Willow Carter

[Rootbeerpants]

Name: Willow Carter
Gender: Female
Age: 18
Grade: Senior
School: Southwest Red Rock High School
Hobbies and Interests: Piano, tabletop RPGs, golf, baking

Appearance: Willow stands at 5’7” and weighs around 135lbs. She has a lean body, with slight muscle definition in her arms and legs. Her hair is cascades down her back past her shoulders in a wavy pattern, framing her heart shaped face. It is naturally blonde but Willow dyes it blue. Willow has oval shaped blue eyes and a button nose along with slightly tanned skin. She wears a pair of rectangular glasses at all times.

Willow typically wears various colours of tank tops or polo shirts with a hoodie tied around her waist. She also wears skirts that go down to her knees as well as knee socks and sneakers. Willow has a small scar on her right shoulder from an accident as a child.

Biography: Willow was born on the 24th of October 2006. She was the only child of Lewis and Mary Carter. Lewis and Mary had both met ten years prior at a fancy dinner that was taking place in the restaurant Lewis was head chef at. Mary was working as entertainment, playing piano for the guests. The two had taken a cigarette break at the same time and after talking outside both swapped numbers. They began dating a year later and got married in 2002.

After Willow was born both parents continued to work their regular jobs, resulting in Willow usually being looked after by babysitters most days. This lead to Willow having a more distant relationship with both her parents, only seeing them at night when they were both usually too tired to play with her. Mary and Lewis did still try to foster a bond with Willow when they could, spending whatever time off they had with her. But this didn’t help their relationship much, especially once Willow was old enough to start school. Lewis and Mary were adamant that their child would be successful at school and get into college. So adamant that most of their conversations with Willow turned into asking how school was going and if she was keeping up good grades. This did lead to Willow having a good record at school, keeping up consistently high marks in most subjects at the expense of not making many friends. Willow spent too much time studying to really make any friends. This along with her getting prescription glasses for being nearsighted left her with a reputation for being a loner nerd among her peers.

Towards the end of middle school though the Covid-19 pandemic started. This forced Mary and Lewis to be at home with Willow but also resulted in Lewis losing his job as the restaurant closed down. Because of this Lewis spent most of the pandemic trying to find another job while Mary looked after Willow. Looking to find some way to connect with her daughter after all this time Mary sat Willow down to teach her piano. Initially Willow was hesitant to learn. She didn’t think she had the time to learn a new skill and was still uneasy spending so much time with her mother after years of only talking about school with her. But as the pandemic went on Willow found herself actually enjoying playing the piano. It was fun to learn a skill for herself rather than for school and she really enjoyed the tactile feeling of making something come to life. After the pandemic loosened up however Mary would stop teaching Willow, focusing more on her career. With Lewis also getting a new job this left Willow to play the piano alone, something she still did for fun now and again.

The pandemic had also changed Willows perception on life. She had spent most of her time in elementary and middle school studying and staying away from people. During the pandemic however she would see tv reports and posts online about people missing hanging out with friends or doing various outdoor activities. Because of this and with highschool starting up around that time Willow decided to try being more outgoing and make friends. Initially this went poorly. Anyone who remembered her from previous schools didn’t want to hang out with her and her lack of social skills held Willow back from making new friends. But Willow would finally find some friends by signing up for the schools table top RPG group. Willow had only heard a few things about table top games. Mainly about popular shows like Critical Role or Dimension 20, thought she hadn’t seen either past occasional social media clips. Still what she saw interested Willow enough to make her sign up, hoping it would allow her to both gain a new hobby and find new friends. After a few awkward first meetings and attempts to learn both how to role play and how to play dungeons and dragons Willow did enjoy her time playing the game immensely. The ability to be a person she wasn’t was intoxicating for Willow. She spent many nights thinking about the various confident and charismatic characters she had made. In time these characters would help her grow more confident herself, as well as help her gain friends both in the club and outside of it.

Willow also looked for a sport to take part in. She mainly wanted an excuse to spend more time outside that wouldn’t make her parents worry she wasn’t spending enough time furthering her education. Willows initial attempts to join most sports teams were met with failure though. Her lack of athleticism combined with requirement to wear glasses meant she never got past try-outs at sports like softball or soccer. Desperate to find a sport that she could compete in though Willow eventually found luck with the schools golf club. Willow spent some time watching golf games from the likes of Tiger Woods and Jack Nicklaus to learn the game as well as various YouTube videos explaining the sport. She also convinced her parents to buy a set of golf clubs and golf balls for her to practice with in their backyard. This lead to her being accepted onto the team, finally finding a sport she could play. Golfing quickly became a nice escape from her daily routine as well, as she found the game rather relaxing while still requiring focus and commitment to play.

While all this had helped Willow find herself more and developed both her confidence and gained her a friend group the extra-curricular activities did pull her focus away from her schoolwork. This lead to a slip in her grades, not enough to worry the school as she was still within passing grades but enough to worry her parents. Both of them sat Willow down to try and talk with her about her slipping grades before they got worse. After years of them mostly being distant with her though Willow ended up in an argument with them, yelling about how she was happier now than she ever had been with them. This lead to her being banned from playing the piano and threatening to take her off of the golf team. She was also grounded for several days. Willow would relent after this and spend less time with her friends to focus on upping her grades again but the incident would forever fracture her bond with her parents, causing her to resent both of them. They would barely speak at all after this.

Around the same time Willow would also realise she was a lesbian. During a table top rpg session her female character would kiss another female npc. Up to this point romance hadn’t been something Willow had put much thought into, her mind too focused on her various other pursuits. For days afterwards though it was all Willow could think about. She eventually resolved to try and find an actual girl to kiss in order to see if she liked it. Willows pursuit of various women though would lead to her being labelled and often ridiculed for being an out lesbian, cementing her with the label for at least the rest of her time in school. When Willow did finally find a woman interested enough to give her a chance all it did was confirm what everyone else was already saying about her. As such Willow decided to embrace it, being an out lesbian at school and home. Her parents did support her but the already strained relationship wasn’t improved much despite this. Willow did also lose a few friends because of this and would face much more bullying at school.

All of this also lead to Willow developing a hobby of baking. Her schedule was too busy for her to commit much time to it but after hearing online that women liked partners who made treats for them Willow began experimenting with recipes when she could. This proved to not help her romantic prospects too much but Willow still enjoyed the process of making things by hand and experimenting in the kitchen enough to still do it when she could.

Now towards the end of the school year Willows grades are good and her parents are still pressuring her to go to college. Willow still doesn’t know exactly what she wants to do though. The only thing she is set on is moving out as soon as she can and living away from both her parents.

Advantages: Willow is physically fit, having above average cardio and upper body strength from playing golf. She’s also more likely to join or form groups due to her desire to be around people and more confident nature.
Disadvantages: Willows requirement to wear glasses leaves her vulnerable should they be knocked off during a fight or accident. Willow also has issues with people forcing her to do things or pushing her into roles she doesn’t want to do and may get into arguments or fights over this. Her desire to not be alone may also lead her be more trusting of dangerous individuals for the sake of being around another person.