4.55 Enchanted Evening

Ada and Alberto Sample-Royale welcomed their son Tomas into the world with an after-the-fact baby shower.

“Don’t bring gifts, but wear your swimsuits!” Ada exclaimed on the phone. “It will be fun!”

“I didn’t think you had a pool,” Charles said.

“We don’t have a pool. Why would you think we had a pool?”

“Never mind.”

The party was in the evening, which seemed like an odd schedule for a baby.

“Isn’t it past Tomas’s bedtime?” Veronica asked in passing.

“Oh, he sleeps all day and is awake during the night.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Veronica said, remembering the difficult days when the triplets had been babies.

Ada looked puzzled. “Why are you sorry? Do you need to sleep too?”

Veronica smiled. Insanity aside, Ada and Alberto were both self-employed, so maybe the kid’s sleep schedule really didn’t bother them.

Tomas wiggled and gurgled and did adorable baby things on his play mat while everyone cooed at him.

The only one who wasn’t cooing was Jeremiah, who wasn’t pleased about loosing his place as Ada and Alberto’s baby.

It had been such a long time since Charles had held a baby. He dandled his nephew and reminisced about how delightful little ones were without a shred of irony. Parents are so forgetful about the baby stage.

Maybe all the sleep deprivation helps keep the long-term memories from forming. Probably better for everyone.

Once Tomas had gone to bed, Charles and Veronica found a good use for their swimwear.

Prom had rolled around, and Hunter still wasn’t sure what he was going to do. He had no date and no prospects of one, and the idea of standing around feeling self-conscious in a loud, dark room filled with other teenagers gave him shivers. But everyone talked about prom. Perhaps it would be better to go, even if he had a bad time, just so he wouldn’t regret it later.

But wow, it was a lot of people all in one place.

Then, while visiting the dog park with Enigma the morning before the dance, he found an unexpected answer.

Eliana Baerwyn, who was the class a year behind Hunter in school. She met his eyes from across the park, then dropped her gaze with a flush. It was like an electric shock ran through Hunter. He stumbled over a rock, a clump of grass, and a dog bowl trying to get closer to her.

“Hi,” he said. “You’re, um, here early.”

“I had to bring PJ back in time for me to get ready for prom.”

Hunter cringed inside. “So you’re going too?”

She nodded. “Weston Mentary asked me.” She sighed. Then she perked up. “Are you going? Maybe I’ll see you there!”

Hunter gulped. “Sure I’m going! I don’t have a date, but all kinds of people go stag.”

She beamed “I’m so glad.”

An hour passed while they talked about their dogs. Eliana glanced at her watch and gasped. “I have to go get ready!”

“Oh!” Hunter exclaimed. “Goodbye!”

“I’ll see you in a few hours!” Eliana cried as she dashed away.

Well that settled that. Now he had to come up with something to wear.

When he returned to the house, Sky and Forest’s dates were already there. Apparently everyone was going to change in the basement.

Leah was gushing with anticipation, but Ali was mostly quiet and distant. There was some kind of tension between her and Sky that he didn’t understand.

Then everyone scurried away to do their hair and makeup.

Veronica and Charles were thrilled to help Hunter dig up something that wouldn’t embarrass him at prom. It turned out that an old coat of Charles’s worked pretty well, and though Hunter carried more weigh than his father, you wouldn’t notice if he left it unfastened.

“You look dashing,” Veronica said. “My baby is growing up to be such a ladykiller!”

“Mom!”

Charles gave his son an elbow nudge. “She’s just teasing you. Have a good time.”

All right then. Showtime.

Well, Forest and Sky had a perfect evening.

For Hunter, it was pretty much the way he expected. It was dark, the music was loud, and he couldn’t work up the nerve to ask anyone to dance. Lots of them were there stag, but they weren’t the kind of people who usually talked to him.

Well, at least he’d never wonder if he’d missed the pinnacle of teenagerhood because he didn’t go.

As the dance let out, he was the first one out the door, and he hung around the schoolyard waiting for his lovestruck brother and sister to finish lingering over the last dance.

“Hey,” came a quiet voice.

“Eliana! I thought you’d be in there dancing with Weston.”

