Character Analysis
Ain't No Buffy
Nefley is kind of a loser. He doesn't have many friends, and he fills the gap with paranormal fanboy speculation.
When Nina and Dave first encounter him, he's passed out at Father Ramon's place, thanks to the McKinnons being hostile. He appears "short and plump. He had very big ears, and mouse-colored hair that was thinning on top" (15.66). He's no Buffy, that's for sure. But somehow, improbably, Nefley is a vampire slayer. When we say improbably, we mean it:He's "never been very sociable" (16.3) and "he was shy and timid" (16.3). He's absolutely obsessed with the paranormal, though.
Nefley's paranormal fascination is mostly harmless… mostly. According to Nina:
There are lots of perfectly sane people who create their own weird philosophies, and Nefley was no different. Nor was he particularly violent or cruel. On the contrary, he wanted to be a hero. He wanted to be a warrior fighting for good against evil.
His problem was that he didn't have anyone sensible to talk to. (16.6-7)
Nefley may be deluded, but he's not entirely dumb. That's why he set a trap for Casimir to discover where he lived, rather than meting him in person. He grabbed Casimir's address book, too, hoping to uncover more vamps that way. If he were more socially adept, someone might have clued him in to the idea that killing the thing you're fascinated with is a little off (to say the least), but no one pokes any holes in Nefley's heroic aspirations until the vamps comes along.
Geek with a Heart of Gold
However, there's more to Nefley than meets the eye. His whole quest to kill vampires is driven by the belief that "evil was a kind of spiritual waste product that had to be collected […] so that it wouldn't spill out and contaminate everything" (16.4). In other words, he wanted to be the hero that helped save the world.
It isn't hard for Nefley to feel heroic about killing Casimir: "Casimir conveyed the impression of being verminous, like a cockroach. And it isn't hard to squash a cockroach" (16.12). That does set the bar kind of low, though, don't you think? What would Nefley do faced with a vampire less pathetic? Once he's faced with the harsh realities of the vampires' lives, Nefley changes his mind about them. Nina's mom turns on the charm, Reuben backs her up, and they establish that vamp's aren't the enemy Nefley has believed them to be all along.
Of course, Nefley's still sort of a weirdo, so we're not surprised when he steals Nina's diary and then reads it when he gets home. This completes his change from vampire-hater into vampire-supporter, with him proclaiming: "I'll spend the rest of my life in the service of the very people I once tried to destroy!" (26.56). Given his fanaticism, we're thinking he means this declaration one hundred percent.
Nefley becomes an unofficial member of the Reformed Vampire Support Group when the dust settles. Nina worries that he "might one day succumb to his own, peculiar brand of loopy idealism, and launch some kind of vampire appeal campaign, complete with newsletter, walkathon, and charity Christmas cards" (29.5). Luckily, Reuben helps keep an eye on him, which we're thinking means Nefley's stranger impulses don't stand a chance.