They’d gone to the library, all four of them. They needed another planning meeting and Lucie wanted to look up the history of the town, especially the Arbuthnot Estate. Rafe was reading up on the racing history of Two Lakes (the library was strong on local history for some reason), Leo was learning how to make cocktails and Amber was mining history books for ideas to adapt in her next novel.
“Anyone else hungry?” Lucie said eventually, putting her book away. “I am! There’s lots I want to say at the meeting – shall we eat and talk?”
“We can’t go on living here once we’ve opened it up as a gallery. So I was thinking about us moving onto the Arbuthnot Estate. There are so many empty houses there. But we need to find out who owns them and then we can put an offer in on them. Old Tench might know – or Artie, or Bess Preston.”
“That’s a great idea Lucie – and I’ve got another one to add to it. I think we should buy them all from the original owners. And then hold them corporately and sell them to whoever wants to live there. I think we’ll get people wanting to move here as the place comes back to life. Especially with Chas wanting to start a stud farm off, and get horses back here too.”“How would we do that? Get three valuations and make an offer on the average? Will people want to sell?”
“I don’t see why not. Most families must have given up hope of ever seeing any money back from these houses. They won’t be worth much, but a little is better than nothing.”
“I tell you what I thought as well,” said Amber. “We should get Marcus and Annette to do vineyard tours and wine tastings. If we can offer an art gallery, vineyard tours, stud tours at Chas’s place – and have you seen Minnie’s latest thing as well? Her builders (tr: Dan and his mates!) are finished now…”“You’re right, Amber,” Leo said. “If we can put together half a dozen reasons to come here, do some publicity…”
This had started off as just their own vision, Rafe thought. But now it was spreading to include everyone.
Like all the houses on the Arbuthnot Estate, this one was a bit the worse for wear.“That one’s the Puritan,” Clara had told them. “It’s ‘a comfortable, well-planned home of the popular Dutch Colonial type.’ To quote the catalogue. Original price, one thousand, nine hundred and forty-seven.”
“Nice big sitting room,” Rafe said. “Plenty of space for the children to play in when we get round to having some.” He hugged her. Just to remind her of the fun they were going to have making the babies.“Nice and light too,” Amber added. “And on a cosier scale than the gallery.”
“This would be a nice-sized kitchen,” Leo said. “And we could make a garden, grow our own herbs. Clara says there’s three of these Puritan models, so we should look at the others as well.”Lucie had been reading the catalogue as well. “I hope you’ve noticed that ‘the kitchen has light and air from both sides and is very conveniently arranged.’ Well, it’s certainly easy to reach the sink. Let's look at the bedrooms.”
Amber was looking through the hole in the wall at the back bedroom. “That room looks nice too, Lucie.”“It is. Nice big size, windows on two walls. And a built-in closet! Major modern thing for the time it was built.”
“I can see Clara’s house from here,” Rafe said to Amber from over by the window. “It’d be nice to be living in a proper neighbourhood where you know people. We can always do city holidays if we feel the need for a change of scene.”
“There’s only one bathroom,” Leo said thoughtfully, “but this room’s easily big enough to build an en-suite. We could enlarge that closet. And even the third bedroom is big enough for a double bed – or two children’s beds in case there really is something in the water here!”“Let’s check out the other two houses as well,” Lucie said from behind him.
“I bet this one has no bathroom at all,” Leo said, looking at the heap of rubbish in the garden.“Not even taking the bet. But I’d love to live this close to the water,” Lucie said longingly.
“Mind you don’t fall down those stairs,” Ralph said considerately. “I liked the other house better – what about you?”
“I like you even better.” Amber loved Rafe’s protective side. He showed it just enough to make her feel watched over, sheltered, but not smothered. “I can’t believe it took me so long to realise it. Lucie knew how she felt about Leo months ago.”“Well, at least we both realised it simultaneously. Think of all the agony we were spared. Oh, and that reminds me: talking of agony, I’ve got something to tell you all. No, you’ll have to wait until Lucie and Leo are in the same room as us. Next house!”
None of them were impressed by the outside of the third house.“We’ll still have to clear all this up,” Lucie said. “We’re not going to want to live next door to it.”
“Aargh!” Leo said. Because she was right.
“You were going to tell us something. Something about agony…”“Oh yes,” Rafe said. “This is something I did last couple of times I was over in Newborough. See, I didn’t see why Maddie should get away scot-free from ripping Frank and Honey off, and then probably going and doing just the same to someone else. And I figured her most likely target would be her last husband’s family. So I got in touch with them via a colleague of an ex-colleague of ours – not hard: Stephen Hatter was a quite well-known businessman in certain fields – and told his son what Maddie had done here. He found that very interesting…”
“Sneaky, big brother,” Leo said admiringly. “Why was that so interesting?”
