S057 - Winters, Jacob

#1

Name: Jacob Winters
Gender: Male
Age: 18
Grade: 12
School: John Endecott Memorial Academy
Hobbies and Interests: Rock music, goth fashion, reading (especially horror literature), photography, urban exploration

Appearance: Jacob Winters stands at 5'9" and weighs 146 lbs., with an average and unathletic build. He's African-American and has dark brown skin. He wears his black hair in dreadlocks, which are then usually tied together into a high ponytail. His features are considered to be somewhat feminine, with arched eyebrows, almond eyes and full lips. His eyes are dark brown, and usually have noticeable bags beneath them.

Jacob is into goth style clothing, though he favors simpler outfits instead of the extravagant looks of certain subcultures. His clothes are usually predominantly black or other dark colors, and generally fairly form-concealing, usually covering the arms and legs completely. He wears some jewelry, with a particular fondness for choker necklaces, though his only piercing is a single one in his right ear lobe. He generally wears black nail polish, though he doesn't use any other form of makeup. On the trip, he was wearing a black bomber jacket over a white button-up shirt, black jeans, and black work boots. He had a pair of black-rimmed sunglasses, a silver stud in his right ear, and a black faux-leather choker with a small crescent moon-shaped charm attached.

Biography: Jacob was born to Sophie and Marcus Winters in Salem, Massachusetts, the younger of their two children. He was born two years after his older sister, Monique Winters.

Growing up, the Winters household was something of a strict one. Jacob often found himself in significant trouble for minor infractions, especially regarding performance in school. Moreover, he developed the sense over time that his sister was the favored child between the two; while their parents were strict with both of them, they tended to be more lenient with Monique, though she was also the more obedient one to begin with. This led to Jacob becoming surlier and more rebellious over time, only worsening his relationship with his parents.

Despite his belief she was their parents' favorite, Jacob loved his older sister and had a close relationship with her. She was warm, understanding and patient in ways their parents often weren't, and he confided in her quite a bit over the years. Her decision upon graduating high school to move out and go to college left him feeling a bit isolated at home, worsening some of his behavior.

Monique had a keen interest in photography, and the hobby rubbed off onto her brother before long. While Monique preferred natural environments, occasionally with human subjects, Jacob took to photographing urban and suburban areas, generally without people as the focus of the shot, or without any people at all when such a thing was possible.

As he got older, he started favoring abandoned areas for his photographs in particular. He especially enjoyed the look of former residential buildings, finding the contrast between their current abandonment and their signs of previous habitation an intriguing subject. Getting these shots involved a fair bit of trespassing, and sometimes a degree of breaking and entering. Over time, Jacob came to simply enjoy exploring these areas even outside of his desire to photograph them. He took a degree of pride in his skills in breaking into places and navigating the more treacherous locations, found trying to learn about the histories of such buildings interesting, and the obviously illegal nature of doing this added a bit of a thrill to it all.

He wasn't ever caught by the police or punished legally for it, but he did eventually let some of it slip to his parents. They were furious upon finding out about this side of his hobby, grounding him for three months and taking his camera away. He was initially quite crestfallen over this, falling into a depressive funk. Monique would sneak him an older camera of hers soon after, however, and this ultimately did little to really stop him; it simply made him sneakier about it. He was careful to keep his activities hidden this time, and continued with his illicit art, with his parents failing to discover this.

Jacob and his sister also shared a love of reading. Monique was particularly fond of mystery stories, which Jacob also enjoyed, but over time Jacob gravitated towards horror literature in particular; their macabre subject matter and bleaker stories were more gripping to him than most other fare. Compared to his other main hobby, his parents were much more approving of this, though they did also insist he balance it out with more academic works of nonfiction or historical fiction.

Jacob's personality was moody and sensitive even at an early age, and as such he struggled relating to other kids. He was a bit of an easy target for bullying, and was often a bit defensive even around people genuinely trying to reach out to him and prone to taking even mild criticism of himself very hard. This led to him self-isolating a bit, spending most of his time in elementary and middle school fairly friendless. He developed a tendency for dismissive snark and cynicism as a bit of a defense mechanism. He also became a bit grudge-bearing and slow to forgive, refusing to let go of perceived slights or past disagreements, even relatively minor ones. These behaviors only further pushed many people away, which then worsened his attitude in turn.

Jacob was never quite as academically-minded as his sister, and his grades were consistently mediocre compared to hers. He generally did decently well in English and various social sciences, but he struggled with mathematics and harder sciences. Despite the criticism his parents threw his way for this, he maintained his consistently just-about-passing performance, only really showing improvement in those areas that interested him.

In high school, Jacob took an interest goth culture, especially the metal goth subculture. He came to broadly listen to rock and metal music in general, but found he especially enjoyed gothic metal, industrial rock and symphonic metal. He was a fan of such acts as Nine Inch Nails, Lacrimosa and Nightwish, but also listened smaller local bands in the scene; these were the only concerts he was able to attend. He found the loud, harsh sound and dark lyrics exciting. His parents' dislike of such music was further icing on the cake, adding a rebelliousness element to his enjoyment of it.

He also liked the clothes, and dressed similarly to the best of his ability. His parents generally tolerated this to a point, allowing him to dress mostly in black and wear a bit of jewelry and makeup, but they were furious with him for piercing one of his ears, and generally weren't willing to spend too much money on it. Still, his involvement in goth spaces allowed him to meet friends and generally make his social life less lonely.

In junior year, Jacob met his eventual boyfriend, Francis Carter, a year younger and a sophomore at the time. Francis was also in the metal goth scene, and the two befriended each other fairly quickly. Francis was the drummer in a gothic metal band, which helped get Jacob into that particular genre of music. Francis was openly gay, and their friendship helped Jacob accept his own bisexuality; he'd never dated anyone before, though he'd had crushes before on both boys and girls. Eventually they started dating, though Jacob took the relationship just a little more casually than Francis did. In particular, he kept it hidden from his parents, uncertain of how they'd react to him having a boyfriend.

Jacob is uncertain of what he wants to do with himself after graduation. Due to his uninspiring performance in school, his parents have indicated they're not terribly interested in supporting him attending college unless he can show a coherent plan for what career he'd be pursuing there and how he'd go about it. Monique, at least, has told him she'd allow him to move into her apartment in Boston whether he attends college there or doesn't attend at all. Simultaneously, he feels tempted to stay in Salem for a year to remain with Francis, who won't be graduating until next year.

Advantages: Jacob is at least mildly athletic due to his urban exploring, though not impressively so. Said experience also gives him knowledge and skill in climbing and traversing unknown, unusual, and even dangerous environments.
Disadvantages: Jacob is moody, cynical and snide; he makes few friends, and many find him unpleasant or irritating. He's prone to petty grudge-holding and passive-aggressive behavior that could spark serious conflicts or lead to him refusing help over past grievances. Despite seeming blunt and brutally honest, he's also sensitive and easy to emotionally bruise, which could lead to him lashing out in a tense situation.

Designated Number: Student No. 057

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Designated Weapon: One can of Surströmming

Conclusion: Hey S057 between you and me this stuff might actually be useful, it's just stinky fish, you could eat it or use it as a distraction and you're somewhat athletic so it could give you an advance if you starting throwing it at people as a distraction. Also while we're being honest with each other, don't tell anyone, but I took fish from a can of this and put it in Donald's and Lourvey's pillows. - Josie Knight