Time passed so quickly that nobody was really ready when Adjo spontaneously aged into a child.
The prospect of two adults, two elementary-aged kids, a teenager, and an um ghost living together, a three-bedroom Victorian, no matter now lovely, started to feel incredibly cramped.
The Samples hastily began house-hunting for something with a bit more room. They happened on a contemporary home on a cliffside lot overlooking the sea.
Zahra admittedly had a lot of voice in this decision. She was more level-headed, and her parents were pretty frantic to get the extra space. All the artsy-fartsy quaintness of the Victorian had really started grating on Zahra (who can’t stand art). The modern home was just about as bland inside as you could get. Everything, and I mean everything was done in eggshell and brown.
Still, it was a great place, and a great space, and they could redecorate at their leisure.
Layla stayed behind to sell the old house while Lance moved the kids into the new place, where there was actually enough space for the beds Shanni and Adjo were going to need to sleep.
Once everyone was settled, they held a late-night, family-only celebration of the twins’ birthday.
Lance and Layla bid each other a temporary farewell.
It would be hard to sleep apart, but they’d be able to reunite in a day or two when all their affairs were in order.
It actually only turned out to be one day. The Victorian sold like a hotcake. Then Lance and Layla got busy making the new place their own.
(What really happened here is that Layla had a really high-point gardening wish that was just about to be fulfilled. I put off moving the family into a more appropriate-sized house for twin children in hopes that the last plant would mature and fulfill the wish. But Adjo aged up earlier than Shanni for some reason, and I had to get them into someplace with an appropriate number of adult beds before nightfall. I decided to keep Layla in the house until the wish was fulfilled, using a standard hack to let them keep their wishes as I switched between houses. But somehow I managed to screw it up ANYWAY. Layla lost the wish, so the whole finagle was completely pointless, so I moved her into the new house the next morning.)