Pick'N'Mix Mods for The Sims 2

26 - Summer Lovin'

Sophia-Grace, toiletry bag swinging from her hand, trying to count back the days and weeks they'd been on the road, rounded the back of the bus to see Deano staring at - no ogling - the pert backside of a dark-skinned girl leaning into the hood of an RV.

"Go and help her then", she startled Deano from his vacant eyed ogling.

"Tani doesn't need any help."

So, he knew her name, "She'd like you", Sophia-Grace had already heard of 'Tart-Anne's' reputation.

"Out of my way", she added, "unlike some, I have things to do.", ascending the steps into the bus, completely forgetting her count.

Five minutes later, as Sophia-Grace walked through the parking lot, she could see neither Deano nor Tanya-Anne. The van's hood was still propped open, tools abandoned on the ground. She didn't want to think about what was going on behind the drawn curtains, but her imagination took her there anyway.

Deano sat in the driver's seat. He been watching 'brat-mobiles' leave the lot all morning and now reckoned he could get the bus to the road, so long as that piece of grassy-sand would hold. Ona and Lottie were getting bored at the back, they all wanted to leave, but EssGee was nowhere to be seen.

"Let's go", said Sophia-Grace, appearing out of nowhere on the steps, "follow that car."

"Which one?"

"Arron's Merc of course."

By the time Deano coaxed the bus over the sand to the road, the Mercedes was long gone, but there were enough other vehicles leaving to guess which way it had gone. Deano followed the RVs as best he could, but the old bus couldn't keep up and one by one he lost them over the horizon.

"Which way?", he pulled-up at a 5-way junction miles from anywhere, the signpost long rusted into incomprehensible gibberish.

Ona and Lottie darted from one side to the other.

"Right!", shouted Ona, the road clearly leading down to a secluded bay.

"Onwards!", cried Lottie dramatically.

"How should I know?", scoffed Sophia-Grace.

"Well, you're the one who knows where we"re going!"

Sophia-Grace did indeed know where they were going - 'The Field' - she just didn't know how to get there, "Ummmm ..."

"We can't stay in the middle of the road, pick one.", he yelled, "Any fast car and we're toast!"

"Second left", called out Lottie, "there's skid marks!"

Sophia-Grace had grown-up with rumours of 'The Field' - a rite-of-passage the summer before entering university. It was said if you had your First Kiss there it would be with your one-true-love, your Prince Charming, your Knight-In-Shining-Armour, your soulmate. Her head told her it was baloney - Mummy and Daddy had met at their Field but hadn't got together until he was a rising business star and she was a successful corporate lawyer, rekindling the flame in a night of unbridled passion at a conference, and married before 'the bump' showed. She was 'the bump'. A fact that her witch of a grand-mother never tired of telling her, while wailing about her daughter's dashed career opportunities and the loser of a man she'd had to marry. But her heart so wanted a Prince Charming.

Problem was, 'The Field' was not a place but a concept, the actual location chosen changed from year-to-year. You had to be in on the secret - know people, be in the acceptable social circles, come from the right families. Aaron, whom she'd known from childhood, was this year's organiser. And he'd hinted at the location, but never actually said where, just telling her to 'follow my dust'.

Sophia-Grace didn't like Aaron - he'd grown from a spoilt little mummies-boy into an arrogant jerk who thought he deserved everything and could get away with anything. He'd humiliated her in front of Deano at the bonfire-barbecue and, for some unfathomable reason, Deano's opinion of her mattered. But she was determined to get to this year's Field, as Julie-Aaliyah, her BFF from St Francesca's Prep School, would be there - she'd fit right back in.

"Junction ahead", called out Deano.

"Ummm ...", went Lottie, scanning the road for tyre marks.

"Which way?", Deano called, frustration rising.

"I'm busy", Sophia-Grace stated from the back, as Ona vomited again.

"I told you not to let her read the map!"

"Follow the dust."

"What?", echoed Deano and Lottie.

"Just 'follow my dust', I don't know, pick one." "Oh god, not down my legs, Ona."

"Go right", said Lottie authoritatively, reading the map. Adding, "why didn't Sophia say that sooner!"

She showed Deano the map, her finger placed under a small lake called "Mid Ust".

"Go Team Dottie!", smiled Deano.

"Team Lono", she corrected, "I'm the brains, you're the brawn."

"In the bucket Ona. That's my arm, jees!"

"Do we really need those two?

Deano almost wet himself laughing.

25 - Beach Party 27 - The Field