Content warning:
After so much anticipation, the time could have come to learn more details about what Hotaru really did to make Maki decide to leave and keep Lily away from him so desperately. I can't go into much more detail because this would correspond to spoil the whole section, but I still want to warn you that the last section of the chapter could be a trigger for some people regarding family-related issues and violent behaviour.
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From Sirio's diary
The new trial to be held here in New Sixam is approaching, and we are doing everything possible to be as prepared as possible for when that day comes. Most likely, we won't get any other chance like this afterwards.
Trix: Oh, these muffins look delicious!
Halley: The first hearing of your trial is starting in a few weeks, but I think I've managed to put all the paperwork together.
Sophia: She's been working on your case day and night for weeks, when this is over you'll have to pay for her next vacation!
Sirio: Sure. Thanks Halley, really.
Halley looks almost as exhausted as we are from this whole situation, but she also seems very satisfied with the work she's doing. She has really found the right job for her, I have no doubts about this.
Trix: (curious) Do you already know the name of the judge for your trial?
Halley: We were lucky, it's Smith.
Trix: Do you mean Octavia Smith? What a coincidence!
Halley: Yes, do you know her?
Trix: Of course yes, she's my older sister!
Florian: She is always very strict… But you can also be sure that the truth, whatever it is, will come out with her as the judge.
Trix: That's for sure…
Halley: Well, it's time to go back to my office. I'll keep you updated, bye!
Sirio: Bye, and thanks again!
Even though they have a lot of other things to do, everyone is helping us all with this trial. I feel really lucky to have friends like them.
Florian: Hey, do you have a moment?
Sirio: Yes, of course. Did something happen?
Florian: I was just wondering, why isn't Maki here today? Usually, the two of you seem stuck together with superglue!
Sirio: She's at the museum, she's trying to write some reviews, you see.
Florian: By the way… How come you aren't married yet?
Sirio: What?
Florian: I mean, you've always seemed like the type of guy who was already planning his wedding since when he was ten years old. What's on your mind?
As usual, any conversation with Florian becomes very personal very quickly. It's a consequence of our telepathy, I think. And, for the same reason, I also tend to be totally honest when talking with him, even when it means splitting out some uncomfortable truth.
Sirio: Well… I don't think Maki is really ready for this yet. That's it.
Florian: What? But you already have two children and everything! Do you have at least talked about it?
Sirio: No, never seriously… But I often feel it from her, especially when we talk about the trial and all the rest. I don't think she has overcome completely the failure of her first marriage yet, that's it.
Florian: (suspicious) And you want to tell me that you still aren't planning anything about this? Absolutely nothing?
You see, my dear diary, in these conversations it's just impossible to hold any little secrets, he always finds it out sooner or later...
Sirio: (embarrassed) Well, actually… I was thinking that I might propose once this process is over, when we can go back to Sim City and everything else.
Florian: (chuckling) You never change, you know?
Florian: Then do your best to win that trial as soon as possible!
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We've moved here to New Sixam for quite some time now, it's now New Year's Eve. We all have many good resolutions for the year that is about to begin, and we can only hope to have a little more luck than we have had so far.
Maki: Come on girls, are you tired already?
Alba: A little.
Lily: By the way, where did Helios go?
Well, this is usually the most common situation we experience at home these days. Helios is always so full of energy, and it is enough to lose sight of him for two minutes to be sure to find him in some hidden corner of the house, occupied in his favourite activity: exploration.
He's really eager to see new things and learn, that's very clear to us at this point.
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The first one to reveal their New Year's resolution was Techna.
Techna: Yes, I got selected!
Sirio: Hey, what are you doing? Are you studying?
Techna: Yes! I was just admitted to Foxbury university, and I enrolled in the computer science major. I plan to follow the lectures by commuting from here and everything.
Sirio: (surprised) What? Seriously?
Techna: Yes.
Sirio: But why didn't you tell us anything before?
Techna: Ahm… I wanted to be sure of getting the scholarships and being admitted first.
Techna studying computer science in college… Well, come to think of it, it's actually a very suitable major for them. They have always aimed to “expand their knowledge of the world”, and what better way to do that than by taking a degree in their favourite subject?
