pixeldistractions
this is why I've got nothing
Laura. 40-something. Wife, mom, author, creative distraction, tired old forest witch. TS4, mostly. Hugs and kisses, drama, swoon. Sims behaving badly. Gameplay notes. // Sometimes Final Fantasy, No Man’s Sky, Minecraft, Cities Skylines. // Saucy sim dramas and gameplay shenanigans at: Postcards From Sierra Nova (TS4), Lakeside Heights (TS2) // @lauraraeamos is my main // Do you like love stories? Do you like complicated relationship dramas? Go here → lauraraeamos.com
4275 posts
Don't wanna be here? Send us removal request.
Last Seen Blogs
edwardscissorfeet
xuan 萱
tameyazu
題名未設定
duelamort
lafferson connoisseur
la-craftsvilla
La crafts villa
calissarowan
Calissa Rowan
Text
Maya said, “It’s not like you’d summit this year and be done. Did you think you could feel that kind of rush and never want to do it again? Believe me, once you get there, you won’t want to stop, you’ll see. This is your life now. Even if it’s not what you do for a living, you’ll dream in summit fever. Just wait.”
Jack was all in with the hype, but Jordan began to wonder if the dream of a summit would be all he ever got.
This hobby was expensive. He wanted to be sold on the whole package, he wanted to drink the Kool-Aid and buy all the hype, but the fine print gave him sticker shock. First there were the classes. Two years of training, probably, if he didn’t want to die on the mountain. He would certainly not make the cutoff for this January’s summit, which meant another spring and fall session next year. The gear wore out, and he’d need to repair and replace it often.
Then, when he finally was ready, there would be airfare, lodging, and supplies.
And besides the climbing, he still had important repairs to complete on the camper. There was still child support to send to Colette exactly when and how she wanted it. He needed to find work, finally, having burnt through most of his savings.
How did anyone afford this lifestyle?
Well, if you looked at the people around him: Tyler Jackson was the son of Aura Jackson, a millionaire business mogul and sitting Secretary of the Treasury. His mother bankrolled this entire park. He was literally a trust fund baby.
Yeah. That was how.
Darren was a corporate marketing consultant by day—whatever that was—and an avid prize-winning marathoner on the weekends.
Kristoff wouldn’t talk about his work, but it sounded a little shady and was probably lucrative or else he wouldn’t do it.
Then you had Jack. He was just a cop, but his wife was an accountant, and he was the son of Sophie Phoenix, culinary marvel. She wrote a cookbook, Jack said.
Jordan hated to admit that Colette was right, but you couldn’t live this kind of lifestyle on a hobo’s wage and still send home child support.
Even Ingrid’s minimalist free spirit #roadlife was made of three-thousand dollar cameras, sponsorship deals, and loans from her mommy’s pocket.
And he needed to talk to a lawyer still. Lawyers cost money.
He needed to maintain a residence somewhere, because that was what Colette wanted. Not just any residence, but at least two bedrooms and a bathroom in a respectable neighborhood. And he likely couldn’t do all of that on gig work in between climb training. First and last month’s rent was the same price as the Komorebi trip he wasn’t skilled enough to take.
He wasn’t twenty anymore and adults don’t get a gap year.
He just wanted to find his own stride, to live a life that he carved out for himself and not one that someone else picked for him. But where was that life? The only answer he knew was that he needed more work, bigger jobs, and more of them. Money wouldn’t solve all of his problems, but it would solve a lot of them.
So he picked up whatever work he could find in between the climbing. Task Rabbit, Doordash, delivering groceries and helping people pack and move boxes. It hardly made a dent in what he needed.
Jordan wasn’t of the mind to think any kind of work was beneath him, but he needed something more substantial than this. He could get by on little money, but not this little. Especially not after dropping $450 on climbing shoes! And even when the jobs paid more, it wasn’t always worth the trouble. If he wanted to be bossed around by insufferable women, he could go back to Colette.
So he worked and he climbed. He climbed and he worked.
The vacation was over. He did handy jobs in the mornings, and it was hard physical labor. He climbed in the evenings, which was more physical exertion. Finally, he dropped onto his bed at night and crashed hard.
He didn’t intend to sleep through the ping of Maria’s goodnight texts, but his body was done and so it slept on his behalf. He would see her in his dreams instead, and he hoped she would wait for him there.
