MURDOCK, Errol Thom

Height: 5'7"
Weight: 153 lbs
Eye Color: Brown
Hair Color: Brown
Build: Average
Scars: None
Piercings/Tattoos: None, but he's planning on some tattoos.

Personal Style: Errol really doesn't care much about what he wears. He's either in a shirt tie and good pants, or casual clothes, usually long shorts and a T-shirt. His casual clothes are often wrinkled, rumpled, or in need of a wash that he doesn't care much about doing. His good clothes are, obviously, in a better state.

Errol quite enjoys ties, and has plenty to accompany his clothes. Some girls may have a thing for shoes, he has a thing for ties. He has them in every color of the rainbow and the occasional novelty one. He often puts them on in accordance to whatever music is on the radio when his alarm goes of, disregarding completely if they match his clothes or not; what matters to him if it matches his mood, and matches the music.

Appearance: A typical teenage boy, Errol isn't too physically remarkable. He has a strongish jawline, and his brown hair is unruly for the most part. Sometimes he just doesn't care what he does to it, and other times he's meticulous. Mostly, it just hangs down in a 'surfer dude' sort of way. He's not that tall, not that short, and more often-than-not, scowling. If he's in long sleeves, only this scowl and a mild accent show him to be who he is.

Now, if he's in short sleeves, things change. Errol has a habit of drawing on himself, mainly just abstract swirls with all the colored pens he can get his hands on, often his own 'coded' music. He makes no attempt to hide the marks and it's quite distinguishing; sometimes the same marks will stay for days and days, or in a half-washed form. He's almost notorious for mismatching his shoes.

Likes: Music of every kind, bright colors, geometric shapes, strong winds, the sound of water, colored pens, writing music, conducting said music, annoying the crap out of people, playing on his keyboard, playing the violin, flying kites, confusing people, rain, and running around; but not running around to compete or play.
Dislikes: Humanity quite often, neon colors, theme parks, thunder and lightning, traffic, people who have no idea, Americans (even if he is one!), heights, explaining himself, being disturbed when writing or playing music, people getting in his way, the sound of traffic, the feeling of sandpaper and not being listened to.
Dreams: To stand alongside the likes of Mozart.
Fears: Being overwhelmed by his synesthesia, death, being bored, and falling from any height.
Habits/Hobbies: Writing music, playing on his violin or keyboard, listening to music, and bothering people.
Secret(s): He hasn't got any major secrets, although he'd never state that he likes animals overmuch.

Personality: Errol comes off as a jerk. Pure and simple. He's excessively touchy, excessively rude and takes pride in his ability to make people mad. He's not a spoiled brat, but he is a brat. He typically does not treat people well. He sees himself a step up from pretty much everyone else on the evolutionary ladder due to his synesthesia, and tends to isolate himself from people, even his roommates and family. He's not impossibly unfriendly, but he's got one hell of an unfriendly, grumpy exterior and not a lot of people get past this to meet the wise, diplomatic boy that is hidden underneath. And Errol is okay with that. He's fine with being the grumpy composer. He'll laugh at insults, even if they do hurt him underneath, mimic you and play meanly if the situation calls. He doesn't end things by walking away, he ends them by getting meaner to 'shut a person down', but he rarely throws a fist. Naw, he's not a headlock guy. But he will do his best to shut a brain down.

Driven by music since he was a child, composing is his life. Music is what Errol lives for. Rock-loving tweens might say the same, but it is not to the same degree as Errol. He's been composing since he was a child, and while classical is his mainstay, he can compose a song for a metal band or a techno song. Lyrics aren't as common, but he can procure those as well. If he's not writing music, he's probably playing either of his two instruments, practicing endlessly. Music produces a sensory experience unlike anything else for him, and he sticks to it like an addict to drugs. Because all his senses are blended, he sees the music in ribbons and splashes of color. Play the music right, and sometimes he'll taste or smell it, too. It sends him into a faraway world. Conversely, the right colors and shapes give him the same result. Rain is a symphony in it's own right, and more often than not he's frantically writing what he hears in a rainstorm. If he's not writing or playing music, he's searching his unique little world for inspiration. It is this world that he feels makes him a 'superhuman' of sorts. Superiority complex? Yes, probably. Your letters and numbers are not colored - but his are. You won't taste a name - but he will. He's more than willing to state that 'that sounded like neon orange, don't you fucking do that again' and sound like he's on drugs, only to be smug when no one understood what the hell he meant.

