Come to this

Round 28: Autumn 2028

last update/Audrey's next update/next update

Arianna Weaver is 73, Liam is 65, Jonas Lachance is 50, Tatiana is 45, Audrey is 16, Edward is 13 and Brendan is 5.
(Jacob is 27, Dominic is 18, Jack and Charlie are both 16 and Sophie is 15)

Narrated by Audrey Lachance

When I broke up with Charlie last year, I did so knowing it might make things awkward between us. I just really thought it was for the best though, so I thought about it for a long time and then finally just did it.

It hasn't been quite as bad as I was expecting though. There is still some weirdness sometimes but we still hang out and we still talk. We're still friends.

Things have actually been a bit weirder with Jack since Charlie and I broke up, which I wasn't expecting.

Like with Charlie, we're still friends but it's like he's not sure how to act around me sometimes.

I think maybe it's because he has a girlfriend now, Sophie. A girlfriend he actually seems to like, I mean. He's not the same with her as he was with Julia.

Jack and Sophie actually act like a couple, for one thing.



It's a bit strange seeing Jack so into someone else but I had been hoping he'd find somebody. Not just so he'd get over me, but for his own happiness. He's my friend and I like that he's happy.

I'm a little bit over dating for the mean time, although there have been a couple of guys who've shown some interest.

I try to be nice about it when I say no but they usually get offended anyway. It seems like it's the kinder thing to do to say no right away when you're not interested but some of the boys don't see it that way.

Brendan just started kindergarten this year and he's already popular with the girls! He gets phone calls from Caitlin and he has his friend Annabel over a lot after school.

I think my little brother might end up being a little charmer!

When Brendan's not hanging out with one of his little friends, he's talking about them.

Grandma likes to tease him and call them his "girlfriends", which she thinks is hilarious.

Brendan doesn't think it's very funny. He's never going to have a girlfriend (so he says now, at 5!)

Caitlin and Annabel are just his friends that are girls, not his girlfriends.

But that's just Grandma. She's not a nag, she just likes to tease.

She does the same thing to Jacob, and he's 27. Everyone is waiting for him and Claudia to get engaged and Grandma loves bringing it up at every opportunity. Jacob is used to her by now though, so he mostly just laughs.

Edward isn't really dating yet. His grades were slipping down and fast, so he decided to focus a little more on that.

Mum and Dad are thrilled. He's finding high school really difficult but he's working hard to improve.

I tried to teach him how to play chess, because Dad always says chess is good for your brain. I don't think Edward really bought it but he humoured me anyway.

It was probably more due to the studying than the chess, but Edward's grades are improving.

Dad was very pleased for him but I think he was a little stunned at Edward's victory dance!

I wish I could say Dominic was doing so well but he's going through a pretty tough time right now, since his girlfriend Tessa died.

He came over for dinner the other night and he barely touched his food. Dominic usually has a pretty big appetite, so that's unusual for him, though understandable.

Dominic had a pretty long talk with Dad after dinner. We're all worried about him, you know.

None of us have ever been through anything like what happened with Tessa but we all just want to make sure he knows we're there for him.

I think Mum is the most worried, but she always seems to be worried about something. She even wanted Dominic to come home for a while, so she could look after him. He turned that offer down but Mum says it's still open.

I think it's good that Dominic's talking, and not bottling anything up. I've never seen Dominic cry before. It's hard to watch him and not really be able to do anything to help.

Extras:
I don't know if I've ever mentioned it here but I know we've discussed once at Laura's blog. When my Sims come home from school sometimes, their hair looks weirdly transparent. You can kind of see it on the left side of Edward's head here (our left, not his). It looks kind of like he has white tips, because of the door behind him. I found a really easy fix for it though and am very excited!

I tried it twice and it worked both times and only takes a second. I just chose the "Snap Reset" option on Decorgal's modeling box and Edward's hair was back as it should be, as you can see here. I would think that the Snap Reset/Stop All Poses/Force End options on any of the pose boxes would work the same way but I only tried it on the modeling box. I hope this ends up being helpful to some of you down the track!

LOL, I love this so much that it is now my avatar just about everywhere. Audrey and Edward were very unimpressed when Tatiana grabbed Jonas's butt one morning before school.

Notes:

• Title is from Come To This by The Sleepy Jackson.
• Charlie and Audrey do not seem particularly interested in each other at all. Jack's only rolling romantic wants for Sophie but plenty of platonic ones for Audrey as well. Audrey isn't rolling romantic wants for anybody, so I guess she wants to take a break from dating for a while. I'm quite happy to let her!
• Audrey will start college in 2030. She earned an A during high school, as well as four scholarships. I'm assuming Jack and Charlie will head off to uni with her but I haven't played them yet so I'm not sure.
• Brendan is a little social butterfly, despite his shyness. Reminds me of somebody else, when they were little!
• Poor Dominic. :( I think this update was harder to write than the last two, in some ways, because I had to balance the rest of the family (who are really doing quite well), with Dominic (who really isn't). It gave me a bit of a break from the tragedy though, which was nice. I'll need to get back to it soon.