Teenage riot, Summer 2025

Round 27: Summer 2025

Principal Betsy Carmody is 54, Kendal Draper is 49, Joanna Draper is 30.
Students: Rebecca Kirby and Tessa Novak are both 16, Susannah Carmody, Dominic Lachance, Nathan Collins and Malcolm Novak are all 15, Julia Gray and Hope Collins are both 14, Audrey Lachance and Jack and Charlie Benton are all 13 and Sophie Gottlieb, Camilla and Lila Sitko and Connor Novak are all 12.

Narrated by Charlie Benton

Watching Malcolm and his ex-girlfriend Susannah together has given me a pretty good idea of how not to treat a girl.


Pretty much the whole school knows he got dumped and why yet his plan to win her back seems to involve constantly flirting with her when she's not giving any sign that she's interested.

I almost feel bad for the guy but I guess he brought it on himself.

I don't know what Malcolm's going to do when Susannah starts dating someone else. It's gotta happen eventually.

I'm not really the world's biggest fan of school but at least I get to see Audrey there.

I've had a crush on her for about a year now. I almost asked her out a few months ago but I chickened out at the last minute. I guess she knows I like her though, seeing I kissed her.

The only other person who knows I like Audrey is Jack. I told him I was thinking of asking her out, because she was his friend first and I wanted to make sure he didn't feel weird about it.

Jack went sort of quiet at first but he said he was cool with it. I double-checked like a million times to make sure he wasn't just saying that, but he kept insisting it was fine.

Knowing Jack was okay with it didn't make asking her any easier though. I think Audrey was waiting for me to say something for like ten minutes.

But I did finally ask her out. I figured we were far enough away from everyone else that if I got rejected, no one would know.

She kind of looked a little...scared? Worried? It wasn't really the reaction I was hoping for.

It took me a while to convince her that Jack would be okay with it. I had to tell her that I flat out asked him and he said he was fine with me asking her out.

She seemed to believe me after that but she still didn't say yes. Audrey's not sure if she's allowed to go out on dates yet, so she still has to ask her parents.

Even so, she didn't say "no", so I'm counting it as a victory!

I was in such a good mood that I didn't even mind going to my least favourite class first up - shop. Well...I minded a little.

Music is my favourite class but Grade 9-12 were in the music room instead.

I've got to be better than whoever was playing keyboards! I bet it was Julia. She was in our class last year and she was always terrible! But me, I do way better in music than any class where I have to make or write anything.

Audrey is like a genius in shop. She doesn't even need to listen to the instructions, she just goes ahead and gets started.

No one else seems to know what they're doing. Connor always looks downright terrified of most of the tools and materials we have to work with.

And even though she was pretty proud of herself, the robot Camilla made was throwing sparks, which I don't think is supposed to happen.

Jack was on the other side of the room and seemed like he was in a really foul mood. He was hitting that hammer on the brick like he wanted to hurt the brick.

I was worried maybe he'd changed his mind about me and Audrey but again, he insisted he was fine.

I hope he's telling the truth. I wouldn't have asked Audrey out if Jack had asked me not to.

I still keep worrying he's mad at me though. He didn't sit with Audrey and me at lunch, which is unusual for him.

In the end, the seats opposite us were occupied by Malcolm and Audrey's brother Dominic. Malcolm spent the whole lunch time trying to eavesdrop on what Susannah was talking about with her friends, hoping to hear his name mentioned.

Dominic kept trying to tell him she was clearly not talking about him but he wouldn't be deterred.

He even went over to bother her some more once he was finished eating.

I think she's trying to ignore him and he's not happy about it.

If Jack is upset about me and Audrey, he didn't seem to be showing it at lunch time. Sophie Gottlieb cornered him near the vending machines and they were talking for a while.

Or flirting maybe? I couldn't tell from where I was sitting.

And then later on, I saw him kissing Julia! I had no clue he even liked her! I really don't know what Jack is thinking right now.

Notes:

• The title (which will be the title of all future high school updates) was inspired by the Sonic Youth song Teen Age Riot, but I ended up spelling it like the Ataris song.
• Reading Maisie's most recent high school update, which was excellent, made me realise I was missing an opportunity with own school updates, so I thought I'd try something new and have one of the students narrate. It meant I had to focus on a smaller group of students but the others were sort of just going along their merry way anyway - nothing crazy was happening with them.
• Audrey is still the only one who knows she's been kissed by both Charlie and Jack. Jack seems so quiet at home (and at school, really) right now, so he likely wouldn't have told anyone, even Charlie. I'm not sure what Jack's thinking; the flirting with Sophie and the kiss with Julia were both autonomous and because Sims are silly, he's now "in love" with both of them. I'll have to try and make sense of him when the Benton update rolls around!
• Malcolm is still rolling up romantic wants for Susannah, while she has moved on. Not a single flirt or kiss want from her, though that was starting before they broke up.