Eliana blushed. “Well, you know, it’s really loud in there. It really wasn’t my thing.”

Hunter was so wrapped up in talking to Eliana that he didn’t even notice when Forest and Sky emerged with their dates, waved to him, gave up, and headed home without him.

In fact, he didn’t notice till the curfew police showed up to round up the stragglers and drag them home.

Veronica was a tornado. “We helped you go to prom, and you get dropped off by the cops! This is the kind of thanks we get!”

“I’m so sorry,” Hunter begged. “I just got to talking to this girl, and I lost track of time…”

Veronica’s face lit up. “You were talking to a girl? Well, that’s different!”

“You’re a nut, Mom, but I love you.”

“The feeling’s mutual.”

Forest, Hunter, and Sky all dragged themselves to bed at dawn, then slept late the next morning with excited romantic dreams dancing through their heads.

———

And this, believe it or not, is the LAST POST for Generation 4.

I was starting to wonder if I was going to get to play prom. It ran on the last day before the triplets aged up, and some glitch canceled it, so I had to restore from a previous save and do a Reset Homeworld. Turns out that’s a very useful option buried in the NRaas menus on City Hall. I think it was under MasterController.

As it was, the crowd in front of the school was such that I could barely get all three through the door before prom was over. Speaking of the bad routing behavior in this game. I really hope they work on that in Sims 4. I pretty much had to choose who would get actual time at the dance, and Hunter lost out. He was only there for about 10 sim-minutes, but he got his picture.

I’d kind of hoped that the prom would pair Hunter up with someone, but as it turned out he had this lightning flash from the attraction system on the day of the dance anyway. Eliana is a 10 out of 10, and he finds her “Devastatingly attractive.”

The next post will be birthdays. Woo.

26 thoughts on “4.55 Enchanted Evening

  1. Man, I have become a total loser about the dollhouse dressup part of this game. I love that hairstyle, and I've been dying to come up with a good place to use it. Also, the number of prom-believable dresses in the game's wardrobe is truly pathetic. So I went hunting on the web for that dress too :).

  2. Everyone looked lovely for prom! I'm glad that Hunter found someone who seems to like him back.

    Congrats to Ada. It was nice to see her and have Charles interact with his nephew.

    I see that Veronica spent her time waiting up for the kids blowing herself up again. That will never not amuse me.

  3. Go, Hunter! I'm glad he's found someone, he's such a sweetheart, and I'm glad that someone has evidently noticed that (although he should have had girls fighting over him at the Prom because he looked very dashing in that coat). Eliana looks like she'll be a good match for him as well.

    His interaction at the end with Veronica amused me greatly, and I'm glad that Forest and Sky enjoyed Prom, although obviously Forest is a bad man.

    Also, I saw that spoiler you posted over on Bookabet's latest chapter. I can't wait to see what happens there.

  4. That was a surprise to me because I never checked to see what StoryProgression rolled for his orientation. I just followed his wishes.

    I've played a decent amount ahead, and I have a pretty clear idea of where the story is going, but it may be a while before this gets focus.

  5. Awww, finally Hunter found someone as well 🙂 That is really great, I'm so happy for him!

    But I have to admit, the best part was the one about the swim suits and the (missing) pool in the beginning 😀

  6. Aww! I miss Ada so much! She really makes me giggle 🙂 I'm glad that she and Alberto finally have a baby.

    Sky looked so gorgeous in her prom dress I honestly didn't recognise her. She and Leah are so adorable.

    Also, I approve of Eliana. I'm happy that Hunter has found such a promising love interest. I only hope that he isn't crippled by his shyness. On a personal note, I realise that I haven't officially asked you if I can steal Hunter for Arya … so, can I? 🙂

  7. It was fun to visit back on Ada. She and Alberto are doing just fine.

    I had a lot of fun dressing Sky up for prom. She also gets a decent makeover when she grows up, since she's coming further out of her shell.

    And, are you kidding? Like I'd want to stop you from making Hunter a legacy spouse! I am eager to see how they do in a relationship.

    Hunter has become quite the ladies' man in cross-pollination. He's making a play for Mango in SRaina's Sweetest of Dreams Wishacy too, though I'm not sure whether he'll win against his rival in that legacy. I'm happy to see him doing so well.

