The Broken Dollhouse

There is a mystery afoot in the Jones household, and today’s edition of Keeping Up with The Joneses begins with…

Aubrie heading into the bedroom she and her sister have shared forever, and discovering that their dollhouse has been completely demolished.

Did it happen in the renovations?  Did it just randomly collapse?

Behind her, younger brother Cade approaches, having followed the random sounds of her sobs.

“Do you know what happened here, Cade?” she asks.

Cade just shrugs, shakes his head and tells her that “Mom says it’s time for dinner.”

During the meal, Aubrie, naturally, brings up the dollhouse, and Arielle promises to repair it for her.  Problem solved.

Except, well… maybe not.

Over the course of the next few weeks, the girls frequently go into their room to find the dollhouse destroyed.  Not that Brynn really cares much.  She is a teenager now and onto bigger and better things.  Like trying to write the next great Simerican novel.

In the mean time…

Dan completes his Lifetime Aspiration.  Yes, he has been a very successful Free-Lance Botanist.

So much so that he decides to put his efforts into a new hobby… collecting.

And promptly heads out into the world to complete his mission while he still can.

In the meantime, life moves forward for the little family.  All of the children are busy with school and playtime.  Dan and Arielle make as much time for them as they can between work and collecting, and gardening… slowly building bonds.

The doll house continues to be a mystery.  No one is quite sure how it keeps breaking, but it seems like every other day, it needs to be repaired.  Brynn, Aubrie and Evan all seem effected by the daily loss.

And then one afternoon, Brynn walks into her bedroom to get her homework and discovers her little brother, Cade, smashing it with his bare hands.

Truth to be told, Cade has always disturbed Brynn.  They have the worse relationship of all her siblings, and it seems like he is always saying things that upset her, or everyone else.

Now, this.

“Cade!” she yells at him, loud enough for their mother to come into the room.  Arielle, as well, is shocked.

“Why are you doing this?” she asks her son.

Cade just shrugs.  “Bored, I guess.”  Then he walks off and goes back to the den and his drawing table like nothing ever happened.

Simmer’s Note: I’m going to try switching to a mostly storytelling approach from here on out. Minus the stuff like stats, etc. Also… cad eis evil. He truly has been randomly walking in there and destroying the dollhouse. For no reason. And Ugh. It’s not like there isn’t enough stuff to do in that house! He’s cute but… *whispers*  I don’t like him.