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My and Maki's new year's resolution instead rounds around the local museum, it would take so little to reevaluate it a bit! It's quite a challenge for us to be able to bring some contemporary art to this place that is so cut off from the international scene, but Maki still has a lot of contacts in Sim City and objectively is very knowledgeable about art exhibitions.
Maki: I'm still in touch with some of my colleagues over there, many would be willing to participate in an exhibition here!
Museum Curator: It would be great to be able to draw artists and art connoisseurs from Sim City here, it would be a real game changer for this museum!
Maki: Undoubtedly.
Sirio: (whispering) Are your colleagues really willing to come all the way up to here?
Maki: (whispering) I think so, as long as it's for a very surprising event at least. There is so much space here, there is the potential to do something very unique and never seen before!
Maki seems enthusiastic like the first time I met her, when she was busy with her first exhibition at the Sim City art gallery. It's been a long time now, but the swirl of colours that surround her as new ideas emerge in her mind is unmistakable.
For her the whole museum, right now, is like a big blank canvas, she just has to decide how to use it.
A little later Techna joined us with the children, who had just finished their school day. In front of the New Sixam's museum there is a large playground, and the little ones always enjoy spending the afternoon with us there.
Alba: What a big hug, Helios!
Helios: He!
Sirio: So, do you want to play pirates too?
Helios: No, story!
Sirio: Okay, let me think…
Sirio: Once upon a time…
Helios: Hero!
Sirio: Yes, once upon a time there was a superhero who…
Alba: Wait, I want to hear the story too!
In these moments it's so easy to forget about every problem for a while. I would love to paint ourselves right now, to capture the so serene colours surrounding us.
Sirio: … and so the kitten Felix was able to return to the ground again, thanks to the superhero who…
Helios: Fly!
Sirio:… the superhero who flew to the top of that building to bring him back to his family. The end.
Helios: Yeah!
Maki: Hey, Lily! I was about to phone you, we were getting ready to have dinner!
Lily: Come on, it's not that late! It's just (looks at her watch)…
Maki: Seven in the evening.
Lily said nothing more, but she seemed genuinely surprised about being so late.
Maki: So, Lily, have you found something to do after school?
Lily: (vague) Nothing serious, I'm going to an arcade with some schoolmates.
Maki: Sounds fun.
Lily: Ah, that's not bad.
Lily: Here the new consoles and videogames are released months ahead of Sim City, that's impressive! Do you know why?
Sirio: Techna certainly knows more details than I do, but I think it's because the New Sixam companies need months before they get approval to export those products to other countries. They want to check that we don't hide "dangerous alien technology" in what we sell, and stuff like that.
Lily: Well, they're really stupid then!
Maki: They are a bit too suspicious sometimes, yes.
By now Lily has also spent a lot of time here, enough to realize that in the end a lot of things here are not so different from Sim City. She complains less and less often about the choice to move here now, and she starts having friends her age at school and at the arcade. By now, even the colours around her are becoming less tormented and more serene every day, and even the rest of us can only cheer up seeing her calmer.
Lily is growing so much in this period, in every sense. And this also means that we can no longer postpone the explanations that we have been promising for too long...
A few weeks later, Miller's home
Maki: Hey, Helios, what are you playing with?
Helios: Boo!
*Nacho leaves, visibly confused.*
Sirio: Paintings, we sell paintings! Only unique pieces at unique prices!
Lily: Summer really comes early here.
Sirio: The real heat is yet to come, trust me!
Lily: Fantastic… Anyway, do you really hope to sell something with this method?
Sirio: That's the idea, yes.
Lily: Bah, if you think so...
Lily then moved to the back garden, visibly bored. She seemed also a bit sceptical about my chances of selling anything. Honestly, I too didn't know exactly what to expect, but in the end more people came than I had hoped for.
While everyone was distracted by my yard sale, Maki took the opportunity to talk to Lily for a bit alone. She had thought a lot about what was the best way and time to answer all the questions Lily had asked her over the years, and by now she could no longer find valid reasons to postpone. Especially not now that the new trial is so close.