  8. Just polite to ask lol! Honestly though, they are so completely adorable together I don't know why I didn't see it before!

    He's doing so well because everyone loves him. He's such a sweetheart.

    Sky has indeed come on in leaps and bounds since her teen years. She seems really confident and sure of herself. I'm not sure how much is because of Leah and how much is because of her music.

  9. Arya's traits are Insane, Bookworm, Natural Born Performer and Loves the Outdoors. I was trying to work that out as well. Her LTW is animal rescuer so that'll probably help things, although I don't know if that is considered in the attraction system. Hang on … Let me check the attraction notification screenshot so I can see what it said.

  10. Ok … the notification message wasn't very helpful. It was one of the generic ones. Some of the attraction messages I've seen explain why certain sims are attracted to one another.

  11. Ha! And look how fantastically well that turned out! I think Arya needs someone gentle and more serious to help rein her in but not stifle her character and she'll help him to become more confident and assertive. I think they are a match made in heaven. Sometimes, the sims really choose their own path. I can't see her with anyone else now.

  12. Oh no, I've caught up! Waa!!

    I really like this legacy. Your stories and plotlines are very interesting and fun to read. I only have WA, Amb, and Pets so it's fun to see things from the EP's I don't have, like proms and bedtime stories. I love this town, you've obviously put a lot of work into it and it shows. I'm doing an apocalypse story in a desert enviroment, so I'm very jealous of all the prettiness of your world. 😀

    And your sims are really special, you have a gift for showing their characters, very distinctive voices for each of them. I think writing an evil trait without overdoing it could be tricky but Forest seems evil without being… too psycho, maybe? I like how you balance them out, they aren't one-dimensional.

    (Do your sim downloads have CC with them? I'd love to use some of them later in my game, but I'm very leery of CC, I had to create an entire new Sims 3 folder because a sim I DLed had some %##&%$ shorts and I couldn't figure out how to get rid of them.)

    Anywho, I love this story and can't wait for more! (Especially since I tracked down the spoiler comment at bookabet's blog. Drama!!!)

    Thanks for all the lovely work, C

  13. Wow, thanks! I'm so glad you like it!

    Forest has been the biggest challenge to write in this legacy so far, and his story is by far the most intense at the point I'm playing now. When I wrote this post, I'd only played as far as the birthdays, but then the Gen 5 stories really got rolling, and I've now played ahead quite a bit.

    I'd love it if you downloaded some Samples. The Gen 3 household on the Exchange should have no cc. But the Gen 4 one has quite a bit, and you can see from previous posts that it's caused quite a bit of trouble I may take that household down from the Exchange entirely.

    However, if you download one of the .package files I have linked on my "Download a Sample" page, then you can get the family with no CC. Just drop those files into your Documents/Electronic Arts/The Sims 3/Library folder. This is the household without ANY of the CC packaged in it, which will force the game to replace everything. It's possible that Charles and Sky will end up having black skintones this way (that's what the game does when it can't find a custom skintone), but that could be interesting.

    • You’ve come a long way! I’m impressed!

      Forest and Ali are just at the beginning of their story. Don’t worry :). And there’s only so dark I’m willing to go in Sims. I think Forest is the darkest character I’ve ever written in a Sims story, though.

  14. I’m finally continuing reading your legacy. I’ve read the entire 4th generation over the weekend. Charles really was an awesome character. Loved him and Veronica together.

    Oh, I also really liked Ada. Insane sims are so fun. She was also really pretty. Alberto and Ada were a perfect match.

    And Avalon is really interesting! I really liked the story behind the move to Avalon. I’ve had lots of experience with the paparazzi. I could totally relate. That’s why my palace is fenced in. They can’t live without it!

    Reading your legacy really makes me want to play mine!

    • Hello! Thanks so much for reading all this stuff. There is SO MUCH. Charles is still my favorite sim. Gen 6 heir and spouse also make a good pair.

      I’m still in Avalon. I thought about moving again, but I think I will finish (hah) this legacy there.

      Wow, seeing all the comments on this post hearkens back to a more active time….

Leave a Reply to DragonWifeCancel reply