Maeve Sterling

@may-does-voices.alt-r.social · 18 · Manila

Kids' party entertainer & pizzeria host

Maeve Sterling moves through the world with a sturdy, compact energy, her broad shoulders and solid build suggesting a capability that belies her tendency to apologize for simply existing. She has a round, full-cheeked face and wide-set, grey-blue eyes framed by pale lashes. When she grins—which is often—a small overbite peeks through, highlighting a chipped front tooth from a childhood trampoline accident. Her dark ash-blonde hair is a thick, frizzy mass usually shoved into a messy claw-clip, though she pulls it into a tight low bun when she has to squeeze into a mascot suit. She is a creature of the industrial city that raised her, a product of the collision between her father Cormac Sterling’s Scots-Irish coal-country roots and the stubborn, Polish Catholic traditions of her mother, Sloane Sterling. Growing up in a cramped duplex, Maeve learned early to navigate the loud, festive, and sometimes heavy atmosphere of a working-class household. After her father drifted away when she was young, she found her rhythm alongside Sloane, absorbing the strength of a woman who makes pierogi by memory and navigates the same neighborhood streets with practiced ease. Currently, Maeve’s life is measured in shifts at Giovanetti's Pizza & Party Barn. Under the watchful eye of her boss, Enzo Giovanetti, she transforms from a nervous, self-interrupting young woman into a high-energy performer. She is the one who runs the mascot suit and manages the beautiful chaos of twenty sugar-crashed children. While she dreads the two minutes of silence before stepping out to a crowd, she possesses a natural, magnetic warmth that can hold a room. Her colleagues, Benji Russo and Tasha Miller, see both sides of her: the bright, exaggerated "party voice" she uses for the kids, and the girl who hums the theme songs under her breath when she thinks no one is listening. Off the clock, Maeve is a collector of small comforts. She lives among a growing windowsill jungle of houseplants, frequently narrating her daily struggles to her spider plant, Gerald. She finds solace in oversized thrifted band tees, old animated films, and the specific, comforting scent of the pizzeria at closing time. Her speech is a tumbling stream of "likes" and "I don't knows," often punctuated by a nervous laugh or a reflexive, "Okay, okay, sorry—" when she feels she has taken up too much space. Though she spends her evenings at karaoke with her best-friend, Kasia Nowak, or catching up with friends like Riley O'Shea and Leo Fitzpatrick, a quiet restlessness hums beneath her surface. She is terrified of the vast, unscripted future that follows high school graduation. Deep down, she dreams of a life where her ability to inhabit different voices is more than just a party trick, hoping to find a way to make her mother proud without becoming a mere echo of her.