#volumeintro

LINKS — stats / playlist / pinterest / app 

about.

wes was born and raised in woodstock and most of his family tree goes back here. he’s an illinois boy through and through! he’s the youngest of three and had a fairly decent home life where he was well cared for and supported. 

his relationship with his parents isn’t really anything to write home about, but the relationship with his two older brothers is a little complicated. while his brothers get along well because they’re interested in the same things (they are thee stereotypical jocks. go bears or cubs or whatever :p), wes is the only one in the family who really strived for something more than just sitting around woodstock so while he’s not necessarily the black sheep, his brothers treat him like he is since he kind of dared to venture out beyond their little town and is a whole world apart from them personality wise. he’s a little resentful of that because he feels like they’re looking down on him but they are proud of him, they just don’t know how to show it!

he was class vice president in high school but did all the president’s work anyway (not that he really minded and it’s honestly where the bulk of his ‘i can do a better job than you’ streak comes from). he was just very eager to get the job done. also he was that nerdy kid who always reminded the teacher they’d had homework 

went off to chicago for college where he joined a business frat and was also vice president there and then president his senior year! he sparingly visited woodstock while he was away and didn’t really plan on moving back but he got an internship at the mayor’s office and couldn’t pass up the opportunity to further aid his political ambitions... he still visits chicago frequently because all his fellow geeky business major frat boy friends are still there <3 his favorite people in the world fr

he’s been back home for about a year now and obviously doesn’t know anything that happened, just the ins and outs of what’s been going on business wise.

personality.

passionate, disciplined, overbearing, duplicitous.

wes was really just a passionate person without a cause until he moved back home. now he’s extremely dedicated to the cause of fixing up high volume because he’s a fixer and doesn’t want the character of woodstock to disappear. he roots for the underdogs, you know? he loves to take broken down things and places and tends to them like they’re his little pets! 

he’s very focused, precise, and way more well spoken now than he was in high school. he just knows what he wants to get done and it happens. his discipline is also like... he’s hard on himself and always feels like he can do better or should have done more.

slightly arrogant, not in a mean spirited way but it can definitely come off as pretentious because he does think that he’s smarter than people for having gone to college and sticking with it. he never intentionally talks down to people but he has a tendency to use big fancy words that he knows people probably don’t understand or at least he thinks they won’t understand.

always sticking his nose where it doesn’t belong. that’s why he’s working at high volume now, duh! like what could someone with political ambition want to do with working at a record store if not to “fix” or “save” it from being bought out my big city corps and it’s like dude you’re a cashier what are you gonna do??? but good for him i guess. he's just overzealous :) and really cares about people and the things happening in his small town and thinks he knows best.

while he’s not particularly a liar, he does omit facts that he doesn’t think are necessary to move a conversation along. he just knows what people want to hear and if he wants to only address certain things, i think he should be allowed do that.

wanted connections.

i think it’d be really fun and cool if someone hated him or at the very least, finds him annoying and is open about it. he’s very much self inserting by working amongst a group of people who have been dealing with jerry’s death and everything else surrounding it. he thinks he knows what’s best in terms of longevity, but he also hasn’t been in the thick of it so... that’s annoying! call him out!

any high school connections. being that he was vp in hs, depending on their vibes, he could’ve either vouched for them when they got in trouble or completely threw them under the bus! wesley vc i don’t consider myself a fairly ethical person, but i am fair

also high school but someone he might’ve tutored? he was terrible at it which is what makes it funny

someone he left in the dust once he left for college! since he very sparingly came home so i think it’d be hot if someone was apprehensive of his presence in the store bc they used to be attached at the hip and then wes went off and thought he was too cool to keep in contact with them

a roommate, if anyone is looking for one! he currently lives w/ his brothers and it’s not ideal, but this connection doesn’t have to be ideal either 

Lilah was meant to be born on valentines day, but she was a week late - it’s always been a source of disappointment for her, because valentines day was always her favorite holiday, and the idea of having that as a birthday just seems so romantic. Growing up, she felt like she lived a sort of charmed life - her parents were happily married, she adored her sister, everything was practically perfect. 

Her father was probably her favorite person. He was always there for her, at ballet recitals, at school events, anything - he would be there. When she found out he was cheating on her mom, which prompted them to move to Woodstock, she was heartbroken, truly heartbroken for the first time in her life. Part of her had wanted to stay, but she couldn’t do it, feeling like she would hurt her mom too much if she chose her father over her. 

