Chapter 59 - Changes--Mostly Bad On Spooky Day (or All Hallow's Eve, as is the true name of this holiday) I was persuaded by my mother to dress up as a cowgirl. I have never been and never want to be a cowgirl, and fail to see the value of dressing up as a cowgirl, but there you have it.
Mother then drove me around town, and I requested candy from strangers. Naturally, the odds of being accosted while going door-to-door are quite frighteningly high, so I decided to take candy only from distant family members. My first stop was Vickie French, my great-grandfather's daughter.
After some time, I tired of candy and "hung out" at Juana's house for the rest of the evening. Her family is part of a Jacoban church that doesn't allow modern holidays like Spooky Day. I gave her 1/2 of my candy as compensation.
All in all, the night was quite fun, so I decided to try out a few other "teenage" activities. Such as sliding down the banister of the stairs, with mixed results.
Our school's prom took place the next night. I invited no one, since there are no boys not-related to me in our school and--as much as I respect my mother's "way of life"--I have no romantic attraction to members of my gender.
I now wish I had remained at home and watched the last season of Doctor Who instead of attending this event. First, some mean girl threw punch on Juana, so I threw a
real punch at her face, and it turned into quite the ruckus. Once that ended, Juana asked me to help her with her makeup in the ladies' room, but when I turned on the sink to wash the makeup stains off my hands it sprayed water all over me! The last straw was that a really cute boy from another school came to the dance, and laughed at me when I asked him if he had heard of Rosetta Classic!
At least my assorted family banded together to elect me Prom Queen. I suspect this is more of a joke than anything else, because they know full well that I find Prom Queen to be a stupid and sexist title meant to judge girls by their beauty, not intellect. I took the crown anyway, as compensation for the immeasurable hurt dealt to me at the dance.
By the time I arrived home, having left the dance early and walked back without waiting for Juana's mother to pick us up, Grandfather Nicholas and Father were in a huge fight! I received the details from Grandmother later, who had heard a few shouted comments about "she's my daughter too" and "like you've ever acted like her father," followed up by "I'd be a better parent than Kara, that--(names omitted for sake of decency)." At this point, Grandfather Nicholas felt it necessary to teach Miles, who I have stopped calling Father so he doesn't get any ideas, a lesson.
I tiptoed past the conflict, and instead defeated my first challenger in the Sunset Valley chess tournament, Emma Hatch. She was pregnant at the time, and a puddle of water trailed her path to the chess room, but I hoped to just make it through the game before she "popped."
Alas, it was not to be so. She broke just as I took her queen and began screaming several uncouth terms while clutching her stomach. I remained calm and called Grandfather Nicholas to drive her to the hospital.
Have I mentioned that Mother and Aunt Rosa have recently become obsessed with reading? They even started their own book club, called the Polar Bear Book Club. Unsurprisingly, they were the only ones left reading after a while--everyone else had frozen.
Thus, the Polar Bear Book Club became the Coffee Shop Book Club, and membership skyrocketed. They meet every other Thursday to read and drink tea, followed up by a discussion and gossip.
Aunt Rosalia aged up at one of these book clubs, and decided on a completely new look to go with her job. Apparently she got this huge part in a major motion picture and is playing an alien spy-diva who seduces and attempts to assassinate the protagonist, then falls in love with him and sacrifices her life for him, at which point he commits suicide for love of her and they end up together in the afterlife. Quite cheesy, in my opinion.
For curiosity's sake, I'll show you the costume she wears in the big movie. Quite hardcore, but also very cheesy, as aforementioned. I miss her boho days, personally--when she pranced around with flowers in her hair and sprouting up in her wake.
Speaking of Aunt Rosa (again--have you noticed that Rosa and Rosetta are quite similar?) she and Mother have been spending lots of time together. They have been best friends since they were very young children, after all, but it seems like they drifted apart recently, only to come back together now. They go swimming together every morning, whatever the temperature.
In the evenings, they spend time either in book club, the coffee shop, or the diner. They always invite me to come, but I'm very busy with logic challenges, despite sometimes wanting to accompany them quite badly. I'll have fun in my young adult years, but being a teenager is all about hard work!
At the time of the earlier picture, I was busy playing chess with Miles. We could have gotten through the game very quickly, but he kept stalling! "
Are you sure you can move that pawn there, it doesn't look quite right. Do you think we should be spending more time together? Is your mom telling you not to treat me as your father?"
After several hours of such rambling, I finally broke. "
I don't see you as a father because you have always been more of a housemate than a father, and it's not like you're married to Mother, and you barely had a hand in artificially impregnating her, and thus creating me, at all. Now can you please shut up and finish the chess game so I can get to the next opponent!"
Any
normal pixelated person would have taken the extremely broad hint and lost the chess game before going to their own room. However, Miles chose to complain that he was too tired to continue, but instead of going to bed he followed me up to my room and sat in the rocking chair complaining about how tired and hungry he was, and how living here ruined his life!
At that moment, I truly wanted him to die. He was already over 100, and Grandfather had only been 94! Why couldn't Grim have taken this useless idiot instead? I closed my eyes and pretended to go to sleep, sending a silent message to Grim all the while--"
Please, please take him away and let things to back to the way they should be."
After a few hours, I gave up and snuck down to the kitchen, where I made myself a few pots of coffee and sat up with the eleventh doctor. At that moment, Grim chose to act.
And so did Mother.
At the knowledge that Miles had finally died, she asked Bianca to move in--or began to, anyway. But Bianca ran off to "her new job!" Mother searched frantically, all over town, at every venue that needed a proprietor. All day, all night, with no success.
Twelve hours later, she decided to make one last, futile attempt to locate the new proprietor in town. This is something I never thought my mother would attempt, and these photographs are definitely going on the Simnet!
But in the end, it all paid off. She found Bianca, and invited her back over to our house to ask her to
please, please, please move in.
