#Amy write about her ocs without making it a whole essay challenge

[sewellsheart]

Hi! Your BFF collage for Nate and Mallory made me very curious about them. What are their first impressions of each other (you mentioned a bit for Nate, but what did Mallory think about him?)? How does their friendship develop? No pressure to answer ♥️

Ahhhh thank you for asking about my girl, Seren !! This got so long I’m sorry in advance

Mallory and Nate are an interesting combo for sure. Mal is a pessimist, sarcastic, and rather apathetic at times, whereas Nate is obviously none of those things.

She tends to be suspicious of kind people, assuming they want something from her or are trying to get her guard down enough to take advantage of her. This is actually part of the reason that she immediately felt secure around Morgan, because she just laid it all out with her “I don’t want to be here and I don’t like you” attitude (which obviously didn’t last too long 🥰).

So meeting Nate, who was all bright smiles, open body language, and kind words put her on edge. She didn’t play nice with him, she made it clear she wasn’t happy any of them were there disrupting her case, and she wasn’t going to fall for his “sweetheart” facade. Until she started to realize that maybe it wasn’t a facade and she was being a dick for no reason (took a little bit for her to get to that point).

As for Nate’s impression of her, I think he pretty quickly came to understand how she operated. He didn’t take anything she said personally, especially because she wasn’t exactly wrong in being suspicious of them. Mallory shot Adam at Farris Wheelhouse, and if it weren’t for the fact that Adam didn’t have a wound, she probably would have kept pushing the topic until she heard what she knew was the truth.

They had a rough road until she was told they were vampires, and then hit another bump when Nate made that suggestion that she gets closer with Rebecca (or however that scene went, it’s been a minute haha). Mallory did not take kindly to his input there. All of my detectives have varying dynamics with Rebecca.

Iris is close with her, but has a lot of anxiety around the idea of her leaving for good.

Reina is just hurt. They’re not close, they probably won’t ever be close. She just wanted a mom and she never got that, so she’s angry in a “what did I do to deserve that” kind of way.

Sophie is very neutral about Rebecca, they’re not close, but there’s not necessarily any hurt or anger there. There’s potential for growth in their relationship.

But Mallory… oh she hates Rebecca. It’s a serious, bone deep hatred that doesn’t have a chance to leave. Mallory doesn’t want to be close with her, she wants Rebecca to stop trying to be close. If she never saw her again, she’d be perfectly fine with that. Unfortunately, that disdain has also extended to Rook, though it manifests differently. I’ll leave that for my deep dive on Mallory though.

The point here being, Nate prioritizes family, where Mal has never been prioritized by her family, so she couldn’t give a shit less about them either. So him suggesting she repair a relationship that she wasn’t the one to damage… She Did Not Like That.

I think the first time she starts to chill out and understand that Nate is just a well-meaning and genuinely kind person is that cafe scene in book 1, where he’s eating a muffin and making kissy noises at a dog 😭. That’s when she just has a moment of “oh, he’s actually just like that” and she starts doing the exact thing she swore she wouldn’t do: she lets her guard down. She stops being rude to him, stops being so quick to snap, and finds that she actually enjoys being around someone who is kind to her because he wants to be.

It’s really just up from there, by book 3 they’re very close. She hugs him in the hallway and preps breakfast with him; it’s the first time she’s had a friendship that’s just easy. Or any kind of relationship, really.

I said in the tags of her collage that Morgan brings out parts of her she’s kinda scared of showing, where Nate brings out the safe and comfortable. She feels safe in sharing her passions and hobbies with Nate, it allows her to display things she’s good at in good company. Cooking, baking, problem-solving, language-learning, debate—all of it can be shared with Nate. Morgan brings out emotions in her and that’s scary for someone who is honestly really traumatized but refuses to admit it.

Nate is a stable platonic companion that she’s been missing her entire life (I’m sorry to Tina but Mal does Not like her). Honestly, I think she challenges Nate in ways he appreciates (and he feels kinda special about how much she likes him, she’s the neighborhood feral that hisses at everyone except him 😭).

[deztinywarriors]

The Linked Charms - Episode 29 (Multi Liverpool players)