Chapter 5-13: Youth Knows No Pain

                Either age had taken a toll on Camille’s mental well-being or she was just too old to care anymore. One thing is for sure, the cold air of the fridge felt good!

                Even though she had certainly worked long enough to earn a pension, Camille was unwilling to retire just yet. She couldn't imagine sitting around the house with nothing to do. So when the department received a call that there was some shady dealings going on in an abandoned warehouse, she jumped in her cruiser and headed on over.

                “Donovan, there’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you,” she sat with him the next morning, finally ready to fess up. “I don’t know where to start. I’ve been keeping something from you, for years now.”

                “You mean, the secret that you’re an undercover super spy?”

                She gasped. “How did you know that?”

                “Honey, I’m a reporter, it’s what I do.”

                He held her close as they lay down to nap together. He’d known for years. For being such a computer whiz, she’d never thought to cover her tracks at home and that endeared her to him that much more because he knew that she trusted him completely.

                “I love you, you know that,” Neal whispered, resting his head against hers.

                “I love you too,” she replied breathlessly.

                “Wow, you really do have an awesome view,” she said as he came up behind her, wrapping his arms around her. Neal had often voiced his love for living in the city because of the amazing view he had of the rest of St. Claire.

                She turned in him, kissing him a little more passionately. “We have the house to ourselves for the first time.”

                Pushing him towards the bed, she tugged at his shirt then removed her own. “Wait, are you sure that this is what you want?”

                She reached behind her and unclasped her bra. “I’m sure.” She wasn’t, not really but she knew she loved him and she knew she didn’t want to stop what they were already doing. This was just the next logical step. She silenced any lingering doubt by pressing herself into him and feeling his lips meet hers in barely restrained desire.

                And then it was too late to wonder if she was sure anymore.

                “Camille, did you leave something in the oven?”

                “Hahah, yay!”

                “Camille, get out of the way before you burn!” Donovan was definitely starting to question his wife’s sanity.

                “Renata’s what wrong?” Her friend had arrived on the doorstep in her workout clothes. Renata never left the house looking less than put together and her red eyes were dead giveaways that something wasn’t right.

                “Grandma,” her voice broke. “She died! I called, an ambulance and, they, got her, to the hospital, but it was too late.” She managed to get the sentence out between tears and hiccups. Evangeline pulled her into a hug. “The social worker showed up at the hospital to let me know they’d get me “settled” until I came of age to live on my own. I ran away.”

                “Come with me.” Evangeline lead her tear stained friend through the house to her mother and explained the situation. “Please, can she stay here? We graduate soon anyway.”

                Camille pulled the young girl into a hug and nodded a silent yes to her daughter. She wasn’t about to let a young girl go to a group home after losing her grandmother and the house she grew up in when they had plenty of room here.

                “So, you and Neal, huh?” Evangeline had told Renata her secret, hoping to get her mind off things. “How was it?”

                “Um, I dunno. It felt good! But it was kinda awkward too. I wasn’t really sure what I was supposed to be doing exactly and I was nervous that my face would look funny!”

                “Aren’t you worried?”

                “About what?”

                “Getting pregnant, of course. Did you guys use protection?”

                “No. I mean yes. I mean we did, I’m not worried.” The more she thought about it though, the more nervous she got. What if he didn’t use it right? What if it broke and he didn’t tell me? What if there was a hole? Maybe I’ll be one of the 3%. What would I do with a baby? She tried to push it out of her mind but with each push she gave it, the fear latched on a little tighter.

                Camille awoke late one night, thinking she heard a noise. She crept quietly down the stairs where she saw a burglar attempting to break into the house. Creeping through the side door, she went around and surprised them from behind.

                “Take that you filthy thief. Teach you to break into a cop’s house. Tell your buddies this house is off limit.” She leaned over and gave the stray cat a treat for being a good sidekick and went back up to bed, her work done.

               

                Brushing her teeth, Evangeline started to feel a little odd. Suddenly, she felt the bile hit the back of her throat and she tossed her toothbrush down and lunged for the toilet.

                She made it just in time. Please don’t let this be what I think it is.

                After a week of nausea, she finally realized that she needed to talk to Neal. She called him up and asked him to meet her over by the school.

                “Oh Watcher Neal, I’m sorry but I think I’m pregnant. I’ve been throwing up and, I mean, I know you said we were being safe but what now?”

                “Your dad is going to kill me.”

                “That’s your first reaction,” she shrieked, maddened that he was more worried for himself.

                “Well, yeah. You’re dad’s a big guy! I’m not worried about us, we’ll figure something out,” her heart melted a little as he took her hands.

                She finally decided that she needed to fess up to her parents. She was terrified to see the look on her daddy’s face when she told him so she caught her mom alone to ask for her help and advice. Camille was not happy with her daughter, at all.

                “I thought we taught you better than that. You should have come to me first Evangeline.”

                “I know mom. I just, I thought…”

                “You thought you were capable of handling the consequences.”

                Well, no. I didn’t think that far ahead.”

                “I’ll make an appointment to see Dr. Brenner when he can squeeze you in.”

