CHARACTER BASICS.
name: rita daniela skeeter
nickname: none
age: thirty-two
gender: demi woman
ethnicity: half peruvian, half argentinian
nationality: british
pronouns: she / her / they / them
education: hogwarts
occupation: reporter and columnist at the daily prophet
hometown: london, england
current location: hogsmeade
affiliation: pur societatis
blood status: pure-blood
CHARACTER APPEARANCE:
face claim: nathalie kelley
height: 5′6
weight: 120 pounds
hair color: brunette
eye color: hazel
dominant hand: left
distinguishing features:
triangle shape birthmark on her hip
MAGICAL EXTRAS.
patronus: beetle
wand: nine inches, cherry wood, and dragon heartstring core
boggart: public humiliation
hogwarts house: ravenclaw
amortentia: the smell of fresh ink, chocolate, the ocean
PERSONALITY
positive traits:
+charismatic +cunning
negative traits:
-selfish -vindictive
goals/desires:
become a world renowned reporter
become a published author
fears:
death
abandonment
being forgotten
mbti:
entp
hobbies:
writing, reading, snooping
habits:
shaking their quill in their hand as they think
although she never writes in pen, she keeps one perched behind her ear
FAMILY.
father: nicolas skeeter
mother: elena callo ( deceased )
HIGHLIGHTS:
rita skeeter, in and of themselves, was a scandal. they were born on a cold chilly morning on november eleventh, on the six month anniversary of her parents wedding day, and only seven months after her parents engagement came to be. elena callo had always been the girl everyone expected her to be, having been sorted into ravenclaw, she excelled in her schooling, and it was no surprise to anyone when she took a position in the ministry shortly after her twenty-second birthday. however, as all children do, she eventually made a mistake that would determine the rest of her life. after attending a quidditch match with her older brother, she found herself face to face with puddlemeres newest beater, nicolas skeeter. a few drinks later and she found herself in bed with nicolas skeeter. she left before he awoke the next morning, embarrassed and humiliated with herself. she went on with life as usual until she found out that her harmless night with nicolas skeeter wasn’t so harmless after all, and with crafty negations between both parties, elena callo became elena skeeter before anyone became aware of the result of their little indiscretion: rita. there wasn’t true love in their marriage, if anything there was resentment in the beginning. nicolas skeeter’s career was just starting, and the last thing he wanted was to be tied to a wife and baby, but he didn’t dare risk scandal. scandal could ruin them both, the common theme that bonded them. whenever they were born, her parents decided to let their family, and the media alike, think that she was premature, and quite ill as a result, backed by the word of the healer after they had received a significant amount of galleons for her silence. they were three months old before they were ‘well’ enough to be shown to the world, and this was the first time the world saw the scandal became known as rita skeeter.
while their father hadn’t been excited about rita’s existence in the first place, especially on the realization that they were not the son he craved, nicolas skeeter knew that at least he could instill his values in them. rita’s only true unchangeable flaw in his eyes being their mother’s eyes, the one thing of her mothers she has. the first time they learn about mudbloods they are barely three years old. her father sat her down in the living room, and began filling their innocent mind with words and phrases describing monstrous things, not even human enough to be called a person. those were what mudbloods were, and the reason that she had to avoid these monstrous beings became quite clear to the three year old rita skeeter right away. over the next seven years her father would continually give her lessons about how to be a proper pureblood, and what is right and wrong as he slowly formed their views little by little. her mother on the other hand never so much as uttered the word mudblood the entire duration of their time with her. you, being the curious being she was, rita once approached her mother and asked why she never used the term and her simple answer was “ i don’t feel it necessary.”. as rita gets older, she realizes that her parents views on the subject of what it meant to be a pureblood, and relations with those of other blood status’ were far from the same. their mother seemed to have a more radical view, at least compared to her father, not that she ever voiced it around him. their mother never really seemed to voice any of the opinions she had around her husband, though she told rita of some of them. how she didn’t like the cologne he wore, or how she wished he would take his shoes off when he came into the home. all in all, her mother was picture of how a pure-blood wife should be, at least in her husbands eyes. quiet, polite, and not questioning things. if he only knew what she thought of his views, and his actions and indiscretions. her childhood is spent in a house of unrest just waiting to boil over, and at the age of three, she is completely unaware of just how bad things are below the surface.
