The Legendary Legacy of the Fairfoot Family 1.1
[ 1.0] | [1.1]
Last time, in the prologue... Daddy and his son talked about their ancestor, Pippin Fairfoot: ten generations ago, he had presumably crashed in this neighbourhood with his alien spaceship, settled here in New Ambleside and lived (or not?) to see his descendants prosper. Or not.
His son was eager to know more about this long-ago age, and Daddy had promised to tell him more in the morning..
"Well, then," Daddy said. He had an old, tattered book in his hands, which he laid upon the table before his son. "This is Pippin's diary. As you can imagine, it's mightily valuable. Please be careful."
"Where'd you get this so quickly?" asked his son, his eyes shining with excitement.
"It's always been in the possession of our family, I got it from our library this morning. Now, let's take a look..."
-- Dear child...
This book is to be a faithful reflection of your father. Your mother suggested I keep this as a diary, as it were, and I thought it a good idea, because one never knows when they might call on one.
At the time you read this, you must be fully grown already. A strange idea. Right now all you are is a little foetus in your mother's belly!
At the time you read this I will be a father. I will be your father. I hope I will have been a worthy father, I hope I will have got to spend enough time with you, my dear child, for I asked your mother to give this book to you when I am gone. I am certain that she will be around for you far longer than I can, and although that grieves me, I know that she will take very good care of you and, eventually, your children.
I am writing this for you in the hope that you will forgive me for my probably not being around very much during your childhood.
I suppose that now, you would like to know more about how you came about. All children are interested in the time before their birth, the time when they weren't there yet. I shall start by telling you about how I met your mother.
Not long after I arrived, I went to a little café. It was a sweet little café and we will have gone there many times after it. But that time I looked with the eyes of a tourist, the eyes of someone who sees everything for the first time.
And there she was. I met many other people that day, some of them friends, others not so much. But Adrienne was the highlight of my day: I felt as if I was hit by two lightning bolts at once when I set eyes on her.
My first interaction with her was a romantic one. Somehow I felt driven to flirt with her again and again, completely contrary to my shy nature. It was just casual romancing but deep inside I felt that she appealed to me very much.
I think she felt the same way about me.
In the days that followed she walked by every morning. Of course I couldn't let her slip away, so I would greet her and she would stay for a good portion of the day and evening.
Sometimes we would spend our evenings dancing awkwardly, and very careful not to stand on the other person's toes.
We would then say goodbye just as awkwardly in twilight.
Another time we would kiss on my doorstep and go out for dinner.
Oh, we were doing great together.
And then one day, while we were dining out and her smile was so sweet.. I'd been thinking about it for days...
You can imagine her face when I popped the big question!
Of course she was only too happy to belong to me and my house. So from that moment on, your fate was sealed, dear little one. Adrienne was to become your mama!
She moved in with me and I quickly found that her woman ways were different from mine.
My delicious peanut butter and mushroom pancakes nauseated her. I had never before seen anything like it.
But when she told me she was pregnant, she made me a very happy Sim. I will become a father and I can't deny that I feel very proud of her already. And I want you to know, so this is why I am writing this for you.
I think I am going to make her one of my special bluebell spaghetti for her tomorrow. With sauce.
Also I am happy to tell you that I witnessed a star falling down yesterday night. I take it for a sign of something good, and I made a wish.
This would probably be a good moment to tell you about the house as it is now, because it is bound to change a lot in a few days. I still have the photographs from when I first moved in. Here they are.
[Note from Nimi - the previous, brightly coloured photographs were not included in Pippin's diary, so Daddy and his son never got to see them. You, however, have the exclusive insights in the founder's life. :D The following photographs of the house were included, as you will see.]
It was spring when I arrived; and the many downpours were quite unsettling to me at first. Fortunately my roof did a good job of keeping the rain out.
This is the living room. There is room for a little hall as well, and the stairs are already there. But they lead to nowhere for now.
And this is the rest of the house.
We have adorned it a little more since then, though! There is a telescope, a side table and a plushy giraffe. Adrienne calls the giraffe a necessity.
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"Wow," said the little kid from the eleventh generation in wonder, after scrutinizing the ancient pictures, "It's the same house! But it has changed so much."
"Look at the little light bulb. And the oven! And he didn't even have cupboards!"
"His bed rests on a crappy couch!"
They looked at eachother in amazement.
"I'll bet you're glad to live in this day and age, aren't you?" Daddy ruffled through his son's hair. "We are practically living in the lap of luxury, we have long forgotten what it's like to struggle for money."
His son marvelled at the thought, Daddy wasn't sure if he really grasped the idea. 'He'll learn soon enough,' he thought, 'seeing as we've now lost all of our family money too.. and selling old possessions won't last forever...'
The child started to flip the pages, looking for more story to read. But Daddy gently took it out of his hands and shut it. The old spine made a crackling noise.
"That's for another time. You want to make the stories last as long as possible, don't you? There's much more, but it's more fun in small portions like these."
"Hmm," his son grumbled a little, "okay then."
"And don't you ever sell it," Daddy said, "however tight you are for money. You just don't sell the diary of your legendary ancestor."