The Past and the Pending, Part II

(Continued from Part I)

Even a good day’s sleep couldn’t restore Joey’s spirits. He wandered around in a state of constant agitation, turning the TV on and off again, opening and closing the refrigerator without taking any food, and standing up to look out the window. All he could think about was what Tiffy said on the deck the night before, and the sight of his father’s ghost only hours afterwards. It was like his father was trying to tell him something…

But these were only surface thoughts that I could read — I couldn’t penetrate more deeply into his troubled mind, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to! Eventually he called a cab and left the house for a time, and I chose to remain where I was, thinking Tiffy might come home soon. I wanted to see how she was holding up after seeing Sid’s ghost. Well, I have to say, I was somewhat surprised when she arrived home — she was in the most cheerful mood imaginable! Almost immediately she changed into her sweats and started working out in front of the TV.

Tiffy works out

Apparently she wanted to lose a few pounds so she could fit into the dress she had bought for Joey’s upcoming wedding.

“Must…stop…eating…mac and cheese…” she grunted between sit-ups.

As she rolled over to do leg-lifts, the front door flew open, and in walked Joey with his arms full of strange electronic equipment. Tiffy tossed him a “hi”, then did a double take.

“What on earth is all that?”

Joey shrugged, nearly dropping what looked like a red police car light. “I don’t know.”

“Come on, don’t play dumb,” Tiffy said. “Fess up.”

“It’s just some junk I picked up at the pawn shop. No big deal.”

Tiffy eyed him suspiciously. “What are you going to do with it?”

“Play around with it, I guess. Look, I’m trying to learn some new skills, all right? You said you wanted me to get a different job.”

Joey headed down the hallway to his bedroom, electrical cords of all colors trailing behind him. Tiffy winced as the door slammed shut.

With a sigh, she went back to her leg lifts. After finishing up her workout, she stood and stretched, noting that her bulging tummy seemed to have diminished.

“Yes!” she said. “Maybe now I can fit into that stupid dress.”

Tiffy is fit!

While Tiffy headed off to the shower, I floated into Joey’s room to see what he was up to. He was sitting in a tangle of cords, trying to hook the police light up to some strange box with an array of knobs and lights on it. Even after observing for a good long while, I couldn’t make heads or tails of it, so I drifted back out to the kitchen, where Tiffy was now preparing dinner.

She had become quite the cook and seemed to enjoy cooking for two instead of just herself. I found myself idly wondering why she hadn’t met a nice boy and settled down yet, then slapped myself when I remembered how I felt when my mother used to say, “Maude, sweetheart, why aren’t you married yet? You’re not getting any younger, you know!” Good lord, how I hated that.

When dinner was ready, Tiffy called Joey into the kitchen. With an awkwardness in his movements, he sat down to his plate of pork chops and vegetables. It looked mouth-wateringly good, and I found myself wishing I could manifest and inhale the entire plateful, but I kept to myself in a corner of the kitchen and just listened to their conversation.

“How is it going with the…stuff?” Tiffy asked after chewing a mouthful of potato.

“Good.”

“Well, that’s good.”

I yawned.

“I have some news for you, by the way,” Tiffy said then, which perked me up. I had no idea what she was about to say. She was keeping her thoughts very close.

Joey looked at her expectantly.

“I’ve gotten a job at the new college,” she said with a hesitant smile. “They need a housemother in the girls’ dorm, and I would get to take classes for free. They might even let me teach some freshman classes, due to my experience in the medical field. What do you think?”

Tiffy and Joey eat dinner

Joey said nothing at first, then forced out a smile. “That’s great, sis. Really. Wow. I mean, I know you’ve always wanted to go to college. Huh. Wow. Great news.”

Tiffy watched him carefully. “That means I’ll be moving out of course, but you can stay here if you like. Bailey can move in with you.”

Joey shifted in his chair. “I don’t know. I don’t think we can afford this place on our own. Bailey doesn’t have a job.”

“Well, maybe she’ll have to get one. Or maybe she can ask her parents for money.” Tiffy started slicing up her pork chop.

“You don’t like Bailey very much, do you?”

Now it was Tiffy’s turn to shrug. “It doesn’t matter how I feel about her, as long as she makes you happy.”

Joey’s jaw clenched, but he didn’t say anything else. They ate the rest of their dinner in silence.

After cleaning up the dishes, Tiffy went out onto the deck to gaze through her telescope while Joey dragged all of his weird equipment into the hallway and set it up against the wall. He pushed a desk chair and file cabinet out as well and started hooking everything together. Within an hour, he had the strangest contraption I’ve ever seen. It reminded me of those chairs you sit in at the beauty parlor, the ones that dry your curls. But Joey didn’t have any hair to make curls…

He sat in the chair, placed the dome thing over his head, flipped some switches, and started talking in slow, measured tones.

“My name is Joey Kilman,” he said. “My sister’s name is Tiffy. We live in a trailer house at 14 Montreaux Road. My mom’s name is Rhonda. My dad’s name was Sid. I’m getting married on Saturday. I’m a car salesman — YEEOOOWWW!”

