Isaiah Davies

#### Personality

Even in the midst of the chaos of his family, Isaiah is *patient*. He seems to have an unending supply, even with those who are willfully ignorant. Although he is a fairly introverted person, Isaiah has qualities that make him an excellent *advocate*. He knows how to use reason and calm to accomplish what needs to be accomplished and assist those that he's trying to help. You can tell Isaiah anything knowing that he will always be *non-judgmental*. Coming from a family of extroverts, Isaiah is rather *subdued*. He doesn't feel this is a bad thing but some of his brothers disagree. His focus is on his impact rather than the things that he has and so Isaiah is pretty *unattached to physical objects*. His apartments are sparsely decorated, his furniture is second-hand, and his clothes are pretty unadventurous. Aunt Sybil says that his nose is *always in a book*, so much so that he'd probably walk into a wall and still flip to the next page to continue reading.

#### History

##### Family History

When Efrem met Nakeisha, it was by chance. She was a Muggle who was assisting at a march in the city of Buffalo, providing medical care to anyone who was injured during it. He was there to assist anyone who found themselves in need of legal assistance. Even though he was of magical blood, the Davies family couldn’t stand back and allow themselves to observe the Muggle world without getting involved. It would have been morally abhorrent to do so. After a series of gestures, finally to his ear to indicate that he couldn’t hear her, the nurse began to write out things on a piece of paper for him. The pair chatted this way for quite some time and then she left him with her phone number written on the back of his hand.

So, he needed to buy a phone and figure out how to work it.

For a while, he traveled between Rochester and Buffalo to see her, telling her that the traffic was good when he’d never set foot in a car and had no intention of doing so. Efrem learned a lot about her, that she’d relocated from a much warmer climate in order to attend school in Buffalo on a full scholarship. Her family didn’t have much money and so she was thrilled to be able to come out of school without any debt. She worked in the hospital in the maternity unit, working mostly overnight shifts which she said, surprisingly, seemed to be when all of the babies wanted to be born.

Depending on how her shift had gone, Efrem either brought her wine or he brought her food. There were days that she didn’t want to talk about what happened and on others, she gushed over a little baby that she loved caring for. In the beginning, he mostly tried to lipread her and speak in response but Nakeisha learned some basic ASL which he really appreciated.

He asked her after a few months what it was that they were to each other and Nakeisha responded with *I sure as hell hope we’re dating because I’m not about to waste my time*.

When things became more serious, Efrem introduced her to his family which was her first interaction with Deaf individuals other than Efrem. She was nervous, given her novice ASL skills, but there are some things that cross communication barriers and that thing, for Nakeisha, was food. She brought a dish with her to dinner and managed to hit it off with Efrem’s mother. His sister, Sybil, was dubious at first but when the music turned on after dinner and they danced, the pair started to warm up to each other.

They married on a cold December night in the middle of a blizzard. Prior to the wedding, Efrem had to break the news that he was able to do magic and Nakeisha’s response was *Unless you can make all this snow disappear with a snap of your fingers, I don’t care*.

Exactly one year later, they had their first son Zachariah. Then they had Isaiah and Ezra by the time Zach was three. In an effort to have a girl, Elias was born. At which point Nakeisha informed her husband that he was going to have to live with only sons because she was never going into labor again.

The pair still reside in Buffalo, Efrem apparating to Rochester to work for the Davies non-profit providing legal support while Nakeisha drives into the hospital to continue her work in labor and delivery. They have managed to navigate their way in a bilingual Muggle-magical family and they wouldn’t have it any other way.

##### Character History

Born in the same hospital where his mother works, Isaiah was a joy as a newborn. He was sweet and cuddly and while he was up frequently during the night, he did sleep for decent stretches on occasion. However, before leaving the hospital, they did a hearing test and determined that he was going to need to follow up with an Audiologist. Efrem wasn’t at all concerned about it but Nakeisha, even knowing her husband for this long, felt overwhelmed. The pair took him to an Audiologist but then shortly afterward, they head to Rochester to have Isiah seen by a Healer instead.

Regardless of which professional looked at him, he was definitely Deaf. In one ear, he was profoundly deaf and in the other, he had mild hearing loss. Efrem turned down a magical hearing aid when it was offered, knowing that he would much rather Isaiah choose for himself if he wanted any assistive devices. At home, the pair signed with him and adjusted to life with two children.

Isaiah was young enough that he doesn’t really remember a time before his two younger brothers were around which, if you ask him, he’d say was a total shame as they can be completely annoying. There was no question about where he’d attend school after showing his first signs of magic and so it felt as though every day of his childhood was preparation for Ilvermorny. To get some sense of normalcy and to be part of his mother’s culture, he attended public schools in Buffalo until the age of 11 when he head off to start his magical education in Pukwudgie.

Having already had some Davies come through Ilvermorny, the school was more prepared than it had been in the past to accommodate him. That wasn’t to say that things were simple. Isaiah still struggled with professors who would turn around when they were speaking or speak too fast while the magical captioning fell behind and there was the matter of the Great Hall which was always so loud that he needed to turn off his hearing aid and function without any residual hearing when trying to communicate with his peers.

When all of his friends were hitting puberty, Isaiah found that he wasn’t experiencing things in exactly the same way as his peers. He did like men and he liked women but his desire for sexual intimacy was… just not at the same level as everyone else. It took a lot of discussions with friends and family to figure out what was going on with him and to deconstruct the feeling of otherness that he’d put on himself. Eventually, near the end of his time at Ilvermorny, Isaiah did get into a relationship with someone he cared about deeply and understood that he identified as graysexual.

Upon graduation, Isaiah and his boyfriend went their separate ways mostly because he still had an additional year to complete before graduating. The Pukwudgie wasn’t sure what he wanted to do now that he had graduated and so he helped out with the Davies non-profit doing whatever they needed while pursuing his options. At a certain point began to read up on doulas after doing some research and recognizing that Black mothers died during childbirth at a disproportionate rate. He decided to pursue this as a career, becoming connected with a magical doula that his Aunt Sybil knew and respected.

When he was done with his training and able to work on his own, Isaiah found himself loving it. He started to recognize the Healers in the hospital who worked in labor and delivery and become friends with them because he was there often enough. He worked on education and support for both his clients as well as the professionals that worked with them. After a particularly long and complicated labor, one of the Healers asked if he would have any interest in joining their staff. So, at a much older age than the majority of his trainees, Isaiah started at the hospital, deciding that if he was going to make a systemic change it needed to happen from within the system.

It was during his first year that an opportunity became available to apply for a fellowship with St. Mungo’s. Isaiah thought that it would be a once-in-a-lifetime experience to work for a hospital in a socialized healthcare setting and he applied, keeping his fingers crossed. After several months of waiting, just after entering his second year of training, he heard back that he was accepted into the program and is headed to London.

### Connections

#### Friends

* Doona McCannell - colleague