Fanon:Pride and Pleasantview

This is an ongoing Neighborhood story featuring the standard Maxis characters of Pleasantview. The University is Academie Le Tour.

The Pleasant Family
Daniel would very much like to start an open marriage with Mary Sue. Unfortunately, Daniel has as much foresight as a fruit fly. Instead of talking to Mary Sue about what he would like, he just moves in his girlfriend Kaylynn Langerak and waits for Mary Sue to notice. Lilith, who is not stupid despite her GPA, immediately sees the writing on the wall and moves to college.

After Mary Sue is fired from work, she comes home in total aspiration failure and has a visit from the psychiatrist.

It takes Mary Sue a little while to realize Kaylynn is not going home. Nevertheless, she figures it's some work late idea on Kaylynn's part, and doesn't realize what's really going on until her husband takes Kaylynn to the bedroom.

Poor Angela Pleasant who thought her sister was crazy for leaving without an A+ and several scholarship grants, is forced to watch as her parents break up. For Mary Sue however, it's a positive memory. Angela leaves for college immediately.

Kaylynn Langerak does not leave with Daniel. She's already pregnant and scared of what's going to happen to her and her new baby.

Mary Sue takes everything in the divorce. Daniel walks away with a stipend of 20,000 simoleans. She knows deep down that the entire affair is Daniel's responsibility. She had never met Kaylynn before, she'd been gone every time the girl arrived to clean. Who knows what Daniel had told her? It comes to light he had indeed told her their marriage was open, that jealousy and betrayal weren't a problem in the Pleasant household. Mary Sue supposed it wasn't, as long as the betrayal was never discovered. Daniel really was a jerk.

It takes time, but she starts to see past Kaylynn's involvement in her husband's lies. She starts seeing Kaylynn as a scared kid pulled into something she couldn't control. Now, with her own daughters gone, facing the prospect of living alone in a big empty house (that she won't give up, no freaking way!) she decides to set aside her anger and invites Kaylynn to stay, and she will help raise the baby.

Daniel's son, Marcus, is born. Daniel has a habit of wandering back into the house after he kicks over the garbage can. He is there to see Marcus born, and is attacked immediately afterward by Mary Sue, who loses the fight. She kicks Daniel out (again).

Mary Sue and Kaylynn become friends, and slowly, it turns to something more. By the time Marcus becomes a kid, the two are in love and decide to get married. Angela and Lilith are, of course, shocked and slightly outraged by the match, and depart for college directly after the wedding. Apparently there was something slightly off-putting about your mother marrying your father's former mistress, even after your parents have divorced.

The Goth Family
Cassandra Goth is left at the altar by Don Lothario and goes into total aspiration failure. Mortimer Goth immediately asks her best friend Darren Dreamer to come over and comfort his daughter. Cassandra takes one look from Lothario to Dreamer, and decides immediately to forget about Don and be with Darren.

Darren proposes and they decide it's best not to waste the arch. They also want to have a baby, and succeed on the first try. Dirk Dreamer decided his father's new family was a bit much to handle, and moved to college to be with Lilith.

After seeing what happened to Don Lothario, Dina Caliente decides she won't make the same mistake. She calls Mortimer immediately and seals the deal on engagement. Mortimer sees how happy his daughter is, and he doesn't want to spend his old age alone. Sure, Dina's after his money, but what better to spend his money on than someone who will give him the affection and attention he needs? The morning after Cassandra's wedding, before he returns the arch to the rental store, he marries Dina with Darren as the only witness.

Dina immediately went out and purchased a dozen of the most expensive dresses she could find. She was determined that every day, she should look like a queen, so she picked out a tiara while she was at it.

When she got home from her shopping spree, she realized the precariousness of her situation. What if, during the course of the marriage, Mortimer didn't die right away? What if he lingered on and on, listening to that bookworm daughter of his? What if Dina, as she surely got tired of the facade, wanted a boyfriend? What was to stop Mortimer from tossing her out if he discovered the secret? Nothing, that's what! Dina knew what she had to do.

Dina laughed out loud when her pregnancy test came positive. What could he do to her? Toss the mother of his child out into the street? Hardly! She had her get out of jail free card! She was untouchable! Which meant Don Lothario was back on the menu. And oh, how little newlywed Cassie would cry her little eyes out when she realized he hadn't missed her for a second.

