Chapter 17
Seneca walked into the kitchen where Deliah was pouring milk into her cereal, a diner for champions for sure. He fought every fiber of his being to go back to turn around and act like he hadn't walked into the room, but he knew that he couldn't hide from Deliah forever. He had to start living his life. It had been days since she'd banged on his door demanding to see him, and he had to be strong.
He didn't know what to say, so he tried to grab for any straw he could. "Doing ok in Grammar?" he asked casually, going to the fridge and looking to see what was in there. "What other classes are you taking again?"
Deliah cleared her throat as if she hadn't been prepared to speak. "Uh, yeah, Grammar is going fine, as are my other classes. I have Art History and trigonometry this semester."
"Those can be tough, I hope you pull through," he said, closing the door with a premade sandwich. "Have a good evening," he said, giving her a wide but professional berth as he exited the room.
"You... too..." she said after him. She pulled out a stool and sat at the counter, half bewildered. Should he have been avoiding her? Had he conceded and put down his guard? Could she get close, even if it took a long time?
~*~
The weeks passed and Gloria and Alex danced around each other, being civil and slightly competitive with their tasks, but not taking it any further. Gloria and Ashton once caught Maria trying to contact spirits out in the greenhouse, but they stopped her before she brought anything around. She was rather ticked.
"It's getting close to Halloween, and I've read that spirits are strongest and loudest around this time! This time comes around only twice a year, I need to try and communicate!" Maria protested as Gloria extinguished the candles and Ashton put her books away.
"Not in a shared space. And I thought we were going to wait to talk to my friend who talks to spirits for you to do this? So you don't contact the wrong ones? Remember that?" Gloria asked.
"No, I don't remember that at all. When was that?" Maria asked, annoyed.
"On our way to the bar the first week? You didn't believe that she could bring people back from the dead?"
"Oh, I got super drunk that night, I hardly remember waking up in my own bed." She shrugged, yanking her books back from Ashton and shoving them back into her bag. "I don't want to wait, it'll make me lose the chance."
"Wait, you said twice a year, when is the other time?" Ashton asked.
"Most people celebrate a resurrection in the spring, it's a thin point in the veil between this world and the others," She said, rolling her eyes and looking at her nails.
"Maybe I can talk to my friend and see if she can come a weekend and give you some pointers. Though we are very far inland, it would be hard to get here from the Western Islands..." Gloria pondered.
"It would take days to get here even if you could get a hold of her today, which you can't. We have no screen time until Saturday, in three days. So she wouldn't get here for at least a week." Maria tried to shoot down.
"You assume that Midshore has a smartphone," Gloria smirked. "Midshore is quite unplugged, but very centered in nature. I'll talk to Miranda and Timothy about inviting her to visit for a few days."
They walked back to the house, a bite in the air. It was a relief after all of the heat and humidity of the summer, and Gloria liked the way the wind wove through her hair and tickled her scalp. Ashton's hair whipped in the wind and Maria grumbled about how cold it was, pushing past them.
After walking in the quiet, enjoying the scenery, Gloria broke the silence. "How's your son?" she asked.
Ashton's eyes grew wide and he turned his head to look at her, then looked back to where he was walking. "How did you learn about that?" he asked without an edge.
"I promised I wouldn't tell," Gloria said.
"Hmmm," he thought, as the house came into view. "Is that why you were looking at me strange a few weeks ago? You were acting strange for days,"
"It was a strange few days. It felt like so much and so little had happened those few days. I learned so much about the people around me, and it's as if it changed nothing," she thought out loud.
"So you also know that Alex has a son?" he asked.
Gloria nodded, and Ashton continued. "It's his biggest regret- not being there for his son. Creating a life by accident. He sends all of the money he earns to them, and I know he cares for them, but no matter how hard he tried, she never saw him as anything more than a one night stand and her partner in an accidental child. Alex doesn't think he has what it takes to be a father, so he keeps his distance."
Gloria let the information sink in, nodding. "And what about you? How's your son and his mother?"
"My son is bright and bouncy," he smiled. "I see him weekly, any time I have. His mother and I are on good terms and her husband doesn't mind me coming by. There's nothing going on between my son's mother and I anymore."
"You'll find the right one, I know you will," Gloria said. "When I first got here, I thought you and Aquila would be a cute match, but she and Arhun very quickly showed to be a good match," Gloria laughed. "You'll find the right one."
"You sound like my mother," Ashton said as they opened the door to the house, entering. Maria was groaning about it only being Thursday and she wanted to watch things on the internet.
"Everyone else will have seen it by the time I do!" Maria pouted in the corner, badly knitting. Gloria had tried to teach her so she had something besides talking to spirits to pass her time, but she wasn't good at it in the least.
"You know the rules, no screens during the week. You've made it over a month with this restriction, why are you whining now?" Alex asked pointedly.
"I'm not whining!" defended Maria. "Just because I don't have eyes to make at someone like the rest of you, I'm bored! This place is boring!"
Miranda walked into the room, having overheard the whole conversation. "You're bored? How could you be bored? We're busy everyday!" she chuckled and sat down.
"It's the same thing every day, day in and day out. I'm here so I can learn about flowers and to talk to the ancient spirits that haunt this land, but I'm hardly doing either! Gloria says she has a friend who can speak to spirits, she was going to talk to you about her coming to visit. Gloria," she turned sharply and looked at her, "maybe now would be a good time to ask?"
Gloria hadn't expected to bring it up while this many people were present, but she also couldn't think of any reason not to. "My friend- teacher really- can talk to spirits. It's part of her power manifestation. I thought that if she could talk to Maria we may not have to worry about having a haunting on our hands,"
Miranda bit the inside of her cheek, forming her thoughts. "I wish that could be the case, but I actually have some exciting news to tell you all. We're going camping next week and will be gone all week, we can't exactly be inviting guests around while we aren't home," she smiled.
