Chapter Seventeen: Old Man Marlin

"Why you paint so blue?" Rosaline asks softly, unsure of whether she should speak while Thorne is in the midst of painting. Thorne shrugs as he dips his brush into the palette, a gloomy blend of blues and blacks at the moment.
"I'm painting your dream of being real. You don't quite understand sadness, but it's hiding within you, twisting and turning. It's a beautifully tragic thing, I think." Thorne mutters, the words sounding oddly sophisticated yet somehow right with his child-like voice. Rosaline wipes her eye, unsure of this weird achy feeling at the pit of her stomach. "I is sad?" She whispers to herself.

The finished product is more abstract then Thorne's usual style, but he immediately declares it one of his favourites and hangs it in his room.

"Ya-hoo!" Nathalie screams into the quiet night. It doesn't matter if she's getting older, she gets to wave a yellow thing around and jump about like a child. That's all an excitable sim can ask for.

New belt, new wrinkles, new hair. Otherwise, not much is different about Nathalie Marlin.

Rosaline sometimes gets overwhelmed with her thoughts. So when Thorne sleeps, she will sometime sit in the dark and stare at his paintings, just thinking in the simplistic way only a doll can.

Tyson enjoys hanging out with Marilyn, he tries to impress her with his salute.
"You're not supposed to grin Ty!" She squeals, finally starting to relax around him. "He's awfully cute!" She thinks to herself with a devilish grin.

Another birthday!

"Why am I so excited? I'm becoming an elder, an shrived-up, dying old man." Ned moans, trying to fight to compulsion forced upon all sims to cheer on their birthday.

"I'm oldddddddddddd!" He whines, just like a little child.

After a quick wardrobe change, Ned feels a little more hip. "At least I'm not wearing old man loafers anymore." He thinks to himself.

"Tyson! How dare you cut my hair in my sleep!" Nathalie screams, furious with her oldest child. "Pranks are one thing, but this goes too far."
"But Mom, you look so pretty with your hair short. Besides, you can always get a wig." Tyson gives his mom his most convincing, wide-eyed look, hoping she'll buy it.
"It is kind of cute...All right Ty, this I'm going to let it go." He breathes a sigh of relief. "But the money for the wig is coming out of your allowance. Now go to bed young man, it's nearly midnight!"
"Aw man!" He cries out as he stomps over to his bed.

Seeing this potion near the portrait of Rosaline makes Thorne wonder if Tyson knows about Rosaline.
"I thought nobody could see her." Thorne thinks to himself as he picks up the potion.

Before Thorne can propose the idea of trying the foreign potion to Rosaline, she chugs down the potion in an excited gulp.
"That's it, it's the legendary potion! It makes us real! I get to be real!" Thorne wonders if the potion fixed her speech problems as well, as he never heard Rosaline speak so clearly.

"I'm really a real girl now." Rosaline whispers tiredly, the four hour long transformation taking a toll on the newly human body.