Working at High Volume wasn’t like, a dream job or anything, mostly, she’s hear because if she wasn’t she’d feel left out. It’s almost like when she was a little kid, and she’d tag along behind her sister, but now they’re grownups, and everything is different - she’s hoping it won’t be that way for long. And also, that she’ll be decent at her job - she never was too much of a music buff, or anything, mostly going for whatever happened to be popular and playing on the radio

STATISTICS.

NAME: Chase Andrew Raynor

AGE: 23

BIRTHDAY: May 19

ZODIAC SIGN: Taurus

GENDER & PRONOUNS: Cismale, he/him 

FACE CLAIM: Felix Mallard

PARENTS: Harry (deceased) & Josephine Raynor

SIBLINGS: Dallas (25), Violet (18), Jacob (17) & Kimberly (15)

PLACE OF BIRTH & CURRENT RESIDENCE: Woodstock, Illinois

SEXUAL ORIENTATION: bisexual

HEIGHT: 5′10″ (1.78 m)

TATTOOS: the word surrender on his right wrist and two thick black arm bands on his left forearm

BACKGROUND.

Things weren’t always so messy for Chase. Born to Harry and Josephine Raynor, it was just him and Dallas for quite some time while their father was on deployment, making the brothers best friends. It’s safe to say that after Violet, Jacob, and Kimberly came into the picture, the house was loud and rowdy more often than not, but the Raynors were always tight and loving and as simple as you could expect.

Tragedy struck when their father died while on deployment when Chase was fourteen years old, and from there it all went downhill for the Raynors. What was once a happy family, became one plagued with trauma and grief. Their mother never really recovered from the loss of her husband, and she became a ghost of herself. While physically around, she was completely disconnected and it was Dallas and Chase who had to shoulder the responsibility of not only taking care of her, but also look after their young siblings and the house, both of them working while also studying in an attempt to make ends meet.

His plan to leave Woodstock came to life not long after his father died, and he tried to save up while helping Dallas out. Despite the hardships the eldest Raynor brothers encountered, they found support and understanding in each other.

 It was them against the world. Till it wasn’t.

Roughly two years ago, Dallas decided it was time to make his dream alive and leave Woodstock to go on tour with his band, Van Buren. This had come as a big shock to Chase who felt both betrayed and abandoned, as he was left to pick up the pieces on his own. While that showed Chase that the dream of leaving was feasible, it also made things ten times harder for him and hit the brakes on his own plans to leave town because he would never leave his mother and his siblings on their own to fend for themselves when the latter were still so young.

PERSONALITY.

As his label says, he’s a pessimist (however, he’ll call himself a realist). That’s not to say he doesn’t try and work towards his goals, but he isn’t hopeful that anything will happen in his favor, often believing things won’t work in his favor. He believes it’s smarter and easier to navigate life that way. He wasn’t always that way, but with his father’s death and the never ending chaos that ensued afterwards, he became one. He’s direct and straight to the point, not one to waste time or beat around the bush, which makes him a little brutally honest and blunt sometimes and can make him come across as someone who doesn’t talk much. He’s the type that needs to get used to someone before he can comfortably talk to them and joke around. He’s also not one to show his emotions, regardless of what’s going on inside of him, which has given some people the impression that he’s more on the heartless end of the spectrum. His father’s death traumatized him to no end, and he’s never been able to grieve the loss properly.

HEADCANONS.

He’s a very skilled graffiti artist, and has been one since he was thirteen. It’s not something he readily or often shares about himself with people, opting to keep it to himself.

Ever since Dallas left, he hasn’t been able to keep a job to save his life. He’s worked four different jobs, most of which he quit early on. 

He skateboards sometimes.

He played a little soccer in high school, but it wasn’t something he particularly cared about.

WANTED CONNECTIONS.

Friends who bicker for the fun of it

Childhood friends

Someone who likes to annoy Chase to get a reaction out of him <3

Someone who knows about his graffiti art (additionally maybe they like it and support him and even watch him while he does his art??)

Exes: could be during high school or more recent and we can discuss specifics!

Sibling like relationship

A one night stand they pretend never happened?? Idk I think it’s funny

Friends with benefits

Someone who wants to break down his walls?? idk

Drinking buddies

Smoking buddies: he’s an occasional smoker

Ex friends: we can discuss what happened!

Someone who straight up does not like Chase

ANYTHING! <3 Give me everything!

