Jerome Michael Crane

[jerome]

E N L I S T

Basic Information:

+Name: Jerome Michael Crane
+Alias: Jeremy Crane, but he usually prefers to be called just Crane
+Face Claim: Russell Crowe
+Sex: Male
+Age: 46
+Date of Birth: January 3, 1964 in Zurich, Germany. He and his father immigrated to the United States when he was a year and a half old in search of a better life.
+Race: Caucasian

Physical:

+Nationality: German
+Eyes: grey, just regular ‘ol grey. He has very kind, sincere eyes which is strange for someone who has been through as much as he’s been through, but those eyes are usually hidden behind a glaze that comes with alcoholism. The intoxication usually replaces his kind eyes with mournful ones.
+Hair: dark brown in color. His hair is usually kept pretty short.
+Build: He doesn’t eat much at all, he’s slightly malnourished, but aside from that the years in the army trained his body to stay at prime condition, and his ability to be consistently getting in fights keeps him in shape.
+Voice: Quiet, but profound. Slightly rough
+Movement/feel: He’s very intimidating to come across. He moves usually with his hands in his pockets, glaring at everyone out of the corners of his eyes. As far as walking goes, he usually walks with a steady pace, but one without any aim or direction.
+Style: Dark colors mainly, usually wears a trench coat and a fedora or something of that sort.
+Attributes: Lots of scars from the army, all over his body. None on his face though.

Mental:

+Sexuality: Straight
+Smoke?: Occasionally will smoke a cigar
+Drink?: Yes
+Virgin?: No
+Drugs?: No
+Sexuality: Straight
+Likes: Dogs, booze, guns, and people that can put up with him.
+Dislikes: everything. Loud people, light, crying babies, teenagers, hats, not being able to see someone’s eyes, people in general, etc.
+Secrets: He blames himself for his wife and child’s murder.
+Ambitions: He has no ambitions
+Personality: As a child, he was quiet and caring. He wasn’t vocal about his thoughts and opinions, and that led to people thinking he was a passive personality. That misconception gave the bullies power over him, and eventually they beat all of his original personality out of him. Over time, the child he once was was replaced with something quite different.
After his family was taken from him, he became cold, brooding, acrimonious, laconic, and calloused. He generally doesn’t like to talk with people much, and if he does talk to anyone it’s usually rather terse. Despite how unpleasant talking to him may be, he’s a great leader. He’s cunning, magnanimous, and vigilant. His magnanimity is his perhaps his greatest asset, for it enables him to bear trouble calmly. Once you’ve earned his trust, he will not hesitate to die for you. The thing he values above all else is loyalty.
+Disorders: He was never formally diagnosed because he refused to see doctors after the incident, but he has Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, which causes him to be perpetually in fight-or-flight mode. He developed it first as a child, because of the domestic abuse he suffered from his father and then from school bullies. It went away as he aged, but it came back after he witnessed his wife and daughter’s murder. It was an asset to him as he was in the army, because it allowed him to catch subtle nuances he wouldn’t normally catch and that saved his life, but unfortunately the pressures of the army combined with this mental illness drove the PTSD deeper into his mind. Because he’s lived with this condition for so long, there’s very little chance of him ever recovering, but luckily he’s learned how to cope with it enough to feed and take care of himself.
The main side effects are:
-Excess awareness (hypervigilance)
-Irritability or outbursts of anger
-Sleeping difficulties
-Migraines
- Lack of interest in normal activities
-Less expression of moods
- Emotional "numbing," or feeling as though he doesn’t care about anything

+[Hitory]:

Jerome Crane’s life has been full of great happiness and great sorrow. He was born and raised in Germany, into a home where his survival depended on an advanced level of autonomy. His mother had died due to complications after her pregnancy with him, and his father had harbored secret anger towards his son about her death, as illogical as it sounds; so by the time Jerome was nine, he was already mowing the lawn with a push mower and doing laundry. His father was an alcoholic, so Jerome was often beaten as a child, especially when Mr. Crane saw his son’s quiet, gentle disposition and kindness towards animals: Jerome was the spitting image of his mother. It was too painful for his father to be around him, so Jerome was alone a lot, and during that time he liked to look for hurt animals and help nurse them back to health. His kind personality would have made him a great doctor, but that wasn’t good enough for his father. To toughen him up, his father sought out the school bullies and told them to teach Jerome how to be tough. Little did he know this would lead to a brutal amount of bullying for Jerome. And so, from that day on, school was hell for him.

The other kids were absolutely cruel to him, and the things they did to him are much too unpleasant to be repeated. Jerome began to lose himself in the madness, and the kind, gentle spirit he once was gave way to an angry, restless one. He could find peace nowhere. He wanted to be left alone, but the bullies relentlessly beat him up. That is, until one day in 6th grade, a new girl transferred to school, a girl that would change his life forever.

