Wow, profile time! I haven't done this in forever. This one's for my semi-new character, Noland.
It's pretty late right now (12:30 AM), but I'll just post this up anyway. 8D
Name: Noland Strong
Nicknames: Mr. Strong, Mr. S, Strong (by his students), Nole, Noelle (by Chrystal on one or two occasions)
Age: 33 (He's the same age as Stefan, but his story takes place 3 years after the events in OFAV.)
Birthday: TBD
Gender: Male
Height: Around 5'9
Special Talent: Analyzing literature and academics; moderate physical strength; empathy
Hobbies: Reading literature, poetry, and essays
Profession(s): High school English teacher
Birthplace: TBD/Unknown
Current Residence: I don't state specifically where he lives, but he lives in a suburban area near his old college.
Likes: Poetry and literature, movies, art
Dislikes: TBD
Love Interest: Stefan; later Chrystal but their relationship never goes beyond friendship
Sexual Orientation: Bisexual (Kinsey scale 2)
Hair Color: Light brown
Hair Length: Short, just above the earlobe
Eye Color: Light blue
Jewelry: None; sometimes may wear a watch, if that counts
General Appearance: Moderately tall with a fair build. I draw his face more rectangular than most of my other characters. Wears wire-rimmed glasses. Has a fatherly appeal about him, despite being a bachelor. Has somewhat timid mannerisms, contrasting with his more masculine build.
Relationship with Family: Unknown; assumed he is distant from his family, considering he doesn't contact them often.
Key Family / Relatives: Unknown.
Relationship with Friends: (Present timeline) Chrystal-Initially is toyed with by her, but eventually is comfortable talking with her on a personal level despite being her teacher. His Adviser/workmate (unnamed atm)-he looks up to her and confides in her information he can't share with Chrystal, but sees her strictly as a friend. (College timeline) Stefan-Falls in love with him and is comfortable speaking with him, but has a habit of keeping secrets from him. Other college friends-Tends to let them push him around; goes along with what they say.
Key Friends: (College) Stefan. (Present) Chrystal, his adviser
Key Enemies: Another student of his (unnamed atm)
Educational History: Masters degree in English, or something like that.
Phobias / Fears: Being hated
Bad Habits / Vices: Tends to keep secrets, tends to be a follower rather than thinking for himself, has a smoking habit
Emotional Problems: Self-pitying and insecure
Best Qualities: Gentle-hearted and empathetic
Worst Qualities: Weak willed
Key Childhood Experiences: None; he has some back story for when he was in college, though. I'll get into that later, though.
Personal Goals: To apologize to Stefan, to be seen as what he considers normal
Professional Goals: Not to lose his job, I suppose? He doesn't have any goals to progress forward in his teaching career.
Style of Speech: Soft spoken with careful articulation; moderately formal with most everyone he talks to.
Personality: A kind guy, but meek and horribly weak willed. Easily talked into things he doesn't believe in. Desires acceptance. Very much a follower. Self pitying. (I already mentioned most of that in the rest of the profile, huh? xD;)
I feel like Noland is kind of a controversial character, but I personally don't see him as a necessarily bad person. Anyway, most of Noland's story isn't a very happy one, so if you find Noland to be a bad person... well, some of it comes back to bite him, I guess.
...I haven't done one of these profiles in a while, so I guess I can start with what Noland and his life were like in college (backstory, essentially; sorry that it's long), then move into his present timeline when he's in his 30's, then general stuff. This'll probably be a very unorganized profile... xD;;;;
Noland is Stefan's ex-boyfriend from college. I haven't mentioned it much until recently, but Stefan has had 2 girlfriends and 1 boyfriend in the past. So Noland is the only other boy that Stefan's been in a relationship with besides Gabe. But anyway, Noland and Stefan befriend in their senior year of college. They both have similar interests (literature, similar taste in TV shows, etc...), so they quickly become close to each other. Out of his friends, Noland is closest to Stefan; Noland's other friends have a tendency to unintentionally push him around simply because of Noland's pushover-like nature. (Weird sentence;;;) Noland sees Stefan as a slightly haughty, but extremely intelligent man with a soft side. He somewhat idolizes Stefan for his ability to have a strong hold on his own opinions. Over time he realizes that he has romantic feelings toward Stefan; he is the first man that Noland has a crush on that Noland knows personally (as in, not actors/etc).
Because they're fairly close, Stefan picks up that Noland is bisexual; they both come out to each other upon Stefan's inquiry. Similarly, Noland confesses to Stefan; the two of them begin dating some time after. While Stefan is pretty comfortable with letting others understand his orientation, Noland feels insecure about publicly being in a homosexual relationship. For example, Stefan is quick to brush off any gossip or rude remarks made about the two of them, while Noland lets the gossip sink in and trouble him. Furthermore, the two are frequently teased by their friends. In reality they only mean good-natured (albeit annoying) banter, but Noland takes their teasing negatively. His reasoning is that if he was with a girl he wouldn't be hearing any teasing at all, so any teasing is negative teasing. (another weird sentence. .____.) Comparative to other situations, Noland doesn't really receive much negativity from his peers about dating Stefan, but he has a bit of a complex about being accepted by everyone--even people he doesn't know.
