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What does she see in him?
That is a question both the Lobo family and some New Orleans citizens has been wondering about the Countess regarding to Bellafrancesca's son, Tedward Lobo. To many people who know her, Maryanna Zaleska is a woman of few words. She's mysterious, and also dangerous. She is rumored to want to live a normal life without doing evil, but she also made herself at home with the Lobos, and they know living with such a family literally running an organization about doing evil would be anything but normal and even contradictory to her supposed goal. Whenever she does say more words than she prefers to, it's usually about or to Teddy. Even Teddy's younger sister, Mandy notices it and mercilessly teases both her and him about it until they're beet red.
Quite frankly, that's a question Marya has even been wondering to herself about as she lays on his bed watching him snoring peacefully as the morning sun rays hits his face: What exactly does she see in him?
The answer is quite simple actually.
Teddy Lobo is everything Marya didn't think she would want to be in a long-term loving relationship with. He's a man, he's a werewolf, his mouth is loud and vulgar, he's raised to be a violent criminal, and he accepts aspects of herself she thought was a curse and needed to get rid of in order for her to have a mate.
Marya doesn't feel attracted to many men in her life. She grew up in a vampire society where purity culture was rampant. There were beliefs that a woman's virginity status determines the taste and texture of the blood. The blood of a young virgin woman is considered pure and tastes the best while the blood of a woman who had sexual relations is considered tainted and undrinkable. Of course her vampiric father, Dracula subscribes to such beliefs and thus, young virgin women are his favorite prey. Those beliefs as to why vampires prey on women are why mortals often compare vampirism to sexuality and Marya is very well aware of that, so she understandably hates her vampirism and wishes to get rid of the aspect of herself that has learned to grossly objectify those of her own sex in such a disgustingly predatory way. She still vividly remembers the guilt she felt after the incident involving the young woman that goes by the name of Lili.
Marya hates how those problematic beliefs contributed to her vampirism especially considering she was a victim of such a thing to the vampire man, Dracula, and then only for her vampirism to be sexualized by the other men around her who accepted who she is primarily for their own benefit: R.M. Renfield who lusts for her simply because she's his master's daughter and he'll go to her for approval or punishment when his master isn't around. And Sandor who became her Renfield for the hopes of getting himself the very thing he wanted in life – eternal life.
So to say that Marya has been a victim of such gross objectification by many men she knew in her life is an understatement to say the least. As a result, there are very few men she trusts to have a genuine loving relationship with that doesn't involve using each other for selfish desires.
There was one male psychiatrist Marya did take a liking for: Dr. Jeffrey Garth. She hoped his advice to force herself to resist the addiction she has little to no control over would be the last hope for her curse cure. Unfortunately, it only backfired.
She once told Teddy what psychiatrists made drug addicts do back in the day according to Dr. Garth and his exact response was to stare at his cocaine line on his finger for about 3 seconds before scoffing off “Tsh! Like that's gonna fucking work out well.” And just like that, one nose swipe and the line was gone.
But there is a difference between Teddy and Dr. Garth: Teddy doesn't force Marya to suppress aspects of herself she has little control over. As a matter of fact, he embraces them all. Her beautiful crimson eyes, her pointed fangs and claws, her advanced strength, speed and senses. Her superfast healing body, her ability to get powerful by eating bugs, her fashion sense, the interesting idea he entertains himself with of both of them living together as power partners sufficient enough to afford what they want and need.
Now it's true that Teddy initially did objectify Marya for being Dracula's daughter and saw her as a potential ticket for advancing his family's power and world domination plans and she's sexy and blablabla-wait… No! Vampires don't say blablabla!
Fortunately, he couldn't continue objectifying her like that when he saw how much she suffered more than he thought. She doesn't even enjoy being Dracula's daughter, an ordinary yet simple life has been robbed from her at such a young age. Lured away from her village home by Dracula taking on a form of a glowy colorful bat to catch her eye, her beloved mother the only parent she had was murdered by the man who taken her captive, drained from her blood, died and then reborn into a monster she didn't want to become. Lived decade after decade in this agonizing state and then killed by his entitled servant simply because she didn't give him what he wanted, and then he got eternal life and had the audacity to use her dead body as a weapon for his enemies…
Teddy just couldn't keep himself from feeling bad for this woman even if he tried to. He wanted Sandor to suffer for everything he did to her more than he wanted to idealize her. Same for Dracula, although he kinda finds his fatherly power a bit more appealing and he would probably find himself being lured into his dark side just to help his family business. If he showed that vampire that he's a capable man who can stand on his own feet and care for his family and show that Draculas and Lobos can unify in peace, maybe Dracula will change for the better and reverse his daughter's curse? Maybe?
