Amy and Bill, Two of a Kind

by Sanguinary Sweetness

Remember Eddie?

Sad, lonely, Eddie, whose highlight of the week was watching Heroes and trading his blood for sexual favors? Eddie certainly seemed to be the ‘anti-vampire.’ There was nothing about him that would illicit any of the traditional reactions. No mystery. No fear. No fascination, sex appeal or curiosity.

Eddie did, however, provide a number of crucial insights. It was Eddie that taught us that vampires ‘are what they were when they were turned.’ It was Eddie that taught us that hiding your true nature never lasts forever (as evidenced by his homosexuality being revealed to his family). ‘It’s the rare man who truly knows who he is.’ It was also Eddie who taught us that there are consequences for our actions and the ones that are closest to us are often hurt the most by our decisions (his son growing up without a father figure).

Another important contribution from Eddie is that he provides the context for revealing the true nature of the relationship between Jason and Amy. Through these revelations, it also becomes clear how the Jason/Amy relationship closely parallels that of Sookie and Bill.

There are multiple similarities between the two relationships:

Amy appears and ‘saves’ Jason from himself (in his quest for V) while at Fangtasia. Bill appears and ‘saves’ Sookie from the Rattrays, but also from her loneliness and boredom in a small town where she’s known for her ’disability.’ Both initial meetings take place in a bar. Both couples bond over vampire blood within a night or two of meeting one another (depending on if you believe the story line or Eric’s version of the timeline).

Both Amy and Bill are able to get Jason and Sookie to open up about painful events in their childhood (Jason confesses his guilt over his parent’s death, and Sookie talks about Uncle Bartlett). Amy and Bill both give impassioned speeches about their feelings for Jason and Sookie at crucial points in their relationships. Amy tells Jason that she has never felt with anyone the way she feels about Jason and professes her love for him. Bill tells Sookie that she has awakened the humanity in him and says that he will not apologize for the love he feels for her.

Both Amy and Bill are not what they appear. They both attempt to fit in as regular people in Bon Temps and hide their real natures. Amy gets a job at Merlotte’s and Bill gives a speech and mingles with the locals at the Descendants of the Glorious Dead meeting. Meanwhile, Amy is holding a kidnapped Eddie hostage, and Bill is compiling a dossier on Sookie and working for the queen.

Amy repeatedly makes decisions without consulting Jason and expects that he will follow her orders without protest, yet she becomes very angry when she finds Jason has withheld things from her. When Amy and Jason kidnap Eddie, she had ample opportunity to let Jason know her plan, but opted not to. She manipulates Jason into doing what she wants by telling him she’s doing it for his own good, the sanctity of their relationship, or because her actions were the result of her love for him. When she finds out Jason has been sneaking Eddie Tru Blood, she adapts her personality to fit what Jason wants.  She pretends to suddenly care about Eddie, when in fact, she plans all along to kill him. When Amy finally does stake Eddie while Jason is trying to free him, she tells him ’not to let a vampire come between them because what they have is special.’   She dismisses an act of rage and cruelty by telling Jason that she did it because of her devotion to him, their connection and the awakening he has caused in her. She tells him he knew all along how the story would end and he chose not to see it.

Bill repeatedly makes decisions without consulting Sookie. He also fails to tell her the whole truth (or any part of the truth) in many situations, unless he is forced to (Uncle Bartlett, Jessica) and then uses the same excuses as Amy in order to calm Sookie’s anger. He tells Sookie everything will be fine when he stakes Long Shadow, knowing that there will be consequences which may be grave. He doesn’t tell Sookie about all of the effects of the blood until she ingests Eric’s. Suddenly, it occurs to him to bring up the fact that sex dreams can result. He hides the fact that Godric is Eric’s maker, despite their recent conversation where he questions Eric’s intensity in the investigation (which he then uses as a reason for them to leave Dallas). He tells her his decision to kill Uncle Bartlett was the result of his love for her. He holds her partly responsible for the creation of Jessica when he tells her, ‘If you knew what I have done to return to you.’ He fails to mention that he’s keeping a file with her family tree and newspaper clippings from 20 years ago in a secret drawer in his study. (Though I’m sure that one just slipped his mind. Perhaps the overwhelming humanity Sookie has awakened in him brings with it a case of highly selective amnesia?)

Bill also shows multiple instances of resistance to allow Sookie to help Eric and Godric in Dallas. He tries over and over to get her to break her word to Eric and leave Dallas before Godric is found. In season one, Bill tells Sookie that they have to obey Eric’s commands and that if his demands aren’t unreasonable then they must follow them. Yet in the Dallas scenes, suddenly Bill feels empowered to leave Dallas without fulfilling the agreement he and Sookie made with Eric. Bill also makes it clear that his loyalty is not to his sheriff when Eric is laying on the altar in the FOTS church. Bill grabs Sookie to try and make her leave, but she resists and runs back to remove the silver chains and free Eric. Bill would have left him there to die. What changed? Is Bill that threatened by Sookie’s relationship with Eric, does he fear, like Amy, that a vampire is going to come between their love? Or is this evidence of Bill adapting his personality to fit what he believes to be Sookie’s ideal? Or is there more to the story then we’ve seen?

So where does Eddie fit in?

Eddie, as we’ve seen, is the voice of truth. Eddie repeatedly calls Amy a psychopath. Her actions, at least initially, were no different than Jason’s. But Eddie, who is certainly no expert in the human psyche (hell, he can’t even glamor people)  pegs her as a psychopath within a day of meeting her. Eddie repeatedly tries to get Jason to see who she really is. He tells Jason ‘She’s lying to you,’ ‘She’s not the one,’ ‘She’s far more dangerous than I could ever be.’   Jason refuses to see the truth, even until the end.  His love for the persona that exists only in his head, completely blinds him to the truth. Even once Amy confirms, via staking Eddie, who she really is, Jason forgives and gives her another chance. Amy ends up dead as a result and Jason is left to mourn a person that was a lie. Does this mean that we will see Sookie refuse to face the onslaught of evidence we are beginning to see about who Bill really is? ‘How many bullets will she have to take’ for him until she faces the truth that’s been there all along? As Eddie, Jason, and Amy have shown us, those decisions will not come without consequence, both to Sookie and those that she loves.

Screencaps courtesy of truebloodnet.com.