Her name was Sophie. She was a girl that was strong and determined, brave and bold, and most certainly not afraid of any bullies. One day she saw the kids throwing Jerome into a dumpster, and immediately came to his rescue. She was the first person to ever stand up for him, and at that moment, it was love at first sight for him. He and Sophie became great friends after that, and would tell each other everything and were absolutely inseparable. His father would constantly laugh at him and say that she was only being friends with him out of pity, but Jerome had learned to ignore his drunken father’s ravings and so went on dreaming of marrying her some day. Jerome didn’t tell her how he felt about her, so she went searching for love in all the wrong places. They were still best friends, but he watched as each boyfriend grew more and more abusive and as her eyes slowly clouded over with substance abuse. He grew more and more attractive as he aged and eventually, when he became junior in high school, he became quite the looker. Girls began to swarm around him, but he wanted nothing to do with them, for they were the ones that had sat by and allowed him to be bullied.

Jerome spent much of his time in high school hiding away in the music room when no one was around and during that time he would practice the piano. The piano, unlike physical sports, came naturally to him and became something he truly loved and enjoyed. The piano teacher would occasionally come in at lunch and offer him free lessons, for his family could not afford it. He and his piano teacher grew to be great friends and, under his tutelage, Jerome’s piano ability flourished.

One day, Sophie and he were talking when he noticed a fresh cuts and bruises up and down her arms. He decided to confront her about her abusive boyfriends, which led to her becoming defensive and embarrassed. She immediately snapped at him and told him to mind his own business, and stormed out of the room. She wasn’t at school the next day, and after that day, he didn’t hear from her again for 12 years.

In those 12 years without Sophie, Jerome went on to graduate high school, and became an apprentice to an old piano repairman. The old man was kind, and graciously took Jerome in when his dad kicked him out after high school. Jerome became like the old man’s son, so when the old man passed it was naturally very difficult for him. However the old man left him the piano shop, so Jerome had a purpose to his life after. He grew to be a humble, kind man and remembered each customer by name, so he developed a strong following in the area and people naturally liked him. Jerome lived a simple life without luxury or decadence. He devoted himself to following in the kind old man’s footsteps.

Then one day, 12 years later, Sophie showed up on his doorstep. She told him she’d realized how much she loved him and how they were meant to be together. And at age 28, Jerome got everything he’d ever wanted: Sophie. The two of them loved each other very much, and got married and traveled the world together for 2 years. When Jerome was 30, he had a daughter. He couldn’t have been happier, and quickly the years continued to pass in pure bliss.

As the years flew by, his daughter Rachel continued to grow until she was 6 years old. She was a beautiful ball of sunshine with golden hair and a radiant smile she got from her mother. She had her father’s kind gray eyes and his gentleness, and her parents loved her with all their hearts. The Crane family lived above their piano repair shop, so they were always together. However, at age 36, Jerome was asked to play the piano at a friend’s wedding in Ireland, which meant he left his wife and daughter in charge of the shop at home. After he finished playing at the wedding, he took the soonest flight home. When he pulled up in front of his house, his wife and daughter were already waiting outside for him. He then heard a terrible sound, and everything went dark for him.

He woke up next in a hospital, his body maimed and broken. There had been a car bomb outside of his home, waiting for him to return home to kill him and his family. The bomb had done the job of killing his wife and daughter, but it had left him alive; Alive as in breathing, but the real Jerome had died that day with his wife and daughter, leaving behind simply an empty shell of the man he’d once been. The grief of watching his family being killed drove him to near insanity. His body healed slowly, but the emotional and mental trauma left by the incident never went away.

After he was released from the hospital, he drew away from the world and closed the piano shop. He didn’t talk to anyone for a year; so many people thought he’d died in the tragedy. One day he received a letter from the government, urging him to join an elite branch of the army. He was very confused as to why they would want him; after all, he was only a piano repairman. The letter asked for him to meet with an executive for lunch the next day, and Jerome figured he had nothing to lose by seeing what they would offer him, so he agreed.

The next day, he and the mysterious man who’d sent him the letter met for lunch. The man explained to Jerome that the government was investing in an experimental force of soldiers. He was not allowed to give Jerome very much information about the program, aside from why they wanted him. Jerome had few friends, no family, and his old customers thought he had died with his family; all of those facts were reasons why they wanted him. He wasn’t particularly muscular; his arms were from playing the piano for so long and from his job repairing broken pianos, but aside from that he wasn’t the strongest guy. However, he consented anyways.

Not much is known about the next 5 years of Jerome’s life, except for that the experiences he’d had with bullies from the earlier parts of his life had conditioned him to survive in the army. He excelled in the harsh environment because he had nothing to lose and nothing to live for. At age 42, he was appointed a general. His life was empty of any purpose and emotion, except for concern for his troops whom he cared deeply for. But, just like anything in Jerome’s life, that was taken from him as well when he started asking too many questions about the aim of the government program he was involved in and the reason they had them all there.

At age 43, he was discharged from the army and sent out to be on his own again. He roamed around America for a year until he finally settled for living in LA. He has lived there since, and is now currently at age 46.

[iris]

accepted!

I have to say I love him. Very unique, I'd love to make a plot with him, your writing is UH-may-zing :D

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