— from “boxes and squares #4.2: then have some faith” (5/5)
0 notes
Text
Jordan called her back that evening after all the kids had been settled down.
“Thank you for that. He was so upset. He was trying to tell me something when she took his phone, and he’s been holding it in for three days.”
“I know,” Maria said. “I could see that on his face.” She inhaled sharply. “But Colette is gonna kill me. I wonder if she’s seen me at the hotel? I wonder if she remembers who I am?”
“Let me worry about Colette,” he said. “It was a good idea. We told her there was a tutor at the arts center, and he used their phone to call me.”
“Did she believe that?”
“For now. Well, now she wants the name of some poor arts center tutor who doesn’t exist, but that should hold for a while.”
“Okay, but I’m still gonna look over my shoulder everywhere I go.”
“She won’t lay a finger on you as long as I’m alive,” he said. “You are an angel on earth. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
“Those are some big words, mister.”
“Yeah,” he laughed, feeling shy now. But he wasn’t going to hide from that feeling. He needed her like he needed the wide world to roam in, like he needed new horizons, fresh air, open skies, like he needed his kids to believe in him, like he needed time to just stop and wait. He had to figure out a way to make it all work. “I mean it, though. I need you. Please don’t give up on me.”
“I’m not,” she said. “I won’t.”
— from “boxes and squares #4.2: then have some faith” (4/5)
Tonight’s update is little, but potent. But if you need more, the full chapter is now live on the blog! ;)
7 notes
·
View notes
Text
So Maria and Johanna became frequent patrons of the arts center. Maria worked on her new hobby, and Johanna expanded her social circles with all the new kids she met there. Spitfire as she may be, Johanna could also be very friendly. Each time Maria came to pick her up from the kiddie corner, she seemed to have made a new friend.
Today she was talking with a boy at the science table.
When he turned around, Maria gasped.
“His name is Milo,” Johanna announced, and Maria was grateful for that information because she hadn’t met the twins enough times to know which boy was which. It was shocking how much he looked like his dad. Looking at his face made her heart hurt.
He looked at Maria funny for a minute. “Oh, hey, aren’t you the kitchen lady from my dad’s work?” Then he added sadly, “I mean, his old work.”
The kitchen lady. Maria laughed. He wasn’t wrong. “Yeah, that’s me.”
“He doesn’t work there anymore,” Milo said, “but I guess you probably know that. You made me a grilled cheese once when I came to the hotel after school. It was really good.”
“You can’t go wrong with grilled cheese. You know, your dad is my best friend.”
“Oh, weird.” Milo made a mystified face. Not in a bad way, but like he’d never considered his dad having a best friend before.
Maria was totally unsure how much she should or shouldn’t meddle here. She should probably mind her own business, but she knew too much and she cared too much. Jordan told her about the confiscated phone and how he hadn’t been allowed to talk to his kids for three days. She knew Jordan was upset about it, and it looked like Milo was, too. Maria loved Jordan, and Milo came from Jordan, which meant that her love extended to him, even if they didn’t know each other very well yet. Her heart ached for them both.
“He can’t wait to talk to you again,” she said.
There was a small panic on the boy’s face. “Oh, I have to do all my homework before I’m allowed. But I can’t do it.”
“Why can’t you do it?”
“‘Cause fractions are really hard, and my mom can’t help because she’s always working. My dad is really good at fractions, because you need fractions for building stuff. But he can’t help me now because he’s gone.”
Oh, sweet boy. Maria wanted to hug him, but that would have been totally weird, so she didn’t. But she had an idea. “Wait, what if he can help you? Do you have your homework here?”
“Yeah, It’s in my backpack.”
“Hang on just a second.” Maria stepped around the corner to make a phone call.
It was 4pm, still too hot in the desert for climbing and late enough for work to be done. Chances were decent that Jordan would be free. She often called him at this time of day.
And he picked up.
“I have to show you something,” she said. She pointed her camera at the kiddie corner where Johanna and Milo were still chatting. “Look who JoJo found at the arts center. Do you think they remember each other from the hotel? It’s probably been a while since they were both there at the same time. But JoJo just walked up to him and they started chatting.”
“And they’re getting along?” Jordan asked.
