Trigger Warning: Imperfect sim face, also some language.
“Looks like the watcher purged our pictures again.”
“Well, I think that's because the save sputters out whenever save cleaner isn't run in a while.”
“Hmm, there's got to be a way to clean the save of all of the unneeded SNAP files without purging such personal keepsakes, if only I had three more lives!”
“Watch it woman, we've got to leave this blog to our kids eventually. And they'll probably have a way to do that, in a generation or two.”
“I'm not a woman, it's me, Malcolm! You should know that by now.”
“Huh. Thought I was talking to Drea this whole time. Say Malcolm... when can my wife Meghan drive again? I miss her.”
“Never! I haven't been allowed out for years.”
“You should've stayed on the downlow though, our readers are going to get confused.”
The person in Meg's body shrugs uncaringly. “Well they can just go back and read the last coupla hundred thousand words and catch up. How's that sound.?”
“Awful.”
“You're usually more fun than this, old man.”
“I want my wife back.” Dustin grumbles.
She'll be back later in the afternoon though, probably when Malcolm is losing a game of SSX3 to Casimir and can't handle the heat.
Jyoti blinks in the harsh sunlight, not used to being up so late. She has just enough time to wave Caz off to school before heading out.
She doesn't realize until she sees him that she held her breath half the way to the cemetery. Yesterday felt long enough that it could last for two weeks, but here was her reward for waiting. Malcolm ignores the greeting of someone passing by and beelines over to her as soon as he sees her.
He marches over and asks her about work. Is he nervous about today too? She sure is.
“So, this is a strange place for a ...date.”
Malcolm cuts her off, determined to make the most of things.
She gasps, “This is, the first time you ever gave me a gift like this!”
“So it's not bad, coming here?”
She shakes her head slowly. Who even knows, anymore?
This isn't the worst place to rest that he can think of, but a ghost probably can't appreciate the sunlight warming their skin the way he can.
Since Malcolm can't take her somewhere better immediately, he asks to see the memorials right away. He can't bring himself to say that he has a grave in this place. Jyo doesn't say anything either, after explaining that she's been leaving flowers for him and Emir here for so long.
I just got flowers from my favorite ghost, she thinks. She knows better than to say that out loud, he seemed sensitive to the topic last night.
Jyoti basks in the moment, and Malcolm counts the moments until he can take her somewhere else. Anywhere else. Somewhere far away, where nothing that makes him afraid to act will be waiting to separate them again.
He doesn't want to think about how many times he'd thought he was going to lose his son in his younger years, so this is a bitter moment for him actually.
He walks away when he can't be alone with his thoughts anymore.
Sensing something is wrong (or that he has wondered too close to the main gate of the graveyard) Jyo works to distract him, after that.
Normally he would feel bad, dancing on a sim's actual grave like this. But his mind in a weird place today. Just like he is not in his grave, maybe none of the people buried here are actually here, either.
Emir, for example, wanted to go to the Spring Festival. He knows his dad changed in some way yesterday, he had come home and told him what had happened as well as he could, in that shy way of his. All Emir had gathered was that his mom actually found his dad, working at that little store and that somehow, his dad had started to have a bit of life in his eyes again. Does he want to meet her, though?
He did NOT want to be wherever they went for a date. He wants to be sitting moodlily just where he is right now. He's totally not bitter about anything at all. Probably. Where has she been, all this time?
Malcolm stops playing to cry about the whomever's grave he just played frisbee on. He does feel bad, about a bunch of things.
He turns to look over all of the other people who he has outlived. Not seeing the signs of conflict.
When there's smoke, there's fire.
It was loud, anybody would have heard the yelling from across the way. Malcolm instantly recognizes her fairy best friend. They were all classmates, after all, and had shared teachers and school activities. Kevin is someone Malcolm always got along pretty well with. It was unusual to see his cool demeanor cracked by anything.
Not only has his demeanor been cracked, he's stomping his foot on the compacted ground. “He can't protect you, Jyo! If he could, he never would have left your side. The fact that he's only here because that monster you had a child with let him out should scare you greatly.”