“Well…”
And Rafe’s face grew stern. “She’d turned up. Full of a story about how she’d given all her savings to her stepson to help him do up his dilapidated house (described it to a T, in case they ever looked at it) but then his jealous girlfriend had turned her out and refused to give any of it back, had actually spent all of Maddie’s money on herself…I gave Stephen’s son names and addresses, references to check up on the story, Artie, Bess, Marcus, and said he’d be welcome to come here and meet Frank and Honey. I think I’ve spiked her guns nicely there.”“I could kiss you,” said Amber – and did! Leo looked away tactfully.
“Look what Minnie’s opened!” Amber said. “A whole new shop. She said she figured it was about time. Three new couples getting married, there’ll be more babies on the way. Save you having to go all the way to Newborough…Let’s go and look inside. I haven’t yet.”
Rather predictably, Amber headed over to check out the bookshelves and Lucie the artwork. Leo was thinking about something else.“There’s one thing we’re absolutely going to have to get sorted out before we can open and that’s the gas station. We won’t get anyone here without it.”
“Nor for any racing Chas gets going either. And Marcus would find it a great help for transporting his wine and visiting potential buyers. He wouldn’t have to be paranoid about his fuel gauge all the time. We should get him in on financing that. But first, if we’re talking about opening a business, let’s go and…”
“Talk to Minnie!” Leo said, finishing his brother’s sentence.
“So that’s what we’re thinking,” Leo said in conclusion. “About another year – give or take – and we’ll be opening. Art gallery, gym, restaurant. Vineyard tours. Stud Tours. Bookshop up at our end.”“And I’m aiming to have a nice little street of shops, for people to spend money as well. Souvenirs for sure, postcards, toys in the one I’ve just opened and children’s books there. I reckon you’re right and now’s the time to start looking at getting that gas station opened. Wouldn’t hurt to refurbish it a bit.”
“Right, we’re agreed then. Carry on getting this place ready for opening. Create some studio spaces – for ourselves to start with, and then for others to use too. Get the bookshop ready to rent out to someone. Get the restaurant ready at Leo’s place. Oh, and do up those two houses in our spare time.”“Piece of cake,” Lucie said. “You missed out doing our own painting, writing, sculpting, making that seating for the church…”
“Piece of cake,” Rafe said.
Caleb was right about the crops I was growing. Miss Kirk was right about me not applying my intelligence to things.“There’s nothing wrong with having a romantic side to your nature,” she said briskly. “There are marriages that have failed because of a total lack of romance, because of an over-pragmatic approach to a relationship. But your romantic side shouldn’t be in the driving seat when it comes to practical problems.”
I was going to give this one more go. And it was something that Old Tench and Artie had said, months and months ago, that had given me the idea.
“Remember Victoria and Albert’s honey? That was good honey. Best in the neighbourhood. I reckon it was all them flowers in her garden…”
First things first. I would harvest these – they’d be okay for fertilizer at least. And it would save me fishing time too.
I suspect I’m going to have a lot to learn about bee-keeping. I strongly suspect I’m going to get stung. But honey ticks Caleb’s boxes – practical first. It’s small. I can transport it on my bike. People will buy it – Minnie says she’ll happily stock my honey, which wasn’t what she said about my pumpkins. And when we start getting visitors to the town, I can start selling it to them as well – local lavender honey. I need to tidy up round here though if I want visitors to be able to come to the farm and maybe do tours like Marcus and Chas are planning.
These weeds have to go for a start-off. And this building needs painting too.
And Miss Kirk was right about something else as well. I’ve just been camping out here, getting by on Lachlan and Marianna’s hand-me-downs. I could make this place into a home. My home, not some fantasy. It’s been hard, letting go of those childhood dreams, but Miss Kirk has helped me sort out the childish from the childhood.“You’ve found your grandparents’ farm. You are bringing it back to life,” she’d pointed out. “But that doesn’t mean going back in time to re-create it as it was then. You need to live your own story, not try to relive theirs.”
Okay, here goes! Clean boxes are essential…
Let’s try and calm the bees down a bit first though.
I was right about getting stung!
Hey, how about this? There’s finally some honey on the supers!
And in this hive too. Look! Real honey!
Honey. And beeswax too – Minnie says that will sell as well, though probably not here yet, not until the visitors start coming. But Julie-in-Newborough will know who’ll take it, so Minnie’ll organize that for me.
And she’s given me some sample boxes to pack it all in. I just need to look through them and decide which ones will work best. Maybe not that sad-faced one at the top! But the happier ones – and we could also pack the honey as a romantic gift. Put a ‘You’re as sweet as honey’ gift tag on some of the boxes.Finally, I think I might be getting somewhere with my life.
Blake and his house were made by Jessabeans. Link here for Blake
https://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html?assetId=9352926
and here for the house
https://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html?assetId=9352888
which I tweaked slightly to fit in with the landscape and the story.
The art gallery was made by CycloneSue at TSR. So were most of the dilapidated bits!
Sandy at ATS3 made so many of the shop and home objects (if I listed them all, we’d be off the page). And she also made the heap of rubbish with the bath on it and several others too.