Maki: Lily, do you have a moment?
Lily: Sure. What's up?
Maki: ... I think it's time to talk to you seriously about your father, and about everything else.
Lily was taken aback for a few moments, she didn't expect it, but then she hurried to answer:
Lily: Well, it was about time!
Lily: Mom, you don't need to try so hard to sugarcoat whatever you have to say. I'm not stupid, if you never told me the details it's because dad did something really bad, isn't it?
Maki: …
Lily: So, what's he been up to? Did he hurt you?
Maki: ... we used to argue often, almost every day. At the time I had preferred to overlook it, but looking back on it now… But no, that wasn't why I decided to leave.
Lily: (worried) Okay… but then what did he do, exactly?
Even if Maki thought a lot about that conversation, she still needed quite some time to find the right words to use, and to decide where to start from. I know this story for quite some time now, I totally see why it's so difficult for her.
Maki: Hotaru, always had trouble controlling his anger. I didn't want to see it at first, but when you were born, and Hotaru inherited that company and all that money, it really became impossible to ignore.
Lily: ...
Maki: … it happened when you were more or less the age Helios is now, you were so little…
Lily: …
Maki: Hotaru had come home from work particularly late, he was angry with some colleague who according to him had just wasted a lot of money. There was a storm that night, you were scared of thunders and you were crying so much…
Lily: …
Maki: Hotaru has never been very patient, especially when you were crying. But that evening he couldn't hold himself anymore, he kept screaming about how annoying your cry was, and…
Lily: (upset) He turned against me?
Maki: (nods) I didn't think twice, I grabbed you as quickly as I could and ran to my parents' house. You may not remember them anymore, but we lived with them for almost a year before moving into our apartment in Sim City.
Lily: So that's why you decided to divorce…
Maki: Yes. Hotaru never agreed, it was a difficult trial, and I didn't even know if it was the right thing to do. I mean, he kept telling me to trust him, that it wouldn't have happened anymore, and in the meanwhile you kept asking where your dad was every other day… But, in the end, both the judge and the psychologist proved that he may have been a threat to us, and gave me sole custody. But Hotaru never accepted this, and paid the most expensive lawyers in Sim City to be sure he could overturn that result, accusing me of having done all this just to keep you away from him.
Lily: … And he would have won the second trial, so we moved here.
Maki: (nods)
Lily: And now you're doing yet another trial…
Maki: Yes. But we think this can finally be the last.
Lily probably wasn't totally taken aback by the tone of this conversation, by now she knows enough about the world to have been able to extrapolate a lot of this information by herself. Yet, this didn't prevent her from feeling upset after learning about all those details. If there was any respect for her father left in her, that was completely shattered by that conversation.
A little later…
Sirio: So, how are you?
Maki: … It was very hard. But I think she understood…
???: Good for her, because we have a lot of questions too.
Hotaru: For example: why the heck did we have to come to this hole full of aliens? The last trial was all too clear, what do you expect to change with this other procedure?
Sirio: Many things in New Sixam courts work differently than yours, don't...
Hotaru: I didn't ask you, smurf.
Maki: (tired) It's been a long day, make it short: what do you want?
Hotaru: We just wanted to be clear, we're not going to waste any more time playing games with you and your obsession to keep Lily away from me at all costs. By coming here you may have gained some time, but the result will remain the same.
Maki: You say it. The truth will come out, Hotaru, rest assured.
Hotaru answered with an exasperated expression, before leaving saying:
Hotaru: See you tomorrow, in court!
Lily: …
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§HermioneSims§ corner
Tough ending, uh?
Yet, also this time I have some funny pictures for closing.
Toddlers, and their impressive attention spans XD
It was brave of Maki to defy Hotaru and do what she could to protect Lily, despite Hotaru's wealth and powerful lawyers. Now, that Lily's older I wonder if the judge would be able to listen to her opinion about who she wants to live with (since ideally the judge should be deciding based on what's best for Lily).
ReplyDeleteIt's been nice seeing Lily mature and also become happier over the last few chapters.