InsaneJournal

FAMILY MEMBERS: Parents, Frank and Alice Longbottom; Grandmother, Augusta Longbottom; Grandfather (deceased), Junius Longbottom; Great-Uncle and Great-Aunt Algie (Algis) and Enid Longbottom
OTHER: The Longbottoms are one of the Sacred 28 so Neville is related to most purebloods in one way or another.
PETS: None of his own. Is still mourning the loss of Trevor, his toad, to old age. He does occupy the same space as Pansy’s pet pomeranian, Boots, and her cat, Mewcius Meowlfoy, and is secretly trying to befriend them with treats when Pansy isn’t there to see it.

APPEARANCE:

Neville is still somewhat round of face as he was when younger but he lost a significant amount of weight due to a combination of maturing, the stress of the war, and the tortures inflicted on him by the Carrows then.. His skin still has a tendency to occasionally blotch and his complexion is somewhat uneven. His hair has darkened as he has gotten older and settled more into a darker brown than blond, and is naturally messy, made worse by the fact that he often forgets everyday things like haircut appointments. He has extremely expressive dark eyes, as well as a face that reveals his thoughts quite easily, and a tendency to redden or blush at inopportune moments.

Although Nev isn't as chubby as he used to be, he still has difficulty remembering that and tends to dress as if he still were in shirts that are a bit too big and baggy clothing as if he's hiding himself. He always slouches to hide weight that doesn't exist and frequently ducks his head to avoid the gaze of others. He's learned to force a strange sort of grace when needed - to do this, he tends to move somewhat slowly, mimicking a gracefulness that doesn't come naturally. When he gets comfortable with someone or alternately, if he’s exceptionally nervous and not paying attention, he tends to revert back to his old self, constantly breaking, spilling and knocking things over.

PATRONUS: Currently, Neville can only cast a non-corporeal patronus though this may change over time.
BOGGART/WORST FEAR: This shifts as Neville has a lot of self-doubt, anxiety, and fear, often taking the appearance of someone who actually represents something more abstract in Neville’s subconscious. Currently, his boggart would likely take the form of his father which reflects his own fears that he will not be able to fulfill the role of husband and, later, father as society expects and also his solid sense that he is not, nor will he ever be, the man his father was.
SPECIAL ABILITIES: Neville is remarkably good at herbology and plant identification, as well as sketching/illustrating said plants (though he is NOT good at illustrating anything else). Proficient in charms, counter curses and defensive spells, as well as duelling, due in no small part to his time in the DA and experiences during the war.
EDUCATION: Gryffindor, 1998

LIKES: Flowers, walks, reading, ballroom dancing, sketching, doing crosswords, ladybugs, listening more than talking, thunderstorms, early mornings and late nights when the streets are empty of people, gum wrappers
DISLIKES: spiders, shrieking and loud noises, bullies, having to speak in public, chewing gum, forgetting things
FIRST IMPRESSIONS: Neville is still very quiet around people he’s never met, some of which is due to shyness/unbringing and some of which is due to his nature. He is gentle but this reads to some people as weak, though he is more difficult to push around than might be thought at first glance.
OVERALL PERSONALITY:
Neville is oddly stoic and strongly determined though neither is an attribute most people would recognize in him. He is also shy, gentle, and introverted by nature (he could die quite happily if he never saw anything but plants for the rest of his life). He has learned, however, to work with other people and to be (somewhat) more graceful with his interactions than he was in school, but finds the effort a little exhausting though he would never admit it. His shyness does war with his intense sense of curiosity, both about the natural world and about people who intrigue him.

He’s genuinely kind to people and extremely patient with a paternal, if absentminded, demeanor and always tries to see the good in others. He can be very understanding, yet not always insightful about the needs and feelings of others, particularly when it comes to people who frighten him a little. He does have leadership qualities when put under pressure although it’s not something that he has needed to express much, typically being in the presence of others who have established leadership roles. He has forcefully taken on that position, however, when it comes to a fight that truly matters to him.

It takes a lot to anger Neville but when he is angered, it is a calm, white-hot fire that doesn’t stop burning until its cause has been extinguished. He feels that same anger towards the Death Eaters and toward the war, even though it is over- for being responsible for taking his parents from him, and for so many other losses that devastated the people around him. Once Neville takes a stand on something, he is not easily moved from it and stubbornness is one of his greatest flaws, though because he is quiet, not everyone who knows him is completely aware of it.

Despite the fact that he performed heroic acts during the war, Neville does not see himself as a hero or even a person of much consequence, due to his low self-esteem. He still has intense nightmares about the war and about his childhood. He fears that he will never live up to the impossibly high standards instilled in him from a young age by his grandmother and also that he will never have the loving family and warm home life that he has always dreamt of.

