Generation 5: Chapter one

'Hi' to anyone that is reading this... Here's a little author's note to resolve some confusion that probably everyone has regarding the blog layout and the banner, and the title of this post even.

Okay, so, many months ago I had stopped writing, and I didn't think I would return, like, ever. Anyways, at the beginning of this year I got my computer upgraded, and it was reformatted...and of course, I didn't create a full backup of my Sims.

Saved files is one thing that I lost, as well as some sims that I didn't save in CAH. So, I can't exactly continue where I left off in generation 4.

I decided go ahead with generation 5 - now, I know that leaves a ton of loose ends (I hate those), I am going to try my best to resolve those. In this post there is a subtle explanation, but I will work on a lot more and a better one, once I have more time.

My writing has also changed, TBH (because I have changed a bit in the mean time)...As you will see, the amount of writing has increased drastically.

I do hope you'll have the patience to stick through it though. And one more thing about the sims' appearance...

Being able to play with sims that had crazy colored hair was something that sparked a re-interest of the game and in writing. As I'm gonna be keeping that aspect, expect to see some interesting colors. The photos of this particular post have also been edited, but that's a one time thing though. That's all I have to say for now.

Onward to the chapter~

The stable's walls were adorned with various types of murals, from contemporary style to back in the fifties even. It was my job to clean it all up, since, I had to admit, I was the one that made them. It was an act of boredom, quite frankly, an act I only did when I wasn't attending to my horse named Grace, who was currently nuzzling at my neck, looking for a treat.

"Not now, Grace," I flashed her a quick smile before focusing on the work in front of me. The amount of bubbles the sponge created would be better suited in a nice hot bath than on that ugly wall. Time to get a cheaper type of soap.

Focus, Krissy, the more time you waste here, the less time you get to spend at home, relaxing, cuddled up on the sofa with a nice book, or in front of the TV...ah dammit, I did it again. 

It truly was a bad habit of mine, to spend time reminiscing rather than doing actual work. But it was so much more fun to procrastinate...

If I were to write an autobiography, it would probably be filled with blank pages. There were so many things that I could write, but it made me sad to even think about it.

Krissy Duff. That was the name I went by in the quaint town of Appaloosa Plains. Only two people in the whole town knew that it stood for "Kristine", and that my real surname isn't Duff. My parents, whose surname was Wilson, was caught in a house fire that I was directly responsible for, having been playing with candles, something that I was regularly scolded for doing.  I was five years old at the time, and couldn't comprehend exactly what I had done. I had killed them. People all around me kept saying it was an accident, that I didn't mean for it to happen...

No matter what they said to comfort me, it still didn't bring my parents back from the dead, did it?

In any case, an old couple, Phillip and June Ferrell, took me in as their own. The rest of my family had seemingly disappeared from the face of the earth when I was little. My grandparents, Daniel and Vala Jackson, were still alive, but no one knew how or where to reach them.

Behind me, Grace whinnied unhappily, grasping at strands of my hair with her teeth. "Hey-ey!"  gently tugging my hair free, I turned to face the beautiful black mare that stood beside me, anxious for attention. "Shucks, I wouldn't never forget about you, don't worry," I whispered at her ear, carefully stroking her neck and combing away some of the hair to reveal her pretty face. Yet, she wasn't satisfied with the meager attention I was giving her, whipping her head back and forth, seemingly scared.

"What could such a big animal be afraid of?" I shook my head, starting to braid her hair.

And back to reminiscing about the past.

I still couldn't comprehend how my own family could just disappear. Memories of a conversation I once overheard still lingered in my mind. "It's time for us to move on, Nicolette," my grandfather had whispered to my mom as he embraced her, his eyes filled with what looked like tears. "Sarah's father isn't going to be a bother anymore, he died in jail, where we put him...finally there'll be some peace."

Grace was starting to make me feel uneasy as she clopped her hoof on the ground. "Fine, fine!" I sighed heavily. "Why are you making such a fuss today?"

