Nerium Nightshade

Nerium Nightshade is described as the Snrubville Mafia's gem. While first seeming like a bit of a ditz, her capabilities shine when working at her flower shop or with plants in general. Her relationship with her girlfriend Vincent Colosimo is a surprising one but one built on love nonetheless. Her close connections with the mafia also make her a valuable asset if appealing to the mob is something you're interested in.

## Appearance

Nerium stands at 5’5” and sports long, straight, strawberry blond hair. She is pale and has freckles speckling her skin which she clothes in bright, flowy dresses and skirts. Nerium is almost never seen wearing restricting pants or dark and muted outfits, save for when she is attending funerals.

## Personality

Nerium is described by many who meet her as a sweet girl, with the looks and personality of a fresh strawberry. She's seen as an imaginative young woman with a tendency to escape reality into her own head. This has caused her to be disconnected from most of the world, a fact not helped by the morally questionable Snrubville system being the only thing she has ever known. The slight disconnect from reality has caused Nerium to be very blunt with those around her, although Vincent was able to reign in her comments to some degree when working with her family in the mafia. But to regular citizens, Nerium is merciless to those she deems deserving. Her overall friendly and honest nature has given her many connections in town, but to close friends and family that friendliness quickly turns sickly sweet, for better or worse. Vincent says that Nerium's love is apparently so sweet it’s poisonous.

Nerium likes flowers, flowy dresses, sunny days, and pineapples. She dislikes brutal violence, horror movies, and weapons.

## History

Nerium and her family grew up in Snrubville. Their family flower shop business has been a part of the community for years and she has inherited it like her ancestors before her. She learned from a young age how to care for plants, how to run the business, and the shop’s long-term relationship with the mafia. She knew very few kids her age to befriend, making these early years lonely. Throughout her childhood, Nerium would daze off into her imagination to escape the mundanity of life. These daydreams soon became a habit for her whenever she had the time to frolic off, making her barely cognizant of her surroundings for a majority of her adolescent years.

She was taught by the Snrubville Mafia where she met Vincent, the girl she would start dating a year before they both graduated. Vincent's friendship brought her into the world much more often, allowing Nerium to learn about the rest of the town she had been ignoring. Nerium graduated from the mafia's schooling system and immediately started work at the family flower shop along with her mother and grandmother, her parents telling her to run errands in the rest of town as a way to get her to socialize. In a tragic twist of fate, Nerium’s parents both died of unknown causes and she had to take over ownership of the shop earlier than expected. The death and sudden responsibility caused Nerium to retreat back into her mind for a long while, with Vincent and the shop being the only things to bring her out of it. Her only living relative is her grandmother Holly who occasionally aids Nerium, much to the girl’s worry.

Contrary to how she may appear, Nerium is no damsel in distress. Her family name of Nightshade was passed onto her for a very good reason. Nerium supplies the town with not only beautiful flowers and plants but also medicinal herbs and, ever since the abolition of vaccines, medical drugs she makes with the help of the Mafia’s doctors to sell back to the people at exorbitant rates, although Nerium herself is not completely aware of the latter.

## Relationships

### Friends:

#### Ezekiel Scipio

Ezekiel Scipio is what most would call an unusual friend for Nerium. While the two have very different aesthetics, they bonded over their similar love of flowers. Nerium enjoys Zeke’s indifferent and calm behaviour since it is such a contrast to the rest of her restless life and companions. Ezekiel will regularly be seen visiting Nerium's flower shop to buy roses, ask for tips on keeping flowers alive, and for simple company. Nerium also supplies Zeke's funeral home with flowers and will come by during funerals to console the loved ones with calming herbs, teas that are suspiciously effective. She has found it very fun to entertain Zeke with stories of her and Vincent, hoping he will do the same with himself and Derek.

#### Clarissa Queen

Clarissa Queen acts like an older sister to Nerium both because of her real age and how much she knows. Nerium’s knowledge of water flora is one she wished to build upon and Clarissa’s Boat Rental Shop was the perfect place for her to conduct her research. Clarissa and Nerium share their knowledge of fauna and flora respectively with one another which is the basis of their friendship. They occasionally share tea and various dessert recipes over conversation. However, as much as Nerium looks up to Clarissa, she feels a cold distance from the woman.

