JW

Full Name: James Walter

Species: Human

Age: 27+

Ethnicity: White

Height: 6'9"

Weight: 180lbs-ish

Gender: Cis Male

Orientation: Bisexual

Horoscope: Gemini, Year of the Tiger

Artwork

Personality

James Walter picks his way through life glancing over one shoulder. Street smart and shifty-eyed, if he can take it, he will. Finders keepers, losers SUCK. Growing up in poverty with an abusive father, hopping from home to home and then world to world, and suddenly landing himself in an important position as an adult has given JW a skewed sense of WANT vs NEED. Suddenly an entire town is at his mercy and his fingertips. If it's yours, he covets it. If it's addressed to him, he gives it the stink eye and dunks it in water first because why are you being so nice? Nobody is nice for no reason! Money is his weakness though and it's an easy way to twist his arm no matter how high on the ladder he sees himself. JW has gone so far as to swallow live goldfish for a crisp twenty dollar bill.

And yet, he hates those with money. He envies and despises them and lets his envy leak over onto other privileged people like folks with high educations, claiming them to be know-it-alls. JW is petty and delights in any failure he sees them face. He is a hypocrite in denouncing things like fancy cars and expensive houses when he himself would absolutely indulge in the very same.

On the social end of things, JW tends to go on long solo walks, only coming home when it's time for dinner. When he does hang around people, he tends to be a wallflower and provide snide internal commentary. He isn't good at talking to people outside of ranting, small talk, or making sales. People are more trouble than they're worth in his opinion and if he can't get anything out of them, what's the use in bothering at all? As much as he'd like to call himself a lone wolf, he's more of a lonely wolf. JW is mentally ill and his schizophrenia causes him to come off as rude (even when he isn't trying to be) and distant. He's in a lot of pain due to it and other issues with his body so his fuse is short and his patience is thin as he is. When JW actually does make an effort to reach out and attempt to make friends, he tends to shove his entire leg down his throat. The best way to be friends with JW is to not take anything he says personally because he doesn't mean half of it.

James does surprisingly well with children though. He's ashamed of his incomplete education and doesn't feel nearly as pressured to sound 'smart' around them. He talks to them like equals. Their protection is very important to him. That is, until they become teenagers. He finds himself easily frustrated by them since he is suddenly an opponent. He reads too much into the attitudes they put on as they come into their own and, in turn, makes himself a great target for anybody looking to ruffle his feathers. JW somehow seems to age at least ten years when he comes within a twelve foot radius of a single Hip Teen.

Though his moral compass is wobbly (lying, cheating, stealing, more lying, leading people he doesn't like into fae-infested groves so that they end up on the receiving end of their pranks instead of him) he's not the sort to go out of his way to be cruel. He might make messes in public spaces but he won't do things that could cause harm, such as setting fires or leaving broken glass laying around. He doesn't like animals very much and while he will shout and shoo strays, he wouldn't hurt them.

James Walter is not a terribly good man, but he's not a bad man either. That's what is most important.

Mental Illness

JW has only slightly diagnosed schizophrenia. THANKS, AMERICAN HEALTHCARE SYSTEM. He experiences physical pain, hallucinations, ritualism going down stairs, paranoia concerning the mail and the motives of others, and a powerful delusion that has caused an eating disorder.

He experiences pain in his right arm that grows so severe that he must wear a pressure bandage over it. As for hallucinations, his include hearing voices not unlike a talk radio station being left on in another room, crackling sounds like paper packaging, barking or whining dogs, thumps, cars in the driveway, the voices of familiar people calling his name, door chimes, locks or door latches coming undone.

Long parallel lines like text in books, striped patterns in clothing, and wood grain on furniture will 'jiggle' in his vision. Doorknobs and handles will appear offset a few inches from where they actually exist. Physical space like doorways and ceilings feel shorter than they actually are so he changes his posture to suit what he observes. JW does not hallucinate full figures. The closest he usually comes is having trouble recalling conversations or events because he was seeing subtle changes in somebody's face, mistaking them for somebody else.

JW is also battling what has finally turned into anorexia. He has developed a convoluted switchback set of rules and regulations for himself when it comes to eating as a method of self-punishment. He is constantly seeking out loopholes in his own rules and exploiting them only to feel even worse later. He rarely engages in purging, preferring to fast instead. When he does eat, he either zeroes in on junk food or things with trace vitamins like egg sandwiches.to keep skirting the line between passing out in public and not doing that.

Special Attributes and Abilities

Antlers

Depending on the story/timeline, JW grows a set of antlers every year. They are identical to whitetail deer antlers in that they are forward-facing and do not fork. The tines grow from a singular beam. They bud in spring, shed their velvet in early fall and fall off entirely in early winter. The size and shape of the antlers reflect his current health just like they would on a deer. They are the result of a curse placed on him by a phooka and he will continue to grow them until the number of years equal to the number of blackberries he stole has passed.

The Ghoul Eye

After the events of Hawksaw, JW gains a wicked scar across his left eye, which is infected with the same magic that animates Deuteronomy. It is, essentially, an undead eye that allows him to see spirits. It causes him to have uneven and impaired vision.

Spiritual Revolving Door

The Ghoul Eye that JW possesses allows easy entry for spirits. This is useful for medium work when JW is helping homeowners with problem spirits but it is a double-edged sword. Powerful and malicious spirits can easily take over his body just like the troubled ghosts he communes with. In order to prevent this, he protects himself with charms and artifacts.

History

JW was born around 1950 in rural Tennessee. His family mostly got on with the help of his mother's parents. When his mother contracted pneumonia and died suddenly his father fell into a guilt-driven depression and drinking habit which set off his schizophrenia, something that his own father had suffered from. He surrendered JW to go live with his grandfather on his mother's side at the age of six or seven. JW lived with him and learned farm work until he was 14. After the death of his grandfather he was placed back with his father who had deteriorated greatly. JW was a sheltered kid and didn't know to look for help. He was pulled out of school after failing tenth grade and kept secluded from people.

He left his father's home at 18 after a violent fight and took his horse to a different town. There he fell in with a Mexican-American family after making friends with the oldest son, Horas Valentine. They unofficially adopted him and repaired much of the damage that had been done to him. He was fed, clothed, given a role in the family, and spoiled just a little bit. He grew up along side Horas and the two of them did everything together, including sharing an apartment and working at the same deli. They were like Timon and Pumba if Timon and Pumba smoked weed and occasionally vandalized buildings.

Hawksaw: The House of Twisted is the first story in the series. I have completed this one. It describes JW's arrival in the year 2007 from 1974. It hints that this is not his first adventure, but a terrible creature he encountered on the last one still has his claws sunk in deep from Beyond. The being, described only as The Man in the Cap, attempts to puppet JW's body from within and force him to kill himself. JW overpowers him and manages to force him "back through the veil". The Man in the Cap steals a chunk of his memory on his way to being shoved into spectator mode and proceeds to make a pest of himself from there on out.

The thing about JW that I want to make very clear is: yes he is schizophrenic, aware of it, and experiences audio and visual hallucinations along with pain, but they are separate from the "man in his head" that yells at him. JW is very familiar with his symptoms. The Man in the Cap is very real as an entity.

Fun Facts

  • JW can't swim.
  • JW can ice skate very well.
  • He's a good singer even if his voice is a little raspy after the fire in House of Twisted
  • JW's initial design didn't have much of a chin or a nose and now he's ALL chin and nose lmao
  • He's scared of robots.

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