"Oh, I dunno, maybe because there's something lurking about with purple hair, waiting for the opportune moment to pounce on someone she calls a friend?" an all-to-familiar voice spoke behind me, and I could swear she was grinning from ear to ear.

"Dear lord! What is THAT!" I gasped in mock-horror.

"They call it a fake tan," she sighed begrudgingly, blowing at her fingertips that had most likely just been manicured. All throughout high school, my best friend Cara Bradford had been teased that she as white as a sheet, even though the sun was not shy at shining here. Because of that, people thought she was a loner that was holed up in her house all day. It was quite the opposite actually. She loved going out and having fun, she was just incapable of tanning. "My dad finally gave me his credit card..."

Having a rich family made life so much easier.

Cara had lived in Appaloosa Plains most of her life, but in senior year, her family moved away to a big city, where bigger opportunities awaited her father, who was an entrepreneur or something like that. All I knew was that the amount of numbers that his salary consisted of was enough to leave me dumbstruck for at least a week.

"I thought you and your country folk were supposed to be experts and making people feel welcome," Cara muttered, raising an eyebrow suspiciously. After just a year in the city, she had already lost her accent, though I swore I could hear a faint trace of it mixed up in some of the words. "Is this how you greet a friend that you saw like, a whole year ago?"

Chuckling, I grabbed her arm and pulled her closer for a bear hug. "You have no idea how much I missed you, you crazy chick!"

"Nah, I missed you more."

"I missed you the most."

"No you didn't."

"Yes I did."

"Are we really gonna play that game now?"

"Maybe," we burst out laughing, resulting in another tight hug. "Gosh, it feels like it's been ten years since I last saw you, instead of just one." 

She nodded in agreement. "Sure has. Come, let's find a spot in town that doesn't smell like horse dung...and that has loads of caffeine, maybe. Still a bit jet lagged, but at least we can catch up." As she pulled away, Cara jerked her chin in the direction of where my horse stood. "That girl with dark hair is giving you the evil eye...," she spoke in hushed tones.

I sneaked a look and shrugged. "Teenagers these days, huh? No manners at all."  To think, when we were teens, we had acted the same way, judgmental of everything and everyone around us. We looked at the tacky shoes some people wore, to the rainbow-colored shirts that some boasted with, and not-too-secretly we had laughed about it. 

With no car of my own to drive around town, and with a lack of taxi's available, we had to make due with walking from place to place. A fact that Cara didn't appreciate. Apparently she had blisters on her feet, something she got from wearing high heels and not being used it.

"You can only blame yourself," I winked, ushering her to a nearby coffee house.

"One does not simply show up in a upper-class club with sneakers," she scolded, pointing to my own pair of dirtied sneakers, hardly a spec of its true color visible.

The coffee house was filled with a mixture of aromas that tickled my taste-buds. An assortment of pastries were stacked at the corner of the room, just waiting to be eaten. The assistant waved shyly and pointed at the dishes in front of us. "Can I get you girls anything?"

"Two cup of Joe's would be nice," Cara answered before I could, giving me a shrewd look, as if knowing that I was dying to try out those appetizers. "Decaf for her, regular for me." Seeing that I was about to protest, she turned to me again with a stern gaze. "You're already hyper at the moment...let's not make that any worse."

As we sat waiting for the coffee, Cara whipped a laptop out of her over sized handbag, taking advantage of the free Wi-Fi being offered.

"Look here," she snapped her fingers. "This is the university campus that I'll be going to this year."

She turned the screen slightly, leaving me amazed. On the laptop was a map of the campus, and when you hovered over one of the buildings with the mouse, it showed a picture of the landscape. There were huge buildings, some that looked quite old, which could have been churches, and then loads of modern buildings and dormitories. "Wow, it looks great. Any party clubs nearby?" I chuckled.

Cara pouted. "I'm not going there to party...but yes, there is one or two."

"Which could easily mean more than five."

"Whatever...have you decided where you'll be going? Think you could join me?" she asked hopefully.