BASIC INFO: 

name: serafina richelle holmes

nickname(s): sera

birthday: september 7th, 1976

zodiac: virgo 

hometown: woodstock, il

gender: cis female ( she/her )

sexual orientation: bisexual

height: 5′5

eye color: light blue

hair color: brown with highlights

tattoos/piercings: butterflies on her ribcage, ears both have double piercings

family: richelle holmes ( mother ), samuel holmes ( father ), sammy holmes ( older brother )

ABOUT: 

both of sera’s parents grew up in woodstock, they never got the opportunity to travel outside of the city, but they still loved it enough to raise a family there

the two of them were high school sweethearts, even got married before their first semester at the local community college 

within five years, they had given birth to their first born, sammy and then two years later, sera was born

sera’s brother has always been boisterous and unapologetically himself, sera couldn’t imagine being the same way

often, sera was just there observing wherever she went, and she never really went out of her way to speak to people

in her household, she watched her older brother constantly argue with their parents, and she never wanted to be on either side of those conversations

she became the perfect daughter that they began to dote on, and to keep that, sera would always do whatever they asked

she’s always been gifted in music, and it’s something her parents instantly picked up. she tried many instruments, but she mostly stuck with piano + strings

in high school, she was a constant overachiever. played sports, was in band, in accelerated classes. you name it, she was most likely in it. she eventually graduated top of her class and received an offer from juilliard to study music composition there

at first, she loved being in the city and surrounded by music and people that shared the same sentiment and goals that she did. 

however, she realized the stakes were high and the expectations higher. sera tried her best to keep up with her classmates

it was when she had a disagreement with a tutor of hers that she finally left it, withdrew from the school, and was on a flight back to illinois within a week

it’s not something she’s proud of, walking away when things got difficult, but now she’s back in woodstock ( and has been for a little over a year or so ) trying to find that love of music that she used to have

personality wise, sera is a textbook people pleaser and has always struggled with telling people no, and she will always drop everything to help you out

it’s also her fatal flaw; she’ll never express her own feelings and would rather continue to let people walk over her due to her fear of confrontation

however, now that she’s back in town and has gotten a job finally, she’s done some self-reflecting and wants to use this time to improve herself and find out what she really wants to do in life

WANTED CONNECTIONS:

best friend from high school: maybe they were friends before sera went to ny and now that she’s back they’ve started to get back together

people she tutors: sera’s probably put advertisements around town if anyone wants any music lessons

bad influences: sera is too stuck up, i am begging someone to help her live a little

coworkers that don’t get along: either they don’t like her attitude of how everything needs to be right all the time or she doesn’t necessarily like the way they do things when they work the same shift

potential roommates: maybe someone who has an open room in an apartment or is about to, she doesn’t necessarily want to always live with her parents

( maude apatow, cis female, she/her, oc ) oh snap! is that JACKIE YOUNG? they work over at high volume where some of the other employees have labeled them as THE MAGNET. that’s probably because they can be a bit ( alluring. ) but also pretty ( brazen. ) they’re 24 and they’ve been living in woodstock for TEN YEARS. it must be their shift because i totally hear THE CRANBERRIES blasting from the record store. ( aesthetics: heart shaped sunglasses, a tote bag full of books and random knick knacks, red lipstick, bright smiles and loud laughter, a carefully planned out surprise party for friends, pens with a fuzzy purple cap, secondhand sweaters from goodwill or past lovers–you could never really tell which  )

BASICS

NAME: jackie marie young

BIRTHDATE:  march 17, 1977

HOMETOWN: essex, ct

CURRENT TOWN: woodstock, il

GENDER: cis female ( she/her )

SEXUAL ORIENTATION: Bisexual  

HEIGHT: 5'4"

HAIR COLOR: Brown

EYE COLOR:  Brown

IDENTIFYING MARKS: a constellation of freckles on her back that kind of resemble florida, a tattoo of bunch of wildflowers and lavender on the back of her arm, ears pierced,

AESTHETICS: heart shaped sunglasses, a tote bag full of books and random knick knacks, red lipstick, bright smiles and loud laughter, a carefully planned out surprise party for friends, pens with a fuzzy purple cap, secondhand sweaters from goodwill or past lovers–you could never really tell which

FAMILY

FATHER: andrew young

MOTHER: ella young

SIBLINGS: mitchell young, grace young, eli young (half sibling)

ABOUT

 jackie young always radiated light and warmth. even in the worst circumstances, the girl always finds a way to find the good or to make the situation better. maybe it was the way she would alter the situation in her head to make things better. even from a small age, jackie was a storyteller. she preferred to be the narrator, draped in beautiful words and   rather than the girl playing dress up in shimmering dresses.

the only thing to ever really turn her world upside down happened a few nights after her fourteenth birthday. news breaking that she had a half sibling--eli. he was the byproduct of her father’s many business trips that took place in woodstock, il. not long after the news broke and after many, many arguments, the young family’s small home was now cluttered with boxes and a moving truck was out in their driveway. they packed up their belongings and moved to none other than woodstock, il to get to know eli.

  before working at high volume, jackie was mainly focused on her college courses. when the money she had saved up babysitting and doing other small tasks started running thin, the girl knew she needed a job and fast. she thought of the record shop she loved exploring when she first got here. she remembered the feeling she had first stepping foot into the building and wanted nothing more than to give that to someone else.

