Chapter Seven

Sometimes you just have one of those days.

I woke up with an unaccustomed feeling of anxiety. I just knew something was in store for me, and I didn't think it would be good. Even as I chalked it up to the residue of bad dreams, I found myself doing something absolutely unprecedented for me, I suppose as a sort of gesture of good to ward off future evil ... I made my bed!

As a talisman against misfortune, it proved inadequate.

 

The unpleasantness started off right away with a geiser in the sink. I'm no good with mechanical objects. With a brush in my hand I'm the boss, but replace the brush with a wrench and I'm confounded. I confronted my mortal enemy The Plumbing with determination and gritted teeth - and I hated every second of it. I got it fixed, for now. I got some lovely new blisters, too. And I invented some new swear words.

 

The sink wasn't the only thing that decided to break. All this in one day. Could it get worse?

 

Well, yes. Because I still had to clean up.

 

After all that, I needed to get out of the house for a while. I changed into my sweats and went for a long walk to clear my head.

"Oh, no, what now," was my thought when I practically tripped over a large, dirty, grubby rock. But the instincts of an artist can't be denied. I noticed some shiny glints even in all that mud, and I had to take it home and clean it up.

I showed it to the guys. They say it's surely a diamond, albeit probably not a very high quality one. It may not be worth much, but it's found money. To me, it could be a small fortune.

There's a place where you can send off a geologic specimen to get it analyzed, so I posted it straightaway. I was kind of excited. Mortimer, whose family has been in the region for generations and will be for generations to come, said that the mountains that surround this town are old and weathered, and frequently slough off little treasures like this. He said if I remember where I found them, I can go back and find more almost any time, especially after a heavy rain.

If that rock is a real diamond, and if it's worth anything, I may have just found a way to supplement the meager income I get from selling the occasional painting!

In the afternoon, I had a few people over, and guess who gate crashed? That's right. My former best friend Lisa Bunch. I was surprised she showed up here after the way she left things between us. She lives right across the street from Demarco, so she's pretty hard to avoid, and if she chooses to follow him, who can stop her? I should have smelled trouble coming, but I guess I'm just too naive. I thought she'd behave herself. 

It didn't take her very long to begin insulting me and trying to pick a fight. I felt sorrier for poor Davy than I did for myself. He stayed on the sofa and tried to continue watching TV, but I could see him watching her. She must have hurt him badly, or maybe there are still feelings there. Whether feelings of unrequited love or just pain, I couldn't say. 

Demarco gave her a disapproving look but, to his credit, tried to stay out of it. He respects me enough to let me take care of myself, though I could see he was ready to leap to my aid if I needed it.

When she didn't get enough of a rise out of me, Lisa began working on Demarco. He submitted rather shamefacedly at first, but when she started in on me again, he got angrier than I've ever seen him.

I guess none of us truly expected her temper tantrum.

 

Demarco  had had enough. He "escorted" Lisa firmly to the door and made it clear she wasn't welcome back.

 

"What can you expect from her," was Davy's remark, and we all silently agreed.

 

Once Lisa had gone, my true friends were nice enough to shrug it off, and we had a nice afternoon after all. The whole long, tiresome day had left me feeling drained, though,  and after everyone had left I got ready for bed even though it was still light, and went outside to do some painting. The nice thing about living outside of town in the middle of nowhere is that I can do things like paint outdoors in my nightie without feeling self conscious. My main release and outlet had never failed me before and it didn't this time, but I subconsiously chose dark and somber colors to match my mood and the tone of the day.

 

I woke next morning feeling much refreshed. The flag was up on the mailbox, and all in a rush I remembered the possible diamond! I ran to the mailbox and with trembling hands withdrew a giftwrapped box.

  

I'd say this makes up for yesterday. In spades!

author's note: My sims continue to amuse me. When Avi made her bed for the first time in her life, I knew it had to go into the story somehow. Sorry about the inconsistency of so many costume changes, but this "day" actually represents a number of sim days. Sometimes nothing interesting at all happens, and it takes days to collect enough to write about. Also I seem to have taken rather a lot of similar party pictures, but I thought the pictoral sequence told its own story, so I couldn't bear to leave any out. 

Yes, I of course I cheated the final shot of her holding the diamond. As my readers will have noticed all along, I'm a big fan of the liberal use of MoveObjects On in my photos. I don't contrive the situations, but I have no compunction about faking a shot here and there.