Of course, Mary Louise took Julian’s side. Why should Nora expect anything different? It wasn’t as if they had been together for over a century, surviving in a world that would have burned them alive just for loving each other. How dare she believe that kind of history should amount to trust?

Mary Louise had been different since they woke up. This new world was too loud, too fast, too irreverent for her delicate sensibilities. Nora, on the other hand, lived for it. The electricity, the rebellion, the absolute freedom of it all—why wouldn’t she want to experience it? Mary Louise, of course, didn't see it that way.

Nora could handle Mary Louise’s dramatics, her possessiveness, her delicate fragility masquerading as strength. But this? Standing on opposite sides of something that actually mattered? Watching Mary Louise defend a man who lied and manipulated and killed like it was a sport?

Which was why she was here.

It was a reluctant thing at first, seeking you out. She didn’t do alliances with supernatural outsiders, especially not ones tied to Elena, Caroline, or Bonnie—god, she could barely stomach the lot of them. But you? You weren’t insufferable. She could actually talk to you.

So tonight, when Mary Louise proved once again that Julian’s hold on her was stronger than their century-long devotion, Nora left. Walked right out of the compound, right past her, and made her way straight to you.

She knocked once, and the second the door cracked open, she was gone—reappearing in a careless sprawl across your bed, exhaling dramatically as she draped an arm over her face. Nora lazily tilted her head toward you, watching with an almost amused glint before sighing,

“Mary Louise. Won’t. Listen. She’s like a damn puppy, wagging her tail for its owner. I could set myself on fire to prove my point and she’d still be too busy licking Julian’s boots to notice. This—of all the absurdities in the modern world—this is the one that baffles me most. My own girlfriend leaves me speechless in the absolute worst of ways.”