She tilts her head for a second, not sure what Kevin is saying. “Oh please, Malcolm's not a threat to anyone. And he's coming over here- I haven't told him much yet because it's only been a day- I'm surprised you found out he was back so quickly.”
“He's not out here to have a picnic and restart your life together! And you're going to sleep with him, just go back to being his wife, like nothing ever happened between us?!” Kevin doesn't care who can hear him, this is a raw betrayal.
Jyoti watches Malcolm walk over, a look of complete serenity on his face. Why did this have to be happening now? She tries to memorize his smile before she never gets to see it again.
She talks without moving her eyes off of her husband. “Kevin, I can't process this so fast- I wasn't expecting anything like this-”
“It may be happening fast, but you're smart enough to figure things like this out.”
She feels the bite of his words but can't say anything.
Kevin thinks back to the day he proposed to Noemi, how he sought out Jyoti as if he needed her permission, as if she was going to choose him after all this time, and finds himself with an incredible anger inside. He doesn't even know who he is angry at yet.
“Excuse me, beautiful. Is this guy giving you any trouble?”
She cringes. “Um, Malcolm, this is not the best time for that.”
Kevin holds in a long, long string of swear words. He doesn't consider himself to be a possessive guy, but this was just wrong on so many levels.
Now he's forced to listen to them flirting, and Jyo won't even get her head out of the clouds long enough to look at him. As if what they just shared after years of being so close meant nothing to her.
“But I've learned not to hesitate anymore,” Malcolm was saying, “I'm not going to let you out of my sight if I can help it. Whatever things you may be going through- you need to know that I will be there.”
Dammit...
And here comes Noemi. Oblivious. Kevin was just taking his family to the park and cutting through the cemetery to get there when he'd seen Jyoti with Malcolm again.
Kevin's not sure if he cares that she sees him being so upset. Jyoti was the person who'd convinced him that humans were worth something. Everything, even, if it was the right human. He had been willing to give up everything he had to be with her, and it was all falling to pieces right in front of him.
He can't hold it together and turns his back on everything.
When Malcolm walks away for a second he whirls on her, wings beating quickly in agitation.
“You're going to pretend that nothing happened, aren't you?” He hisses.
She takes a step back. He's actually generating wind in her face. But she's never been afraid of her friend before, and she's not going to start being afraid of him now. She knows Kevin, he's a good guy, they can fix this. Somehow.
“You're going to throw it away, all of it- on a single chance that he's not going to leave you by yourself yet another time!”
“Kevin I haven't said anything like that-”
“The irony is, he may not have a choice. The vampire will be able to overpower him. If he decides he wants more Sparrow babies, he'll come back for you, and treat you like an f*ing brood mare. And you'll fall for it, the way you fell for it a decade ago. You'll pretend it's what you need and justify it, and never be able to break away from being in his power.'
“The only one who can protect you was here the whole time, it isn't Malcolm, and I know for a fact you were not thinking of him the other night. It was my name on your lips. I've always done everything I could to protect you, and you don't care!”
As Kevin screams his head off across the meadow about what a bad person she is, Malcolm can only see her beauty.
Malcolm just wants to feel the breeze on his skin. It's damned beautiful outside.
If he gives them some space, he's sure they'll be able to resolve their differences. They're really great friends.
“Kevin, I don't know what to tell you. I can't say anything you want to hear. I can't just forget my husband, it took me so long to get used to the idea of being alone without him.”
“...and then, you reminded me the other day that I don't have to be- you can't imagine how scary that was, actually letting someone in again after all the years of just coping. But someone I've always loved, and never got enough time with, has come back to me. Even if he's not the same- even if it's not really him, I have to believe in it, I'd never be able to live with myself otherwise.”
“You should know- you love Noemi-”
“No no, no- it's not the same at all. I love what she is to me, but it's not the same, she isn't you.”
Jyo takes a step back at that comment.
