#i contain multitudes you wouldn't begin to understand! /silly

[puppydog-princess]

oooooooo i fucked up i should have gone to bed but i just got sucked up reading my book

[druidgroves]

georgiamac brainrot under the cut. y'all know how it is.

1. this gun for hire

ohhh maccready. you're much more than that and you've got a big storm coming.

2. just here for the paycheck

which is what he tries to tell himself in the beginning. he does think georgia's dedication to the minutemen is a bit silly, a lot more morally righteous and "do no harm" than he's used to (little does he know that georgia is a "do no harm but take no shit" kind of person), but she pays well, she's consistent, and keeps it fair.

3. calling someone by their last name is the best way to flirt, actually

georgia almost exclusively refers to him by his last name, so this comes into play a little more once she allows herself to be a little flirty.

4. a ship dynamic that's less of an "italicized 'oh' moment" and more of an "italicized 'ah fuck' moment"

this is pretty much mac's reaction once he realizes he's got it bad for georgia. it snuck up on him and when it's finally staring him in the face he is very distressed by it for multiple reasons. he worries if it'll change things between them, feels a little guilty upon realizing he's slowly moving on after lucy, and fears that georgia won't return the feelings...

5. yes yes i do like you. i am afraid to write the stronger word.

...so he represses them. his "oh i never thought about that" line in his romance in this instance basically means "i wouldn't let myself think about that." on georgia's end, she's got all sorts of mixed up feelings thanks to how her relationship with nate went. is she allowed to move on? should she even be worrying about this when she's trying to find her son? she can't keep her emotions hidden for very long, but she'll allude to them in this case.

6. when i'm with you the line between 'friends' and 'lovers' blurs and i don't care which side i end up on as long as you'll have me

their whole relationship can be squarely defined as friend to lovers. potential spoilers for BLP, but i don't have them planning to outright tell each other their feelings until right before georgia goes to the institute for the first time (subject to change, but probably not). so they have a looooot of time in that will-they-won't-they area, both afraid to make the first move, but knowing that whichever way it goes, they still want to be at each other's sides.

7. i don't know. i mean, we're two sides of the same coin, right?

there it is ! one of my favorite lines in his romance. both are widowed parents trying to do right by their kids while also trying to survive by themselves at the same time. even before they get to know each other, without even knowing, they already understand what the other is going through.

8. please never leave / where would i go without you?

mac basically says it out right, we know he hates being alone, so once he and georgia get close and develop feelings, he really doesn't like being away from her if he can help it. really, he's worried something bad will happen to the one person in the commonwealth that took a chance on him who he's already invested so many feelings into. for georgia, she already decided long ago that mac was her partner (in the platonic sense of the word, to start) and she doesn't see herself going anywhere without him. she wouldn't want anyone else by her side.

9. i am better than i was; i will be better than i am

i am firmly of the opinion that despite him being a little shit mac wants to be a better person (he contains multitudes). it's why he lied to lucy about being a soldier, why he left the gunners, and why he's trying so hard for duncan. why would he lie if he didn't want lucy to think better of him? why would he leave the gunners if what they do wasn't "catching up" to him? why would he fight tooth and nail to save every cap he could for his son? why do all that if you didn't want to be, or at the very least be perceived as, a better person? working with georgia and the minutemen (as well as the railroad later on) kinda give him that push he needs to really decide what kind of person he wants to be.

10. there's good in this world, and i found a little bit of it in you

after first leaving vault 111, georgia was convinced the world was past saving and that she was never going to find shaun. she thought the world was cruel and without mercy. but then she found so many people, mac included, who proved her wrong. for mac specifically, she caught on that he wanted to do better and in doing so, she found another spark of good in the world.