Whether it's the result of a childhood spent watching and reading too much science fiction or he's this way naturally, Anthony knows, he just knows, that Something is Out There. Paranoid in many respects, he strongly believes in conspiracy theories and he wishes that everyone else would realize that They are watching him. Everyone around him is either hiding something, plotting his ultimate demise, or both. He is inherently distrustful of everything, from the boy sitting next to him in class to the sweets handed to him by a kindly old woman. One would think that being this on the edge all the time would be a dangerously unhealthy way to live, but Anthony actually wears it quite well. This is probably because Anthony is almost always planning some mischief himself.
The only reason Anthony is so watchfully paranoid towards everything is because he never fails to be up to no good. If he didn't think that organized crime was yet another government conspiracy to strike unnecessary fear into the hearts of the middle class, he'd call himself a criminal mastermind. If he were a fan of dramatics, he'd be constantly tenting his fingers and cackling.When he sees a locked door he doesn't see picking it open with a hairclip; instead, he envisions a team of five, dressed in black and fully equipped with the latest in lock-cutting technology in order to get into the room without making it look like they'd had to break the door down. His plans for petty theft and the like are almost always exaggerated - he can make lockpicking seem like high-profile bank robbery. On a lesser scale, Anthony can be counted on to always have a very good idea of where things are going. His back-up plans have back-up plans, meaning that he is rarely surprised.
Anthony very much enjoys keeping a low profile, at least when it comes to unsavoury activities such as stealing someone's diamond-encrusted watch only to return it a few days later, because he was just trying to prove that he could do it. It's unclear who Anthony is trying to prove himself to, but if asked he would say that it was the security cameras that the government has undoubtedly installed in every corner of every hallway in Hogwarts. Keeping such a low profile has allowed Anthony to become a rather likable person - his conspiracy theories are entertaining at the very least, and, despite his rampant paranoia, he's actually very friendly. He knows that it's better to have friends than enemies - friends are less likely to plot your demise, after all. His paranoia is something of a novelty, though, and those who have known him for a very long time are better off telling him to shut up when he goes off on wild tangents about how so-and-so is definitely about to do something very shady with that pen.
Those who like instant gratification should probably not hang out with Anthony. They say that slow and steady wins the race, and Anthony has applied this to absolutely every area of his life. Something that should take him seconds takes him hours; something that should take him hours takes him days. Overthinking is one of Anthony's greatest faults - he must analyze every aspect of every situation before he does something, and then he still won't do it until he's sure that it will work. The flip side of this is that nearly everything Anthony does is of very good quality, and he rarely makes a rash decision. While his ability to rationalise is somewhat lacking (if it involves people, he's a master at jumping to conclusions), he can still be counted on to take a step back and view a situation for what it's worth and proceed from there.
DEFINING CHARACTERISTICS Anthony will have you know that he has no defining characteristics, because the only way to keep Them off your back is to blend in with the crowd - anyone who sticks out is an immediate target, you know. Despite those feelings, Anthony is pretty good at 'sticking out' - his wild theories and natural suspicions make him a prime candidate for being picked out of a crowd, and he is known for scaring the younger students with tales of what happens to people who log into the school computers one too many times. Anthony tries very hard to blend in but ends up being completely unable to do so.
LIKES 1 Murder mysteries. He doesn't go spreading this around, but every summer he makes sure to go to one of those dinner-and-a-mystery places. He gets very, very involved. 2 The X-Files. It's safe to say that Anthony was allowed to watch too many episodes of this as a child, and most of his ridiculous ideas actually come from the show. He can often be heard saying, "I wonder if they covered this on X-Files..." 3 Technology. Anthony is passionately obsessed with his computer, but he hates associating himself with the group of people who are also obsessed with their computers. He's also very into spy technology, like the kind that's displayed in the James Bond films. 4 The piano. Anthony very much resented his mother for making him start lessons at the tender age of six and a half, but now he wouldn't trade the keys for anything. Unless that anything was proof that there really are parallel dimensions. 5 Conspiracy theories. Anthony has a new theory about something every day, and he faithfully subscribes to the Big Theories - secret society that controls the world, UFO sightings, the mysteries surrounding the life of Christ. OTHER LIKES The Clash, communism, socialism, Karl Marx, Jewish holidays, secondhand shops, revolutionaries.