it was a cold may morning whenever rita and their mother made the trip back to her home town for her grandfathers funeral. during the funeral they spoke about his bravery, his skill, his family, and their ancestors. it was only whenever a young rita listened closely that they heard lies being told, and things not adding up quite right. they stayed silent though, as they were supposed to, and waited until the witches and wizards dispersed to pull on her mothers robes and ask about what they’d heard, and asked why they lied. their mother knelt down to face them, and told them a phrase that would stick with them for the rest of their life: the story is what you make of it. the young witch nodded, and touch their mother’s hand as they led them away, the words still dancing in their head
she’s ten whenever her mother dies in front of her very eyes, falling down the stairs and breaking her neck. of every memory they have kept over the years, this one is the clearest of any of them. it was new years eve, and as was tradition, several of the pureblood families gathered in one of their homes to celebrate the beginning of the new year. they remember preparing for the party during the weeks leading up to it. her mother insisted on buying new outfits, even if they had plenty of things in their closet that had only been worn once. she remember the dress, white lace with silver embroidery around your neckline, cuffs, and the bottom. just as every other year their mother fixes them to look like some kind of doll rather than a living child, but as her mother always said, that’s what purebloods do, so she knew there was no point arguing. by the time they leave their hair was braided, done so by her mother’s uncharacteristically shaky hands, cherry red lip stain had been charmed onto her lips, wearing a pair of black heels, and a tiny silver locket ties together the outfit. as usual her parents are dressed in their finest as well, and from the outside looking in, the lot of them appear to be the picture of pureblood breeding at its finest. seeing it on the inside though, rota know better than most that not everything is as perfect as it appears. her mother had been changing, slowly but surely she noticed things. whenever she went to work at the ministry her mother started to dress up a bit more, wear shorter skirts, and shirts with lower necklines. of course, at the pure age of ten, rita didn’t realize why anyone would possibly do this. her father had been staying later and later after quidditch matches and practices. as a result, the family hadn’t had a single dinner together in their own home for months. things were changing, and this change would bring about her mothers ultimate demise.
the family arrived at the party punctual as usual, and her father joined a group of other men, drinking to his heart content, nothing unusual there. as the night went on, she noticed that her mother seemed a little off. her usual smile was absent from her face, and she found herself drinking more than the young witch had ever seen her drink in their entire life up to that point. she downed glass after glass of the wine served at the party, doing it as discreetly as possible, yet even at the age of ten, her mother couldn’t hide it from her keen eye. rita walked over to ask if her everything was alright, and, as usual, her mother shooed them away, promising everything would be alright come morning. she didn’t know then that her mother would never see the next morning, so rita went on their merry way to get the latest news on who had hexed one of their siblings. as the night grew closer and closer to midnight most of the children found their ways to their parents sides, so they decide to follow suit. however, unlike all the other children her parents aren’t in the hall, and so with a little sleuthing, they found themself on the second floor, hiding behind a stand as she heard the majority of her parents argument, horrified at what they discover. their mother was leaving their father, more importantly, she was leaving them for some mudblood? how could she? anger and hurt filled rita as she listened, blind at the moment to the anger growing inside of her father until he finally goes over the deep end. what followed the argument is something she will never tell another living soul. she watched as her father pushed her mother down the stairs, and she watched her mother’s body fell until it lied limp at the bottom of the stairs as the clock strikes midnight and everyone in the hall cheers celebrating the new year. rita was stunned for a moment, not able to comprehend what had just happened as their brain tried to rationalize what just happened. they watched their mother, waiting for her to stand up, do anything, but after a few moments of seeing her lie there still on the floor they realized the horrible truth, their mother was dead. she let out a gasp upon the realization of this fact, something that is suddenly so much louder than intended following the death of their mother, and their father notices you. he starts toward her and she was frozen in fear as she stood there, unable to so much as blink. she remembers the scent