That was a question that I dreaded. As much as I would have loved to pack up and go along on a new adventure with my best friend, it just wasn't possible for me in my situation. The only income the Ferrell's had was mister Ferrell's pension which was slowly starting to dry up. It just wasn't in their budget to send me to university. "I would love to, but...you know I can't."

"Nonsense. We could talk to my dad, ask him for some help-"

"No no no, that's out of the question, I don't want your dad to think I'm sponging off of you."

"Well...," she paused a moment, looking for an answer. "What about a study loan? A scholarship? You have options, Krissy. You can become successful in whatever career you choose...why do you want to settle as some pretty country girl with nothing to do, other than ride her horse into the sunset?"

Instead of answering, I stared intently at the coffee machine, watching the black liquid circulating. What she had said hurt, deeply, but it was a question that I had been asking myself for a very long time. I could lie and say that I have to take care of my adoptive parents. I could say that it's too much fuss, it being a lot easier to get a simple job and make a simple living here. To be honest, I didn't want that. I wanted to live the best life that I could, and I wasn't going to get it here.

"I'm afraid," I ended up answering. Fear was my biggest enemy. I feared failure the most of all. All that effort for nothing. If I avoided doing it, I would never have to be afraid.

"Aw, sweetie," she put her arm around me, hugging me gently. "We all are. The world is a big, dangerous place, but sometime or another, we have to face that fear."

After a good amount of catching up, laughing about just how silly we were in high school and a lot of other nonsense, Cara kept pestering saying "hi" to the Ferrell's. When we were juniors, Cara had the habit of coming over to our house every single day to hang out. She had slowly incorporated herself into our family and became good friends with my adoptive parents.

As we made our way to my house, my best friend tied her hair back with a rubber band and whipped out her mp3 player, most likely to inform me of a new song she had heard of.

I was so very wrong.

She had just wanted to irritate the crap out of me.

"So light 'em up, up, up, light 'em up, up, up, light 'em up, up, up, I'm on fiiiiiire..." Placing extra emphasis on the last word, Cara attempted a record breaking note, which was one of the worst mistakes in her life. She almost sounded like a duckling screaming for its mother. Not a pleasant sound at all.

If genies existed, and if I were to run into one and be granted three wishes, one of them would be to forget this very moment and grant my ears some peace of that horrid noise.

"Cara.... I love you and I love Fall Out Boys' music...but...just...no. Don't do that again. Ever."

"You're just mad because you can't even sing, like, at all."

"Keep telling yourself that."

"Krissy?"

"Yeah?"

"My songs know what you did in the dark," she whispered another line from the song in a low voice, sounding extremely creepy in the process. I was going to have nightmares.

"Good afternoon, misses Ferrell," Cara greeted loudly as soon as we stepped through the door, slinging a arm around my neck, casual-style. She finally took a hint and ditched the mp3 player as well as the rubber band that held her hair in a ponytail. With no response, I noticed Cara nearly retreating out of embarrassment.

To her relief, I heard June Ferrell call out to us. "Hello, Krissy and..." The crease between her eyes deepened as she tried to remember the face in front of her. "I'll be damned. Cara Bradford. One year later, and you look completely different."

"It's the hair, right?" she mused, tugging at a strand of purple hair. "Yeah, my mom said that it might freak people out a little bit."

"I must say that it suits you. How is your mother, if I might ask?"

"Good, good, she just got out of..." They were in full conversation mode, one which didn't interest me too much, so I excused myself quietly and looked for June's spouse.

Peeking around the corner like a twelve year old poking her nose into other people's business, I spotted mister Phillip Ferrell seated on the couch, a sight that was familiar, as that was where he mostly hung out in the day, watching the sports channel or some other kind of documentary.

We all knew that when he was on his couch, it was best that he not be disturbed. Or if someone wanted to know what it would look like if all hell broke loose, they could go ahead and experience his wrath. For an old man, he still had some spunk.

"Krissy?" I heard Cara call out. "Are we gonna continue that conversation that we had earlier or are you just gonna try forgetting about it?" 

I sighed with a heavy heart, wishing that for once, Cara would throw me a bone and just leave it at that. "You're not gonna let me forget, are you?"

