1.19 Feeling empty, and dark, and cold

Now that there were five Sims in this house, there was a greater demand for fresh food than ever before. Anna still sold some of the vegetables in the grocery store, earning some extra money to add to the family funds, but it wasn’t so much. They ate most of it, and there was still a hungry unicorn to take care of. Money was definitely becoming an issue, since she was still on maternity leave and only got some of the money she would have earned at a proper workday. Jo was doing his best, but had to miss some days at work, too, due to health problems. His knees were aching all the time, and sometimes he was barely able to get up. It was all down to Anna and the garden at the moment, which stressed her out a lot.

She stayed outside until the sun was down, and was up and running before the first bird even thought of opening its eyes. The store was asking for different vegetables and fruits now, since they had hit autumn now. Nobody wanted carrots yet; in general, people seemed more interested in fruits than in vegetables. The grapes still sold well, though.

Despite their money problems, Anna and Jo had been talking about an entirely different issue for months now. Jo had been to a doctor, who had confirmed that he no longer was able to conceive children, as he was strongly going on eighty. Anna desperately wanted more children, and so they had decided to adopt a child. A boy this time, somebody who could fill Jo’s place when he was not there anymore. Of course, they didn’t really want to think about it, but they had to. They didn’t really have a choice.

And so, on a lovely day in October, little Billy joined the family. A bright and funny boy, more than happy to have found parents who wanted him.

 

His skin color differed from the one his siblings had, but that didn’t matter. He was one of them now, even though he sometimes did stuff his sisters wouldn’t dare to. It sure wouldn’t get boring with him around!

Little did he know what tragedy he was about to get involved in very soon. One afternoon, when he was in the middle of a heated discussion with his mother and Birdy, Jo went outside to feed Kokette. She had already been neighing for half an hour now, and it was high time to give her some carrots from the garden. Anna didn’t want to leave her kids at that moment, because she had just thought of the smartest argument. So Jo went outside, despite feeling funny that day.

He barely made it halfway through the garden when suddenly a very strange feeling crept over him. Kokette, sensing something bad, came running, but it was too late.

Right before her eyes, Jo’s life ended. His wife was not there to watch, neither were his kids. Although he was glad that they were spared with this disturbing experience, he couldn’t help but feel sad that he would never be able to say goodbye to Anna, the love of his life, properly. He tried to scream, but his voice was gone. He tried to run, but his body no longer worked the way he wanted it to. She would never know how it happened.

As Kokette started neighing loudly at the sight of a scrawny figure in a black coat, Anna stopped in her conversation and looked outside. All she could see was a black person standing there, and something behind it. Something she couldn’t quite grasp, as it looked lucent. Jo surely would check out what was going on there.

He wouldn’t. Jo Vocis was gone.

When Anna went outside later, to find out what took Jo so long, she didn’t see him anywhere. Instead, she found a plain grave. Silently, she walked inside, being unable to say a single word. All she could think of was that she hadn’t been there when it had happened. She had left him alone in his last moment, hadn’t been with him when he took his last breath. She hadn’t held his hand, hadn’t watched him close his eyes for the last time. And now he had left her forever.

Author’s notes: R.I.P., Jo… it’s not fair we only had such little time together. He died as soon as his age span was up, not even lived a single day longer. When I watched it, I felt sad for Anna, but writing this chapter even brought up many more emotions. I guess watching someone close die does that to you.

 

1.18 Will you be ready when it all explodes?

Like her older sister, Britney had gotten an unusual looking doll for her birthday from a distant relative. Which was odd, since Jo had no sisters or brothers, and his parents had died a long time ago. Anna hadn’t brought anybody along when she arrived in Appaloosa Plains. Nobody even knew she had moved here. How could this doll be sent by anybody she knew? Had they spied on her the night that she decided to leave her old life? There was no other way this toy could have gotten here. They had followed her, and eventually they found her. Who knew, maybe there was even a camera in these dolls, to spy on her every move! The same day, she locked those dolls away into a closet. Neither Birdy nor Britney were allowed to play with it anymore. 

Anna now was even more protective of her children than she had been before. Every car that passed the house was eyed by her conspicuously, every visitor at the front door had to declare his or her motives for showing up. It seemed a little paranoid, but for her it was the only way to make sure nothing would happen.