Kevin swears under his breath. He hadn't meant to say that to her face, especially now when she didn't deserve to know.
Dannigan stops Noemi before she can make it to her husband, who's making such a big scene in front of anyone who is in earshot. “How are you doing?”
Noemi rubs the back of her neck with her hand and takes in a long breath.
“I'm not sure...” She begins, but is interrupted by Dannigan's long sigh. “Well I'm not, my favorite pair of crocodile shoes got dust on them when the cleaning lady-”
Malcolm has breathed enough fresh air (or given them enough space while he was dancing) and comes back to the conversation. “What do you think of it... that I joined the army too? It's not my dream job, but it's a valuable service and you wouldn't be risking your life on your own that way...”
Kevin's whole face was made for this expression in this moment.
“Malcolm, you don't have to pretend you aren't hearing this conversation.” Jyoti says, bracing herself. Malcolm inclines his head, inhales deeply, and frowns.
She stumbles with her words at first. “There's a lot we haven't talked about yet...”
Eventually, Jyoti manages to clue Malcolm in to what's been going on. “Kevin and I... spent the night together. Just once, but it wasn't long ago.”
Kevin makes no effort to take the absolute look of smugness off of his face. Damn right we did.
Malcolm listens to this information mildly.
“It's not- what it looks like. Well, it is, but not how it sounds. I've always cared about Kevin, we've always been friends, never argued. But, you're back now and I'm not going to lie to you, I mean, I'm rambling. I guess... ask me anything.” She finishes.
Eventually things start clicking together. “You mean all this time, you two never...? I mean, not to be rude, but people used to joke about how you both were inseparable back in high school.”
She feels her face heat up. “We talked about dating and decided not to, back then ...you were my first.”
“And you've only been... together recently?”
She nods slowly, bracing herself. Malcolm was not the kind of guy who would get right to the point about something private. She has a flash of apprehension that she had decided to ask Kevin just to be friends, but it vanishes quickly. Even if Malcolm will never see me again, he's alive... I have to try.
Malcolm levels his gaze on her. “What about Casimir?”
Jyo's stomach drops. Here it is. “R-right. His father and I-”
“Loki. You don't have to pretend we all don't know who you're talking about.” He tries to keep the derision out of his voice and fails. “Loki, the man whose decisions made our lives a living hell. Who took away our-”
“Our chance at happiness. Yeah, I learned about that last part after Caz was born.” She recalls the sting of the encounter in France. “I didn't know he had a... history with our family. I sort of... resolved to be alone after that.”
“Fine... And, I know when we got married it was the first time for both of us, I guess I just kind of figured that you and Kevin had played around a bit, first.” He confesses. “...before we dated, but I never asked you about it as I figured it wasn't my business. Jyo, you're my business now. I'm not going to let you go so easily again.”
She feels her cheeks flush. “I told you I was too busy for that kind of thing...”
-Nevermind Kevin weaving magic spells into the conversation right in front of everyone-
Malcolm nods, taking her hand and slowly stroking the back of it with his thumb, “You did.” He hesitates, then adds, “I guess that's why Loki had to chase you when you were asleep.”
She senses it then, the hollow hopelessness there below the surface. And more, it feels like he's angry. She pulls her hand away from his slowly and nearly whispers her question. “Is it because you knew about Casimir that you stayed away?”
His still green eyes flick up towards her face but he doesn't want to tell her everything right now, when his mind is still on overdrive. “I never would have stayed away if I knew where to find you.” He says at last.
Instead of staying quiet Malcolm moves on with another immediate question. “And the astronaut thing? That was because of me?”
She shrugs. “Partially. I mean, I'd thought about it as a kid but it seemed so silly until I met you, and you encouraged me. When you died, I thought- well-” She's unable to finish her sentence.
Kevin has listened to enough and interrupts. “You didn't do that for him!”
“You did that because you were afraid of the future and you wanted to die!”
“Okay- maybe for like a second-”
“For like, the entire thing! It's all you complained about during training- 'When do you think I'll be called away on active duty- If I die Caz still has his father!'” He parrots.
