thank you, part 2

December 2087. Vale Akiyama is 27, Vicky Garth is 23.

previously: throwaway girl // real music, part 3 // Thanksgiving // the worst show ever

The show was the worst. Vale was booked on a Thursday night, the week before Christmas, playing a holiday party for an investment firm. Old, stuffy financial people. Young brown-nosing financial wannabes. He couldn’t say no, because the bank manager was the wife of his club manager, who basically pimped him out for the night. 

A paycheck is a paycheck, right? Well, maybe not always. 

"Can't you play more Christmas music? Can't you make it a little more festive? No, not that Christmas music... No, that’s too loud... No, that’s too fast... Can you just, like, put this album on?"

The lights were garish, and the decor was nauseating. They asked him to wear red and silver. Vale hated wearing red. He was pretty sure he hated Christmas forever now, too. 


When it was over, nobody wanted any autographs. Nobody asked about any upcoming songs—he had nothing new ready, anyway. He never wanted to disappear until tonight. He changed out of that jacket and into the most nondescript plain black hoodie he owned. 

He got on the train like every other nobody in town, and he went home. 

Bored and disappointed and scrolling for a funny meme, it was a mistake to check his messages. Seems like the bank manager Instagrammed the disaster of an event and tagged him in it. Ugh, why?

“Lame show, dude.” 

“Oh my God, what were you wearing?”

"Jingle bell, jingle bell, jingle bell rock.... Not!"

When he got home, he didn't put on any music, he didn't turn on the TV, and he didn't make himself a cup of green tea and take it to the keyboard to wring out any last drops of creative genius. 

His latest review called him a rising star. Again. Still rising. Eternally rising. How long can a star continue to rise and yet fail to become risen? His life hung in limbo, and he wanted more. He wanted an entire life upgrade. More in every way. 

When he stepped out of the spotlight, when the crowds had dispersed, when it was finally quiet, he felt lonely sometimes. Granted, he was a man who valued his space and independence. But it got lonely. Especially after shows like that one, when he felt like he was doing everything wrong. This time of night, when his friends and family were paired up and settled down. When some girlfriend he'd talked to once or twice, for whatever short time she stuck around, felt too shallow. When all he really wanted, corny as it might sound, was a good long hug. 

He wanted someone to make him laugh, make him furious, light a fire in his gut. 

He scanned past all the anonymous fan mail for Vicky's name.

Two voicemails and a text. 

1.) Get a new number, you turd. 

2.) An epic tirade, “So I was on the island and learning all this cool shit, but then I came home, back to the real world, and I’m like, I better make something useful of myself. So I liked herbalism and thought, pharmacy school? But it’s basically pre-med lite, which I quit for a reason. Ugh. What even is my life? Do you think I’d be a total flake if I dropped out? Again? Maybe don't answer that. But I don't know why I'm so hung up on this doctor thing. I grew up thinking that's what I should do. Actually... I kind of remember, when I was little, my mom would be holed up in her dark bedroom and I would bring her a glass of water, and she was like, "You're such a caring girl, I don't deserve you." Ha! Shows how much she knew me! I'm like the least caring person alive. And she was like, never even awake, so what could she know? And you know, now that I’m older, I kind of think…” 

He was actually very curious about the rest of that sentence, but it got cut off because her message was a novel and his inbox was full. Damn. 

He deleted a bunch of fan mail—hate mail—to make room for the next time she wanted to write a novel in his voicemail. 

3.) And finally, she sent a text that said, “Yeah, well, never mind.” 

But he didn’t want to never mind. He wanted to hear all about her shitty childhood, and how many gnats were infesting in her strawberry plants, and which TV show she watched before bed and all the ways it was terrible, and what she dreamed about at night.  

It was late, but he texted her anyway. 

Vale: You awake?

Vicky: No, what time is it? 

She was awake enough to text without misspelling anything, so he called her. 

“Hey, I said I was sleeping.” 

Her voice sounded dreamy, cozy, warm. 

“So pretend you’re dreaming about me,” he said.

“Ha, I was dreaming about cake. Are you feeding it to me?”

“I would,” he said.

“Okay. You can be in the dream then.”

“Tonight was the worst.” He told her all about it, every ugly detail, the sequined jacket, the Instagram tag, the hate mail. 

“Aww, baby," she cooed. "You’re past your prime. You’ll be playing at bingo night next summer.”

Maybe she wasn't far off. After tonight's dud of a show, maybe it was all downhill from here. 

“Vale, kidding," she said. "You’ll make up for it next weekend. New Year’s Eve. You’ll rock everybody’s socks off.”