HISTORY:
Neville was born in London, then went to live with his parents. They were attacked in their home when he was an infant by the Lestranges. Unlike Harry, Neville has no clear recollection of those hours. What he knows is what his gran told him- that neither he nor his parents, both gone mad from the curses hurled, were discovered for quite some time. Aurors at the scene thought it possible that Neville suffered some backlash from the curse, damaging his memory, something that Neville has struggled with ever since.

He moved to Sowerby to live with his grandparents following the death of his parents. While his parents had been fairly well off, his grandparents had a more modest income (or rather one that seemed modest- drained as it was by his parents’ medical bills and the hiring of private nurses). Unlike the Weasleys, Neville never had a painful awareness of being poor. This might have been due to the pride with which his grandparents carried their poverty and also due to the impeccable lineage and connections that they had.

It was from his grandad that Neville first learned to dance although he wouldn’t think of it that way. Junius Longbottom was a loud, happy man who frequently burst into song and enjoyed dancing despite the fact that his wife didn’t appreciate either. Junius wasn’t inclined to sing so much as bellow and part of Neville’s gentle tonal quality developed as a reaction to the raw, jarring sound of his grandad’s voice. Despite Junius’ bold, brash attitude, Neville loved him and admired him greatly. However, like all of the males that he admired in his youth, Neville simply wasn’t made to be anything like him, however much he might have wanted that.

Neville’s family believed for most of Neville’s childhood that he was a Squib. Neither of his grandparents were pleased by the development though his grandfather chose to ignore it for the most part, thinking that it wasn’t urgent since he hadn’t yet neared adolescence. Augusta, on the other hand, drug Neville through a series of doctors and quacks, trying to determine why the child showed no sign of magical promise. Several of his relatives also made it their concern, which only intensified his mental block, as did the unorthodox and often cruel methods they employed to attempt to find the magic within him. One particularly dramatic attempt was successful when, at the age of eight, his Great Uncle Algie accidentally dropped him while hanging him out of a window by his feet. Neville bounced.

His grandfather died when Neville was ten. The pair of them had gone for a walk and Junius just fell, then didn’t get up again. Neville managed to keep it together long enough to fetch his gran but nothing could be done. His grandad’s death changed everything for the two of them- his gran became much more critical and in some ways, Neville always thought that her conviction that he couldn’t do anything started there. That his inability to save his grandfather somehow made her feel that he was less than his father. Of course, this belief fostered a lack of confidence and real inabilities.

By the time he went to Hogwarts, between all of his relatives, Neville had really lost much of what little confidence he had. He spent his school years largely terrified and summers were rarely better but as he grew older, he began to find himself. It wasn’t until his seventh year that he finally blossomed. He had spent his whole life living in terrors both real and self-invented so when the school fell apart, he was weirdly better equipped to handle it than some of the other students. Seeing how the other students were treated forced Neville to step up - his courage manifested itself finally, not for himself, but for his friends and for the younger students that he watched being tormented. And so, although he knew himself to be no Harry, he did what he could to the best of his ability.

The years after school have been spent trying to figure out his place in the world and also in trying to find some way to restore his parents to health, though it hasn’t yet been successful. His family has always been well off, even if Neville never really recognized that before going to school, and so he hasn’t actually needed to work. He has traveled a little, indulging himself in the study of magical plants abroad in parts of Europe and central Asia, but never stays away for long due to his devotion to his family. He adds to his income there by doing scientific illustration and providing material for magibotany texts. Although he has maintained his friendships, relationships have been few for Neville - he still carries the war with him and he’s afraid of being rejected for both the person he is and for the scars that never quite seem to go away. He had come to believe that he might just be best alone when the Curse happened.

Neville wasn’t distraught at the idea of an arranged marriage - the truth be told, he had half-expected that at some point, his grandmother would force someone at him and that he would eventually learn to like and love that person. What did surprise him was how random (and somewhat unsuitable) many of the pairings seemed to be. Of all the people he expected to be bonded with, Pansy was among the last. He is painfully aware that she thinks him stupid at best, something that often makes him even more awkward in her presence. However, Neville secretly finds much to admire about Pansy and he wishes that he could find a way for them both to be happy, even if he doesn’t quite know what that is and isn’t sure he ever will. To that end, he’s decided to go slowly and not pressure her to “make it work,” although he is afraid of the legal and social implications of anyone finding that out.

As one of the outcomes of this forced marriage, however, Neville has decided that he wants to find some sort of way to make himself a person who might be of greater worth to the relationship. He has been struggling over what that is but is currently contemplating the Auror trainee program, in part because his grandmother has strongly implied that her connections and his father’s past might get him in the door. (He can’t quite believe that his own abilities might do the same.)

PREFERRED NAME: Gwen
PLAYED BY: Alexander Koch
CONTACT: Email preferred - graeae AT gmail; Discord gwen#3304
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