Player: Andee

Ana Eva Vanessa Maria Perez-Montoya was born February 2nd, 1987 and was raised in Springfield, in the Six Corners neighborhood. For much of her early childhood, it was her dad, baby sister (Del), older brother (Carlos), and their Abuela - her father's mother – living in a small house several blocks away from the Montoya Botanica, the family occult shop and sometime church of Santeria. Perhaps not coincidentally, Abuela has always been a little vague as to why she chose to settle mere blocks from the sprawling Springfield Cemetery.

From an early age, the Perez-Montoya kids have had to cope with death and grow up quickly, losing their mother to a pulmonary embolism right after Del's birth, and their father to a car accident ten years later. Their loss catapulted Carlos into a worsening downward spiral of petty drug-related crimes, ending in his incarceration in 2007. Del, already a bit of a sulky brat, continues to act irresponsibly in ways that will get her attention - at one point Anita had to haul Del's ass into Tapestry Health for tests, an abortion and birth control. Needless to say Anita has always been the default responsible party in the family, and as such her father and Abuela trained her in the running of the family store, which she fully took over from Abuela in 2007 at the age of 20. As a present for herself, she purchased her beloved (and battered) 2002 blue Honda Civic.

Anita's cornerstones have been home, the store, and the cemetery. With the goings-on at the store, the cemetery so close, and losing her mother so young, Anita has always had an affinity for the dead. For one thing, they don't tend to yell, storm out of the house, or cause trouble. She's been known to walk among the graves when in need of peace and occasionally visit her parents' place of rest. As such she is no stranger to ghosts or the dead in general and has no fear of them and for the longest time had half convinced herself she preferred the dead to living people… until she met Jordan Mendez and fell for him as only a woman fresh out of adolescence can. They loved each other so hard, they both ignored Abuelita's dire mutterings of "ese chollo va a causar su muerte, mija." They were in love, were going to get married, raise a family of their own, the whole nine yards. As of June 23rd, 2009, they had been dating for six months. Jordan and Anita started having sex fairly quickly, but they were careful. His parents quickly found out, but struck them a deal: they’d vacate their home on Thursday nights to go to the movies and give the couple some space, and they provided protection. In their minds, they’d rather Anita and Jordan have someplace safe and with contraceptives readily available.

Anita saw a sudden run of old Latinas coming into the store and scouring it for protection candles and charms, including a few of the quiet, serious Santeria practitioners. After the third such customer, Anita called her Abuela and warned her. It turned out that one practitioner – Consuela – was already at the Montoya home, and Abuela grilled her in rapid-fire Spanish. Abuela returned and told Anita that several locals spotted a ghost, one that seemed intense, purposeful, and scary – it was a young woman with no eyes, only empty sockets that wept blood. Abuela then grilled Anita about where she was going tonight, and Anita lied and claimed she was visiting a friend – Winifred – up at Smith College. Abuela didn't buy it, and promised they'd "chat" later. Anita hung up and realized she was unsettled, and for the rest of the day watched carefully as her stock of protective items dwindled.

After closing the shop, Anita headed over to Jordan's home and arrived forty-five minutes late – which for her meant early. Jordan's dad greeted her when she entered and told her that her plate was in the oven. Anita asked about Jordan and his father indicated he was upstairs on the computer, and informed Anita she was the mistress in his son's love life – or more accurately, she was a World of Warcraft widow. Anita grunted and ate quickly before heading upstairs. Jordan was deep into a raid and only tangentially registered her presence; he mumbled a greeting and swore loudly at his guild members. Anita mumbled back and fell into bed. Long used to Jordan's WoW addiction, Anita drifted off without an issue, but just as she was about to fall asleep she rolled over and saw a ghost staring at her in Jordan's room - a young woman with empty eye sockets that wept blood! Anita sat bolt upright, now totally awake, and Jordan took notice. He took a "girlfriend break" on his raid – much to his Guild mates' protests – and held Anita for several seconds. He asked for sex; she rolled her eyes and rolled over. Jordan grunted good-naturedly, and went back to his raid. Late at night he crawled into bed with her – and farted loudly.

