each other from Oxford and then they become like actual, good friends while at our fictitious university? I kind of feel like it might be more IC that way? Because yeah, I totally see Moira as having zero patience for Charles doing his bar thing, and I think in my head I definitely see him acting that way, especially since he's just like, young, with an ego, and very smart? but he's really good when put into a mentor-y position, which I think he would be in more at grad school than undergrad (or at least more significantly), and that helps ground him, so he and Moira become better friends from there? (maybe like in the movie the first time they meet he drunkenly hits on her and she just shuts him down? but then they start to become closer friends more during grad school and such?) IDK, I think that fits in more with my characterization of both of them?