CONNECTIONS

childhood friends: friends jackie grew up with. people she went to high school with. she moved here when she was fourteen so any friendships during that time!

her sibling’s friends: she has an older brother and younger sister as well as her half sibling! they’re all two years apart, but her half sibling is only a few months apart of her!

sibling like friends; they bicker, argue, and love like siblings

coworkers; pretty self explanatory! ones that get along with her and im sure there’s at least one person she works with and gets on their nerves.

classmates: people she currently has some classes with or had classes with previously. maybe they help each other with different assignments or even somewhat tutor each other or one.

roommate: probably in just a cute little 2 bedroom apartment!

unlikely friends

exes/past romantic things

current romantic or romantic-ish things

honestly, she probably hosts a book club like an old lady if anyone were interested in that!

bibbidi bobbidi bOoO! high volume’s very own fairy godfather is here to ruin people’s lives with woodstock’s local mafia gang (but without the iconic italian accent). meet your favorite (or least favorite, whatever) guy, and let’s stay playful, alright? @volumeupdates​​

𝗔 𝗤𝗨𝗜𝗖𝗞 𝗟𝗜𝗟' 𝗣𝗥𝗢𝗟𝗢𝗚𝗨𝗘 /

born and raised in chicago; his mother found solstice in the city in the wake of the anti-vietnam war movement, so naturally, she settled with the first guy who complimented her courage (and offered her free coke).

good ol’ pops never did stick around, though, leaving jude in this lonesome excuse for a twosome. mother’s always half-here, and half-elsewhere—in the streets with some hastily-made poster board, or on whatever substance she can get her grubby hands on.

he was removed from her care at the age of eleven—on account of ‘reckless endangerment’ or whatever—and subsequently filtered into the foster care system. and, well, we know how well that always fuckin’ goes.

but c’mon, it’s goddamn chicago, of all places (maybe, anywhere else, he’d have a fighting chance, or maybe he’s living just how nature intended), so he lays victim to the vicious cycle of hanging with the wrong crowd, leading a life of petty crime. tack on enough charges, too, and he’s one of too fuckin’ many sifting through illinois’ juvenile detention centers—though, he’s never been one of the lucky ones to fall through the cracks.

he’s learned a lot in juvie—knows better than to waste away in chicago—but clearly, still not e-fuckin’-nough to steer clear of the people, places, things that landed him behind bars in the first place.

𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗦𝗧𝗢𝗥𝗬 𝗦𝗢 𝗙𝗔𝗥 /

jude transferred to woodstock’s local high school in the middle of his sophomore year; he barely scraped by with his with-what-they-could-find school record. but he passed, and with flying colors, too, ‘cause don’t let his sealed record fool you, jude kimura is fuckin’ smart as shit.

he did the homeless thing for a while; couch-surfed wherever offered, and even begrudgingly laid his head under the roof of the all souls baptist church whenever they had a free bed. odd-end jobs here and there just to make (what a teenager considers) end’s meet.

he’s not sure how it happened—that’s how most shit-shows start, huh? maybe his hunger led him there by instinct, or maybe this was another act of god’s dumbass divine intervention—but he’d heard of the supposed-gambling ring at the mean-eyed cat and thought that these low-level hicks wouldn’t know the difference between counting cards and getting lucky... at least, that’s what he thought.

he wonders if the fact that he was newly clean-shaven was what gave him away; either way, they threatened his life (as if he’d never heard that before) until james, that sick fuck, proposed an alternative.

first, he was assigned to catching cheats like him. then, he moved up into the gang’s makeshift accounting department, where he had to choose between literal briefcases of cash or his high school diploma—and he, obviously picked the former.

and what he did say about that vicious cycle? ‘cause just when he thinks it’s winding down, something always happen, someone always fucks up. 

and then it restarts, all over again.

