cant_kim | Entries tagged with ooc

Kim is extremely class-prejudiced. Toffs are uncaring, greedy, and naive. Well, most people are the first two -- toffs get an extra dose of stupidity. And she thinks that toffs think that people like her are pretty much worthless and very much inferior.

Thing is, she's internalized those stereotypes to a certain extent. Because while toffs may be dumb, well, they're toffs. They're the ones that matter in the world. So while she doesn't see herself as inferior, exactly, she does think she doesn't matter much in the grand scheme of things.

I can't write Kim as a girl pretending to be a boy. It just -- doesn't work in my head. If Kim were a girl pretending to be a boy, she would be exaggeratedly boyish. And sure, she does that sometimes, if she's afraid of being found out, but generally, she just is a boy. You can't live like she has, for as long as she has, without a lot of stuff becoming instinct.

That's especially true at this point, when she's about thirteen and hasn't even had an inkling of puberty. It'll change some when she hits, oh, fifteen or so, and the hormones hit. Canonically, though, her development is only really catching up with her when she's seventeen. So I write her the way I would write a boy, just -- one who doesn't have a penis, and doesn't want anyone finding out.

She's not a transsexual, though, for all that I use icons from Boys Don't Cry. In another life, she would have identified solidly as female. When Magician's Ward comes around, she seems relatively comfortable as a girl. But I can't imagine that the transition was smooth. She has too many masculine habits -- and thought patterns -- to just stop being a "boy."

Relatedly: physical contact freaks. Her. Out. Anyone getting close enough to touch her is close enough to notice what's off about her, and actual contact just ups the chances.
I'm not sure how the whole dressing-up-as-a-boy thing came about, actually. Canon is mum on the subject. I'm inclined to think that Kim's mother was poor and pregnant, and took care of Kim for a year or two before either dying or abandoning her (maybe someday I'll do some kind of plot revealing Kim's father as a toff, but I doubt it; I prefer her origins to be squalid, not romantic, and being the long-lost daughter of some lord is definitely romantic).

At that point Mother Tibb entered the scene and started raising Kim. It must have been Mother Tibb, then who gave Kim boy's clothes -- probably to keep her out of the stews, because she was so useful as a lockpick and pickpocket.

Kim's greatest fear is being caught. Not just being caught out as a girl -- being caught in jail and being caught in the stews are even scarier.
Mairelon describes Kim as making "a very pretty boy." There will, at some point, be men trying to take advantage of that. Canon says she "had learned long ago to spot and avoid them," so there'll have to be at least one incident where she learns what they look like.

I shudder to think what sex is eventually going to be like for her. (Well, okay, I don't just shudder, I write fic about it. ¬_¬ And she definitely freaks out.)

I also shudder to think what puberty is going to be like. However, I look forward to playing it. ("WTF BOOBS?! AND HIPS?! AND AND AND BLEEDING?! WHAT IS THIS SHIT?!")

Kim Merrill