“Like peanut butter and jelly.”
“That’s so funny. It’s great, really. One less thing to stress about, huh? I kind of wondered if they would get along. Is Felix there too?”
“It doesn’t seem like it. Just Milo,” Maria said. “So, I don’t know if I’m overstepping here. I probably am, and you can let me know if this is a terrible idea, but do you want to talk to him?”
Jordan only thought about it for a second before answering. “Yeah, I do.”
Maria brought the phone over to Milo, and seeing his father’s face on the screen, Milo lit up. His mother would be angry about this, but Maria didn’t feel like she’d done something wrong.
Milo got out his homework, and Maria propped the phone up on the table. Then she left them to it. She didn’t want to eavesdrop.
“But I want a turn talking to Jordan,” Johanna whined.
“You had a turn last night. Tonight it’s Milo’s turn. It’s really important. You can talk to me instead.”
“But I always talk to you.”
“Don’t you like talking to me?”
“Yeah, you’re still my favorite.”
Maria hugged her baby, feeling lucky for this one thing. Nobody would ever come between her and this little girl. “Thanks, baby.”
“But when we’re playing animals, Jordan is my favorite.”
Maria laughed. “Oh, okay. That’s fair.”
Over in the kitchen area, Jordan and Milo were having a happy little chat. They talked about school, video games, and how his brother was at a student council meeting after school. They talked a little bit about math, but that wasn’t the only thing they talked about. They didn’t talk about Colette. And Milo especially liked to hear that Jordan planned to visit Wisconsin in December.
He didn’t quite understand, though.
“You’re coming home? Mom got a new couch, it sucks. Or if you want, you can have my bed and I’ll sleep in the living room. The couch isn’t that bad.”
Oh, the heartbreak Jordan had to deliver. Milo didn’t understand that they wouldn’t all live under one roof like the seemingly happy family they pretended to be. It would never be like that again.
“No, I’m sorry, buddy. You’re gonna keep your bed. I can’t sleep in that house anymore. But maybe your mom will let you stay over in the camper with me on the weekend. Someday she will. But, for now, we’ll hang out a lot. We’ll see movies. We’ll go skateboarding. We’ll do whatever you want.”
Jordan felt like the biggest piece of shit in the world and there weren’t enough promises to make up for it. “Let’s talk about those fractions, huh?”
After about an hour, Milo brought Maria’s phone back. It was okay that they took an hour. Maria hoped that they had a good long chat and weren’t talking about fractions the whole time.
And Lord help her if—no, when—Colette ever found out about what she had orchestrated here. Maria was a dead woman walking.
“Thanks, um, Maria, right?”
Better than the kitchen lady. “Yeah, any time.”
“Well, I gotta go now. My mom’s picking me up in a minute.”
Pray for me, Maria thought.
— from “boxes and squares #4.2: then have some faith” (3/5)
footnotes from previous stories: Jordan is the neighborhood dad
6 notes
·
View notes
Text
Ha ha, why does she look totally smashed? 🤣😂🤣
I swear I don’t have that mod in my game. Yet. And I say yet because I feel Ingrid begging for an update soon, and she needs some harder stuff to play with in this game. So Maria better watch that wine, I guess.
And what kind of drunk is Maria?
The kind that plays her dusty old violin that she hasn’t touched in years (while her kid is asleep upstairs). What kind of drunk is Lou? The kind who listens to her sister’s sad violin concertos and thinks deeply about her life on a Friday night.
4 notes
·
View notes
Text
Lou was coming up on her thirtieth birthday much faster than she wanted to admit. While she had no qualms about getting older, she wasn’t a fan of the unwanted changes that came along with it. For example, was that a shooting pain in her lower back just from playing hopscotch? These days, she would also much rather hang out with her sister and niece after a long week of work than go bar crawling on a Friday night. Especially if her sister promised a bottle of wine to share.
Lou was proud of Maria for doing something new and creative for herself. Or, it may turn out, that something might benefit both of them if the wine ever turned out good.
“I dare you to drink it first,” Maria laughed.
“On three,” Lou said. “One, two, three, chug!”
“Huh, not bad. I like this for you,” Lou said. “It’s better than knitting, huh?”