Anita dreamed she was sitting in a plush leather chair in a boxcar, and then her father's voice told her, "Anita, you have to wake up." Anita's eyes snapped open and she realized the outer wall of the room was engulfed in sheets of fire! Jordan's eyes were open but unblinking, and Anita stifled back a sob as she scrambled out of bed and crawled out into the hallway. Behind her, the ceiling started to collapse and flames were licking everything. She half-rolled, half-fell downstairs and crawled into the living room. There, she found Jordan's dad unmoving in his armchair and noticed the clock next to him read 3:14. Smoke filled the room and she crawled towards the front door. Before she could make it the heat and the smoke choked her lungs, but before she blacked out she spotted the same bloody-socket ghost watching her. Then she lost consciousness.

The heat raged all around her, and then constricted her like bindings. As Anita hovered on the brink of death, a feminine voice crackled from the fire, "Do you want to live?" Anita howled her assent, and then The Witch merged with her soul. An adrenaline spike slammed Anita into consciousness and she barreled out of the front bay window and into the rose bushes outside! As she rolled down the front lawn, she coughed up bloody phlegm and watched as plasm leaked out of her body to heal her burns! She started screaming and prayed for blessed unconsciousness, but The Witch reveled in the sensations and refused to let her slip into blissful oblivion. Anita could feel the geist try and stroke her hair and whisper murmurs of comfort, but Anita hit full-blown freak-out and started screaming.

Firefighters and EMTs arrived a minute later and two EMTs tried to calm Anita, with no success. They finally resorted to injecting a sedative – and were stunned when it took three doses to get her semi-comatose and drooling. As they hustled her onto a gurney, one of the EMTS commented, "She's hot," referring to her body temperature. His partner eyed him, and he clarified, "Not that way!"

Anita regained consciousness in a hospital bed, and immediately smelled the stench of burned flesh and hair. The clock read 4:17 AM; she's only been unconscious for an hour. She whispered to herself, "What happened?" and The Witch inside her replied, "You died. We made a bargain." Anita started to sob softly, and then the door to her room opened. Two men – one dressed in a smart suit with an FBI badge pinned to his lapel, the other in a SWAT T-shirt and jeans – entered the room, and they both are startled to see Anita awake after taking so many doses of sedatives.

The FBI agent introduces himself as Agent John Summerville. The other man was TJ. Despite her hellish experience, Anita found herself appreciating the two men as they clearly knew each other well and TJ especially was a loud jokester who went out of his way to try and cheer her up. Anita weakly joked about being late on her taxes and TJ admitted that Anita "has had a much worse day then he has," which caused her to cry again; John commented, "Way to go, Slick."

TJ slammed his fist down on one of the machines hooked up to Anita in frustration, which caused it to beep alarmingly. As nurses rushed in, TJ turned to them and breezily ordered a latte for Anita, which caused her to laugh. Glaring, the nurses stalked out. The three of them talked about the fire and TJ admitted it looks like arson. John added that Anita was the only survivor, and Anita said Jordan's brother Rey was involved in gang activity and she assumed it was a hit as a warning to Rey. Both men promised to look into Rey very closely and passed along their cards. As they walked out, TJ opened his arms wide and bellowed, "So ladies, who is getting me that latte?"

Abuela was her next visitor, at 6:30 in the morning. She was clearly torn between bring very thankful Anita was alive and annoyed that Anita lied to her about her location. Abuela told her that Del will run the Botanica until Anita is ready to get out of the hospital. Anita found out that she was in Baystate and spent the next few days there recovering – and found that much to her amusement, an intern brought her a latte once a day. The doctors were amazed at her recovery, except for her body temperature, which stayed firmly at 102 degrees Fahrenheit no matter what they did.

Anita was released on Saturday June 27th, and Abuela picked her up. Abuela started lecturing her on honesty and sleeping over boys' houses, and to make matters worse, The Witch deconstructed Abuela's lecture and seemed amused by it. Anita returned to the Botanica a few days later and found it a mess, Del was not a good or organized shopkeeper. Abuela and Anita lectured Del, but to little avail. Anita slowly got back into her normal routine – or as normal as it can possibly be, as her temperature never dropped below 102° and the dead swarmed her for favors. The Witch taught her a few tricks and Anita started to learn more about the lands and powers of the dead. During her recuperation she did check in with TJ, but the SPD has no leads at the moment about the arson.

see The Witch

Anita's Keystone Memento is a short length of rope, singed at both ends.

Anita is a member of The X-Krewe. She is also now a member of The Troy Cell. She half-jokingly refers to both as her gringos, to which TJ often retorts with "Yeah, but I was your first."

Anita is a 5'3" Puerto Rican woman in her early 20s, of average build with dark curly hair cropped at the shoulders and dark brown eyes.

Most sections of this page were originally published on Livejournal.