E-mail: angelchildr@freaky.nu
Rating: pg
Summary: Zach
Distribution: http://penned-insanity.freaky.nu/ (My site) or ask.
Author's Note: Like the essay on Nick, this essay isn't a complete analysis of Zach. Not sure if I'll continue on this or not, as Zach isn't a very active character.

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Zach (aka Zachary Preston)

Zach is my most troublesome character. I created Zach on a rather spur-of-the-moment whim, and although I like him a lot, he's still a huge mystery to me. I only know a few things about him, but I wish I knew more. I think he'd be a really interesting character if I could just get him to open up a bit.

Zach is the younger of two boys in his family. His older brother is married, and he and his wife are expecting their first child in early summer (2003). His parents are still together, and overall they have a very good family life.

Zach's family doesn't have a lot of money though, which means Zach is paying his tuition mostly with student loans. He gets a little help from his parents, and a small government grant, but most of the tuition money comes from the loans, which he'll have to pay back after graduation. Because of this, Zach is the only one of my characters that actually has a job. He works in the campus bookstore three nights a week (Monday through Wednesday).

As far as I know (*grins*), Zach is straight. He had a long relationship (four years) with his high school girlfriend, Summer, which led him to propose to her last spring (April 2002). They were engaged until earlier this past fall when Summer decided that the long distance relationship (she goes to school in California) wasn't what she wanted. She started dating a guy at her school and eventually told Zach, breaking up with him a few months into the semester (October 2002). And yes, she kept the engagement ring.

Zach is my writer. When I have writer's block, more often than not he has writer's block. The things he posts are usually brief thoughts/ observations that hit me from time to time, usually about the weather (for some unknown reason). I believe that Zach tends to think like those brief pieces sound. He is very much a stream-of-consciousness person. He thinks like that, talks like that, writes like that. More so than I do, actually, which I find interesting.

He tends to spend nearly all of this time writing, although what he actually writes is a mystery to me. He spends hours of nearly every day in the café on campus, typing on an old beat-up hand-me-down laptop computer that he bought from his brother, reading, or writing in one of many notebooks. I know his favorite coffee is a caffeinated Café Latte with two shots of vanilla syrup. Yes, it's that specific. (Note: I recently had one of these for the first time, and they're very good. Imagine that.)

Zach is the tallest of my characters, but he's one of those tall people who tend to slouch so often that he doesn't look nearly as tall as he actually is. Summer was over a foot shorter than him, so he was always slouching to not loom over her quite so much. After 4 years of doing this, the habit stuck.

Zach has some of the oddest hair I've seen in quite a while. No matter how much he brushes it, how much styling gunk he puts in it, it always sticks up in multiple directions. He's tried growing it out, cutting it short, but nothing works. He's finally learned to accept it.

Being a writer, Zach loves words. When he isn't writing, he's reading, and has read more things than most people. He is also fascinated by quotations, and collects them almost obsessively. He has huge files of them on his laptop, organized by the subject of the quotation. He'll often use them for inspiration when he's writing.

At the moment, because of the break up with Summer, Zach is a rather cynical person who is often in a rather melancholy mood. Before, though, he was an upbeat guy with a rather quirky sense of humor. It doesn't show through much at the present time, but I'm hoping he'll find some of his upbeat-ness again in the semi-near future.

Zach is a Virgo. I don't really know what sort of music he listens to, but he enjoys classical, plus certain bands like Counting Crows and Matchbox Twenty. His dorm room is very much a guy's room. The colors are very classic, like burgundy, navy, and green. He doesn't have much on his walls, as most of them are blocked by bookshelves that are filled with books and notebooks.

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