“Don’t knock knitting,” Maria said. “It sounds very relaxing. But you like this better because you get to drink the wine with me. I don’t think you’d be as appreciative if I knitted you a scarf.”
“Truth. Just, like, just don’t go and develop a drinking problem on my behalf.”
“So, Jamie wants to move in together,” Lou said.
“Oh my gosh, did she say that?”
“No, she would never. But her sister is all talking about moving in with Ian, which just makes Jamie have this constant look, like… the perfect mix of expectation and disappointment at the same time.”
“Moving in together is a big deal,” Maria said.
“I know, right? But do you think if we moved in together she’d stop swooning for a baby?”
Maria’s eyes went wide. “No! She would do the exact opposite. Lou!”
“That’s why I’m not asking her to move in! I mean, I wouldn’t mind having her there full-time. We’re good in that way, but god, ever since this whole science baby breakthrough. It’s all she ever reads about, thinks about, talks about. Isn’t it wonderful? Isn’t it amazing? Everyone can have a real family together, even people like us… Like, what makes a ‘real’ family anyway? And besides, if I had her baby at my place, who would watch your baby all the time?”
“Thank you, by the way,” Maria said, “for agreeing to watch JoJo. She’s kind of sour over it, but I’ll bring her with me the next time. Twenty-four hours is gonna be rough, even if it’s also fun. I really think we need to focus on each other.”
“In bed…” Lou crooned, and they both laughed. “Can he afford all these trips?”
“He’s paying for this one, I’ll pay for the next. It’s even. It should be, right? Aren’t you a feminist?”
Lou gave her sister a disapproving stare. “I don’t know, equality and all that, but… that money is for you and JoJo. That’s why Joseph left it to you, so you’d be taken care of. Not to spend on your boyfriend.”
“I know,” Maria said. “But anyway, he’s never asked me for money. He’s not like that. He’s not materialistic at all.”
“Does he know you have it?”
“Uh, no, he probably doesn’t.” Maria took a long sip and settled into that new worry, while Lou’s thoughts drifted to her own concerns. She had planned to ask Jamie to sleep over tonight, but now the idea felt loaded. So she thought instead about organizing that girls’ night. Pajamas, board games, and campy movies was a lighter topic to think about. Maria could bring the wine. But trying to sync up everybody’s busy schedules was harder these days as they all settled into their nearly thirty-something careers and relationships.
“Lou,” Maria said delicately. “You said ‘her’ baby. Not yours together.”
Lou felt called out. “I did, didn’t I?” Lou nodded, then she let out an exhale so heavy it could blow the whole subject away. Too much reality for a Friday night, and the buzz from this wine was finally kicking in.
“This isn’t bad, by the way,” Lou said. “Kind of like cider, but not too sweet. It could definitely be stronger, though.”
“Then we’d definitely develop a drinking problem,” Maria said.
— from “boxes and squares #4.2: then have some faith” (2/5)
story notes: = the reason Lou and Jamie are on again, off again, over and over again?
Also, so Maria is a little bit loaded? That’s not meant to be a secret, exactly, but it hasn’t been mentioned for a while. She mentioned it all the way back here, talking about how she didn’t really need to work, but liked to work when Jordan was on the schedule. She receives a military death benefit from the government on Joseph’s behalf, but Joseph also had a bit of family money which he left to Maria and Johanna. It’s not a ridiculous amount, but it’s enough.
6 notes
·
View notes
Text
Random picture I took only because I love that fractured light coming through the trees outside the window. ❤️
3 notes
·
View notes
Text
The community arts center in Evergreen Harbor was a popular destination in the neighborhood, but Maria had never found the time to go. There was always some excuse to claim for why she was too busy. She worked four days a week, and she obviously had Johanna to care for all on her own. Nobody could claim that she wasn’t busy. But her sister suggested that she should experiment with some new hobbies and try to find something more than work and motherhood (and pining over her man) to do with herself.
So they went to the arts center one morning. There was a children’s program for Johanna, and Maria browsed through some of the adult offerings.
She really had high hopes for the wine-making class. Wine was delightful, and Maria had Italian heritage and culinary inclinations. Surely this should be a good fit!
But then she remembered that she was also squeamish. Somehow she never thought very deeply about how wine was made. But now, flat on her ass in a barrel of sloppy fruit, she didn’t think she’d ever see wine the same way again.