Joey tests his lie detector

The police light flashed as an electric shock sizzled its way across Joey’s body. What on earth, I wondered as he recovered from the zapping. Has he built a device for torturing himself? Or is he just really inept with electronics?

Tiffy rushed into the hallway. “Are you all right? What’s going on?”

Joey shook his head and stood up slowly from the chair. “Well, I guess it works,” he said.

(to be continued…)

14 thoughts on “The Past and the Pending, Part II

  1. oooh, neat contraption! i’ve only seen it and i actually have it (part of a collection someone made) but i’ve never used it. i wonder what he’s going to be using it for!

  2. Hi… been lurking around your blog for awhile now… I just wanted to pop in and say I love your stories. :) I’m a mac user so I don’t get Sims 2 until May 2005, so lovely blogs like yours are tiding me over in the mean time. I’m especially enjoying your legacy family and the Kilmans are quickly becoming one of my favorites, too.

    I love Joey, but I think he’s definitely headed for trouble. I got chills when I realized he was practicing passing a lie detector test!! Eeee. Poor Tiffy doesn’t really know what’s going on either, but I have a feeling she might find out before long. I really can’t wait to find out what happens!

  3. Kathy and Lauren: I directed Tiffy to work out by selecting the “Work Out” option on the television. I wish they would work out on their own, but I don’t think they do. Autonomous yoga would be way cool. :-)

    Heather: Thanks so much for your comment. I hope our blogs will keep you excited for the game until May!

  4. Hi, I am a mac user also, and just wanted to agree with Heather. Thanks for this blog because I don’t even get to play until may. Also, love your legacy family.

  5. Autonomous yoga would be really cool!!! I just gave the exercise gym to my Blogger family so I’m going to have to do it the long, hard way until they can all fill up a room and do yoga at the same time. They went to the swimming pool autonomously the first time, but they haven’t gone back. Perhaps the environment score is really low in the backyard. I’m going to have to investigate that.

  6. I’m actually not a MAC user, but I have to wait till Christmas to play because my Graphics’ card isn’t compatible so I have to get a new one installed.

    Yes, playing this game IS that worth it. 8)

  7. Jen — You’re welcome! Just be sure to update often and I might make it till May… LOL.

    Mieko — Oh, I think I take the cake on this one. I have to buy a whole new computer so I can meet the system requirements for the game, so I’m going to be treating myself to an iBook probably in a few months. (My parents just don’t know it yet. *shifty eyes*) I know a sensible person would say just buy a PC so I can play it NOW, but I am a die-hard Mac user. (But don’t think the thought hasn’t crossed my mind…)

    Okay, I’m now going to stop ranting in Jen’s comments. LOL. Carry on with the Sims blogging! ^_^

  8. I have yet to upgrade my system. I’m not a mac user, but I play the game on a laptop with integrated video that shares my existing 512 MB memory chip (64 MG is allocated for video). It’s fine for now, nothing grainy or too choppy. I want to move the game to my desktop where I can take advantage of my 19″ monitor. But I use that computer for other things and the hard drive (a measly 12 GB) is nearly maxed out and it’s a slow snail of 500 MHz. I have to wait and not be so impulsive. I have house bills to pay off. :(

  9. Hi there,

    I’m a PC user, just got a new spanky doodle one so it runs the Sims 2 beautifully!!! Our old one wouldn’t even let us comprehend running sims 2. Thank goodness for my man’s impatience at waiting for the computer to load everything, otherwise we wouldn’t have got it.

    I love your blog by the way!! It’s excellent. Now that I’ve just started playing the Sims 2, I’m practising running families and learning how to do everything, then I’m going to attempt to make my own blog about a family. I don’t think I’ll ever quite master writing such wonderful stories as your own. Do you let them run (almost) completely by themselves? Or do you consider yourself to be a major participant in their daily lives??

    As for all the MAC users, I hope May comes sooner! My sister has an iBook, it’s fantastic. So I think you should treat yourself next May to a new iBook and Sims 2 :) Is your birthday anytime then?

  10. Hi Kel, welcome to my blog, and thanks for your kind comment! To answer your question, I do a little bit of both — some families I let run more autonomously than others (the Kilmans started out that way), and some require my constant attention. Actually, I think I’m a control freak when it comes to most of my Sims families. :-P And definitely let us know when you have your Sims blog up and running…I love reading Sims blogs!

  11. I have been reading you blog for sometime now and I want to tell you I just love it. You are one of the few who post more frequently then others. I love to see your great pics and I wish I was playing the Sims but I can’t. I’m living with family and who just got a computer and don’t want anything to mess up it. I could argue that it won’t but I can’t make any guarentee or over step my stay. I will have to wait until Nov of 2005 before we can move out. That’s a loonngg time from now so all I have is blogs. When ask what I want for Xmas I said, I want Sim2, a computer, and a place of my own like a house. Do you think I can get all that for about $50? Please keep writing your wonderful stories your blog is my life line to Sims2.

  12. Hi Mary, thanks so much for your comment. I can only imagine how frustrating that must be, having to wait for so long. I hope you get at least one of those things for Christmas! :-D