Jo couldn’t understand what all the fuss was about. He still hadn’t learned about Anna’s past, at least not completely, and he didn’t know why Anna had gotten so careful all of a sudden. He decided not to make a big deal out of it. In a while, she would get back to normal, and until then he tried to make sure that the kids weren’t suffering from their mother’s temporary insanity. Britney was a natural in walking, and she learned it within only a few days. It seemed like she was eager to run around and explore the world.

 

Considered hormonal by her husband, Anna more than one time asked herself if her fears were justified. Of course they were. Those dolls hadn’t appeared out of nowhere, somebody had dropped them off at their house, which meant somebody knew where she lived. Tendering her little garden behind the house, she was glad it couldn’t be seen from the front. To the people on the street, she was invisible. When she wandered around inside the house, she tried to stay away from the windows, so that nobody could see her either. And in the evening the first thing she did was closing the curtains and activating the motion detector for outside. Now, nobody could get near the house without her knowing about it. 

 

Birdy was unaware of what was going through her mother’s mind, but she felt that something wasn’t quite right. Anna jumped at every noise, never let anybody inside the house spontaneously – those were the things Birdy noticed.  She tried to support her mother, tried to make her feel safer. She frequently asked her if the baby was okay, and if there was anything she could do to help. Anna couldn’t believe how much her daughter had grown in the last few months. Going to school had been good for her; she instantly had found many friends and her teachers were delighted by her enthusiasm.

Seeing Birdy like this, gave her hope for Britney’s future, as well. Both of them were going to have a great life, just like their little sister or brother that was yet to be born. While she was waiting for her due-date, she noticed how quickly Britney adapted to the language around her. Even as a baby, she made noises that sounded like short words, and now that she was a toddler, she learned so many words so quickly. Every time she talked to her, Britney had something new to tell, or to ask. She loved asking her mother things, whatever they were. And later, when Jo made her dinner or cuddled with her, she would often repeat what her mother had told her before. She was curious, and knew how to amaze her parents with her accuracy and her imagination.

Fortunately, the lessons on walking and teaching were completed by the time Anna went into labor. It was less painful than when she was expecting Britney, but still the contractions demanded a great deal of her. As quickly as he could, Jo took her to the hospital.

Little Beth was, unlike her older sister, completely healthy, which is why she could be taken home a day after her birth. The two girls were waiting in the house anxiously, curious to meet their little sister. 

Life soon got back to normal, though. Second grade was harder than first grade for Birdy, and she often sat on her desk for hours, doing her homework. She wasn’t interested in Simlish and writing neatly, she paid much more attention when it came to her science class or maths. Logic and experiments fascinated her, and she was willing to do a lot of research at home. Simlish bodies were particularly interesting, both bone structures and what was going on in their minds. More than one time she spent an entire break in front of a skeleton, studying the connections between the bones. This is how a body was supposed to work, and when something wasn’t right, doctors had to fix it. One day, she wanted to be a World Renowned Surgeon, and help many people get the body they wanted and deserved.

It couldn’t hurt to be in good physical shape, so that she could run from one operation to the other. And as long as she was too small to ride on Kokette, she practiced on her rocking horse.

Kokette was preoccupied by Anna most of the time, anyway. The unicorn seemed to feel that something was not right, and was there whenever Anna needed a shoulder to lean on. Anna felt Kokette breathe, imagined to feel her heartbeat, ran her hair through the unicorn’s mane. This was her home; this was her castle. She was supposed to be safe here. 

 Beth hadn’t gotten one of these mysterious dolls for her birth, which disburdened Anna a bit. Maybe it had been the right step to lock the other dolls away, maybe there had really been cameras and her persecutors had thought she had run and left them behind. 

With their mother lightening up a bit more every day, Birdy and Britney found it easier to have fun at home. They loved each other so much, and spent most of the weekends together, playing cuckoo all day.

When she wasn’t playing, Birdy already helped a lot in the household. She had learned how to separate waste at school, and since her mother wasn’t too familiar with it, she took it upon her to clean the house the right way. Unfortunately, that included cleaning the potty. But only one more toddler to get through (after Britney had grown up), then it would never be used again. Right?

