Chapter 15

Alex sucked on his teeth, then exhaled. He patted her on her bare shoulder, "Good night, Gloria. Sleep well," and he turned and walked out to the living room.

Seneca mumbled the words of his textbook to himself, trying to stay focused long enough to let the words on the page sink in. He was a Simlish student, he didn't understand why he needed to take a science class, and yet here he was, having to take Geology. He thought it would be easier to learn than chemistry.

The house was quiet. The party from Hell was taking place up at the campus, and he had elected to not go. He didn't want to tell Deliah that he wasn't going in case she decided to stay home and try to be his study buddy. He didn't need any more company. He'd talked to Gloria for hours, and had been happy to see her. He'd been a bit surprised that she'd looked a bit worse for wear. He'd expected her to look beautiful- she was always beautiful, but he'd expected her to have worn some makeup or something. Instead she was wearing workout clothes and she looked like she hadn't washed her hair in two days.

He smiled. Was it weird that he remembered how her dirty hair smelled? The way her pillow smelled? He wished he had one of her pillowcases just so he could be closer to something of hers. Because his mother had decorated his room, there was nothing of Gloria here besides the picture of the two of them. There was no little bottle of perfume tucked in a corner somewhere for him to sniff, no pillowcases or towels. Everything was brand new and sterile. Once upon a time, this had been regular. If something showed wear, it was replaced with something new. But Gloria had shown him that things with wear and familiarity were treasures and something to be relied on instead of discarded.

The clock had turned to 10:30 and Seneca stretched. He should go to bed. Maybe he'd be able to go for a walk tomorrow morning and try to avoid Deliah. Let Yuzuki smooth her out and he'd bring home pizza or something...

Standing from his desk, he nearly jumped out of his skin as someone pounded loudly on his door. "Seneca!" Deliah's voice sounded. "SENECA! Open this door! Open this door right now or I'll find the spare key and open it myself!"

"What the hell, Deliah?!" he shouted, trying to get his heart rate under control. Spare keys were kept for each room incase of emergencies. "What do you want?"

"'What the hell?' Are you serious? You were supposed to be at the party tonight! You were supposed to be there! Why weren't you there!?" She pounded on the door, making Seneca recoil. "Open this door!"

"Uh, no." he said, realizing that he hadn't locked it. He quickly turned the lock.

"This was supposed to be the night! You won't even look at me to tell me that you don't like me! You're a coward, Seneca, and I'm going to tell everyone that you are! You're afraid-"

"You think I'm afraid of you?" he asked. "I've nearly died before, and you think I'm afraid of you? Deliah, I-"

Another pair of footsteps came from the other side of the door. "Deliah, this isn't how you win, by pointing fingers. You're not going to make any friends this way, let's go down to the kitchen, get you something to drink..." Yuzuki urged quietly.

"But I dressed up for this! And I got ketchup on this dress so I can't return it! Do you know how much it cost? A lot! And he won't even look at me!" Deliah started to bawl.

"Ok, maybe we won't get you something to drink after all, let's get you some water..."

Seneca leaned against his door and sighed. He knew that he had nothing to do with her attraction to him, but he still felt guilty. Was there something he could do to let her down easy? Tell her that he wasn't interested without hurting her feelings? Deliah was a few years younger than him since he'd started college a bit later than most of his fresh-out-of-high school peers. She hadn't learned that life isn't over when someone says no to you. What was he going to do?

~*~

Gloria looked at the schedule board. Great, she was paired with Alex for half the week. Did Timothy and Miranda not see what was going on between them? Probably not, since most of whatever this was happened when they were alone and there were no witnesses.

It was Sunday morning, and most everyone was still asleep. Alex, acting the role of the dutiful student/son, had gone to feed the animals and make rounds on the greenhouse to make sure that the sprinklers had enough water in storage and that the building was secure.

This place still felt a bit unlike home. When she was younger she was used to sharing a home with her large family, but she'd quickly moved out to live with Seneca when the twins were still very young, shrinking her daily family down to just one other person. It had been that way for about two years and she wasn't used to having a large family again.

