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height. 163cm

appearance. she has a mole on her right shoulder and a star-shaped birthmark on her right collarbone. she has various round scars on her arms due to picking off scabs as a kid lol. her ears are pierced.

closet. usually, she wears jeans, converse sneakers, and a t-shirt (with a hoodie if it's cold, but let's be real, it's LA). a lot of the times, she'll also have her hair in a ponytail. she prefers comfort over fashion and generally does not care how other people perceive her clothing choices. that being said, she does wear flats sometimes if the day's really nice, but not dresses. if she has to go to a formal event, she'll wear a blouse and slacks.

background check!

history. she was born in new york to first-generation immigrants. however, soon after her birth, the family moved to richmond, ia, where lena grew up. she has an older sister by two years (also born in ny) called helen (fc: cheng xiao). growing up, lena was the shier of the two and spent most of her time reading and hanging out with book nerd friends. she also didn't have very many friends, which was why she read so much. she really liked to imagine herself in fantastical situations and wrote stories about it. later, she'd learn that was called fanfiction.

when she was about 10, her parents signed her up for piano lessons. she liked music, but not to that degree, and proceeded to hate doing music immediately. however, she did meet one of her best friends through piano lessons, so things sort of worked out. her parents, both engineers, wanted her to go into engineering and lena did always have good grades growing up, but she wanted to major in creative writing. there were a lot of (good) tears when helen decided to major in biology, on track to pre-med, and a lot of (bad) tears when lena decided to major in creative writing.

education. since she's a freshman, lena is technically still undeclared. she came in through creative writing and she still plans to major in that, but because of a gen-ed class (and a great professor), she's considering minoring in physics.

expectation. she's not sure what she can do with a creative writing degree. obviously, she wants to write books, but few authors make a living like that, so she's thinking maybe she can ghostwrite.

pack your bags!

personality. tbh lena's sort of unassuming. she's pretty, but not to the point of turning heads, and she's quiet too, rarely speaking in class. she's pretty shy and always has a poker face, which makes other people think that she's cold or mean, but in reality, she's always ready to make new friends.

she can also be pretty stubborn and stuck in her own mind/set, not easily changing her mind once it's set (haha pun intended), but she's also loyal and cares a lot about her friends. if her friends tell her something that goes against her beliefs, she'll consider it very seriously and may change her mind without much convincing. she's very emotional, which makes her prone to anger, but she's quick to anger as well as quick to forgive. she has a fairly good memory and will remember details that her friends tell her. she's also a good active listener uwu and is willing to spend money/time in order to help others.

trivia.
✈ her favorite food is raspberry
✈ she wears a perfume that smells like strawberries, though
✈ her favorite artist is troye sivan
✈ she's fairly close with her sister and often texts/calls her (helen goes to college in pennsylvania)
✈ she also REALLY likes fries lmao
✈ she looks thin but she's actually on the chubbier side because she doesn't exercise often
✈ also because she never exercises, she has knee pain >:((
✈ her favorite pastime is writing harry potter fanfiction (she mainly ships luna x ginny and draco x hermione)
✈ her ao3 account (leanmeanbean) is hella popular and her fics have like hundreds of kudos (i'm jelly lol)
✈ her favorite genre of books is fantasy, though she reads most things
✈ she has a nervous habit of tugging at her sleeves/picking at her hands so a lot of her long-sleeved shirts have ripped sleeve-collars
✈ her favorite color is green, but like a nice darker green, not neon
✈ though she knows how to play piano, she hates it and will not go near one to save her life
✈ her chinese name is 刘亦娜 (liu yi na)
✈ she gets airsick really easily :((
✈ she really like the movie inception
✈ she grew up not really being allowed to watch tv and still doesn't, so she has no clue what people are referencing when they joke about tv shows
✈ she also really can't do horror :(( she'll stay awake all night if she reads/watches anything too scary (ex. the inferi scene from harry potter and the half blood prince)
✈ she tried dyeing her hair in high school with her friends but the bleach fried her hair, the pink dye washed out in a week, and she was left with frizzy orange tips for a while before she chopped it off
✈ she still doesn't really have friends in college except for like one person (her roommate lol)
✈ her shampoo is watermelon scented
✈ she doesn't live in LA but the reason why she's still here in july is because she's taking summer classes (calc 3 and physics 2)
✈ she doesn't really believe in zodiac or tarot stuff but she does watch pick-a-card tarot videos sometimes ;))
✈ did i mention she's bi? i should have mentioned that sorry ;;;

suitcase. five t-shirts and a pair of shorts. a pair of running shoes. five pairs of socks/underwear. phone, phone charger, portable battery. sunscreen, moisturizer. a cardigan. a notebook and sharpies. a pack of hair ties.

flying with who?

sister ✈ helen liu (21) 9/10

since they're pretty close in age, lena's fairly close with her sister. they used to dress up together and play together, though as they grew older, helen's extroversion came out and they stopped hanging out as much. but there's nothing they don't tell each other, and lena calls/texts her sister pretty much every day. fc: wjsn's cheng xiao.