She finished making the bottle. It was terrible—her butt was in it, after all—but at least she could say that she tried something new.
She would keep wine-making on the back burner while she looked at some of the other classes.
Flower arranging? Now this was definitively not gross (unless she found a bug, then she’d be out!). But she was also not very good at it, and the arrangement turned out terrible. How hard could it be to stick a bunch of flowers in a vase and make it look pretty? Very hard, apparently.
Now she felt like a failure all around on top of having sticky “feet juice” all over her clothes.
This was why she felt it totally acceptable to take herself back home, sit by the phone, and pine over her damn man.
And that was exactly what she did.
But, you see, about that man—Jordan wasn’t having the best time out there, either. He told her all about his falls, scrapes, bruises, sunburn, and a possible fractured wrist. He was lonely, tired, sad, sore, and yet, he didn’t quit. He may have thought about it in some particularly down moments. He may have weighed up the pros and cons. Yet he was still out there, climbing and climbing, against all odds.
So when he called later, when he asked her how the wine-making class went, how could she tell him that she tried once and quit over a little goopy mess on her clothes? He wouldn’t judge her, and he might even find it endearing, her being such a delicate little princess. She did wish for him to find her endearing, but she didn’t want him to think of her as a quitter. Because she wasn’t one.
So she went again. She tried again. She put the sloppy fruit out of her mind, and this time, it didn’t bother her too much. It wasn’t so bad.
Then, when Jordan called her that night, she would get to tell him that she tried again.
The wine still tasted like shit, but that didn’t disappoint her. Somehow, it only felt like a challenge.
— from “boxes and squares #4.2: “then have some faith” (1/5)
story note: you are not experiencing deja vu! Sorry to make you read this scene again. I first wrote it as a little off-story piece. Not non-canon exactly, but just a little drabble. But then I decided that it belonged in the “official” story. So here we are again! With a little more depth this time. 🙃
and a little gameplay note: Maria is taking “nectar-making” in the culinary category for her second aspiration, besides her “big happy family.” <- since that one takes about a whole freaking lifetime to complete! And as for the negative moodlets, I’m happy to see they don’t happen every time. I guess we’ll just have to keep her stocked up with other happy moodlets to overpower the ick factor, lol!
7 notes
·
View notes
Text
Figure drawing guy in the background photobombing my shot, lol!
1 note
·
View note
Text
Chapter 4.2 is running away from me. In the best way possible. These characters are ALL just so magical together (okay, minus Colette, lol!), and their conversations sparkle. I can’t shut them up. I wouldn’t dare. But like, this chapter is gonna be 5000 words by the time I’m done with it! 😱
And you know, that’s just gonna have to be okay.
Chapter 4.2 is also testing my patience because all the lots I need keep crashing, and for no reason I can figure out. Like, it’ll load for some families but not others. Whyyyyyyyy?!?
#novelists gonna novel#storyteller problems#sim storyteller problems#on writing#this is why i've got nothing
4 notes
·
View notes
Text
Oopsie, I guess I had this one posted over on the blog, but it looks like it never made it over to Tumblr. It’s not a story, but a history/backstory timeline on Jordan and Colette and their 10-year “relationship” (= hot & cold co-parenting partnership with occasional benefits?).
There’s not much shockingly new information here—most of this has been mentioned or discussed in one place or another, but some of it may have been easily overlooked or lost in the mess. It’s something I wrote for my own purposes as I was drafting, but I thought maybe some of you might find it interesting to read? Or not? Carry on as you like, lol!
Can you even imagine a time when Colette was carefree and happy? They were such babies. 💔
So it’s June 2078 when Jordan and Colette meet at a college party. He is 18, fresh out of high school, and invited by some friends (he didn’t go to college himself). She is 21 and about to start her third year of studying for a business degree where she intends to be super successful and rich. They begin dating (screwing) casually but often. The relationship is fun, but very superficial.
October 2078 — Colette gets knocked up with the twins. Jordan is instantly freaked out, especially a couple months into the pregnancy when they learn that it’s twins. Their short “relationship” ended right away. Colette was put off by his immaturity, and Jordan was put off by her pressure. Colette thought long and hard about abortion, but she couldn’t bring herself to do it.