of alcohol as he told her what to say, and she simply nodded in fear. as if a switch had been flipped, their father then calmly lead them down the stairs, careful to keep rita from stepping too close to their newly deceased mother, and told them to do something he had never told them to do before. cry. they didn’t need to be told twice as the tears began to roll down their cheeks, and within moments their father cries for help, and soon people invade the room as her father fakes for all those present, and twists the truth. the story that goes down in the papers is their mother had gone upstairs for reasons unknown, and upon her attempt at descending the stairs to meet up with her family for the festivities she tragically tripped over herself in her drunken state, fell down the stairs, and ended up breaking her neck in the process. the next few days are filled with mourning, and kind words about her mother as they are forced to stand strong. overnight her father has gone from the happily married beater for puddlemere to parker skeeter the grieving widow. her mother’s name is quickly forgotten as the media sympathizes with their father, and it almost is enough to make rita laugh to hear their kind words to her father. as time goes on,just like every story does, the story of her mother’s death died down to become only the substance of side conversation at parties. rita, however, never forget her mother’s death, and instead of being sad that she is gone, she soon found yourself resentful of the mudblood loving traitor, and saw their father as more of a hero than a killer. by the time rita’s first day of hogwarts rolls around, she doesn’t even care that she’s dead, or at least, their tell themself they don’t, which is almost as good as fact.
hogwarts was where she turned into the person they are today. from their first train ride, until their last day in the school of witchcraft and wizardry, they began to notice a skill of their own, an ability to pick up things from even fragments of conversations and use them to their advantage. they first noticed this skill shortly after their mothers death, realizing how their father had used the facts to create a plausible theory to explain them all away. they soon realize that gossip is the same way, and that they have quite a knack for it. listening to the others go on and on in their car on the hogwarts express, and all of the chaos that was the sorting ceremony, they found out plenty of juicy details, even as they were sorted into ravenclaw. plenty of information to use, to twist until it was barely recognizable. the only snag came in the form of the rules your father had taught you for being the pureblood you should be, never let things come back to you, and never be a scandal themself, so they became strategic about it all. they would make notes containing only the newest gossip, and occasionally a few blatant lies to spice things up, and would strategically drop them off at the entrance to all four houses common rooms at some point in the day every so often. they find themselves enjoying the new chaos at hogwarts, even though some ignored its existence, everyone seemed to have at least heard of the notes that would appear mysteriously at the common room doors. she also derived a sense of power from it all. no one knew it was her, or at least, if they did know, they never told her they knew, and that was just as well. as the years went by, and she proved to excel at transfiguration, and stayed just above failing in herbology, they became rita skeeter, a name they told themself people would know one day, even if they didn’t right then
from the time rita skeeter learned about animagi in their third year at hogwarts, they decided then and there that they would become one. it was a grueling process, exasperated by the fact they wanted it to remain a secret. they studied and read for years, preparing for when they would finally put it all into action. it was in the summer after her sixth year that they put their plan into motion, finally succeeding her endeavors shortly before her seventh year was set to begin. her form was a beetle, not something they would have ever anticipated, but a useful thing in the end. no one would notice a beetle in a crowded room, or whenever spilling out their deepest and darkest fears to no one but themselves.
after graduation, it didn’t take long for the skeeter to take a job with the daily prophet, and slowly but surely she earned her way up the ranks to become a darling of the paper. her columns attract the public attention, good, bad, and ugly. as they work hard and fast in their career, in the under belly of things, rita finds themselves embroiled in tom riddle’s movement, just as her father wished. never too close to the flames to get burned, but never far enough away to grow cold. they use their place in the media to control a viewpoint, to turn heads, manipulate like she always has. when the one that shall not be named dies, she has her hands clean from an outside perspective, and now the same dedication shown to the previous movement is put toward pur societatis. rinse and repeat, some things never change.