“That's... a little below the belt, don't you think?” Jyo asks, shaken. She hasn't shared her self-destructive thoughts from that time with anyone else.
“This whole thing has been below the belt. That's the problem. Maker- to think I almost left my wife for you.”
Malcolm absorbs this conversation stoically, with the sense that it's happening to someone else. He wouldn't go back to living in that cold underground laboratory for any reason, but somehow when he'd gotten out he expected life to regain some of the simple promises of happiness he had so carefully clung to there, amidst the constant confusion of alternating blackness and bright lights.
Lives are damaged, and trust is fractured. How much can be rebuilt, after all of this?
Kevin stops to take a breath and Jyoti gets a few words in.
She explains, or tries to, that she was starting to have feelings for him, in that way. That she's always known he was special. That they can have that friendship again, if they want to, but she can't be with him on the deeper level that he may need now.
“That's my line, whore!” He explodes. “We mean nothing to each other from here on out, do you hear me? Nothing!”
Jyoti is effectively silenced by this line of reasoning. Later she will remember important details, such as how there was juice involved, and Kevin might have made the first move, at least he reciprocated that first fateful kiss. Details that are useless to her now as her mind has just gone blank.
Kevin turns to Malcolm in exasperation. “Do you believe this b**ch? Openly cheating on you and acting as if she can be loyal at all in the future.”
Kevin is rewarded with a frown.
Malcolm calmly waves off the fae's venom. “Kevin- it's not that simple. It's not like we were on a break. She thought I wasn't coming back in any form, ever. As far as I can see, she's trying to do the right thing now.”
“The right thing.” Kevin scoffs.
“Look, be her friend, or don't be her friend, but don't expect more than that. She's probably just as confused as you are.”
Kevin's disappointment is evident on his features. How can Malcolm not understand what's going on? Then the answer comes to him. Of course, this man has nothing to lose and everything to gain in this. Humans are still such an enigma. He has a moment of reflection- Jyo chose someone she could manipulate well, who would be more loyal to her than she deserved. Malcolm would let her get away with anything.
“She chose well, I guess.” He says in disgust. “You have no dignity.”
“I- what?” Malcolm can't pretend that he knows where that change of attitude came from.
He takes a step in front of Jyoti in case the fae decides to lay into her again. “Kevin, you should go. Give it time, okay? You both have been friends for so long, but Jyoti is my wife. You're a good person, you should be able to respect that. Go somewhere you can calm down for a while.”
“How the eff are you so calm? Don't you care about her at all?” The fae mumbles under his breath, not willing to walk away just like that.
“Of course I care. I just... I've been gone for such a long time, I- I'm ...I don't think I can talk to you about this.” He doesn't add that he really thought she'd be remarried by now. It's impossible not to have some hope in the fact that she isn't.
Kevin doesn't press it any further.
Jyoti politely asks Kevin to leave the park so she and Malcolm can play more sports games on Roaring Heights graves.
Kevin stares at her numbly, having said everything that needed to be said, and knowing that nothing else will help now.
Their friendship is over, they are barely acquaintances now.
Malcolm can't hide his enjoyment in the final moments. Jyo is willing to give up a very well established and close relationship that she's had for most of her life to try and make things work again with him. He can't tell if the feeling making him giddy and lighthearted is anything more than hormones rekindled by distance, time, and hope. He tries to reign in his excitement and keep it under control. Just because she's rejecting Kevin now does not mean that he can trust her completely. Time alone would have to determine that. But- the sound of her voice as she dismisses Kevin sends a tingle up his spine in a good way.
Malcolm is apparently turned on by everything that just happened. “Do you want to go somewhere more... secluded?” He asks, as Kevin walks away.
“Somewhere we can talk things over?” She asks, not believing for a second that he could be hinting at more.
“Or whatever,” He says casually.
And before they can decide on a place, Kevin is marching back over to them.
“Kevin, you need to back off right now.” Malcolm tells him, effectively halting his approach.
