These are the two leads for my The Hound and The Fox story, I'm trying to re-arange them to make them fit to an opposites attract narrative. I don't know what to do to these two to make it so they don't have chemistry right away. The problem with my first draft is that they got along like, instantly. So I'm trying to tweak them some. Here's what I jotted down as a baseline. Male Lead: Role: Mr No Nonsense (sort of) Baseline Personality: Focuses on business side of things and tradition, mostly serious but can be absentminded. + Is Talented at his craft + Is good at formulating a plan + Willing and Able to teach + Confident in Himself + Very much a Brain over Brawn person. _ Falters Under Pressure (hard to describe but it depends on what is causing the pressure to begin with especially his own mistakes while executing said plan.) _ Doesn’t Trust Others Well (given his career and history, makes sense) _ First impressions take time to break. (longer than it should. _ Cannot ‘take’ Failure, especially not from those he trusts. _ Refuses to accept ‘help’ from outsiders. (IE: people who aren’t in his ‘group’) Character Growth: Learning to accept failure, and to trust others more readily. Overcoming the ‘hinderance’ of tradition. (hindrance is in quotes because some traditions can be good) Female Lead: Role: Ms. Fun and Exciting Baseline Personality: Somewhat intelligent in some areas, but otherwise kind of a ditz. (with a capitol D) She readily accepts any challenge (in spite of not being ready for it) and will ‘honor’ the challenge if accepted. + Willing To experiment to find a solution + Trusts others well but earning it can be difficult. + Fast Learner (when she actually puts the effort in) + (Note: when focused on a task) Can adapt to a stressful situation with poise. + Has immense physical/magical powers. (for a one tailed Kitsune) _ Puts up a façade but lacks confidence in herself. _ Quick to Anger at tiny things. (silly shit, like: the traffic light took five whole seconds longer to change than it did yesterday! Annoying!) _ Gets Tunnel Vision very easily when focused on a goal. (Thinks harder instead of ‘smarter’ to solve a problem often resorting to brute force.) _ A bad first impression will linger for a while. _ Does not like to change herself to adapt to others. (as in her way of thinking, much less her appearance or approach to solving a problem.) Character Growth: Overcoming her lack of focus, and learning to believe in her own strength. She knows how strong she IS, to the point it scares her a little, just not how to utilize it. Note that they both have the negative of 'bad first impressions last a while' I think that's one of the only things I could do to make them 'hate' eachother for a longer period of time.
Well I haven't read many romances, or at least not ones with happy endings. But I've watched a few buddy-buddy cop movies! The open mindedness versus traditionalist contrast you have there is large cask from which to siphon tension. It's so common I don't even want to call it a trope... it's just a facet of human nature. Some people thrive more in order, others in disorder: clash results. Ideally each one has moments where they prevail from which the other learns and possibly integrates. In the beginning though, it's just a source of conflict. It could lead to the woman lead disregarding the man's plan even when it's a good idea to stick to it, and the man refusing to deviate even when the situation clearly calls for adaptation. Trouble ensues in both cases, keeps things interesting. That noted, if there's romantic tension between two people it doesn't have to metastasize rationally. The mask is "that behaviour of his grinds my gears" when in fact it's "I can't stop thinking about him, and I don't know why, and that's frustrating." So it could be little things that wouldn't normally bother them.
I can only speak from first hand experience when it comes to love. My wife is the opposite of me in a lot of ways, similar in others. I am a move the mountain kind of guy, I do not sweat the small details. My wife was in banking, pennies matter. After 45 years she still corrects me if I use improper English when speaking. I swear like a sailor, she uses phrases like "Cheapers Crow" and "Darn it!" She sings songs, plays with little kids. While I am fine with them, my world does not end and begin with grandkids. The kids and I refer to her as Mary Poppins. There are times when my coarse ways, and her striving for perfection collide, I would not call her my soul mate, but the perfect puzzle piece that fits with me that lets us both become more together than apart. I would not want anyone just like me, nor would she want anyone just like her. healthy relationships seem to always be a balance. My wife takes longer to go out the door than me, pisses me off to no end. I tell her I will be out in the driveway honking the horn. I say it jokingly, but really would love nothing better than to do it. I am of the mindset, if you are not early, you are late. She is always on time. We go out to eat fairly often, we visit the same place and we know what is on the menu before we even go. I know what I am going to have when I walk in the door, she needs to look at the menu and think about it....blows my mind. In my mind, if something needs to be repaired and it can be made better than it was, I am happy. She expects things to be fixed right. While we are both optimists. I take it to the extreme. My feelings, it always could be worse. While I was writing this out I asked her if I had any flaw she would like for me to work on....she just smiled at me.
What is their first or initial interaction with each other? My go-to would be for them to face some sort of challenge and each take a different approach that winds up screwing up the whole thing because they're working against each other, not together. And instead of realizing that, they each blame the other for their perceived weakness that's at fault. This starts off a resentment between the two because each of them feels like they're being disrespected by the other. If they both find it had to overcome an initial bad impression, your best bet would probably be for each of them to show their worst sides to each other right off the bat. Just looking at your initial character outline, it seems like "She readily accepts any challenge (in spite of not being ready for it)" and "Cannot ‘take’ Failure" could be a good conflict. She jumps into something unprepared and causes a challenge or mission to fail, and he has no patience for what he sees as her incompetence and bam! They're off on the wrong foot right at the start. I'll also say that as someone who writes a lot of competence kink into her stories, that when one character assumes the other is as dumb as a box of rocks, but then finds out that they are in fact very smart, it can be very sexy and turn their opinion from "eh" to "oooooooh" very quickly.
In their first interaction it's not really during a 'challenge' per say. In this version of the story they both get exposed to their 'worst' traits while also learning that the other is potentially better at their craft than them. (they're both thieves) The female lead uses her skills to infiltrate a league of thieves Gala which nobody from the 'outside' is supposed to know about to find out about her next big score. The subject of a suitable target comes up and they both wind up arguing over their values. Though her presence at the Gala is initially frowned upon, the thieves guild is intrigued by the overconfident 'upstart' lady. The hound issues a challenge target to try and dissuade her from joining the guild. Which Meiji being Meiji she stupidly accepts the challenge. this time around I plan to have their rivalry stick around longer.
My advice on that would be to make sure there's plenty of expounding on exactly how much they irritate the crap out of each other, even if it's ridiculous and everyone else with eyes and ears can clearly see that they've got the hots for each other. I think it's honestly fine for them to have chemistry right away - all my favorite enemies-to-lovers stories start out that way. It's fun to make it clear that what they think is anger or irritation or even hate is actually the buzzy tingle of attraction. A really good example of this is the song Loathing from the Broadway musical Wicked: What is this feeling So sudden and new? I felt the moment I laid eyes on you My pulse is rushing My head is reeling My face is flushing What is this feeling? Fervid as a flame Does it have a name? Yes! Loathing Unadulterated loathing Spoiler alert: Galinda and Elphaba don't hate each other at all, they're actually smitten.
Neither one is willing to open up enough to admit they like the other because that makes you too vulnerable. The first one to make that admission risks rejection and humiliation. So they keep up this act of bristling at each other. Some people who are afraid to show their real emotions hide them behind a prickly exterior, a wall of off-putting or cocky behavior. This is why when a little boy likes a little girl he picks on her (or vice versa), rather than admit he likes her. And yet he never leaves her alone—he's constantly pulling her hair or putting frogs in her desk. At first she might think he really doesn't like her. She likes him, but because of the way he's acting she'll never admit it. That kicks off the "Get away from me! I can't stand you!" routine that lasts until something puts them in a situation where they can finally let their guards down.