Spring 2079 — With great effort, Colette completes her third year of classes while pregnant. She keeps in touch with Jordan, but their correspondence is only to discuss their impending parenthood. She’s already written him off as a deadbeat, but she keeps the line of communication open because she figures her kids should know their dad. Even if he’s useless.
June 2079, Felix and Milo are born. Jordan is not there to witness their birth—Colette didn’t invite him, but he also didn’t ask to be there. He meets the boys when they’re a couple weeks old. He only offers to take them when his dad is available to help because the idea of being left alone with two newborns scares the shit out of him!
When the boys are 4 weeks old, this story takes place.
Fall 2079 — Colette puts her degree on hold, being a single mother to twins. She has to focus on working to support them by herself, trying to find babysitters, having no family of her own nearby. Her family is alive, but unhelpful. Colette is the prideful type who won’t beg for help from them, and so she would rather do it on her own. She doesn’t have much help from Jordan, but she has his dad. Jordan is 19 and still waffling between jobs. Jordan’s dad sends money when he can.
Spring 2080 — Colette (23) is nagging Jordan to get a better job, then his father also starts to imply he should get some steady work. Jordan (20) feels burdened by the pressure of it all and that one stupid mistake when he was barely an adult should ruin his whole life, so he flakes out to go traveling.
Colette keeps in touch with his dad while he’s gone, who still sends money to her when he can and enjoys taking the boys when he’s not working. Mick doesn’t think she’s a nice girl, but he’s sympathetic to her situation, having raised Jordan as a single dad. And he feels responsible for the trouble his son caused her.
If there’s any truly new information I realized while writing this timeline, it would be how close Colette was with Jordan’s dad, and how much he contributed when she had nobody else to rely on.
Summer 2080 — Jordan discovers credit cards, which they hand out too easily to young adults. He goes backpacking in Europe. The gear and hostels and restaurants and plane tickets are very expensive, but the adventure is too tempting to say no. Especially when huge responsibility looms at home. He works odd jobs to keep up with the minimum payments most of the time, but the debt is racking up.
2080-2081 — he comes home occasionally, and he attempts to see the boys when he does, but Colette is pissed that he’s off adventuring while she’s stuck looking after twins by herself and trying to build a career. She wants more committed involvement from him, but she can’t afford a lawyer to enforce child support or a custody schedule.
Winter 2082 — Jordan is home and traveling intermittently. While he’s backpacking in California, his dad dies. He hears about it from Colette. He’s 22, Colette is 25, the boys are 2.5. Jordan inherits what little equity his dad had in their home, but it isn’t much and it’s soon wasted in trying to keep up payments.
Summer 2082 — He can’t keep up with the mortgage payments on his own, and the house goes into foreclosure. He has really fucked up everything, and he feels lost and completely alone. The boys turn three. He doesn’t have a real bond with them—they knew their grandfather more than they know their dad. But in his desperation, he reaches out to Colette because those boys and Colette are the only family he has left in the world.
Fall, winter 2082 — As it turns out, Colette is working in real estate now. She sees an opportunity here. He wants to know his kids, and he needs help selling his dad’s house and doing something about his debts. Colette is clever and money-minded, but she also needs help. She wants consistent involvement from him so she can return to school to finish her business degree. He moves in with her platonically and becomes a stay-at-home dad, and Colette helps make his money problems go away.
This little drabble takes place.
Jordan falls into fatherhood quite nicely the second time around.
Also at some point in about 2083, he and Colette resume their sexual relationship. (Not gonna call it romantic, it was pretty purely just sexual—roommates and co-parents with benefits?) They’re both lonely, and neither of them have dated since they were first together (Colette because of being a single mom to twins, and Jordan because he’s terrified of getting someone pregnant again), and living together makes it easy to fall into again. They’re older and much more careful this time.
Summer 2084 — the boys turn five and start kindergarten, which frees up Jordan to find steady work. He starts working maintenance at Coolidge House County Inn.