best friend ✈ anna park (19) 9/10

lena and anna met at a piano recital. they had the same teacher and both hated taking lessons, so they bonded in mutual hatred. they then realized that they went to the same school (though they were in different classes) so they quickly became friends. anna is also a book nerd, though she prefers typical YA novels over fantasy. she goes to school in ia, so they only hang out when they're both on break. fc: dreamnote's youi.

friend ✈ denise lee (20) 8/10

they're roommates, though denise is considerably more well-off than lena. they don't have very much in common but they get along well, especially since denise is never in the room and lena never leaves her room. since they both decided to take classes over the summer, they're both still in the dorms. denise decided that they should go to youcon and even though lena didn't really want to, she paid for both of their tickets anyway. then denise got sick :(( so she couldn't actually go. denise follows a lot of makeup/fashion youtubers lol. fc: clc's eunbin.

ticket please!

role. fan
details. admittedly, lena knows nothing about youtube. she doesn't really watch it and didn't even really want to come in the first place. her initial plan had been to just follow denise around, but since denise couldn't come, she did a quick google and decided that if there were book review/fanfic review channels or tarot channels, she'd go to their booths. then, maybe she'd just look around to see what catches her eye. food youtubers, maybe? or anyone giving out free stuff :3

preparations. originally, lena's roommate denise paid for both their tickets because she's rich and can do that. they planned to go together but then denise fell sick at the last moment and couldn't go. lena's not sure if she wants to keep her passes tbh. it depends on how interested she is in the con, but if she can't find anything that piques her interest, she's planning to give away some of her passes. but she's definitely not buying more lol.

plans. she has zero clue what she wants to do. since she originally planned to follow denise around all day, now that she's alone, lena's planning to just wander around the con and go to booths that catch her eye. she's thinking about finding book review youtubers first, but if there aren't any, she'll look for tarot youtubers. she also really likes free stuff lol so she might just wander around looking for that. as for panels and workshops, obviously if there's workshops related to writing or panels on books, she'll go to those first. if not, then it really depends on if it's interesting or not. she finds most things interesting enough to take a chance, though, so she's sure she can use most of her passes.

my ship has a canon!

name. charmaine chen
nicknames.

✈ charm // shortening of name; she doesn't really call charmaine this because they're not quite close

time elapsed. 25 january (22)
theme song. lee hi and g.soul - no way

personality. (for details see blackandwhiteburns's app)

charmaine is nice and comes off very friendly and warm. she's a good public speaker and seems to be able to get along with anyone she talks to, but in fact she's reserved and doesn't reveal a lot of her true self. she's nice but won't take no , and she works hard but is sensitive to criticism.

trivia (taken from blackandwhiteburns's app).

✈ she's a good cook
✈ she likes sweets, especially ice cream
✈ she has a boyfriend called chris
✈ she likes g.e.m. and baek yerin (for music)
✈ she likes to read
✈ she's careful about spending money

love song. tvxq - like a soap
love story. lena had been following charmaine on instagram for a while since she liked her photographs. when she first stepped into school, she found with great shock that charmaine was her freshman orientation counselor. she's even prettier in person, and lena was smitten at first sight. despite being shy, she plucked up the courage to ask charmaine to be friends after orientation ended because she felt like she'd be letting too much slip out of her hands otherwise.

they did become friends! sort of. behind the glam of stardom, charmaine turned out to be just a normal person, and lena liked to talk with her when she saw her, which was not too often. she also knew that she was either straight as a board or at least not interested in her. it hurt :(( poor bby but it doesn't stop her from liking her.

half the reason lena agreed to go to youcon anyway was because charmaine mentioned at some point that she was going. otherwise, she could have kept refusing denise's offer. anyway, she wasn't really hoping to run into charmaine at youcon since it's such a big event, but then their flight got delayed, so...

relationship trivia.

✈ lena considers charmaine her friend but she's afraid that charmaine sees her as annoying
✈ despite knowing that charmaine has a boyfriend, lena still likes her and daydreams occasionally about being in a relationship together (though she'd never admit it to anyone because that's taboo)
✈ sometimes lena will write short passages about herself and charmaine (under different names) under the guise of writing exercises; she'll also write gay fanfic sometimes to blow off steam
✈ anna and helen both know about her crush; while helen is much less sympathetic, anna constantly reminds her that it's not her fault that she likes someone (sometimes she trashes chris to make lena feel better LOL)

let's fly!

last words. i beat this out in like two hours because i can't write my own stories anymore :(( i'm going to keep the love interest section blank for now but if i end up collaborating with anyone, i'll tell you.

scene suggestions.

✈ maybe denise facetiming her after day 1 to check in and be like 'can you go to this particular booth for me? get a signature? some merch? i'll pay you back.'
✈ omg i'd love if there were like texts from anna or helen, just like asking her about the day, and maybe she can be texting anna the entire time if she's bored
✈ if she finds tarot youtubers, maybe one of them can like, tell her fortune or smth and she'll blow it off but then later the prediction comes true!!