(I spend the next few moments in game canceling fairy trick interactions... and I mean, several of them in a row...)
“Malcolm, I'm so sorry for all of this. I can't take anything back that's already happened, but you should not have had to find out this way.”
He looks at her, sees the pleading expression on her face, and can only find her beautiful. He finds himself unable to fault her for anything. He smiles a small smile. “Jyo, you know I'm not by any means... a lucky guy. But right now it feels that way. I thought so many moments were my last... but to see you standing here right in front of me, to know that you still care- it means more than I can ever tell you.”
He reaches out and holds his hand for a moment, unable to say anything else. He squeezes it, and begins leading her away from the graves. “Let's find a place we can talk.”
Noemi was talking with Dannigan the entire time her husband was arguing with the woman he'd just boned right under her nose last week, and so as far as he knows, she missed all of it. She comes over to try and make him feel better with flowers, seemingly having no idea why he's upset in the first place.
Not being a complete @sshole, he accepts these without restraint.
Noemi up close. Now I see she has the same shade of green in her eyes that Jyo ended up with for no reason (pretty sure she's always had them though).
I might've been playing with genetics but didn't think it worked, this was so long ago now that I don't remember. Jyo ended up with a nose nobody has, and these eyes.
Dannigan is a diva, and so of course he carries a parrot around and teaches it to fluff up his ego. He is not the only self-important sim I've had as a townie that ended up with a giant bird in public. Maybe it's a club?
“No, I'm all out of handysnax, and you can call me Sir.”
Jyo and Malcolm don't have the energy for another coffee shop, and so just plunk down on the pavement behind the mausoleum to talk.
Malcolm surprises her by saying he can stay out longer.
“Did you want to talk about it?”
“Talk about what?”
“About where you've been, all this time.”
“No, did you?”
“Did I what?”
“Want to talk about who else you've been with?”
She hugs herself and looks over sharply. “I thought you said-”
But she sees him laughing, softly. “I'm teasing. I don't care, unless you're hurt by it then I don't care.”
She lets out a shaky breath. “...right. But Malcolm, I hope you know you can tell me anything too.”
“Mmm.”
She asks him questions that he's not sure how to answer, all she can gather is that Circe was in control of every detail of his life and Loki was not knowingly involved in his disappearance. Malcolm does not want to talk much more about Loki, although he asks how involved in parenting he is.
'Not at all', with a roll of the eyes, is a welcome answer for Malcolm's ears, and more than a little bit baffling because it was Loki's reasoning behind what he had done to Malcolm's mind in the immediate hours after his escape with Emir.
Being that Malcolm had fallen in the fire at the Beaker residence, and Circe was first to the scene, a trusted RN with seniority and experience- it was not questioned that she pronounced him dead there. Jyo learns that what actually happened is that Malcolm passed out and still has no idea where they were holding him for the bulk of his imprisonment. Somewhere... cold, he says.
The elephant in the graveyard that neither one discusses now, is their stillborn son. There is a feeling of fragility to the meeting and neither of them want to break the spell that's holding them miraculously in the same place at the same time together, after all these years. Jyoti is unsure why Malcolm hasn't said anything about him, and it makes her think back to their first conversation. It's possible that someone just filled him in, and it's a wound that remains close to her heart and hasn't gotten easier with time so she doesn't want to dig deeper and find out that he was hoping to meet their son after so long. That would be too painful right now, and Jyo feels like she failed them both, by losing their son. Over the years she's covered the pain in layers of other events, Casimir's birth, the move to Roaring Heights, the discipline of her dedicated military service. Behind all the layers still remains the raw truth of Emir's death, like an egg yolk in a very very thick shell.
Casimir's face flashes before her eyes when she is confronted with the reality of her estranged husband, alive and about as well as can be expected. She will never regret her surviving son, whose very existence provided her with courage when she thought she wouldn't be able to keep going.
At length Malcolm stands up, finishing some thought or other that's he's not going to share.
