BellaOHOT Chapter 5
Simmer’s Notes: First of all, I’d like to apologize for the longer than usual hiatus. While I was waiting out my graphics card issues, World Adventures came out, and after I installed it, I wanted to wait until I sure that nothing was going to screw up Bella’s neighborhood. Between the threat of blue lots, unplayable hoods, and the Error 16 saving bug, I simply decided not to play Bella until someone (EA or MATY) got it sorted out. So I’ve been playing my Sims 2, instead. The new graphics card did WONDERS for them!
Anyway… I feel pretty confident now that I can go back to playing Bella. Nothing seems to be going wrong in my other hoods, save a little bit of lag.
I’ve done something terrible.
Well, we’ve done something terrible - Mortimer and I, that is. After years of denying ourselves and sticking to our principles, it all just kind of fell apart at the seems.
Mortimer had come over with Trent for Cassandra’s Sweet Sixteen birthday party. My little girl has grown up so fast, it seems. After cake, Trent and Cassie wanted to go to the movies. Mortimer gave them a handful of money and sent them off on their bikes. Told them to hurry home because otherwise, they would miss curfew. Not that the Sunset Valley PD was going to do anything to Mortimer Goth’s son, but he had to make it sound good to them. Set a good example.
Some example… we’ve been lying to his wife for years, to all of our family, in fact.
Watching them ride off together, waving back at us with shouts of ‘Don’t worry! We’ll be good!’ made both Mortimer and I sentimental for the past we could have had. How stupid I had been! I should have gone to him in the first place instead of falling for Cornelia’s threats of blackmail. All of our lives had been wasted because of it.
Mortimer tried to make small talk now that we were alone. How was work? How was… what was his name, Don? Are you still dating him?
“I- I w-wouldn’t call it dating,” I stammered, my eyes welling up with tears. We’d gone out sporadically, nothing serious. Don Fiorello was an okay guy, but he was no Mortimer Goth. I had feelings for him, but they were nothing like the ones I felt for Mortimer. Even after all this time.
“Oh, Bella… ” Mortimer sighed. “Don’t cry…”
He hugged me, holding me close to him, but some how, hugging became a kiss and the kiss became… something more.
After so long denying ourselves, Mortimer and I gave into temptations which had always been there and for a while - a few brief weeks - we indulged in an affair of the heart. It was, we told ourselves, what was meant to have been. What should have been.
And then one day, Mortimer called me up to say we had to talk. We met at the graveyard, like we used to as children.
“I can’t do this anymore!” we both said at once.
“I don’t like sneaking around,” I admitted to him after a moment where we both laughed over the bond we had, such that we both shared the same sentiments. “It makes me feel every bit as cheap as your mother once accused me of being.”
Mortimer’s face soured at the mention of his of his mother. “The old bat…” he murmured hatefully. Sighing, he took my hands in his own and squeezed them tightly. “And I feel horrible every time I look at Dorothy and Trent. They deserve than this.”
“You love them,” I prompted, sadly.
“Yes, I do,” he replied just as sadly. “As much as I will have love you, Bella, I love my wife as well. I let myself forget that recently, but now I feel horrible.”
I nodded my head. I understood completely, even though it was hurting me to admit it. We said good-bye, and even though we hadn’t said it, it felt like the end. It had to be the end, at least of the romance between us. Our relationship needed to change.
I decided to move on at last, for real… with Don. He always seemed to interested in coming around and spending time with me and Cassie. He was fun and attentive and … not a bad kisser, actually. He didn’t even ask me why I’d suddenly stopped calling him those couple of months ago. That much, I was grateful for. I was tired of lying to the people I cared about.
While our romance was blossoming, however, so was something else. Something that would soon become impossible to hide as the morning sickness grew stronger and my belly started to grow.
I was pregnant, and there was no doubts in my mind that it was Mortimer’s child. We had not been careful at all that first time. Every time after that, we had, but that first time, on Cassie’s birthday, we had not. And soon the results would be known.
It was with a pained heart that I finally admitted it to Don… that I was pregnant. I didn’t tell him who the father was. He didn’t ask, either, even though I knew he knew it wasn’t his.
Instead, he did the most amazing thing. He dropped to his knees and asked me to marry him. He even had a ring, like he’d been planning it all along!
I hesitated only a second or two while I gathered my thoughts, and then I said yes, letting him slip the ring on my finger. He moved in with us soon after that, saying that while I had done for myself as a single mother, having the two of us together would make all the difference to ‘our children.’
Our children. He was including Cassandra and the new little one to come as his. No questions asked. How could I refuse a man who could have so much compassion in his heart?
When I finally started to show, everyone assumed the baby was Don’s. Even Dorothy, who stopped me on the street one day to ask if Don and I needed anything for the baby. I felt so dreadful then, for leading her on as I told her, “No, but thank you so much for asking, Dorothy” and letting her give me that friendly hug.
Soon, it was time for the baby to be born. I was totally unprepared for it, but Don rushed in to save the day and get me to the hospital on time.
Welcome to the world, Alexander, my son and Mortimers.
“He has Cassandra’s eyes,” Don would later say, as we went to settle Alexander into his new nursery. But I wondered how long it would be before Don realized that those eyes weren’t Cassie’s… they belonged to their father.
Mirrored from Third Time's the Charm.