Author's notes: Namesake for Beth is....have a guess! ;)

1.17 Time makes me its toy

Little Britney was born around 4 a.m. Since she had been extremely small and light, Anna and Jo couldn’t take her home right away, but had to leave her with the doctors and nurses for a couple of months. Although they were allowed to visit every day, there were still too many hours of insecurity, spent at home. Minutes felt like hours, hours felt like days. Since Birdy was taken care of by a babysitter, Anna and Jo had many chances to talk. The first days, the conversations would revolve around banalities like the weather or the new mailman. But as time passed, their topics became more serious. Anna was disappointed of Jo, because he barely seemed to care for her anymore. Jo was disappointed of Anna, because she completely dedicated herself to Birdy and the garden, not letting him in. Each night, when they lay next to each other in their bed without their youngest daughter sleeping in her crib, something new came to the surface. The jobs, the horses, household chores, socializing, Birdy, the garden – all of this was part of both of their lives, they just had trouble adjusting. Especially with Birdy’s birth, everything had been reset. They had to find their new places within this family, which was hard, but now that they knew they were not alone, they swore everything would be different. And the day Britney finally came home, Anna and Jo seemed like a couple nobody could ever tear apart.

But more changes had been necessary. They had agreed that two horses and two kids was too much to handle, so they once again called the animal shelter, who sent someone to pick Freebird up. She was supposed to spend her last months with people who had enough time for her. Letting her go almost broke Jo’s heart, because he’d had her since he moved in with Chuck. But he couldn’t risk ruining his family, which was the only thing that really counted in the end. And if it meant releasing Freebird, this was the right thing to do.

Finally, there were more friendly and romantic interactions between Anna and Jo again. Britney was a sweet little girl who actually slept through most of the nights, giving her parents a chance to rest. Birdy sometimes was more trouble, but far from being too hard to handle.

Jo and Anna took turns taking care of the kids. They loved both equally, so there were no favorite children. One day Jo would feed and bathe Britney, while Anna tried to teach Birdy how to talk. The next day Jo found himself cleaning the toddler’s potty, while Anna cuddled with Britney. They had become a real family, and even they later thought back to those previous days with tears in their eyes, remembering how poorly Britney had been in the beginning, it had strengthened their family bonds. 

Not even Kokette was left out. The children were too small to play with her, but Jo and Anna sometimes took her out for a ride. Mostly Jo, because his riding skills were way better than his wife’s. He enjoyed being on a horseback, and he often thought of Freebird while doing so. On her he had learned how to ride, and what not to do to avoid being thrown off the horse. It had been a lovely time, and Freebird had really helped him get over the mess that was his life at that point. Now she was gone, which maybe was a sign that he was done with what had been before. 

The little garden was growing every day, producing masses of weed that regularly needed to be pulled out. Anna learned that certain kinds of weeds came with certain kinds of plants, which was fascinating, even though it didn’t erase the fact that there was a lot of work to be done. The bugs and snails didn’t lighten her mood, either.

 

They even seemed to make her sick. This was the only possible explanation for her frequent visits to the bathroom that she was suffering from ever since Britney had come home. Whenever Anna sat in front of her freshly harvested salad, thinking of the animals that had been in it before, she knew that she was going to throw up. At some point, she even started feeling sick without being near any food. Was this some sort of new snail-phobia? 

 

While his wife was suffering at home, Jo stayed out long after work sometimes, blowing off some steam with his coworkers. One girl, who was helping out twice a week, was particularly nice to him, and they often talked for hours after their shift had ended. By this time, Jo was almost famous in town, and he knew this made him more popular for women.

 

Talking to this girl, who, in fact, was still a teenager, showed him how old he already was, and it filled him with grief. She had her whole life in front of her, maybe as a musician as well, while he was happy about every new day he had with his family.

 

At home, a huge surprise was waiting for him. Anna was expecting again. He was stunned, and sad at the same moment. If this baby – he hoped it would be a boy – was to be born in a little less than a year, there was a great chance it would grow up without a father.