“Just their socks?”

“What kind of show are you hoping for? I think you might need a special license for that kind of show.”

“Ha. Too bad you’re not here. I actually have cake in the fridge.”

“You tease,” she said. 

“Nah, I’m not teasing. Come get it. It’s all yours.”

“Yeah?” A long pause, but he could hear her breathing on the other end. He liked to imagine she was considering it. He sometimes liked to let himself imagine that she wanted to be here as much as he wanted it. Probably she was just falling back asleep. “Well, bummer you’re so far away then,” she said. 

“Right, bummer," he said. "So, what are you doing for New Year's?”

“Uh, nothing, probably. April is working and Beau is home with the baby. Blossom and George are home with the baby. Blair and Amy are home with their cat, probably making a baby. I guess I need new friends. Or a husband and a baby.”

“Is that what you want then? Pick up the next dude you meet, wedding, baby, white picket fence with a dog in the yard?”

She laughed. “Ew, no dog.”

“Oh, right, I remember you hate puppies.”


“Well, it wouldn’t be like, tomorrow," she said. "And I am extremely picky about my dudes. But someday, I guess. Why not? Do you really think you’ll still be a nightclub playboy when you’re forty-five?”

“Who knows? But if you’re not married and pregnant by this weekend, do you want to come out here instead? We can do the New Year's stuff, get a curry, you can come to my show.”

“Won’t I just cramp your style?”

“See? You do think I’m stylish.”


“Okay. Merry Christmas, that’s my present to you. I think you’re a little bit stylish, sometimes, in the right light.”

“Thanks,” he said. “But it’s not as glamorous as you probably think it is. It actually sucks sometimes.”

“Why? You don’t have any models to fuck tonight?”


“Vicky, there are no models. I've only ever been with one model, and you scared her off at Thanksgiving.”

“What? That’s not my fault. How is that my fault?”

“Well, I don’t know what you said to her, but she never called me back.”

“Ha ha, maybe you’re the one who said something.”

“I didn’t say anything.”


“Maybe that’s the problem," she said. "Maybe you were supposed to say more. Or maybe you’re not as hot in bed as you think.”

“Wouldn’t you like to know?”

“Heh, I think we’re in your dream now, buddy.”


Sometimes it felt like play, and sometimes he didn’t feel like playing. Sometimes she brushed him off so hard and so many times, he believed she really meant it. Maybe she did mean it.

Vale did want Vicky to adore him. She was right about that, but he wasn’t playing games. She was also wrong, though, because he knew exactly what he’d do if it happened. Sadly, he doubted she would ever adore him. He often questioned whether she even liked him at all, and she certainly wouldn’t admit to it if she did.

He wondered why he bothered. Why? Well, why does anybody want to be loved? He couldn’t leave her alone. Next to Vicky, everyone else in the world felt boring.

“But what if this was my dream?” he said. “And what if we weren’t playing games?”

“What are you talking about?”

“I just don’t get it. If you can’t stand me, then what is this?”

“What is what? You called me, remember?”

“Do you wish I wouldn’t call you? Because I can stop.”


“No, I didn’t say that.”

“But you hate me,” he said. “You can’t stand me. You don’t like me, you don’t want me. You say that constantly.”

“No, I don’t.”


“Yes, you do, actually,” he said. “So, what? You can’t hate me, and then run off my girlfriends, too. That’s not fair. What am I supposed to do? What do you want from me?”

“Whoa. Calm down. I don’t know what you mean. I don’t want anything from you.”

See? There it was, plain as day. 

“You don’t want anything,” he said. “That’s what I thought. Okay. Fine, it’s no big deal. I was just being stupid. Goodbye, Vicky.”

“I didn’t mean it like that. I was—”

He hung up.


“You can’t,” Vicky said into a dead line.

Vicky sat up in bed. If she had been groggy, then she was wide awake now, stunned, and still trying to figure out what happened. What the hell? What did she do?

She remembered Thanksgiving, barely, standing in the foyer at the end of the evening, a drunken blur. She didn't remember saying anything important. What could she have possibly said? Why was he so upset? He didn't even seem to like that girl. 


She texted him four times:

What the hell? You can’t just—

I’m so confused. Ugh! Call me back!

I don’t hate you, you turd. 

This isn’t fair, I was tired.

She had more to say than her fingers could type, so she tried to call.

