Not necessarily a cliche or stereotype but I wanted to incorporate my struggles with AuDHD into my characters. Anastasia has adhd whereas Evangeline is autistic. While not directly saying these diagnosis (as they simply do not exist within the time line), I try to make subtle descriptions and inferences through out the novel.
One of the things that I think show cases Evangelines suspected autism is her worry with exactness. Things have to be perfectly on time, she will count down to the millisecond and becomes very anxious when the routines she has in place goes off the mark.
Mentally, if things are not where they need to be exactly at the time they are supposed to be there, she gets really fustrated and angry. She also has a severe noise sensitivity and often struggles with interactions (and trusting people) outside of her very small circle of friends.
There's other things with her that I simply cannot dive into within this post.
Anastasia, on the other hand, deals with ADHD. She has moments of hyperactivity and other moments where she feels as though she cannot move a muscle. Her mind can freeze up and she loses her sense of time. She can be seen as impulsive multiple times throughout the novel. However, there are moments where these quick reactions actually help Evangeline.
Not to mention, when Anastasia is focused on something, someone cannot simply stop her. She does not like the rigid schedule and prefers having breaks in between to decompress. Additionally, the things she is really good at are what she occasionally hyper fixated on. Its a super power for her lol. One of the two is her ability to win any card game thrown at her, she is excellent at poker and blackjack. She also has a knack from designing dresses and learning about history of these clothing
Ofc, as a princess, people cant really know about this but I think its just something neat that I try to incorporate into everything.