Before he could worry about this for long, it was time for Britney’s second birthday. Again, Anna took the lead and blew out the candles with her, while Jo was watching from a distance. It had been quite some time since Birdy had had her second birthday, but it felt like only yesterday.

 

To be precise, it had been four years since that special day. A few weeks later, she celebrated her sixth birthday, which meant she was ready to go to school. Their little girls were growing up so fast, and soon they were to be joined by a third sibling. 

Time was passing way too fast.


Author's notes: Namesake for Britney, as you may have guessed, is Britney Spears. Don't laugh, she had some good songs before she shaved her head and stuff. 
I'm very slowly catching up with the story, even though I'm still a number of chapters away. Maybe we'll get there by Halloween :-P

1.16 No, no troubles at all

The tension grew with every month that passed. Anna still had no signs of being pregnant again, instead both she and Jo grew older. Of course, Birdy did, too. Very soon she would be a school child already, and Anna desperately wanted a playmate for her.  In addition, she needed the feeling of having a newborn baby in her arms again. 

Those days, Anna spent a lot of free time alone in the garden again, since this was something she hadn’t done very often. She didn’t work there because it helped her job performance – she no longer really cared about that –, but because it helped organizing her thoughts. Besides, it was an amazing feeling to see something grow that she had planted and tendered herself for weeks.

Jo didn’t approve of his wife being busy all the time. There were periods where they barely talked to each other, leaving both of them alone. He wondered whether she thought it was his fault that they were failing to have another baby. After all, he was old, while she was still able to conceive children. Guilt was in the air all the time. 

The only one who was enjoying her life was Birdy. Somebody was always there to teach her, or to cuddle with her. Although she sometimes noticed that Mommy and Daddy weren’t talking much, they always made her feel like she was really important. 

They also bought lots of stuffed animals – ducks, unicorns, teddy bears – for her to play with, so that she wouldn’t be lonely at any time. Soon, the yellow duck with the big black eyes was her best friend. She named her Ducky. Her parents kept calling her different names, though, which annoyed her. Tweety and Bobby were the most common names they used. Bobby? Please. Ducky was a girl!

She also spent a lot of time with a special-looking doll, singing to her. By the way Birdy often made up new songs or deliberately changing the melody to something that made sense, too, everybody could tell that one day she was going to be a real virtuoso, just like her parents. Maybe it ran in the family.

Although one of them always was with Birdy, they were barely together as a family. Jo had taken up guitar playing again, because a promotion was getting closer and he practiced a lot. His biggest fan was Kokette, not Anna. Anna was watching from the inside as Jo played for hours, already surrounded by paparazzi who were destroying the lawn with their clumsy feet.

Then, one day, the sweet feeling of relief. Anna was pregnant again. They were going to have another baby, and everything was going to be fine.

The pregnancy didn’t slow Anna down, quite the contrary: all of a sudden, she was full with energy. No challenge was too big for her.

Even potty training was something she did with a smile. Although it smelled really horrible and was a very laborious business. Birdy wasn’t too interested in activities like these, she preferred playing. Sometimes she was found at the xylophone, but most of the time she was actually busy playing doctor with her animals and doll. One day, one of the duck’s webbed feet was bandaged, the other day the teddy bear had to bounce on one leg, because Birdy had accidentally sat on the other. She was a busy bee, always exploring the possibilities of helping people and animals. It stood to reason that banalities like potty training had no place in her life.

There was always time for books, though. Birdy loved hearing stories told by her mother, and looking at the pictures. Whenever she wanted to draw something, it didn’t look quite as good as the paintings in the book, but very slowly she was getting better. One day, Anna even recognized a duck as a duck, and not shouted out how wonderful she had drawn that boat.

The days still had twenty-four hours. A pregnancy couldn’t change that, of course. Yet, Anna got so much more done now that she was pregnant. During the last year, she had spent her days with Birdy and a little gardening, now there was not one moment of laziness. Baby, horses, house and garden – everything had her attention. Well, almost everything. Jo barely was home, and when he was, he needed to nap. 

Then it was time. In the middle of a lovely spring day, Anna’s water broke and she and Jo rushed to the hospital. Despite having slept throughout the morning, he had been wide awake as soon as Anna started screaming.

They were in for a long night.