Eventually, Noland's insecurities with breaking away from the social norm by being in a same-sex relationship increase to a point that drives him to cheat on Stefan. A combination of off-hand comments by his peers ("You're going to break up with him eventually, aren't you?") and getting involved in the situation of a female classmate of his, Noland engages in an affair. I'm not entirely sure yet, but the affair lasts for about 2 weeks to a month. During this time, he's stressed around both Stefan and the girl he's cheating with (Sorry for the lack of name. xD;), and feels guilty almost all the time.
Inevitably, Stefan does find out that Noland's cheating. Even though Stefan seems willing to make up with Noland, Noland thinks it's best for the two of them to break up and officially ends their relationship. The two of them don't speak to each other for the rest of the school year, and they graduate without fully resolving the conflict.
Out of the two of them, I'd say that Noland is emotionally more effected by his cheating and their break up than Stefan. Obviously it has a fairly big effect on Stefan if you know about Stefan's aversion to romance. But Noland has the guilt of never being able to take away what he did. Even after they graduate, Noland still has feelings for Stefan and the regret of never apologizing to Stefan still brings him anxiety into his present-time story line.
Originally, I had wanted Stefan's ex to be some sort of cool guy or player, because I had decided quite some time ago that Stefan had been cheated on. I thought it'd be reasonable that a loose guy or jerk guy would cheat on someone. But it kept coming back to "Why would Stefan go out with a guy like that?" So I created someone that seemed like he would associate with Stefan, and the rest of it started to fall into place.
The situation I made with Noland ended up being this: Not all people who cheat on other people are jerks or manipulative people; sometimes they're ordinary people who make a big mistake. Now, I'm in no way saying that it's okay to cheat or that if someone cheats on you that you should automatically forgive them. I just wanted to have a story from the perspective of the cheater, rather than the one being cheated on, and explore what kind of impact the situation has on the cheater afterword.
Eventually, Noland does reconcile with Stefan when he's 33. Noland works at a school near his and Stefan's old college, and runs into him (and Gabe) by chance at a restaurant they used to eat at. The event is essentially the three of them talking over drinks, ending with this (sketchily drawn) event that I posted a couple posts earlier. SO YAY, I GUESS?
ANYWAYS, that's Noland's backstory and events with Stefan. Normally I don't like to type out big summaries like that (or do I? xD;;;)... but I felt if I just kept it as "Stef's ex boyfriend who cheated on him" without any reasons, Noland would just be this weirdo jerk to everyone. Not that reasons are an excuse to cheat on someone, but...
AHEM. The rest of this should be shorter, since I won't be revealing everything. So, after college Noland becomes a teacher! His ongoing story follows his first year teaching at a public high school, 11 years after breaking up with Stefan. Here, he befriends another English teacher who considers herself to be Noland's adviser, and a slacker student of his named Chrystal.
Chrystal is one of Noland's students and eventual friend. (she's on the right of that one picture I posted.) Because she frequently disrespects him and fails to follow instructions, he often has to keep her after class to discuss with her her poor behavior. Partially because he keeps her after class so often and partially because she goes out of her way to talk to/bug him, the two of them become (sort of unusual) friends. The two of them become comfortable around each other enough that Noland can talk to her about personal matters (his past with Stefan) and his views on life/etc.
To Noland's dismay, he develops feelings for Chrystal--those of which are somewhere between a romantic crush and fatherly emotions. Initially he tries to deny that he has feelings for her at all, but eventually settles for simply ignoring them. Noland never tells Chrystal that he has feelings for her, nor does he try to be involved romantically with her. Sometimes he thinks that Chrys is aware of his feelings, but he's not entirely sure if she's just messing with him.
I know that TeacherxStudent relationships are pretty creepy (to most people? xD), and that's not what Noland and Chrystal is supposed to be. Instead, it's that Noland knows he has romantic inclinations towards Chrystal but chooses not to pursue his emotions because of Chrys's age and lack of maturity. In my mind, Noland remains a bachelor forever and does not pursue any romantic relationships after developing feelings for Chrystal.
I don't really have a clear direction for Chrys's and Noland's story yet so much as a couple of scenes/events, but idk. I'll get around to doing something with it eventually. I know what one plot twist/climax point of the story is going to be, but I don't want to let that one out of the bag yet. SO THERE!
And here's some random fun facts!
- Noland and Dean are similar characters, but I made them different in that Noland is self-pitying while Dean is optimistic.
- Noland and Dean have the same eye color! This just acts as a physical connection between the two characters. They're in no way related story-wise, except in personality.
- Noland was originally going to be mysteriously foreign! Idk what that means... Turkish, or something. This is when I wanted him to be a mysterious and cool guy, so I thought him being European would make him more mysterious. (???)
- Noland is like my only character with short hair! Aha.... .___.
- Originally, Noland was just going to be Stefan's ex. I had already been thinking about a story between a shy male student and an eccentric female student, so I decided to replace the shy male student with Noland to make it more interesting.
SORRY FOR THE WEIRDNESS IN ADVANCE - Noland's last name is a joke! He's easily walked over by other people, making him not very strong at all. HAHA. Hilarious.
I can't think of anything else coherent to say, so.... YEAH! The end of this profile, I guess.
SORRY FOR IT'S RIDICULOUSLY LONG SIZE... I forgot how humongous these profiles can be.