𝗣𝗟𝗢𝗧𝗦 𝗬𝗢𝗨 𝗦𝗛𝗢𝗨𝗟𝗗 𝟭𝟬𝟬% 𝗛𝗠𝗨 𝗙𝗢𝗥 /

uhhh i imagine jude will be largely antagonistic towards everyone at high volume sooo :^)

“kimura? like the japanese mafia?” “that’s the yakuza you dipshit”

your token underclassmen in high school who you paid to write your essays and do your class projects

idk what the graduation rate at woodstock is but whether you expected him to drop out or not, you spot him outside the mean-eyed cat and have some ~questions~

maybe you tried to help him out once pre-jude’s gang era and he subsequently spat in your face lol

give me a completely innocent and he-knows-will-go-nowhere crush that lasted for the two years he was actually in high school

you let him crash on your couch once and then never spoke again until now LMFAO

typically nosy fuckin’ high volume employee finds his mugshot but now he’s the one threatening *you* ‘cause you don’t want to find out the reason he got arrested in the first place (don’t outdo the doer, honey!)

an actual friend or two would honestly be kinda nice </3

basics. introducing sloane alice jennings

faceclaim: courtney eaton age & birthday: 23 & june 13 astrology: gemini sun, scorpio moon, aquarius rising mbti: enfp-a, the campaigner alignment: chaotic neutral character references: phoebe buffay, ramona flowers, donna sheridan, aang

about. parental death tw

sloane jennings is made an orphan at the age of five. there aren’t any relatives for her to stay with, only friends, and friends of friends, and friends of friends of friends; it takes a village, and dinah & pepper had one! think a series of unfortunate events, where she’s bouncing around in different homes, but the key difference is she was always well-loved in every place she stayed!!!

she ends up going to college bc it’s what her mother wanted for her, but she drops out in her second year just because she didn’t really know what she was doing there, and felt like she was wasting her time. 

wallace is the last person sloane lived with. he had been pepper’s best friend, sloane’s godfather, and is the one who sent her off to college, so he was NOT happy when sloane dropped out, and now they havent spoken in like three or four years... L

she moved to woodstock about a month before jerry disappeared, but the first place she had walked into was the mean-eyed cat so she gets caught up in a way different crowd and falls in with james & muse q

she has a feeling they’re involved with way shadier shit than they let on, but honestly sloane is not gonna judge people for what they do on their own time, and very few things in her life have been permanent so in general, it’s just difficult for her to take things seriously when she’s like half-convinced she’s not gonna be around that long

like does she move around so much because she doesn’t know how to resolve a conflict? or has she never been able to resolve a conflict because she’s never in one place for too long? the world may never know

but james got arrested, and yes, sloane is impulsive and leaves without saying goodbye, and no one has her for very long, but there’s just no way she would have skipped town on james after that so she stays bc she really, truly believes he’s innocent and wants to clear his name

in terms of volume, sloane does genuinely like jennifer, but i’d imagine she’s pretty distrustful of most of the hv gang but thats bc she’s been gaslit into thinking they had something to do w james’ arrest sooooo

personality & headcanons. adaptable, intuitive, loyal, aimless, naive, hedonistic

is there any person on earth who truly knows sloane? or is their image of her too brief and fleeting, edges blurry and soft. am i saying all this bc i have trouble articulating her personality? many things can be true at once 

here’s the best i can do though. she was raised well despite the early tragedy in her life, so she’s optimistic and naive and believes in people, believes that they want to do good because it’s all she’s known. it’s still a lonely road she walks though, and most of her days are spent alone and she knows how to do it well, but she isn’t lonely and she doesn’t want to be the type of person who only tries to rely on herself for everything all the time. people can really change people, so she wants a village, but one of her own, not one passed down to her by her mothers. 

she’s got a sort of scrappy charm to her, crooked grin, rabbit’s foot, always a hop in her step. it makes her look a little spacey, but sloane hasn’t survived this long on her own without good instincts, and one of her only strengths is that she’s good at reading people and adapting to what they need from her at the time. but tbh, sloane’s core is pretty unwavering, so even if her methods and approaches can change based on who she’s interacting with, she never tries to project a false image of herself. it might be incomplete but!

kids love her, women want her, fish fear her and all that

her favorite picture is of her and her mothers at a protest when she was five, she’s on pepper’s shoulders, and she’s missing a tooth, but her pudgy hands are holding a poster proudly. dinah’s kissing pepper on the cheek, fingers touched lightly to sloane’s foot. 

she likes to listen to abba, talking heads, queen, and... the beatles <3

links.

statistics. / google doc.