“I have to, first of all, say that the story was blown out of proportion to such a crazy degree,” she said on Barstool Sport‘s Chicks in the Office podcast. “I guess nothing else was happening that week ’cause every outlet picked it up. I felt like I was Brangelina. You know what, you guys? We’re not. I don’t have the career — clearly nothing else was happening. It blew my mind when that became a thing.

She continued:”It was one of those things where I was talking about all the wonderful things that I love about Paul Wesley and how, for a very brief moment in time, we did not get along.

“Just like any normal human wouldn’t. Like, if you said that you and your parents have loved each other unconditionally and your siblings from the moment you were born until the day that you die, you’d be a f*cking liar. So you’d be lying to yourself if that was true.”

The pair had to play romantic interests while they ‘despised’ each other…

The Vampire Diaries

After they spent time on set, they actually became really close.

“And so, of course, you become a family on set.You spend every waking moment together — probably more moments than you do with your real family because you’re there from, like, 5 in the morning until midnight, 6 a.m. sometimes,” she said.

“And, so you see each other with makeup, without makeup, on good days, on bad days, when you’re hungry, when you’re thirsty, when you’re tired. So there’s going to be mood swings.

“It was one of those things that we just — it’s not that we didn’t like each other. We just didn’t appreciate each other as much as we do now. And that, of course, got blown [out] of proportion. They took one sentence out of context and deleted all of the other ones where I’m like, ‘I love him. We’re best friends now.’

“Literally said, of everyone, he’s probably my best friend and they didn’t put that in the article.”

Now, they’re the BEST of friends!

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Her first comments about Paul weren’t exactly that harst.

Speaking on the Directionally Challenged podcast, she explained, “Paul and I didn’t get along at the beginning of the show. I respected Paul Wesley, but I didn’t like Paul Wesley,” she said.

Forever and iconic couple.

The Vampire Diaries

Paul Wesley echoed this sentiment months later while at the Television Critics Association press tour.

“I think the point that Nina was making, and I’ll totally back her up on this, is that we totally clashed [the] first couple years in terms of just getting on each other’s nerves, and then developed this wonderful friendship. So it’s like this nice, happy ending.”

The 37-year-old Tell Me a Story actor added “I think sometimes when people work together nonstop, do press nonstop for years and years on end, you’re just — you don’t appreciate the person that’s in front of you. You’re like, ‘Oh, you know, I’m exhausted and tired.’ And I think now, it’s such a nice sort of story because we’re such good friends now. I think it was a cool lesson to learn. It’s like the people that kind of maybe you don’t get along with in the beginning later surprise you, and I think a lot of my friendships are like that.”