She grabbed a banana from the counter and walked back up to her room, pulling her phone out of her pocket to send Seneca a good morning text. He had a lot of school work to get done today so he wasn't going to have time to video chat with her today, but he was going to text her throughout the day. That gave Gloria the perfect opportunity to catch up on her shows that were still coming out as the world still revolved without her.

Very quietly, opened the door to her room, put her earbuds in, and turned on her laptop. What should she watch first, her medical drama or the new superhero show? Seneca would probably want to watch the superhero show first, she should watch that so that she could talk to him about it.

Clicking the video, the show played out in amazement as the good guys did their best to keep the evil at bay. Gloria watched in disbelief the whole time, hands over her mouth, trying to keep her exclamations as quiet as possible so she didn't wake Aquila.

It didn't work.

"Hey, what's all the noise about?" Aquila asked as she pulled the blanket up higher on her chin.

"Sorry," Gloria whispered, pausing the video so she didn't miss a moment. "The new episode is out and it's so good I- I can't help-"

Aquila sat bolt upright. "Wait, you're watching the new episode!? When did it come out? It wasn't out yesterday!" She threw off the covers and bolted to Gloria's side, peering down at the screen. "Can you start again?"

"What? I'm already most of the way through!" Gloria protested as Aquila grabbed the mouse and moved the progress bar back to the beginning. "Aquila!"

A knock came from the door as Maria and Arhun peaked their heads in. "What's up with all of the noise?" Maria asked. "If I have to change sides of the room I sleep on because you guys are noisy, I'm going to summon a demon to haunt you for sure."

"Gloria was watching the new episode and woke me up. I need to see it too, so we're watching it from the beginning." Aquila said.

"What- no! She commandeered my laptop and put my progress bar back to the beginning! You didn't even wait for me to finish!"

"Ooo, Can we watch too?" Arhun asked as the two of them let themselves into the room.

"The screen is only so big-" Gloria protested.

"Sure, let's just move the chairs around so we can all fit." Aquila said, pushing the chair out of the way.

"I can't believe this," Gloria rubbed her face.

"I missed last week, can we start from there?" Maria asked.

"I don't see why not," Aquila said, backing out of the video and going through Gloria's profile to find the last episode.

"I'm going for a walk," Gloria said, grabbing her sweater and shoes, not changing out of her pajamas. "Don't judge me for my 'to watch' list, and don't add anything to it either."

Aquila just waved over her shoulder as Gloria left the room. Lacing her shoes tightly and tying her hair back, she stretched for her walk and opened the door. It was a wet day- damp and chilly, as it normally was. She had thought perhaps the fellowship was going to lead her to swimming in the river or calls for skinny dipping, or late night campfires, or camping for that matter. It hadn't happened yet, but she'd only been here a week. There was plenty of time for those things to happen, hopefully before it got too cold outside for swimming.

She walked the circuit of the farms. Up to the greenhouse, around to the animal pens, and back to the house. In all, it took her an hour at a moderate pace, not pushing herself and not letting herself dawdle. She stopped to look in the water a few times, or up at the trees, or the birds on the ground, but she didn't stop for long. She had to pry her laptop away from those vultures, after all.

It was about 2 o'clock when she came back to the house, and the show must have ended because Aquila and Arhun were milling around in the kitchen chatting about something. She didn't know where Alec or Ashton were, but that hardly mattered. They were done with her laptop, and she could finally watch the episode before the day was over and she had to go back to the dark ages tomorrow.

~*~

"This will pass," Yuzuki told Deliah as she cried and tried to rip off her dress. "Your feelings for Seneca will pass, you just need a new muse,"

"I can't find a new muse while he's in the house! While perfection is right there! He's everything I want, can't you see that? He's like Kylo Ren from Star Wars, or The Darkling from Shadow and Bone! Uncaring, distant and sad until he finds the one who can make him whole, and that's me!" Deliah tried to grab the zipper pull and free herself, but she was breathing too hard to find it.