Marya honestly doubts so knowing Dracula, but Teddy's growing deep loving care for her and even giving her a chance to live as humanly as she can is what ultimately made her enjoy being in his company, at least enough to cling to him when pitch black darkness triggers bad memories. He takes her around to human places, offers her human food, buys her cute human clothing, buys her stuffed animals humans use for comfort and bond forming… She thought she wouldn't be able to fully enjoy those things without curing her curse first. This young wolf taught her to enjoy those things in the present moment whether she is cursed or not. After all, it's not the outer appearance that matters the most, it simply makes up for it as her additional special quirks he personally finds attractive.
This is surprising to her especially considering Teddy is also a werewolf. Vampires and werewolves were seen as connected to each other and were more similar than seen at face value, but Marya has seen it to be very rare for both species to be closer than just allies to fight against the rest of the world. It's uncommon for vampires and werewolves to be mates. When these creatures search for a mate, it's usually either mortals or their own kind. She doesn't mind either way, she honestly authentically feels more comfortable being in the company of werewolves than vampires.
While it is true Tedward is a criminal, the thing is he doesn't always fully enjoy violence either. He'll rather be a boastful drug addict than to actually have to murder someone in cold blood and then gruesomely dissect a dead body in the torture room downstairs of his home. That is what Mandy would do while Bella scolds Teddy. Thus, that is his least favorite time of the day. Therefore he is fully well aware his vampire mate is no fan of violence either and he is more than happy to stay in his room and chill with her when he doesn't have something else to do.
When the two agreed to marry, Teddy allowed Marya to share his room and bed with him. As a nocturnal creature, Marya doesn't share his same psychological need for 8 hours of sleep throughout the night and thus, she had no obligation to lay in bed at night with him for that amount of time when there's many other things she could be doing out at that time. That and she doesn't understand the concept of time as much as she used to anymore, time has now become a confusing illusion mortals invented to stay in line with their strange purposes made up for themselves.
Nonetheless, she accepts his offer anyway because it's another one of those opportunities for her to enjoy human life again, and he's a good source of company and comfort when she finds out she can still dream as a vampire and they're usually nightmares while sleeping in a completely dark room reminds her of the dark past that still haunts her to this night alongside gunshots that can be heard in the distance outside, and she'll cling onto him when she's afraid. Teddy would hug her back and promise he'll be her most coolest protector she'll have.
Teddy had been accustomed to hearing cars, shootings and occasional blaring music as background noise during bedtime, so these noises don't really bother him as much. But he knows it does bother her more, so he thankfully has a phone to look up peaceful nature sounds and ambience to listen to online to ease her more and he certainly sees why she sleeps better with them as white noise because it is more calming. They don't perfectly block out the outside noise, but the difference is noticeable. For all of his flaws, he is pretty attentive to her wants and needs.
This is all why Marya is more forgiving of his flaws she would normally find utterly irritating and unattractive on anyone else such as the fact that he's loud, rude, obnoxious, cowardly, doesn't know when to talk talking for 5 minutes and tends to get too drawn to the dark side. Then again, Sandor socially presents himself as a polite, well-mannered gentleman even though the way he treats her is quite a different story, making him come off as hypocritical. So perhaps she too supports the idea that it's not the outer appearance that matters the most, to her credit, there are times where she does find Teddy amusingly humorous with his dorky smile and laughter.
So now here she is waking up in the morning and watching this young man snoring away in his sleep. His face looks so peaceful when the sun shines onto him.
But then a wonderful, awful idea was planted into Marya's head.
She turns her head to where the gray tabby cat squishmallow is at. It's a cute little thing with his closed “n” shaped eyes and a “3” shaped nose and mouth. When she begun making herself at home in his room, Teddy reveals a soft secret of his: He owns squishmallows and he adores them so much he even makes his own stories about them and their relationships with each other. He would play with them while snacking on his plate of cheesecake cubes when no one was looking. Perhaps he really does have a sweet side after all.
She sneakily grasps the squishmallow and carefully moves it to face Teddy to avoid as many bed creaks as possible. And then in the most cringiest baby voice she could possibly make…
“Hewo Teddy-Weddy!”
Teddy's eyes shot wide open.
“Ahh Jesus fuckin’ Christ! Shit babe, quit fucking scaring me already won't ya?!” He whines as he quickly sits up from his pillow. Marya couldn't stop giggling to herself.
“I'm sorry Teddy, I just couldn't get such an amusing thought out of my mind when I gaze at your sweet face.” Then she grabs the squishmallow once again and resumes her strangest baby voice, “Come hug meh Teddy-Weddy, I wanna be ya fwiend! Hehehe!”
“Wha-y-you think my face looks sweet?!” Teddy's face turns big and bright red when the vampire couldn't stop laughing and he gets out of bed and gets himself dressed in an attempt to shrug off that embarrassing moment that just occurred.