Mortimer did, indeed, catch Dina and Don in his bed together. Kind of hard not to, with the way she was parading around the house in her underpants. He didn't understand why she was being so cruel, and he felt so stupid. He had known all she wanted was money, how else would a woman like that want him? But he didn't for a moment think she could be so mean. He even entertained the thought she might really like him when she said they should have a baby. Now she's pregnant with his child, and sleeping with other men right under his nose. And the man who left Cassandra, no less! What would the neighbors think? Bad enough about Don leaving Cassandra at the altar, now they were a regular soap opera! He certainly couldn't have her trashing him all over town. No matter what the mother did, their child deserved all the benefits of being born a Goth. As much as Mortimer knew about the world and standards changing, he was stuck in his conventional ways. He was not going to divorce Dina, and he was not going to break up the home of his child.

Dina has been spending her time during her pregnancy sitting on the very top floor of the Goth mansion spying on her neighbors through a telescope. She now has a membership to the science club. She is trying to spend as little time with the Goths as possible, since they all collectively hate her for some reason, but she's not about to leave and lose what's rightfully hers, namely the house and half of Mortimer's money. If he wants to be rid of her, he'll have to divorce her, and he's not about to do it. She finally does stop her spying when her sister Nina comes running in and smacks her around a bit. So much for her relationship with her sister.

Cassandra's son was named Marcus, and Dina had a daughter which she named Pecunia (Latin for money). After the babies were born, now teenage Alexander felt it was best for him to go, and off to college he went. Cassandra and Darren stepped happily into their parental roles, even taking up the slack for Dina, who lacked any concern for her daughter.

Dina actually took quite a bit of time recovering from the birth, her needs were completely shot. After she was feeling better, she reignited the affair with Don Lothario which had cooled since she started to show. Mortimer didn't take much notice.

She hadn't realized how much Mortimer's jealousy mattered to her. Without him caring, it didn't even seem worth the crap she was putting up with from Cassandra. She waited until everyone fell asleep, packed a bag, and headed to Don's house. [See: Lothario Family for more of Dina's story]

Mortimer wasn't sorry at all to discover Dina's defection. When he heard she died, he laughed out loud! Then he thought of a plan of most masterful revenge. He picked up the phone and called the Grim Reaper. The Grim Reaper thought it was an awesome plan, and delivered both Zombie Dina. Zombie Dina spent a few days being incredibly angry. She was ugly! She smelled bad! No one was going to ever want her again!

After those few days, she realized that if this is how she's going to be stuck, she better figure out a way to cope. She accepted Mortimer's offer of employment, and became the Goth Family's permanent nanny and maid. Just after this, Mortimer died, and Dina was left to the devices of her new mistress, Cassandra.

Cassandra refused to acknowledge Pecunia as a sister, and added a servant's quarters to the house just off the dining room. Dina and Pecunia both lived in this room. While Dina underwent a massive attitude adjustment to conform to her new role, Cassandra never forgot the wrongs done to her family with thanks to Dina, and was always careful to keep Dina and Pecunia mindful of their place.

The Lothario Family
Don Lothario's life wasn't going completely spectacular by any means. First, his meal ticket wanted to settle down. As much as he liked her, he simply wasn't mean enough to marry her and keep sleeping around like that. He liked to keep his options open. However, he wasn't too hard up to return to her house and bang her stepmom. The way he saw it, Mortimer should've known what he was getting into on that front. It was well known around town that Don had relationships with both the Caliente sisters.

The morning after Mortimer died, Dina showed up on his doorstep with a suitcase full of cash. Unfortunately, she popped in right at the wrong moment, and went upstairs to find Don in the hottub giving the ole WooHoo to Nina. Oh well, guess she should finally know what that feels like.

Well, Dina finally knew, and she liked it not one bit. But Dina is no Cassandra or Mortimer Goth. She was not about to take that lying down! She lost a fight to her sister, but all it did was whet her appetite. She kicked Don Lothario's butt from one end of the deck to the other. Then, Nina kicked her butt again. After three or four more of these spontaneous fights with the same outcomes (Dina kicking Don's butt, Nina kicking Dina's) Nina finally left, and it was just Dina and Don, staring each other down. Finally, Don won against her and she seemed satisfied and didn't attack him again.

She couldn't stand it. The pain she'd inflicted on Mortimer, the pain Don had inflicted on her, with her own sister. How Cassandra must have felt to see Don back in her house, hurting her father this time. Dina began to cry. She was no kind of mother, no way could she take care of Pecunia by herself. She knew that Cassandra and Darren would have trouble parenting Pecunia as long as she, Dina, was alive. And Don? Don was no better than she, the world would be better without the two of them.

Dina said little to Don for the rest of the evening. When he finally went to sleep, she locked up all the doors. She blocked off the staircase, and she lit the fire that consumed them both.