2084-2085 — their relationship at this point is complicated, hot and cold, and likely codependent. She wouldn’t mind marriage as a financial benefit, but she wants to keep an open relationship (though when she’d find the time to date other men is another story). He doesn’t want that and doesn’t want to marry her, either. The sex is good, as far as he knows (he was a virgin before he met her). She can be bossy and cruel, which he tries to brush off (tries and sometimes fails). She reminds him constantly of how he ran off when the babies were little and how she fixed his whole messy life for him when he came back. He refuses to aspire to more, as she demands. He feels both indebted to her and also caged by these debts he will never repay and ideals he will never meet. But she was the only one who knew his dad, and they’re something of a family. He has become attached to his boys, finally, and the family they’ve made is not trivial. He enjoys not having to worry about things like bills and taxes. He doesn’t want to rock the boat.
Summer 2086 — Maria starts working at Coolidge House. It’s love at first sight for her, but he will remain oblivious for a while still.
2087 — Maria’s crush continues to grow into what she will call “an impossible and tragic love.” Jordan notices finally, thinking she is adorable, warm, and obviously beautiful, but far too precious to be a romantic option for him. She is a widow and single mother, and she needs someone more reliable than he has known himself to be. He adores her, but he doesn’t want to bring his chaos into her life. So they become friends, and the friendship is easy, nourishing, and fun. He loves going to work because she’s there. Bonus, Colette likes the extra money, although she still nags him to aspire to something more.
January 2088 — their first real story on the blog. Maria is 26, Jordan is 28, and Colette is 31.
July 2088 — my sweetheart stories begin.
September 2088 — boxes and squares stories begin.
5 notes
·
View notes
Text
Johanna thinks this is hilarious. “Silly mama, they’re just butterflies!”
#ts4#sims 4#simblr#sims being sims#maria#johanna#sims are cute#squeamish sims being squeamish#sims 4 gameplay#ts4 gameplay
6 notes
·
View notes
Text
Wow, this is magical!
how lovely, the silence of growing things
771 notes
·
View notes
Text
Just a little morning dance party before preschool, as they do.
One year ago:
Also, so glad I finally gave their living room some attention, because yikes! This is the kind of townie-class living room you get before you’re a main character in a story. You don’t get a rug and deco pillows, lol!
4 notes
·
View notes
Text
Story notes on “boxes and squares #4.1: first fall apart”
I have a little confession to make.
I have slower skilling mods in my game. And rock climbing, in TS4, is a notoriously slow skill to master already. So I’ve known for months before writing this chapter that Jordan wouldn’t be ready to attempt this winter’s summit in two weeks, or even two or three months. No amount of skill boosts and stacking moodlets could get him to level six that fast (unless you’re Jack).
But I let him go anyway, because character development.
Am I a cruel sim-god? What if all the shit we go through as humans is because our god is pushing us around as sims, amused by our character development?
Well, anyway.
This is not the first or the last time I will let this man make a mess of his own life when he insists on it. I couldn’t write him genuinely and also make better choices on his behalf. Sorry, not trying to be cruel, but he sure does make it easy! 😂🤣😂
I love him, obviously, or he wouldn’t be the main character of my story.
Wisdom from Kurt Vonnegut, master storyteller:
“We have to continually be jumping off cliffs and developing our wings on the way down.”
Jump first, figure it out later.
Also this one fits:
“Be a sadist. No matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them in order that the reader may see what they are made of.”
Except Jordan does an excellent job making awful things happen to his own life. I, as his writer, don’t have to do a damn thing, lol!
6 notes
·
View notes
Text
Since there was nothing to do about any of it, Jordan finished his stewing in the dust and went back to work on the bunks, fighting for time as the daylight slipped away from him. By nightfall, he had them assembled.
He stopped at Walmart to pick up some affordable sheets, a couple of toys, a break-resistant travel mirror, and some string lights that wouldn’t work until he fixed the electricity. He did plan to have electricity in here, by the way. Eventually. It was on his list of things to do. But first, he needed to replace the faulty electric panel and install a solar battery system. And well, that took money. Quite a lot of it.
He’d get there in his own time. But life didn’t seem to be interested in waiting for him to get there in his own time.
He was glad to see this day over. So he took his tired body and trampled soul to bed.
The camper was too big for him alone. There were bunks for children here, but no children to sleep in them. There was a double bed big enough to be filled with love, but his lover was two thousand miles away. And he had it all to himself.
This is what you asked for, you stupid fool.
“And you’re only just getting started,” Maya said.
“It could take years,” she said.