### Enemies:

#### BeNoir LeBlanc

Nerium has had many run-ins with BeNoir and all of them have left her with a feeling of murderous intent towards the Quebecois man. The most notable is when BeNoir threatened to smoke all of the plants in Nerium's flower shop, to which Vincent nearly killed him for. BeNoir has since been banned from the shop and coming within 10 meters of any flora owned by Nerium, less for his sake and more for the safety of the plants.

#### Moppet

Nerium has never interacted with Moppet directly only because she continuously and consciously avoids the thing. She despises how it senselessly commits crimes in town with no regard for anyone or thing. Nerium also believes that Moppet is the reason her Grandmother insists on seeing ghosts and has vowed to keep the two of them far away from each other.

#### Fiore Scipio

To be truthful, Nerium doesn't have a solid reason for hating Fiore. She is aware of Zeke's vehement hate of his own brother and has overheard some talk of 'murder' but, as always, she's a tad disconnected from the facts. She sees Fiore and Clarissa together, presumably as friends, which only adds to the confusion. Nerium does dislike how Clarissa seems to become more brash around Fiore, and Fiore's general playboy demeanor.

### Family

#### Ivy Nightshade †

Nerium's mother and the person who taught Nerium nearly all of what she knows. She ran the flower shop before her and was a major reason for its continued success and connections with the mafia. Nerium felt she could confide in her mother about everything, making the two very close. Ivy was headstrong and wanted her daughter to be the same. Much to her disappointment, Nerium was quiet and her daydreaming habit made it difficult for Ivy to get her to socialize. After Nerium and Vincent got together, Ivy was thrilled that her daughter was finally opening up to people and the three became very close. Ivy's sudden death affected Nerium the most, but what she taught her helped Nerium become much socially stronger than she had ever been before.

#### Eric Galanis †

Nerium's father was a high-ranking member of an allied mafia that worked abroad in Italy and Greece. He moved to Snrubville with Ivy when they married but proved unprepared for the quaint little town. He took more opportunities to work abroad, being absent for a majority of Nerium's life. Still, Eric loved his family dearly and made sure to be present for his daughter's important moments. His death caused a rift between Snrubville Mafia and his mafia, who suspected foul play, but Nerium and Vincent were able to prevent the rumour from going any further. Unfortunately, the lack of evidence for the two deaths has made reconciling a difficult task.

#### Grandmother Holly

Nerium's only living relative, Grandmother Holly picked up most of the slack Nerium's father left when he was abroad. She was Ivy's mother and knows everything there is to the flower shop. When Nerium took over ownership of the establishment, she insisted that Grandmother Holly finally relax but the woman insisted on helping around the shop. To fuel Nerium's worry, Grandmother Holly began speaking of ghosts and demons in the town that were planning on haunting the shop and took up crude exorcism methods to "protect" Nerium and the flower shop. Nerium worries that Grandmother Holly has gone senile but the rest of her mental faculties are intact, leading Nerium to believe that some of the citizens of Snrubville are terrorizing her grandmother.

### Lover

#### Vincent Colosimo

Vincent Colosimo is Nerium's long-time girlfriend and best friend. She commonly visits Nerium's flower shop, usually with a hoard of mafia enforcers with her to guard the shop. Nerium is the only person who can calm Vincent when she's her angriest and the flower girl’s arsenal of potent herbs makes that job much, much easier. The two met in the school system created by the mafia and bonded over their love of animals and their dislike for the boring system they were forced to be a part of. They began dating a year before they graduated and now live together with their Netherland Dwarf rabbit named Api whom Nerium is a tad jealous of for taking Vincent's attention away from herself.

## Trivia

* Created by Arsomnatique
* When first spawned into Sau's mind, Nerium's personality was originally just "she wears pastel colours" with Vincent being inspired by the other half of the phrase, "and her girlfriend is a goth."