"Nope."

Though it was a well known fact that the Ferrell's didn't have a lot of money, the cottage they resided in was pretty big, with four bedrooms. The house had been one of June Ferrell's biggest investments when she was younger, running a small B&B before she married Phillip. When they adopted me, they put an end to their little enterprise and changed the rooms into suitable accommodations for a child.

Now, thirteen years later, two of those four rooms belonged to me. One served as my bedroom while the other worked as my personal study. No matter how much I had protested, they wanted the best for me, or at least the best they could offer. "We have no need for anymore space," Phillip Ferrell had assured me. "You definitely do...where else would you do your homework?"

Cara would never understand why I wouldn't want to leave these two old people, but I owed them so much, I couldn't just throw it back into their faces, pack my bags and leave.

My best friend skipped up the stairs, surveying the paint spots on the walls and instinctively running to the one where a trail of purple paint was splattered across an oak door.

"You're still obsessed with purple," she winked, pointing at the mess on my door.

"I was an idiot back then," I shrugged.

She was right, though. The entirety of my bedroom was purple, or at least a shade of it, which was in direct contrast with my hair. Who would ever be crazy enough to put turquoise and purple together? Yeah. I was.

"Love what you did with the place," she mused, absentmindedly stroking her hair, probably happy she chose to dye her hair that way. "You should see the new apartment I'm gonna live in after I-"

I nearly lost it then and there. "Cara, STOP." She had made herself comfortable on my bed in the meantime, and look quite chuffed with herself, knowing that she was getting everything that she wanted and just loved rubbing my nose into it. "Why the hell do you feel the need to keep reminding me that you're rich and that I have squat? You're a great friend, truly," I spat back, my words dripping with sarcasm.

"...didn't mean it like that."

"Well that's what it sounds like to me, okay."

The room was silent for too long afterwards. I couldn't just leave...although I strongly wished that I could. As Cara sat on my bed with closed eyes, I busied myself with trivial matters, rearranging my CD's and checking for any blemishes on my face. It certainly wasn't going to be me that was going to break the ice.

"Look...," she breathed. "I'm not trying to remind you that my dad is loaded. I'm just trying to make you realize that you have so much potential. That you CAN move on. So many people get stuck where they are because they feel comfortable...they feel safe. Sometimes you gotta step out of your comfort zone, you gotta do something dangerous...like that one vacation when we were fifteen, remember?"

I couldn't stop myself from smiling slightly. "Shark cage diving...oh God, that was hilarious."

"Uh huh. Last time we're making fun of sharks, right?"

"Yup."

On that particular vacation where I joined their family on a cruise ship, and later for some underwater diving, Cara and I had the nerve to take some bait and antagonize some of the wildlife creatures that were hungry. Of course, that included really big ones, including sharks. My hand was nearly bitten off, but we had fell on the deck of the boat, hysterical with laughter. That was one of the best moments of my life so far, where I actually had a lot of fun.

Fun.

I needed more of that in my life.

"So am I forgiven?" she cleared her throat.

"Um..." So many things were bothering me at that point, I couldn't give her a straight answer. "Do you mind if I go downstairs for a while? I need to talk to my, uh..." It was extremely hard for me to call them "my parents". Sure, they were like parents in every way, caring for me and all that, but I could faintly remember my real ones, and that made a big difference. "You just go ahead and take a nap while I go talk with the people downstairs, okay?"

She yawned before answering. "Normally I'd object, but as you can see, I'm gonna pass out any minute. Just remember to close the door...don't want people disturbing me."

"Sure, sure," I waved as I walked out, closing the door with my one foot and quietly sneaking down the staircase to find the rest of the household.

"Kristine? Sweetheart, is that you?" June's voice reached me from the living room. She was the only one that called me "Kristine". Phillip usually just referred to me as his "baby girl", doting on his daughter like any regular father would. Well, any father that loved his daughter, that is.