Of course, this is a double-edged sword. Neon colors or sounds of traffic, noise in general and other such stimulus gives him bad sounds, colors, and tastes, sometimes even smells. While rain sounds amazing, thunder and lighting cause neon flashes and loud, screeching noises. A 'c' is a bright neon yellow and so he continually replaces 'c's with 'x', much to the annoyance of his teachers. It can make him behave strangely, and moodier than normal. So overwhelmed he may not even go out of his way to bother someone he usually does...

Ah yes, that. For all the okay boy he can be underneath, he can be a proper bully. Show him a weak link early on into meeting him, and he's quite likely to bother you mercilessly about it, exploit it and laugh. He's not extremely cruel, but he's a bully if he's given the possibility. He'll act like an adult around adults, but most of the time doesn't bother with being too kind or nice. Humanity is just too ignorant of things for him to bother. Hypocritical? Perhaps. Will he care? No. He enjoys being a royal pain among all but his closest friends, and even then, Mr. Moody might not help a person just because he doesn't feel like it. He's ambitious but not inclined very much to help people with their own ambitions He marches to the beat of his own drummer, and makes up the beat the drummer plays.

Mother: Madison Murdock, 50, university arts professor
Father: Winston Murdock, 50, general contractor
Siblings: Calum Murdock, 19, Tavis Murdock, 21, William Murdock, 24 and Gordon Murdock, 25.
Other: Nope
Pets: Nope
Hometown: Raliegh, North Carolina

History: The Murdock family came to America after the birth of their first two sons, Gordon and William. They have stayed in Raliegh, North Carolina, ever since. The Murdocks wanted a sizable family, but had never intended to end up with five sons. Errol was conceived as a last attempt at a daughter. Clearly, that didn't work. What they got instead was a one-of-a-kind son. A very, very one of a kind son. Not that he showed it as a toddler. His drawings had some strange additions of light, and he absolutely loved music, but it was nothing extraordinary.

It was in kindergarten that something odd started happening. It wasn't at all odd to Errol, it was his reality, but he started to draw. Drawing, after all, was part of kindergarten, and learning to color. But Errol's drawing were different. The first picture he drew of the rain made his teacher's eyebrows shoot upwards. It look like the drawings of the other children, but as Errol sat and watched the rain from the window, he began to hum a tune, and at the bottom, where the rain hit the grass he would add a color, being very finicky in his shading, so much so he asked if these crayons were all they had - they're terrible for getting the color just right.

Mrs. Finnley, the kindergarten teacher, asked him more, and just got odder answers. When she asked if he heard the rain, he told her he heard wonderful music. In this particular shower, he heard chimes, each time a raindrop hit the ground, he heard a beautiful song. The teacher called his parents, and things started from there. Madison Murdock taught their son how to write music, and how to play the keyboard. He took to both with great zeal, and soon began to play the violin. He'd go and play with the other children, but he always preferred the music. Always. At first, he only wrote classical-esque pieces that were simple and short, but by second grade he was writing complicated stuff from seemingly nowhere. Even at this age, he wasn't a very nice boy; but he was okay with getting scolded, because people just didn't matter that much to him. What mattered was what he did. He just didn't care about anything else. Errol didn't mind when his oldest siblings went to Riverdale, a boarding school he's one day go to, and he certainly didn't care if they scraped their knee.

Yes, the Murdock's last son was certainly eccentric and maybe a mild sociopath, but he wasn't insane...or was he? He always spoke about ribbons of color and beautiful sounds when there wasn't any music or ribbons, after all. He'd also routinely said things about how Tavis' name tasted bad.