Yuzuki stood and helped her with it. "Darling, he's already found his piece. He's found his Rey, his Sun Summoner. You can't fill a place that's already filled. I want you to be happy, but this isn't the way."

"That can't be true. It just can't be," she huffed. "I must be able to win him over, somehow. It may take a while, but I won't quit. I can't quit. quitting is for quitters," she slurred and blew her nose.

"And people die when they are killed," Yuzuki teased. "How much did you have to drink? Didn't they card you?"

~*~

It was dark when Gloria tiptoed down the steps to the kitchen for a bite to eat. She'd been in a snacking phase lately and she knew of some cookies in the cabinet that were calling her name...

Without turning on the lights, she rounded the corner for the kitchen doorway and soundlessly opened the cabinet. She didn't want to wake Miranda and Timothy, and any noise made so close to their bedroom could feasibly wake them.

Peeling open the package, Gloria heard the front door open. Peeking her head out, she saw Ashton coming in the door and removing his shoes, setting down his back pack on the floor. Gloria had been in her room for so long, consuming her internet and enveloped in screens that she hadn't thought to keep tabs on anyone but Aquila. And Alex. Where had Ashton been? She didn't remember seeing him all weekend.

He didn't see her lurking in the dark, and it was late. His posture told her he was tired, and she couldn't blame him. She should be tired too, if she didn't feel so wired.

"Oh, is Ashton back?" Alex's voice came from behind her.

Holding back a scream, she wheeled around to face him. "You people have to stop doing that!" she hissed.

"Doing what?" he asked, eyeing her packet of cookies.

"Appearing without a sound and breaking the silence," Gloria said. "Where was Ashton? Why is he getting back so late?"

"He-" Alex chewed the thought for a moment. "He went to see his son."

Gloria balked. "Ashton has a son? He's far too young for that. And he never said anything about him,"

"He wouldn't. Ashton is the son's father, but not his dad. He- look, you can't tell him I told you this," Alex said, uncharacteristically tense.

"Scout's honor," she said, crossing her heart.

"You just did the wrong sign for that. You're not a scout, are you?" he asked.

"No. Now tell me," Gloria pushed.

"Ashton had an affair with a married woman and she had a son as a result. Her husband was angry, but since Ashton came to his senses and found out he couldn't love a woman who could never love him, he called it quits. He goes to visit his son every other weekend, which is more frequently than I do."

Gloria looked at him, confused. "Why would you go to visit Ashton's son?" she asked slowly, trying to put the pieces together.

Alex didn't meet her eyes, instead staring into the middle distance. "I- I don't-" he took a breath, not blinking. He looked to the floor.

Gloria looked at him with disbelief. "You're a father? You have a child?" she asked. He was a few years older than her, no question, but she hadn't thought of this.

Alex sucked on his teeth, then exhaled. He patted her on her bare shoulder, "Good night, Gloria. Sleep well," and he turned and walked out to the living room.

The plot thickens! What will our cast of characters get thrown into next?

I have some bloopers!

^This was just an unused angle. I like that they've finally fixed mirrors to work properly, but I thought that the space between the mirror and the door was a bit too far to make the shot look good. Also, I'd love if they could add a 'knock on door' feature. They have it for club doors, but not normal or locked ones.

^I love Seneca's facial expressions. A born actor.

^This shot was too cheery to use.

^Gotta say, 'Give fake bad news' is a wonderful animation. it's one of my go tos.

^It had been a while since I've used poses and I didn't get this one quite right for him to be leaning against the door. I'm not sure I have a fitting pose currently, but I have so many...

^ It can be so nice when your sims just rest their faces for a minute and look serene. I also love my custom eyes. Back when custom eyes stopped working, I hated the EA base eyes. Why are they so glossy?! I used these ones for forever, but then they broke, and I eventually found a program to fix them! So I have my favorite eyes once more.

Also, Thankyou @icmnfrsh for submitting such lovely sims.