"Camping!?" Alex and Ashton exclaimed. Alex continued, "We haven't been camping in years!"
"Timothy and I have been seeing how you're all getting along, and we haven't had such a cohesive group of students in a long time. And we have only a few weeks before it gets too cold and the harvest has to be done. And Timothy and I want to have a camping trip before we get too tied down," She smiled and looked at her husband.
"'Tied down?'" Maria asked. "By what? I don't see your life having many swerves."
Miranda's smile deepened and she motioned to Timothy to talk. "Miranda and I are having a baby!" he revealed, beaming at his wife. "And before we can't travel around so easily, we wanted to enjoy not worrying."
"Camping trip's a bad idea then; there's worry all over the place while camping," Maria muttered.
"We leave on Monday morning, so you have a few days to get ready. Feel free to take an evening before then to buy some new clothes in town for the occasion if you feel unprepared." Miranda said.
~*~
"-And he just grabbed some food and left the kitchen! As if nothing happened!" Deliah raved over a way too expensive cup of coffee. Velma sipped her own coffee which Deliah had paid for. Velma had chosen their meeting place and ordered, but in Deliah's urge to impress she'd pulled out her own wallet when Velma hadn't reached for hers.
"That's unlike him, he usually hides from his fears or fights them, not ignore them. I wonder who he's been talking to,"
"Why do you think he's been talking to someone?" Deliah asked.
"Seneca seems like a private person, but in reality he always has a confidant. We know he isn't talking to his girlfriend because you say he only does that on the weekends. If my sources are correct, his girlfriend is on an unplugged retreat in the sticks learning about plants. Just leads me to believe she's not of the same caliber as the rest of us," Velma rolled her eyes. "Plants, really. I bet they're growing some grass out there, damn hippies.
"No, he's not talking to his girlfriend, and he's not talking to any of his housemates about this, so who is he talking to?" Velma stared into the distance with unfocused eyes, trying to put the dots together.
"He goes out a lot, and I haven't asked where, but I think I heard him say something about a teacher's apartment over the phone to his girlfriend when I was listening outside his door. It was pretty muffled though so I'm not sure who," Deliah offered.
"His teacher's apartment?!" Velma leaned in. "Really? Who? And for what reason?"
Deliah learned a bit further away from her, new ideas sprouting in her head she'd rather not grow. "I- I only have one class with him, so how would I know? You don't think he's seeing our teacher, do you? Why else would he be going to a teacher's apartment? Do you think- Do you think he's-"
"There's no point speculating, but I think you should try and follow him next time," Velma exhaled, "Find out what he's doing. We can't have him fooling around with anyone else. He's your dream, he doesn't belong to anyone but you." Velma held Deliah's hand on the table for a moment, reassuring the girl.
"Right," she said, trying to not feel overwhelmed by the thought of yet another woman standing in the way of her happiness.
~*~
Gloria stepped out of the shop where she had found a few things that would be more camping appropriate than her usual clothes and saw Maria coming out of a luxury store, holding two bags.
"You know we're camping, right?" Gloria called out across the street. "We probably won't even have a cabin, just a tent. The running water will be a river or something,"
"I know, I'm coming prepared." she said, rolling her eyes. "Doesn't mean I can't do some other shopping while I'm here. I've had my eye on something in there for a while and I wanted to take the opportunity to get it. Shouldn't you be talking to your boyfriend? It's going to be Saturday soon and I hear all about how you love to spend all night talking to him."
"You can turn down the snark, ok?" Gloria half chuckled. "No need to get defensive. And yes, I'll talk to Seneca in a few hours when the internet gets turned back on. No biggie. I'll get to tell him we're going camping. And I'll get to send a message to my parents telling them to ask Midshore to come camping with us,"
Maria's eyes lit up. "She's coming? Miranda and Timothy approved it? Why would she come camping with us though?"
"I guess they wanted more adult supervision, and they figured that there would be a few less things to focus on while we were in the woods than there were on the farm, so we'll see if she can come."
The cool façade came back over Maria's face. "This camping trip may not be a waste of time after all."
"I'm so happy you're happy," Gloria muttered as she walked back to the house.
Hello! I have a ton of bloopers!
Firstly, I shot Seneca's side of things first, so here's what happened there:
Last we saw Deliah, she was undressing after the party. However, I apparently cheated to make her too angry, because she fell over dead when I booted up the game this time!
But I just plopped a wishing well on the plot and set it to best outcome and made her alive again. However, I'd never tried this feature out before because I don't actually like to play with the fate of it, but knowing I could set it for the best outcome I had a few sims I could test it out on.
Sorry, Father Christmas, you aren't the company I was looking for.
You weren't invited, Liam.
Hey! that's my coffee! Seriously, the barista system needs to be fixed in this game. So often coffee and food just doesn't show up.
I hope you like it...
Things can get funny when you get sims so close to each other! Looks like she's asking for a kiss!
I'm a sucker for a good over the shoulder look.
Surprise scenic hug!
"What if I was a bear?"
"You're not a bear," "That's not the point!"
I'm just going to dribble next to this glass top table, facing away from the hoop. That makes total sense.
Gloria got her knife stuck in the board?! I didn't know that was an animation.
"Don't feel too bad, cutting boards are inexpensive and you'll have a scene where you aren't covered in a weird skin condition eventually!"
Ashton wanted to play soccer with Gloria so much, I think my game was glitching and the sims weren't thinking right. Anyway, he hit himself in the head by accident!
It may be the middle of fall, but the water's so nice... apparently.
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