Viva la vida

Round 32: June 2035 (Winter)

last update/Noah's next update/next update

Adam Gottlieb is 80, Athena is 75, Amelia is 46, Wade is 45, Noah is 17, Emma is 15 and Michael is 4.
(Sophie is 22, Jessica and Louisa are both 15 and Lauren is 14)

Narrated by Emma Gottlieb

Noah just found out he got into Suffolk University, so that's the main topic of conversation around here right now. He'll be a freshman there next year.

Noah is going to major in chemistry and he's already decided to study more after the four years and do a Master's, or maybe even a PhD.

I hope Mum and Dad don't get any ideas in their head about me doing the same thing.

I like school and everything but I'm planning on leaving at some point. I can't imagine signing up for an extra 6 or even 8 years.

I guess that makes Noah a good match for Jessica though. They're both kind of nerdy that way.

We're only 15 but Jessica is already thinking of going on to further study after she graduates from uni. She's going into catering and will be inheriting her dad's restaurant eventually, so I don't understand why.

But Jessica says studying economics will be very helpful in running a business and blah blah blah. I get bored just hearing about it. Economics sounds like a total snoozefest.

It's rare that I actually ask Jessica about Noah but I'll take extreme measures to avoid talking about business.

I always just assumed that she and Noah would break up when he went off to college. Jessica is worried that his feelings will change next year, because she really wants to stay with him.

It could happen. Jack went off to college a year before Sophie and they ended up staying together until his senior year.

That story was supposed to be comforting but Jessica didn't think it was, seeing Jack and Sophie did break up in the end.

Their break-up didn't have anything to do with Jack being older but there was another girl involved, which is part of what Jessica is worried about with Noah. So I thought it was better just to drop it.

I don't seem to be very good at helping Jessica with her problems. I feel kind of bad about that, because Jessica was so amazing when I came out to her.

She was right next to me when I told Lauren and Louisa, which did make things a little easier.

They were fine with it, though they were also a bit surprised. I was really nervous about telling Lauren especially, seeing I had such a raging crush on her up until recently.

I've accepted that she's not going to switch teams for me and it's a lot less weird for me being around her now.

Jessica offered multiple times to be there when I told my family but I didn't take her up on that. By the time I got around to it, I'd told my friends and had been talking to my Aunt Joanna about it a lot, so I was quite confident.

My family reacted in much the same way Aunt Joanna had been assuring me they would all along. They weren't bothered at all and they were all very supportive.

No one really blinks an eye at the thought of gay people in this house. Aunt Joanna has been out since she was about my age and she'd really have something to say if anyone had a problem with it.

Grandma's sister is also a lesbian. I hardly ever think about that; she was divorced long before I was born and her ex-wife died when I was very young.

I don't think Michael was even aware that being gay is something that even requires an announcement.

I just feel so much better now that it's all out in the open. I've just met a girl I'm interested in and I didn't really want to come out by bringing a girlfriend home.

I met Laurel when I bought a bottle of perfume from her at this little occult store at the mall. I thought she was cute but I didn't think much else of it.

Jessica, though, kept insisting that that Laurel was trying to flirt with me.

She just looked like she was doing her job to me and I told Jessica she was imagining things.

We saw Laurel again at Lost Generation and there, we were both thinking that maybe there was something there. It seemed like she was looking at me and wanting me to come over.

So I went over and Laurel seemed kind of relieved. I could tell right away that she was quite shy.

That made me think that I was going to have to make the first move, if I wanted anything to happen. Laurel must have got a surge of confidence though, because she was the one who started to flirt first.

We got along so well. I always seem to end up in arguments with new people, so that's kind of a rarity to me.

Laurel goes to a private school, which explains why we'd never met before. She works part-time at the mall.

She was weirdly jealous of my job at the hospital, because she's into sciencey type things.

I didn't have the heart to tell her that all I do is make beds and collect meal trays.

Jessica and I were due back at my place pretty soon, so I had to wrap it up with Laurel. Before we left, I asked her if she'd want to meet up again the next day.

Fortunately, she said she'd love to.

Jessica didn't let me start driving until she got all the "details". Hardly anything happened at all but I'm feeling pretty optimistic about Laurel. I don't know if it's going to go anywhere but I hope so.

Notes:

• Title is from Viva La Vida by Coldplay.
• Noah earned six scholarships, so that will be half-price tuition for him. I'm planning on adjusting the requirements for Science and Business so that getting to the top will now require further study. Noah wants to be a Nobel Scientist, so he's going to be my guinea pig for that. And Amelia earned a $55,000 bonus this round, so this family can well afford to pay for his post-grad. ;)
• Laurel is a cashier NPC. When I said that Emma hated the one townie teen who's into girls, I didn't realise that I'd forgotten to check the service NPCs.
• Laurel and Emma have two bolts but Laurel is Romance, with an LTW of woohooing 20 different Sims, so I'm not positive of how compatible they'll be in the long run. But they're 15 right now and they've got a little crush on each other, so I'm just letting them be. Emma is Popularity/Knowledge and was happy enough to put off dating until college but I couldn't resist when I saw Laurel heart-farting over her. ;)
• For the high school update this round, I'm planning on having a winter formal kind of thing. I'm going to let Emma bring Laurel as her date, so we can see more of them then. ;)