                “Mom, can we,” Evangeline started, unsure of how to ask her mother to keep this from her husband.

                “Keep this a secret from your father until we know for sure? Absolutely. I don’t want to deal with that if we don’t have to either.” She gave her daughter a small smile of reassurance. Whatever she needed to do for her children, she’d do.

                After school the next day, Neal dropped by the house while Evangeline was away in her journalism club. He wanted to talk to Donovan alone. Hopefully, Mr. Matter would be home. He was, in fact, home, working on another article. He invited Neal into his study.

                “Sir, um” Neal cleared his throat. “I, uh, I’d like to.”

                “C’mon kid, spit it out already.”

                “I wanna ask for your permission to marry Evangeline,” he finally blurted.

                “You what? Wanna marry my daughter? Aren't you a little young to be thinking about this?”

                “Maybe, but we love each other. I just wanted to get your blessing before asking her.”

                “Oh thank the Watcher,” Camille exclaimed as she and Evangeline left the doctor’s office. Evangeline wept tears of joy into her hands. The doctor had told her that she was not pregnant. The nausea was just a case of upset nerves and stress. She had spent so much time obsessing over whether she could be pregnant that she had stressed her body out enough to psychosomatically produce pregnancy symptoms. She couldn’t wait to tell Neal!

                As a family, they all went to the spring festival that following weekend. Graduation was soon approaching and everyone wanted to spend time together while they still could, before grown up jobs and obligations prevented such outings.

                As they all danced, competing for Spring Queen and King titles, Neal dropped to one knee in front of everyone and proposed to her. Emerson was not quite pleased that his sister was getting engaged before she’d even graduated high school. How ridiculous? She’s never even kissed another boy. How does she know that’s the one she should marry?

                “We want you all to know how very proud we are of you.”

                “That being said, we know you’re graduating soon and we’re hoping that you’re looking into colleges. We had some schools mail us some information and we both hope you’ll look through and, maybe, decide to attend a university.”

                “Please, just apply,” Donovan added. “Just to know what your options are.” He tried not to look directly at Evangeline but she knew he was referring most especially to her.

                The three of them took the brochures out on the porch to go over them and fill out some questionnaires.

                “What’d you put for number 13?”

                “C.”

                “It’s not multiple choice,” Emerson rolled his eyes at his sister. “Help a brother out.”

                “Help yourself. Your grades are just as good as mine.”

                “Sheer luck. I think the teachers think I’m cute.”

                A few weeks later, they each received a large envelope. Unsurprisingly, they’d all been accepted with partial scholarships, all to the same school. Rahter surprising however was how well Emerson had done; better than both of the girls.

                “How’d you do it,” Renata asked, a little embarrassed that her scores were the lowest.

                “Sent them a picture,” he winked.

                In what seemed like no time at all, high school graduation arrived as well as their birthdays. Camille and Donovan had planned a spectacular birthday party for them and had promised to stay fairly out of sight for the night. Emerson took over the rented DJ booth while the girls grabbed the guys and danced until their feet hurt.

                Emerson was the first to blow out his candles. He was definitely going to be ladies’ man. He may have gotten the best scores from the university but that just meant he’d have more time for parties.

                Evangeline was next. Graduation, getting married, university; the world was at her fingertips.

                Donovan had even picked up a cake at the store for Renata. She stood there, surrounded by her surrogate family, blessed that they had taken her in and treated her like one of their own.

                Camille and Donovan presented their kids with laptops as graduation/university presents.

                “Don’t think we forgot you,” Camille said, handing Renata her own laptop.

                The next day, the group headed down to City Hall for the commencement speech and to receive their diplomas. All three were ecstatic to be done and well on their way to starting their next adventure in life.

                Camille snapped a picture to hang on her wall, to keep while they were away from her.

Chapter 5.12                                                                                                                                                                                 Chapter 6.1

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I guess the chapter wasn't long at all. Not really much longer than normal. Just more pictures than normal.

When Renata moved in, all the teens only had 3 days left in their age bracket. I didn't know the game "found homes" for children if their family members die. Story Progression originally put her with Pearl and Joshua for some reason though, as far as I know, she's not particularly close with any of them. I moved her to the family with cheats to avoid the money she'd bring and, when Genevria actually kicked the bucket, I MCed out the inheritance funds she gained. So she's earned no money for the family and is just another mouth to feed and care for. Laptop and all.

As for Camille's dementia, I have no clue what the hell is going on with that. After she aged up, I caught her walking around the house completely naked. What you don't see in that shot is that Emerson is just on the other side of the counters. She also laughs at fires (which apparently this house is fire prone) and, the next fire that occurred she ran downstairs, laughed at it until the others put it out, THEN pulled out the extinguisher and...sprayed herself in the face. I have no clue what's going on. Is this normal for elders? The only other elders I had in my game were Shane and Carrie and they seemed normal.

For those of you concerned about Emerson and Sasha:

Though I suppose if you don't think marriage will stop him, a baby might. I assure you, he has no interest in raising anyone's baby at the moment, especially one that's not his own.

Also, Neal aged up with everyone too. Here's his lovely, I-just-became-an-adult face.