▼ PERSONAL DETAILS
► Age - Twenty-four
► Gender - Female
► Sexuality - Bisexual
► Nickname - N/A
► Occupation - History teacher
► Qualifications - Graduate of Ritman High, Degree in Modern History, University of Maine
► Residence - Orono, Maine
▼ PHYSICALITY
► Scars - None
► Tattoos - A tattoo of a butterfly with teal wings on her wrist.
► Piercings - None
► Style - Jenna’s style of dress could best be described as coarse - more often than not, outside of work she is mistaken for a ‘rocker chick’, not that she bemoans the comparison. She doesn’t put much care into her attire on most occasions, reusing the same clothes often and investing in them for longevity over style. She owns a handful of jackets that she wears for casual outings, as well as a few pairs of durable boots. She doesn’t shop for new clothes often, citing the act as a waste of time, and while her choice of clothing itself is striking, her dark and drab palette blends her into the background well enough on most occasions. That said, she will cling fiercely to the sense of identity her clothing brings her when prompted to change it, and reacts with annoyance at best when it is commented negatively upon.
▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔ |  LIFE AT RITMAN
For reasons left unbeknownst to most, if not all, Jenna was a notoriously average student during her tenure at Ritman. This, however, was not what earned her notoriety; Jenna had shown herself, repeatedly, to be one of the most intelligent students in Ritman’s roster, with moments of insight and her talent for essay writing in particular indicating that her acumen was not the issue - rather, she struggled to apply herself in any meaningful way, resulting in grades that could best be described as adequate.
Outside of academia, Jenna’s time at Ritman came off to an outside observer as dispirited - as was the running pattern for her, Jenna made little effort to establish connections outside of ones that she, in a sense, stumbled into inadvertently. She held her friendships, and was generally left alone for the most part by the more unsavoury characters thanks, in part, to her notable talent for blending into the background. Very rarely was she seen outside school, electing instead to go home as soon as she was able on most days and only participating in group outings when actively hassled into conceding.
However, Jenna’s name was not entirely absent from Ritman’s grapevines - she found herself the talk of the town for a week or two after a physical altercation with another student. When prompted to explain her actions, having been labelled the aggressor by all witnesses and not denying the fact herself, Jenna was extremely matter-of-fact in her explanation. According to her, the student she attacked had spoken out of turn about her father in an attempt to ‘get a rise out of the quiet kid’. Jenna was punished accordingly and, until her graduation, appeared never to act out again.
PSYCHE Jenna Morgan was raised by her father, her mother having departed from Maine altogether after a messy divorce - while Jenna never asked the details, her guess was that her mother had had an affair, and left the state to be with the new man. Her father, however, was undaunted by this, doing his best to give Jenna the happiest life that he could and becoming her primary idol. Jenna was relatively content with her lot, until her final year of middle school, just before proceeding on to Ritman. In that year, on one specific day, Jenna had woken up late - she had underslept the night before, and therefore fell right back to sleep once she’d hit the snooze button. Her father, therefore, was late for work in order to get her ready and drive her to school. In a rush, Jenna’s father hugged her goodbye and drove off to work.
Jenna never saw her father again.
She was pulled out of class and informed that her father had been involved in a freak car accident on his drive to work, and had not survived the incident. Miraculously, Jenna survived middle school after this incident, proceeding on to Ritman and staying with her aunt and uncle in the meantime. This single event altered the course of Jenna’s life, as well as her fundamental perception of the world - Jenna became drastically more resigned and apathetic, plummeting from the top of her class to the middle of the pack and refusing any kind of therapy or counselling to grapple with the tragedy. She seemed to express little outward emotion surrounding the tragedy, the exception being hair-trigger anger when pressed too harshly to discuss it.
This stems from Jenna’s belief of how the incident occurred. One minute detail, that being her being late for school, directly caused her father’s death. As far as she’s concerned, her father’s death is her fault entirely. She believes that control was yanked from her grasp in that moment, and has never been given back - not that she has any desire to seize it. Rather, she coasts along in life, under the impression that while she is capable of enjoying life’s little pleasures, there is no point in attempting to change the concepts in life that truly matter; she is powerless, hopeless, and any attempt to change these things will only result in further heartache.
Jenna responds with anger and frustration whenever these ideals are challenged, making it extremely difficult to reason with her - most people tend to avoid the subject, even if they care deeply for her, understanding that only she can truly come to this conclusion, and attempting to guide her to understanding will only end badly. Jenna’s anger, in truth, stems from self-loathing; her anger and her apathy act as defence mechanisms, averting her eyes from her feelings of immense guilt and responsibility for her father’s death, ‘taking her hands off the wheel’ so to speak in order to never truly feel responsible for something, or someone, ever again. Her only telltale reminder of the incident is her tattoo - one of a butterfly with teal wings, tattooed on her wrist. She perceives this tattoo as a poignant reminder of the ‘butterfly effect’ and of her perceived role in her father’s death: a minor ripple, with devastating consequences.
That said, whether she likes it or not, Jenna is not entirely resigned - she can be seen to be empathetic and understanding, only showing it on exceptionally rare occasions and reacting to the idea of kinship adversely across the board to compensate. She generally avoids making connections too deep, but can serve as a shoulder to cry on if need be, and appears to be wiser than she lets on - much like in academia, it seems, she holds herself back fully intentionally. ▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔ |
The Muse
udonoodles