In fourth grade, at the age of eight, his family decided to redecorate their home, and that..well, it re-opened the case of Errol's statements. First, there was painting to be done. The motion of applying paint is was mostly soundless, yet Errol refused to help them, instead sitting and getting in their way, writing down music for himself to play on the piano. If they kicked him out of the room, he'd sit with his ear pressed to the door, writing down what he heard for a base, and then adding onto it himself. If that was impossible, he'd write nothing. More often than not, if he didn't finish what he was writing by the time the color his parents and brothers were using was done with, the symphony was ruined, and he refused to play it or finish it - sometimes he couldn't even bear to look at it, letting instead his parents throw it out.

The next big event was going to buy carpets, three months later. While is parents debated among themselves and with a salesperson, a kindly employee of the firm spoke to him and his brothers, asking which carpet they would get if they could pick any one, just to entertain them. His siblings had sane answers. Errol told the lady:

"I don't like any of them. They all taste terrible." She looked at him, tried not to laugh, and asked him if he'd gone about licking the carpets. He said no, he just took one look at them, and they tasted bad. He ever told her which ones tasted like what with a hint of what seasoning, and that they were all overcooked, terribly. A bit disturbed, the saleswoman confronted his parents about this discovery, and Errol insisted it was true, he'd even physically lick the carpets if he had to (and would have then discovered they tasted unlike he described, beyond 'bad'). His parents declined, and instead took him to a child psychologist very, very soon afterwards.

This psychologist was the first to figure out what was the issue. Errol was a synesthete. His senses had been to some extent or another, thrown into a blender. He saw colors and shapes and forms of the color when he heard certain noises. Motion, such as that of rain, or the motion of a paintbrush, generated to him different sounds. Sometimes words came to him in colors, each letter different, sometimes the music notes come to him in color, mostly greens and greys, like the alphabet Occasionally, certain things like a touch gave him a taste, or the sight of a texture gave him a taste was well. It was very unpredictable, and Errol was not one to explain completely. He thinks he's perfectly normal to this day, and everyone else, to some degree, is handicapped. He has no control over what sparks what sound, or type of sound, or what taste, nothing, except when letters do come in color or sound, the letter comes in the same color or sound.

Unsure what to think of their son now, they just went on as though it didn't exist, though if bright colors were making it hard for him to hear, they went and bought him sunglasses. In other words, if it didn't bother him, it didn't exist to his parents, and as he got older, many of his friends who didn't get it thought he might be on drugs. They focused on his music, instead. They had begun to take him to symphonies, and a couple times his music was even used; mainly in charity shows, where a nine-year-old composer would help bring in donations more than some random old man would. He began to set his sights on releasing an album, but of course, his parents impeded him here. They didn't want him to be too 'out of the ordinary'. They didn't want him to be 'too much of a prodigy'. They wanted him to lead a normal life.

Errol didn't want that, but what could he do? Very little, in fact. They told him that once he was sixteen or seventeen, he would be free to get his music out commercially, if that was what he still wanted. Until then, he was restricted to making music that would be heard by very few. It got in in fight after fight, and both he and his parents were happy to see him shipped off to Riverdale at the age of fourteen. His parents were also glad that this meant they didn't have to worry about dealing with their kids all the time now.

All his brothers but Calum had already graduated high school, and so for the first year at Riverdale, the brothers shared a dorm with a stranger. The premise was to get Errol used to sharing a living space in close quarters, but Errol didn't need anyone, really. He didn't care if he played music too loud. He drove people crazy and he quickly found that he enjoyed it. No amount of complaints or letters could stop Errol from doing what he wanted. Mostly, it was just music, not sneaking around at night, but with his new found freedom, he did that too. It was almost enough for his parents to enroll him in a high school back home, but for some reason (Errol will swear it is to be rid of him as much as possible) they decided against it, and Errol is entering his junior year now.