Character Profile -- Candy Romney

Name: Candace Romney

Aliases or Nicknames:

Candy

Era:

Pre-Rift

Appears In:

Beverlee Hills Mummy

Importance:

Secondary Character

Main Goal:

To keep everyone happy (and pretty)!

Relationship to Other Characters:

Twin sister to China Romney, younger sister to Beth Wakefield, older sister to Jess Wakefield, daughter to Alice Wakefield and William Romney. Girlfriend to Uncle Chester (nickname, not her uncle). Established bestie to Thai Martinez and Ophelia Piercy, and becomes friends with our main character "Sunny" throughout the series.

Backstory/Infodump:

Candy is lifelong friends with Thai and Ophelia, but after the car accident that leaves Ophelia paraplegic, Candy develops a resentment toward Thai who was always jealous of Ophelia. She and China make Thai the leader of their now trio, almost as a punishment for constantly competing with Ophelia before the accident. 

Candy seeks refuge in aesthetics. She loves to give everyone she meets a makeover. It's a way for her to make the world feel less ugly and gives her a sense of accomplishment. She can be a bit insensitive regarding her approach to the subject, but because she's known for this, it would be more of an insult for her not to walk up to a stranger and pick apart their appearance.

Candy is secretly dating Uncle Chester (not her uncle), a pudgy kid on the football team who is aesthetically challenged but absolutely refuses a makeover. It may be his way of punishing her for being ashamed to date him publicly, but Candy isn't really ashamed of him. It's just that she is so easily confused with her sister that it's hard to feel like she has anything of her own. And, although she may not admit it, she might be a little worried that if China disapproved of Unc, that it would affect her opinion of him. Although all of the girls are insecure, Candy is the least secure in her own sense of self.

Over the summer between junior high and high school, Candy and China got matching nose jobs. Their noses were the only parts of them that weren't identical and Candy is sad to be losing that tiny bit of independence. But, China never liked her nose, and, as she points out, now she and Candy can switch clothes during the day and take the classes they like twice and the classes they don't zero times. They plan to attend college together, and can do the same thing there.

Candy is very friendly and has never met a person who wasn't her new best friend, but she likes to keep things light. Even before Ophelia's accident, she would get annoyed when her friends wanted to get too into serious topics. Now, that tendency is even stronger because her sense of permanency took a huge hit when Ophelia was hurt so irrevocably. It used to be boring to be serious, now it's painful.

When she first sees Sunny, she sees a huge project -- Sunny is wearing the baggiest pair of sweatpants and saddest wig Candy has ever seen. She is uncharacteristically sensitive (for her) regarding her offer to makeover the other girl, but basically serves as Sunny's personal stylist throughout the series, until she sees Sunny develop her own style, at which point she backs off. 

Although never the deepest friend, she has a harder time getting close to people since Ophelia's accident. Even though Ophelia didn't die, it was such a close thing that investing in new people is too scary. But there's something about Sunny's dark sense of humor and total lack of interest in anything that Candy finds important that wins her over. Also, Candy is the only one nosy enough to ask about Sunny's past, so finding out that she's never had a boyfriend or been to a school dance touches her. It's not something Candy'd ever admit to, even if it were true. She has the world's biggest case of FOMO. So, although Sunny has a hard crust on her personality, Candy is the closest of the girls to sensing Nakia's true vulnerability.

Throughout the series, and with the reintegration of Ophelia into the friend group, Candy is able to work on her senses of permanence and self. It's Candy who realizes that China doesn't actually want to go to FIDM with Candy, and a couple of years earlier, she would have pretended not to know, but now, she suggests that China apply to UCLA instead. Both schools are in Los Angeles, so they can still take each others' places if needed.

Also with the reintegration of Ophelia into their friend group, and seeing how easily Thai gives up control of the group dynamic, Candy is able to let go of the resentment toward Thai, and the girls end up closer than before Ophelia's accident.