Janice Adler

Janice Adler is a side character in Echo. She is the waitress at Echo's only restaurant.

## Appearance

Janice is an older coyote with gray fur on her face and neck; brown fur on her ears, muzzle, and arms; and white fur on the bottom of her arms, neck, and the tufts of hair on her cheeks. She has golden eyes and a small patch of dyed red hair.

Janice is one of the few characters shown to wear makeup, including blue eyeshadow, mascara, and light pink lipstick. She wears golden hoop earrings and has two beauty marks beneath her left eye. Despite the care Janice puts into her appearance, one can see slight references to her rough past, including faded injection marks, bags under her eyes, and a faded sore on her forehead.

She wears a light blue dress shirt with rolled up sleeves and a black apron with a nametag pinned to it.

## Personality

Janice is pleasant and professional. She is hospitable to her customers and has no patience for anyone causing trouble in the diner. She can also be somewhat playfully romantic and uses her charm to her advantage at times.

In contrast to her bustling, businesslike exterior however, Janice occasionally displays startling and uncanny behavior.

## Story

### Prior to 2015

Janice was most likely born in or near Echo, and has lived there for her entire life. According to Chase, she began working at Echo's diner when she was in her early 20s and never left. During a flashback, Mr. Bronson says that a younger Janice enjoys fast food and erotic novels.

At some point, Janice entered into a romantic relationship with Mr. Bronson, the father of Sydney Bronson. Sometime in the 1970s, Janice was kissing Mr. Bronson from the passenger seat of his van when he suddenly struck an elderly Samuel Ayers. Janice watched in frantic horror as Samuel died, and then refused to help Mr. Bronson as he hastily buried the body on the side of the road.

**Plot**

On Wednesday of every route except Flynn's, Janice has an apparent breakdown during which she urinates on the side of the road with a vacant smile on her face. Depending on the circumstances of each route, Chase may either witness this event directly or be told about it by his friends.

Janice’s episode is implied to be one of the very earliest manifestations of the mass hysteria event that is breaking out in Echo, but it is left ambiguous as to why Janice is one of the first ones in town to act strangely.

### TJ's route

On Tuesday, Janice waits on Chase, TJ, and Jenna and is delighted to see them back in town. She expresses some small-town speciesism, much to Jenna’s chagrin, but TJ quickly changes the subject and volunteers himself and Chase to help her with her spring cleaning.

TJ and Chase arrive at Janice’s house reluctantly on Wednesday after seeing her on the road that morning, but she shows no memory of the event. Janice seems very willing to take advantage of TJ’s generous nature, but is hospitable and grateful to TJ and Chase for their help. She prepares lemonade and cookies for them and shows affection to TJ in particular, pinching his cheeks and calling him adorable. Chase and TJ return to help her the next day, but when they arrive Janice is clearly unhinged. She is not wearing pants when she answers the door and asks them to dig what appears to be a grave in her yard.

That evening, Chase reads the first clue of Sydney's treasure hunt at the diner, setting the events of the rest of the route into motion. Chase describes feeling like the whole town sighs in relief when he unseals the envelope, and when Janice reappears shortly after she seems much more apologetic and composed, and expresses a new awareness of her earlier erratic behavior.

On Saturday, Chase, TJ, and Julian see Janice stranded on the side of the road with a flat tire and stop to help. Chase doesn’t see Janice leave, but she and her car are gone when he returns from the nearby woods, so presumably Julian is able to repair her flat.

### Leo's route

On Wednesday, Janice reprimands Leo and Clint when they begin fighting in the diner. Chase observes that the 'dead look' from that morning is still in her eyes and she looks like she's been crying. She threatens Leo with a taser to get him to back off of Clint, and seems furious about the mess their fight has made of the restaurant.

On Saturday, Janice emerges from the diner kitchen dazed and covered in blood, with a knife in the front pocket of her apron. Chase recalls that she has been looking more and more haggard over the course of the week. She interacts with Chase and Leo calmly, insisting that she has simply been cooking meat, but her behavior badly unnerves them both.

When Duke arrives, Janice confronts him for bringing a gun into the diner and attempts to make him leave. Duke asks if she’s also been seeing visions and Janice asserts that she has ‘made things right.’ Janice reaches for a knife and Duke shoots and kills her to get to Chase and Leo. If Chase flees from Duke and Brian through the kitchen, he sees butchered meat and bloody fur on the counter and stove, presumably the work of Janice in her deranged state.

### Other routes

In Flynn's route, Janice appears only once, on Monday, to serve Flynn and Chase their meal at the diner and is not seen again afterward. Uniquely, her breakdown is not shown or discussed on Wednesday, but it does receive a reference later in the route, when Chase asks Jenna and TJ on Friday if they've seen Janice since 'what happened on the road.' TJ tells Chase that Janice said she was fine the previous day but did not look well.

In Carl's route, Chase is told about Janice's episode on the side of the road by Flynn instead of witnessing it directly, since he is already at Carl’s house on Wednesday morning and does not drive there with the rest of the group. On Friday, when Chase eats at the diner with Leo, Janice is absent and Leo assumes she is out sick. After the Hysteria hits the town on Saturday, Chase witnesses a frantic coyote, later identified as Janice, running across the street as he and Carl drive to Carl's house. This is the only route in which Janice has no dialogue.

In Jenna's route, Janice is not seen in person again after Wednesday, but on Friday Chase has a dream of a younger Janice, who is driving with Mr. Bronson when he hits Samuel Ayers with his van. The vision of Janice and Mr. Bronson eventually helps Chase find Sam's remains, and possibly explains why Janice is still unstable so many years later.

## Relationships

### Mr. Bronson

Several decades prior to the events of Echo, Janice and Mr. Bronson were romantically involved for an unknown amount of time, and seem to have had a playful, flirtatious relationship.

## Trivia

* Janice is a descendant of Hattie and William Adler through their son, Andy Adler.