He leans over so she's sure to make eye contact with him. “I didn't... think I'd see you again either. I'm not sure why they never killed me.”
Jyoti knows. She shudders. “Live specimens are better for long term testing.” Her mother always insisted on having a cabinet full of bugs or cage full of mice for any new series of experiment. To apply her mother's way of thinking to humans, no- to Malcolm, as a specimen would be a terrifying prospect. Jyo has never properly met Circe, and so has no idea of the depths of cruelty to which she was capable, and Malcolm, entranced at the very thought that he is able to even stand in the sunlight, let alone look at his wife after the evils he suffered under the woman's care, is not about to go into the nastier details.
He stands up and she traps him lightly by not moving away from the wall. He reaches up to hold her. “Now that we've talked, you're not about to say, that you have other plans today, are you? I'm scared that if I let you go now you're just going to disappear.” She's so close to him he can't see anything else. If he were younger he would've been lost in this moment, anything that she wanted him to do he would have done for her. He closes his eyes so he can't see anything at all.
“Let's get out of here.” He says, his body betraying him as the phrase comes out in a partial groan.
She's surprised despite wanting badly to have more time with him. “Are you... sure?”
He nods and shrugs her gently off of him. “Sure let's go somewhere more fun than this.”
She grins.
They share another embrace before leaving the graveyard. This one is more solid, lingering.
He moves in to give her another compliment. “Wait.” She stops him.
“That's better. Go on.”
“You know that wherever you are, is home.”
She soaks up the compliment. How is any of this real right now?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
TLDR; Jyoti puts Kevin back into the friend zone, so he slaps her down into the acquaintance zone. After a quick phone call the next day because she has a wish to 'chat' with him, their relationship dips into the red. Malcolm, to whom Jyo could have confessed her cheating to before all of this happened, is somehow over it and she doesn't even have confess as an option now. Even though it was resolved with Kevin right in front of him, and she has a cheater reputation, Malcolm does not care.
My favorite part about this whole scene is that neither Malcolm nor Kevin are a part of the active family so it was entirely unscripted. The graveyard became a daytime hotspot or something when Jyo invited Malcolm for a date, where I was going to pose a few shots of them looking over his grave and being grateful/sad/ cautious about the future. Kevin cued up from out of sight across the lot to accuse Jyo of cheating, and he had his entire family in tow for it. He must have been really mad to have that kind of conversation in front of his wife whom he plans on staying married to.
Even better are the traits of everyone involved; Jyo is athletic and disciplined, so is Neomi (Kevin's wife). Malcolm is Shy, Brave, and Good (also Unlucky and Workaholic- well, we knew he was unlucky since the day he became involved with the Sparrows, really), Kevin is Good, Clumsy, Brave (Inappropriate and Easily Impressed). So Jyo's type is Good, Brave (and some apparently humanizing vulnerability), and Kevin's type is Athletic & Disciplined. Apparently. It was really clumsy and inappropriate for Kevin to have this conversation in front of his wife too, what a doofus. Malcolm dancing the collegiate cheer and thinking about love while Kevin screamed at her was one of the best things I've ever seen in my game to this date (again). Shy sim my ass.
Malcolm danced while they fought, then went back to flirt with her some more. Every time Kevin cued up to yell at her, Malcolm came over to chat or flirt. It was priceless.
Also his hair is a nightmare and her eyes were wrong because I must have been playing with genetics and didn't know what I was doing. She gets her real face back later, but I had no idea what I did wrong and I couldn't replay the scene.
Make it STAHPHPPP (etc)
Ugh my game... save it... rather, someone teach me how to play it properly lmao
Reminder that she was a cute toddler, though.
I managed to fix her eyes, but her nose evaded me for awhile...
Emir was born with this generic hair, and I gave him Meghan's coloring instead. In the future, if someone gets a genetic mutation that doesn't fit the family well, I'll consider it fair game to be changed, and possibly even adjust it to have slight differences so I can trace the mutation.
This would be the new title card if Kevin ever had anything useful to do in this story.
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