Years.
He’d only been gone for weeks and already his whole life was in shambles. What would be left of it next year?
— from “boxes and squares #4.1: first fall apart” (5/5)
Next ->
#ts4#sims 4#simblr#sims story#jordan#chapter complete!#stay tuned for story notes and extras#sim stories
5 notes
·
View notes
Text
Why Colette hates Milo’s long hair?...
I swear I didn’t do this on purpose, but then when I noticed it was the same hair, I had to write it in.
2 notes
·
View notes
Text
When Colette made it down to the kitchen, she was pleased to see homework books open and being worked on. One less thing to stress about. Dinner though. She called in an order for takeout. Colette didn’t cook. Actually, that was another thing Jordan left them to deal with on their own. As it turned out, he cooked more than she did. And even when he didn’t cook, he often brought leftovers home from the hotel kitchen or brought the boys in after school for dinner.
So much for that. But Colette wasn’t broke, and they would eat somehow.
“We can go on the train,” Milo suggested after she’d hung up the phone. “We can ride it by ourselves. You don’t even have to take us.”
“No,” Colette said. “You can’t, actually. Not until you’re ten. And I’m not sending you to live in a camper. But since you all love to go behind my back, why don’t you tell your dad to get a real place to live? He doesn’t even have electricity—did he tell you that? Could you live without all your video games for even a weekend? Just finish some of that homework. I do not want another email from your teacher. C’s are not acceptable. And I hate your hair like that, it’s too long.”
“God, Mom, chill,” Felix said. “Maybe if you weren’t so crazy all the time, Dad wouldn’t’ve left.”
She felt that one like a dagger in her gut.
Milo didn’t chime in, but he didn’t defend her honor, either.
Those boys would never know how close they’d come to seeing their beloved game console spiked through the center with the sharp heel of her pump, shattered into pieces, then scooped up in a dustpan and thrown into the bay.
But she didn’t do that, because she was a grown-up. She was the one who held everything together and cleaned up everyone else’s messes.
To hell with both of them. To hell with everything and everyone.
She closed her eyes, balled her fists so tight that her fingernails made crescent-shaped indents in her palms. “I’m having a bath,” she said. “That homework will be finished by the time I’m done or God help me, I will throw your games into fucking bay! And if you don’t think I can throw that far from here, I dare you to try me.”
There was tension in her shoulders that she needed someone to pound out. She could also use a good pounding, but she couldn’t begin to imagine how to make that happen now. Jordan had been good at giving both, once upon a time. Shame he had to fail her in absolutely every other possible way.
She had her yearly checkup that morning.
Your blood pressure is high. Are you getting any exercise? Eating fresh fruits and veggies? Making time for self-care?
Please. Her children’s father fucked off to the wilderness on a journey of enlightenment or some bullshit and excuse me, fucking self-care? Can you just get the exam over with and get me out of this paper gown?
Colette didn’t have any date to go on. She did match with a trauma surgeon on her dating app, and he did sound very successful. She had been hopeful that he could administer a good pounding, or at the very least, maybe he could help with her high blood pressure. But she didn’t have a babysitter for the boys, because their father was a flake.
The boys were asleep and their homework books were stacked by the time her bath was finished. She wasn’t going to check the homework. She knew there was no possible way Milo could complete his fifteen missing assignments in one night.
They had eaten the takeout she ordered, and she didn’t order anything for herself. She would eat rice crackers from a paper bowl.
Self-care? She cleaned a whole man out of her house, and maybe that was her self-care.
What few things he left here she threw in the trash—a toothbrush, a small pile of dirty work clothes, a pair of muddy boots. As it turned out, she never let him keep much here in the first place.
But the couch smelled like him, like orange soap and wood chips and campfire smoke. So she trashed that, too. And she bought another one. She spent a whole paycheck on it, and she framed the whole room around it. This wasn’t the kind of couch anyone would ever sleep on. The leather was cold and hard, the angles sharp, the color was an eye-searing fuchsia, and the design was exquisite. It was like a piece of art.
She bought a flamboyant vase for a very fake plant. She bought a thin bookcase for books she wouldn’t read. The room felt beautiful and hollow.
— from “boxes and squares #4.1: first fall apart” (4/5)
Next ->
7 notes
·
View notes