DISLIKES 1 The government. This one is obvious - Anthony is absolutely positive that the government is hiding something, and that it must be his calling to find out just what that is. He's also naturally suspicious of authority figures in general. 2 Long fingernails. They are really not conducive to banging out page upon page of Chopin on the piano. It just doesn't work. 3 Bad poetry. Anthony does not claim to be a poetry expert, but he really hates it when people think that, just because they can rhyme a few words, they're the next poet laureate. He doesn't even read that much poetry, but he knows that the people who think they're so good at it are the most annoying about it. 4 Springtime. Anthony is a longtime sufferer of seasonal allergies, and spring is the worst. He constantly looks like a beloved member of his family has just died, and people are always asking him if he's all right when the spring weather rolls around. He usually just glares at them and goes about his business. 5 Silence. While Anthony isn't very much of a talker, he can't stand to be in complete silence - he always has music playing or he always makes sure that he's somewhere where he can hear something. After all, silence is very suspicious. OTHER DISLIKES anti-Semitism, his mother (sometimes), commercialism, capitalist pigs, everyone on his Suspicious Characters List, mainstream pop, silver.
INSIDE SCOOP 1 Anthony has this romantic vision of himself as some sort of Robin Hood figure. However, he only steals from the rich - giving to the needy hasn't exactly crossed his mind yet, and he only steals from the rich because he's interested in the way that people squirm when something of value mysteriously disappears. However, the number of times that he has dressed as Robin Hood for Halloween is just barely able to be counted on ten fingers. 2 He truly believes that the government is hiding evidence of extraterrestrial activity, and that one day said extraterrestrials will rise up from their underground prisons (which they are immediately put into when They discover their existence) and take over the world. It's a very scary thought. 3 Anthony's greatest fear is zombies. 4 For a very long time, Anthony wanted to become a magician. He actually got pretty good at doing card tricks until he realized that the heyday of magicians was long over, and that he was better off setting his sights on something a bit more realistic. However, even now, Anthony pulls out the old card trick if he's trying to ingratiate himself into a particular social group. It's a great icebreaker. 5 He's secretly very into Journey. They're a total detriment to his typical musical leanings, aka punk rock of the most 80's and British sort and classical of the most hardcore eight-thousand-notes-at-a-time sort, but he is definitely not about to stop believin'. Any way he wants it, you know?
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FAMILY Adam Goldstein The more insane of Anthony's parents, Adam works as an executive for an advertising agency and can often be heard spouting off jingles or inserting product placement into his every day conversations. He's as wacky as they come, and it is the general consensus among the family that he must be going through some sort of midlife crisis because of his recent purchase of matching Nintendo systems for himself and his son.
Nancy Goldstein Calm, collected, and polished, Laura is the exact opposite of her husband. However, she's also kind of a corporate ladder-climbing bitch, but she tries very hard to be the loving housewife by pretending that she baked biscuits when she really bought them from the bakery. She fears that Anthony might grow up to be gay so she tries to set him up with every girl within a ten-mile radius. Did I mention that she is also LOUD?
Adam and Nancy Goldstein were a happy couple from the start. Several years apart at Hogwarts, they only met after they both had graduated and were trying to find jobs in London. After another few years they were married and settled into a cute little house in Golders Green, outside of London. It was another three years (the Goldsteins are very good at not rushing things) before their only child, Anthony, was born. Anthony was coddled and babied from the very start, and his parents never really let him out of their sight. He had a few friends in the neighbourhood where he lived, but it was nothing substantial - most of Anthony's time was spent indoors, playing the piano or reading books or playing cheap, crappy video games.
When Anthony was ten, he noticed that something was weird. Why were his parents always keeping him inside? Why was he being hidden away? Of course, he wasn't actually being kept inside or hidden away - as Anthony grew up, his parents became a bit less strict about keeping Anthony attached to their hips - it was just that Anthony was never very big on leaving his own house. Still, he was very suspicious about the whole thing, and he took to sneaking out of his house when it really wasn't necessary. When Anthony's Hogwarts letter arrived, Anthony was sure that his parents had been keeping him inside the house in order to prime him for a lifetime of being trapped inside a dorm room with other boys. To this day, he still has no idea why he ever thought that, because it makes no sense.
Luckily for Anthony, his theory that there was a computer chip implanted into his brain that was preventing him from having any normal social contact was put to rest when he quickly bonded with Michael Corner and Terry Boot after being sorted into Ravenclaw. Anthony's first year at Hogwarts helped him to relax considerably - as a child, he was very clearly headed down a path of social isolation and nerdiness, but being surrounded by so many people all the time loosened him up quite a bit. However, now that Anthony is getting closer and closer to his final years at Hogwarts College, he really can't wait to get out of there. He feels like he's been wasting too much time learning useless information that could potentially be used against him in the future.
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