the third swan brother
Name: Benijiro (Benny) Santiago Ito
Age/Birthdate: 23 / May 18, 1984
Sexuality: Isn't aware that he has one.
Occupation: Night watchman at Madame Taussad's Wax Museum.
Fairytale: The Third Swan Brother, from The Six Swans
Ability, if any: None.
Status: The people close to him know, but mostly he keeps it to himself.
History: Benny Ito's grandfather was the owner of a small but successful chain of laundromat-slash-dry cleaning services in Philadelphia. His mother, Natsumi, was only eighteen when she met Benny's father, a young musician named Santiago Ruiz. His grandfather didn't approve; the two teenagers had an affair anyway. Four months after it started, it ended as quickly as it'd begun; Santiago moved on, and five months later Benny was born. It wasn't easy; they lived with Natsumi's parents until well into Benny's childhood. Money was always tight, and even though no one ever said anything out loud, Benny knew that they didn't approve of him. He was a bastard, and that sort of thing was difficult to live with. That he was half-Spanish and looked different from nearly everyone in his neighborhood didn't help him feel any better.
But Natsumi did the best she could, and worked three jobs (at her father's dry cleaning, waitressing, and weekend babysitting for a few families in the area) in order to finally move herself and Benny into their own apartment when Benny was ten. It was a really important step for them, and as a result, Benny never takes anything for granted. Unfortunately, all of the working that Natsumi was doing resulted in Benny spending a lot of his time alone. Usually, he was curled up in some corner of his grandfather's laundromat, reading some of his books from the library. From a really young age, Benny loved to read; most of it was fantasy or mythology. If it didn't really exist, Benny was an expert about it; he's fascinated with myths, fairy tales, cryptozoology, the supernatural, and magic.
Socially, Benny never really bloomed. Growing up, he didn't spend a lot of time with kids his age. He didn't have any real problems in school - he wasn't bullied too much, nor was he specifically singled out for isolation. He just never really made any close friends. Truth be told, he always felt like something was missing. These weren't the right people for him, and (as much as he did love his mother) there were people who were right for him out there, somewhere. Maybe those lingering feelings (and the beginning of 'remembering' that he was a Tale, the realization that dragged on for months and months) were what made him so interested in myths and legends. He felt like he was connected to magic, in some way, even though he couldn't do any.
When he was sixteen, Benny started working at the dry cleaner with his grandfather; after highschool, he got a second job to help support his mother. He got a job as security in a mall, and after two years there he moved on to take the night watch position at Madame Taussaud's House of Wax. It appealed to his like of the eccentric, to spend his nights surrounded by wax figurines, looking like the set of some horror movie. In between hourly checks of the premises, Benny usually reads, sometimes browses the internet. He's read Snopes over more times than he cares to admit, and knows just about everything about the mysterious, supernatural, or weird.
Figuring out about the entire Tale thing took him a long time; before anyone ever came to him with a Compendium, during his teenage years, he always thought that he was different, somehow. He waved it off as being too 'Luke Skywalker' or something for him. But there was still a sense of otherness that he felt a lot. He didn't figure out that he was a fairy tale exactly - maybe an alien or something, he'd thought. So when a Librarian came to him and told him what was really going on, it was like something clicking in his head. Aha! he thought. Not an alien after all. Well, that was a relief.
It only took him a few months in the city, with the knowledge of who he really was, to meet up with his "sister", Cygna. Benny was excited (in his own way) to meet her - and even more happy when he found that, yes, Cygna "got" him. He fit with her, in a familial way. Socializing with her was easier than with a lot of people, the ones who thought he was "nice, but a little bit weird." He has a pleasant relationship with her, often visiting (and sleeping on her couch when the long drive home - hour and a half to Philly - seems impossible).
Personality: Benny is the type to completely lose himself in whatever he's doing; he'll get so focused on one thing that he doesn't realize something's missing, even though there's a pretty big hole in his life. Particularly, his social life; he spends so much time busy learning about things, working, and trying to help his mother, he never really took the time to make friends or figure out who he is. He doesn't know much, in the way of self-identity, and never really came into his own.
A lot of things go over Benny's head. A lot of the time, he overlooks anything that isn't related to what he's thinking about. Things sometimes need to be explained very, very slowly to him, particularly if it involves social behavior. Romance in particular eludes him.
He's an optimist; he knows that he can do anything he puts his mind to. He's not one to do a lot of introspection - he'd rather think about other things, rather than himself.
Most people find him strange; his focus is so not on social interaction or other people, he's often busy thinking (and talking) about other stuff. When someone does get him, though - this happens most often with people in his Tale, and also with compatible personalities.
As far as romance is concerned, he isn't. He knows that it's going to take a certain kind of person to get that close to him. Trying to make anything else work would just be a waste of his time and their's.
Played-By: Yu Shirota. http://wiki.d-addicts.com/static/images/f/f6/Shirota_Yu.jpg
the obligatory bit
Benny has felt lost most of his life without a family - his other lifetimes, he'd been born into larger families, as was the trend for his tale. This time around, he was an only child and it's felt "wrong" his entire life. He's felt strange without someone there to take care of him, especially with his mom working so much.
His fascination from magic comes from the 'being turned into a swan' thing; you'd probably be a little bit obsessed, too, if it caused you to be stuck as a bird for the entire story.