No answer. The longest voicemail greeting ever recorded. Instead of changing the number like any sane person would do, he set up his voicemail to act as an advertisement “You have reached Vale Akiyama, god of sound, master of the beat, playing New Year's Eve live from Sierra Nova at the Subterranean Flare. Be there or be square. Check me out on Spotify, like and subscribe. Peace to the people. Out!”

She was lucky this time his mailbox wasn't full. Half the time, it was.


“You can’t just call me at two in the morning and dump all this drama on me and then get mad when I’m not awake enough to interpret whatever vague confession you’re trying to make. I need to tell you…” But what did she want to say? She didn’t have the words. “I just need you to call me back.”


He wanted her to adore him. He really did, didn't he? God knows why. Doesn’t he have a thousand models and a million fans to adore him? 

He’s an actual rockstar, and you’re… you.

Maybe she did remember Thanksgiving. But that girl was exactly right. Didn’t he know what a failure she was? Didn’t he know that she’d just bore him or disappoint him, and he’d find someone nicer and prettier? Didn’t he know she’d just fuck it all up? 

Look, she already did. 

Maybe it was selfish that she didn’t want anything to change. She should have known better. He hasn’t been subtle about it—how long did she think she could drag this out? This sparkling friendship, this bubbling volcano of feelings, whatever this was—did she really think they could hold it in limbo forever? 

But now their friendship was basically ruined, because even if they tried, it couldn’t last. How could it last? Nothing ever lasts. 

She texted: 

I'm sorry, I just don’t want it to be ruined.

He was clearly not going to write back tonight. Which meant she was just left with all this rage at two in the morning and nowhere for it to go. 


Goodbye, Vicky.

But what kind of goodbye? Like, talk to you tomorrow? Or have a nice rest of your life?

No, she couldn't lose another one.

He couldn’t have meant it like that, could he?

And he was in California, so she couldn’t even run to his house. Because she would, as pathetic as that seemed. She would run to his door and bang it down until he talked to her.

Goodbye, Vicky. 

What if it ended just like that? It wouldn’t be the first time somebody dumped her like a bag of old gym socks.

She was a throwaway girl, and she always has been. She tried to be a little bit more, but of what she could never even imagine. She was who she was, and he probably did mean it like that. Or if he didn’t now, he would soon.

She felt like the old Vicky. Ten-year-old Vicky, too much of an inconvenience for even her family to deal with. Sixteen-year-old Vicky, traded in for a better model. Twenty-one-year-old Vicky, a cheap thrill to be used and discarded.

She cried a little. Just for a minute. She cried for the old Vicky, who never cried, only raged, screamed, fought, and stalked past people's houses at midnight kicking over trash cans. What good did it ever do her? To be sure, Vale had gotten some of her rage, too. But this time, she just felt sad. Vale could have her tears instead. 

Okay, calm down, call him again in the morning. 

She called him back now. Of course, there was no answer. 

Goodbye, Vicky.

He could end this, of course. He could be done. He could call it enough. The game wasn’t fun anymore. She took it too far. He was over it. Over her. Just like everybody else she ever cared about.

And she cared about him, she realized. Maybe a lot. He wanted her to adore him, and maybe she did. Though she could never tell him so.

She should have told him so.


Then she got out some paper, because why? She’d send him a damn letter in the mail? What else could she do? All that frustration, all that regret. She found all of the words and she wrote them all down.


But the words came out like verse, feelings in rhyme. 

Then she started to hum.


It wasn’t a letter. It was a song.

A surprise, indeed. She didn't think she was capable of it. She deleted lines and sang them again. Random thoughts came together into verses. There was a chorus that felt catchy and powerful. It didn’t sound terrible, maybe. What did she know about music besides singing in the shower?

Hours had passed and it was nearly morning. She felt finished with it. Finished for tonight, at least.

She called him one last time. No answer, but she didn’t expect him to answer. By now, he was definitely asleep. She imagined him in bed, headphones on, music blasting in his ears, so she would just have to shout over it. She would shout her heart out. 

The longest voicemail greeting in history finished. What could she say that she hadn’t already said?


She sang the song into his voicemail.

Then she finally felt more tired than sad, and she went to bed.

—

notes: I have to say, I had a lot of fun posing this one! Because I learned a new trick! I used game animations turned sideways and moved around with the TOOL mod. 

Saving my life! 

Because this was an episode that I had fully drafted before I simmed it, and I really imagined Vicky laying in bed with her phone for this conversation. I didn't want to compromise on that image, and I couldn't find any poses that worked, so I had to get creative. Now I can't wait to see what else I can do with that mod. It truly takes me back (well, almost) to TS2 posing, putting sims on OMSPs and moving them around, lol!