Nicole Rivers/2.0 and Prior

Nicole Rivers is a character played by Carbie.

Description
Nikki is an artist making her way in Los Santos! She came to reconnect with her Uncle Mickey, and also find new inspiration for her art. Nikki is gullible and naïve, just wanting to see the best in people. Even though she knows some of her friends are bad people, she can't bring herself to cut them out of her life, despite the strife it causes her.

Nikki is battling her own demons in the form of alcoholism to control her stress and unwanted feelings, and conflict over if she is actually a good person given the company she keeps. Despite this, Nikki tries to stay positive. She keeps busy by spending time with friends, doing art, and generally pushing all of her unwanted feelings down.

Background
Nikki keeps quiet about her past, but has revealed to Nicholas Reyes that she was homeless for a long time after her parents kicked her out of their house when she decided to pursue art as a career at 18. She never felt like her parents cared about her passions, so much so that she barely considered them parents even at a young age. The one person she did think of like a father was Mickey, but that changed when his daughter Katy was born. Suddenly Mickey had less time for her, and it was apparent that he could never love her like he loved his own flesh and blood. Nikki just couldn't compete, and instead retreated into herself.

Nikki holds a grudge against Katy for this, placing the blame for losing the one good adult in her life on her, especially after Katy decided to come to the city right after Nikki did and take up even more of Mickey's time.

Serial Killers
Nikki is friends with many serial killers, although it is mostly unknown to her. On her first day in the city, Nikki was contacted by Jasper Saxon to draw the pictures for his autobiography that he was taunting police with. When Brian Knight found out, he played one of Jasper's cassette tapes for Nikki, traumatizing her but convincing her he was bad news. After he was put in prison, she felt betrayed and used by him, but said she would protest the death penalty for him on trial.

Nikki also became friends with Chasity Dawes and Joshua Wade, aka FUG, after being stabbed by Jerry/Jenny Slime her first day in the city. She saw them all as just artists, and despite being told that they might be bad news, Nikki was desperate to feel accepted and didn't want to believe it. That crumbled the night Chasity died, and the truth was finally revealed to Nikki and she could no longer deny it. Nikki felt conflicted because the Chasity she saw was a good person, but came to accept the truth, though she can't quite reconcile it.

Her escapades with Serial Killers continued as Jasper escaped from prison, and she was left wondering what to do as he contacted her. This was resolved as Kenneth Jesperson, aka Mr. Smiley, met up with her and revealed everything that was kept from her. He told her who exactly were serial killers, and then gave her a pin, making her one of the Smileys, though she didn't have to sing the song. She only asked when accepting it that they don't do anything in relation to her, and they don't tell her about what they are going to do/have done. She thinks being kept in the dark will help her not feel so bad about having serial killer friends.

This led to her accepting that if she's going to have so many serial killer friends, she might as well try and be there for Jasper. Maybe all he needed was someone to keep a little bit of humanity left inside of him...

Relationships
On 11/19/20, Nicholas confessed his love for Nikki in the graveyard, saying that he'd lost so many people and didn't want to regret never saying anything if something happened. Nikki happily accepted, both of them kissing in the rain.

It took a long time to get to this point because their relationship was complicated by Sai Carter forcing them to get engaged at gun point. Right before this happened, Nikki had given Nicholas a kiss on the cheek, and it seemed like things were going to become romantic, but then it was just awkward. For a few months both of them denied any romantic feelings, having to repeatedly say the engagement was not real.

Trivia

 * When Nikki is stressed, she will stop eating until someone either reminds her to eat, she manages to get into a better state of mind, or she passes out.
 * Probably holds the record of fastest character to be killed by a serial killer, 3 hours after her creation.
 * She created the menu for Nicky's Taco Truck, Grove Street Gas Station, and Martin's Taco Truck.
 * Nikki is absolutely an alcoholic despite her saying she isn't.