What's in a Name?

Ebony Summers

Ebony Summers- Bajan/Grenadian ancestry; Ebony is an intelligent, bold, and lively queer student who Naomi Nichols encounters at Northeastern University, with a warm and mostly friendly attitude and courageous and determined spirit. A student who is studying Early Childhood Education at the university, she is a young West Indian woman who is known both for her signature box braids and impeccable amount of sass. She is one of the few black students at Northeastern alongside her longtime "on-again, off-again" girlfriend Iesha Carmichael, whom is of partial Trinidadian descent. On an average day, she spends her time on schoolwork, hanging out with her friends, dating her girlfriend, tending to her vegetable garden, shopping, and catching up on the latest gossip. Ebony is confident, energetic, and fearless, admitting that she goes a bit "freaky" when in the presence of the full moon or something resembling it, such as a spotlight, although she often ends up using this to her advantage. She is fiercely loyal and protective of her friends and family, as she can be incredibly fierce and opinionated and has proven to be bossy, brash and confrontational under certain circumstances. Strong, boisterous, and assertive, she tends to be very loud and talkative when in a group setting, a habit that often overwhelms Naomi and made it difficult for her to befriend. She was first introduced to her by her good college friend Iesha Carmichael at the university's queer alliance group. Ebony could prove to be incredibly antagonistic toward Naomi during their initial encounters and seemed to exhibit somewhat of a jealousy towards her due to her features and the positive way in which others perceived her. 

With her calmer, more mellow personality, Naomi often felt uneasy when around her and felt her initial time at the university was made harder through her encounters with her. She was taken aback by her criticism of Naomi's past queer-platonic relationship with her childhood best friend and roommate, an Italian-American girl named Bianca. She nevertheless made efforts in trying to get to know her to please Imani, who was dating and involved in a same-sex relationship with Ebony at the time. Naomi immediately noted that Ebony can be very vocal and sometimes struggles to know the appropriate time to tone down her vociferousness and simply listen to others. She is also sarcastic and has an enormous amount of candor that can sometimes appear rude and inconsiderate to other people. She can be quick to anger when her loyalty feels threatened, a trait she shares with Naomi's mother, a Puerto Rican woman with a similarly feisty demeanor. She has a bad temper that often leads her into trouble, making her seem complex to others, but still loves her friends, as she is always ready to stand up for them. Despite seeming overly direct, Ebony is often a sweet and kindhearted person and can prove to be fiercely loyal to those she trusts, whom she will willingly support and nurture if needed. This selflessness can be interpreted as being pacifist, although she can be reactive and will recognize even the smallest slight against her. As soon as she feels someone is slipping away from her, she might start to become slightly possessive and fight to keep that person in her life. Friendly, tireless, creative and with a great sensibility to the arts, she is always willing to lend a hand and wise words to her friends. 

Ebony frequently feels inspired by her harsher experiences growing up in a working-class, single parent household without a father in the outskirts of Miami Gardens back in her native Florida. She also uses her past need to grow up at a quick pace and serve as a mature role model to her three younger siblings as motivation to help others. Although they initially disliked each other and did not see eye to eye due to their clashing personalities, Naomi eventually befriended Ebony and found a softer side to her demeanor when Ebony advised and consoled Naomi during her momentary break-up with her long-distance boyfriend, Jorge. The two of them never become exceptionally close even in later years, but still manage to bond and find redeeming qualities in one another over this experience, being able to find a common ground with one another. Subversive and somewhat unorthodox, with a reputation for being an outsider and nonconformist, Ebony is an unconventional individual with a unique way of seeing the world. A multi-faceted person of many interests, she once took a bunch of broken dolls from a waiting room at the doctor's office, fixed them up, and then returned them. She is identifiable for having a rich inner world and having a depth of emotion and well-developed capacity for caring. She is described as a happy, balanced person overall with a serene, earthy quality about her demeanor and appears to approach life nonchalantly. Ebony is perceived by many as the ultimate "weigher-upper" and is naturally selfless, feeling genuine concern about the welfare and happiness of not only those she considers nearest and dearest to her. 

She generally labels herself as pro-choice rather than pro-life, and she has attended a few drag shows before and seems to be secure and comfortable in her own skin, as well as with her gender identity. A lover of all things that are considered aesthetic, one of her main hobbies in life is collecting cosmetics, and she also loves belly dancing, gourmet food, and mineral water. She similarly watches different series and movies on Showtime and states that two of the famous female figures she admires are Simone Biles and Queen Latifah. Ebony has lived in Ft. Lauderdale and claims that her brutal honesty actually comes from a good place in the end, particularly due to her wanting to encourage others to have a strong demeanor and help them actualize themselves. She hopes that she will be able to help other people see reality and the truth for what it really is, in addition to preventing her friends from being taken advantage of. An "out-and-proud" sapphic, she remains committed to Naomi's friend, Iesha Carmichael and initially develops a kink-based relationship with her. She mentions that she had known she was queer ever since she was 5 years old, as she developed her very first subconscious attraction to another girl back in kindergarten. A verbal tic Ebony has is that she overuses the word "baby" in her vocabulary, most noticeably whenever she is referring to her female girlfriends and current romantic partner, Iesha, and she also tends to say "based" and "cringe" a lot. As an education major, she hopes to teach and mentor young children at elementary schools, having had significant experience in caring for young children from looking after her siblings while growing up. 

She still remains close with her siblings and the rest of her extended family despite living in an off-campus apartment with her girlfriend. She is also a self-described feminist who supports female rights and causes and is a fun, fresh and fashion savvy young woman with a love of mixing and matching outfits. Ebony is shown to be very spiritual as well and managed to find acceptance and true friendship among the people she met at a sorority that took place at her old college. She wears glasses and has almond-shaped brown eyes and caramel skin, with her being moderately tall at 5 ft. 5 ½ in and characterized for her thick lips and winning smile, as described by Imani. She tends to be a "blue-jeans femme" the majority of the time and loves wearing comfortable, flowy shirts with a pair of jeans and sandals or high-tops. While she sometimes prefers to wear sweatshirts and tomboyish clothing whenever she gets the chance, she owns a large amount of designer clothes that she purchases from all over the world. Ebony is not above taking hand-me-downs despite being a self-proclaimed "fashionista" and even runs a personal DIY craft video blog that she calls Pattern Steward. She is also the founder of the Northeastern Shoe Swap and is not averse to wearing a dress if the occasion calls for it, although she generally prefers to sport a pair of jeans in her downtime. She has a curvaceous figure that is considered "slim thick" and prefers to wear only a modest amount of makeup as well, claiming to like the "natural look" for her face. Coming from a big family, she has mostly had to fend for herself, which has created a streak of resourcefulness in her, and she takes a trip to Anguilla. ESTP 8w7