"Yeah, I'm here," I called back, leaning against the doorway, trying to make sense of all the troubled thoughts that I had. Should I tell them? Should I just forget about it? No, Cara wouldn't let that happen. What would they even think of the proposal...

"Sweetie...," my adoptive mother sighed, almost knowingly. "Come here," she beckoned, and my feet moved without questioning her order. "I know that face. You're carrying something really heavy on your heart... I'm here, if you want to talk, and Phillip will probably listen if he can tear himself away from the TV for a few seconds."

"I'm not that heartless...," he grumbled, jabbing at a few buttons and finally switched off the TV, which acted as his second wife in a way.

"See? Now, what's going on? Did you have a fight with Cara?"

"Kinda..."

"What was it about?" Phillip interjected.

I sighed, dreading to say the word. "University."

June's face flickered with surprise, then worry, and her gaze flitted to her spouse, the two of them sharing a knowing look. God, I hated when people did that. What, did I have to start learning how to read minds just to be included into a conversation?

Just great.

"We knew this day had to come sometime or another," June finally answered.

"Yeah..." Embarrassment was all I felt at this point. "I told her it's crazy, I don't have the money for it. I'd much rather just stay here, you know."

"Actually...we do," Phillip cleared his throat. "We've, uh, been asking at some banks about student loans...a lot of them were quite forthcoming."

I frowned. "What d'you mean?"

"If you ever want to go study, the option IS available. We love you too much to keep you locked up in here and stuck in this town, Kristine. Appaloosa is a place for peacefulness, which is perfect for us retired folk. But for you, a young girl full of spirit....it's a truly a crime if you don't go and explore the world by yourself.

"...Wow." Shocked would not have been an apt word to describe how I felt. "Flabbergasted" would probably be better suited. They were quite sneaky for old people, being able to keep it all a secret from my nosy personality, which usually uncovered a plot long before it was set to happen. I owed them so much already, and now they were stacking something else onto the heap.

"Can I go out for a while? Just for a walk. I need to clear my head."

June seemed to notice my confusion. "Of course. Should I tell Cara...?"

"No, don't worry, she won't even notice I'm gone."

Most people would frown upon the fact that they just allowed me to go out while it was pitch dark outside. The truth was that Appaloosa Plains was insanely safe. Nothing, I repeat, nothing ever happened that was bad. Gangsters would stand out like a sore thumb and other sorts of criminals would find that there isn't much of value around here. Most of people's belongings were worn out by now, as furniture was another thing passed down in some households.

Everyone knew who you were, who your parents, grandparents and maybe even great-grandparents were also. That's how tight-woven the community was.

So it wasn't too much of a crazy idea to be walking out into the dark by myself.

What I loved most of the Ferrell's home was that it was quite close to the local beach (probably the only beach in town). Being able to kick my shoes out and bury my toes into the sand was one of my favorite ways to make the time pass by.

Skulking behind some bushes that were conveniently located near the beach, I unbuttoned my blouse and slipped out of my pants, revealing the two piece I always wore beneath my clothes. My mood was unpredictable, so it helped to  wear it underneath so I could sneak away to the beach.

The action of tiptoeing implied secrecy - and yet, as I was sneakily tiptoeing towards the water, there was no secrecy. If anyone were to pass by, they would clearly be able to see me.

I hated being so exposed.

How much worse would it be at a university then? Where your school records were probably no secret, and curious students would love to unveil every secret you've ever tried to keep locked away.

That wasn't even the worse part. I still didn't have a clue what I wanted to study. I was quite versatile, which made things so much worse, made me so much more confused...

"What would my mother have said...," I wondered aloud. My true mother was a woman full of wisdom, something she got from my grandfather. Even when I was little, she spoke to me about adult things, theorizing about life and all its mysteries even though I couldn't wrap my head around it all yet.

"It's a good thing your father resigned from his job. Of course, we're losing a bit of income, but he was unhappy... Why do something that makes you miserable? I'm so glad he's going to do something that he's passionate about. I wish..." Most of the conversation I had already forgotten, but at least I remembered the most important part.

And it was that part that made me realized what future I would follow.