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[Updated with Part Three] The strange life and times of Brian Simulates - A Sims Mobile story

Life, but not as we know it

[Updated with Part Three] The strange life and times of Brian Simulates - A Sims Mobile story
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Part Three

This morning I was inside Sad Cactusman. We were stood out on the street, and we inhabited the same physical position. I phased in and out of him - sometimes I wore his face, sometimes he wore mine.

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Is he a part of me now? Is his green hue a representation of my jealousy? Is that why sometimes I'm him, and sometimes he's angry? I think I might be going mad.

I got invited to a party. Apparently it's a good way to make friends. Parties around here seem to be very similar to work. At one point I threw snacks on the floor and a group of people I've never met before cheered me on.

I've been to more parties. All of the parties seem to take place in houses that look very similar to mine. I checked, and they all back on to the same piece of beach. It's like there's only one house, in one place, but with infinite tiny differences.

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I'm at a party right now and four people are stood in the bathroom. I'm flirting with people next to the toilet, and for some reason there are planets orbiting around my clothes. There's a pizza in the other room, but even when I eat some of it, it stays perfectly round.

There's a good chance that there's some sort of drug in all of the cakes around here. Whenever I get too tired to do anything, I just have to eat some cake and then all of my energy comes back. I don't remember ever buying any cake though.

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And why is it always in my pocket? Why do I carry vast amounts of cake around with me, only to stuff it in my face in a stranger's bathroom so I can keep making terrible knock-knock jokes that I never hear the punchline to?

Sad Cactusman has placed a stack of pots and pans in the middle of the floor of the restaurant he works in. He says that it helps him kickstart his shifts.

Today is my birthday. I don't think it's really my birthday, but I don't remember ever having been any younger than I am now. I've put a pizza in the bathroom next to the toilet. There's no one at my party so I am dancing on my own.

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I've filled Sad Cactusman's room with balloons so he can't go in there and stare at the wall. I'm having a shower at the party now. There's still no one here.

I ate the toilet pizza.

Part Two

Sad Cactusman is green. He is fat. He is a chef. He has a mullet. He has an unusual ability to perform well in a number of employment settings. I know this because sometimes, in a very real way, I feel like I am inhabiting the body of Sad Cactusman.

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But that can't be right. I'm Brian Simulates. I am a barista. I'm working my way towards being a latte artist. Tim told me he used to work in an office, but he gave it all up to become a low paid service worker. I think Tim is either a liar or an idiot.

But he told me, Brian Simulates. He didn't tell Sad Cactusman. Sometimes though, when I look at my hands, they're green, and they're making appetisers.

The sleeping arrangement in the house is confusing. Two of us live there, but there is only one bed. I think I might have signed up for some sort of hot-bed contract - when one of us sleeps, the other one works? I don't remember agreeing to that though.

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Sad Cactusman is much more confrontational than I am. He greets people with crude gestures and they stomp off annoyed. I don't know why Sad Cactusman does that. I've noticed something else though, something very odd.

No one here speaks. I haven't said a single word out loud since I got out of the taxi. I've interacted with people, and I've understood them, I think, but I can't remember speaking to them. Sometimes I think about basketballs when I'm talking to them. Why do I do that?

There are no other houses near mine. There is a yard, that I can clean up if I pay money, but I can't see anywhere else anyone might live. How do I have neighbours if there aren't any other houses nearby? Where did that lady come from?

Sad Cactusman was talking to people on the streets, and after they'd finished, the strangers would walk along the road for a little while and then stop. They stopped outside my house and they didn't do anything.

I'm starting to think that my employers know nothing about running a coffee shop. Entire shifts fly by and I do nothing but give customers awful drinks they don't want and play pranks on Tim. Tim loves it when I play pranks on him, though I have no idea why.

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Despite this, my career is progressing. I bought a rack of assorted tea mugs and it sits in the middle of the floor of the shop. Sometimes I just stand there and laugh at one of the mugs and no one tells me not to.

Why did I have to buy a rack of mugs for a business that I don't run?

More often than not Sad Cactusman walks around in his chef's outfit. But I've seen him change. Not in a voyeuristic way. I've been looking at him as he approaches a potential new friend on the street, and as soon as they start talking, Sad Cactusman is wearing something different. He told me I paid for his jumper.

I don't like it here.

Part One

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Oh hi there! My name's Brian Simulates and I'm just your normal, every day girl. Who's called Brian. Today is essentially the first day of my new life. I'm in a taxi, being driven to my new house. I'm super excited to see what it's like, and start making new friends!

Okay, well first impressions aren't great. The listing described the house as a fixer-upper and it wasn't wrong.

I've also discovered that I'm the sort of person who buys houses without ever visiting them or looking at photos. That's a bit weird, right? Ah well, I've go soooooo much to do.

My house doesn't have a shower. It doesn't have a sink. As far as I can tell it doesn't have any windows. The floor is so dusty that I can barely breathe, and the furniture is draped with covers. There are boxes on the floor too, I hate to think what was in them.

OMG! Made my first friend. I tidied up a bit and invited one of the neighbours round. She seems really nice, although as far as I can tell we just sat on the sofa and gesticulated frantically at one another. For a good chunk of the conversation / arm waving, I was thinking about helicopters. Do... do I like helicopters?

Time to get a job. There's a market place in town so I'm heading over there to see what's available. I don't think I have a CV. It's strange, I don't really remember what happened before I was in the taxi. What's stranger though is that doesn't seem to bother me.

I'm a barista now. Er, okay.

I work with a guy called Tim. Quite often when we're working we get together and reminisce. I'm not sure what we're reminiscing about because I've only known him a matter of hours. One shift, I didn't make a single coffee, I just wiped tables and talked to customers about beans.

Sometimes I build up enough confidence to try one of my signature brews on people. Invariably they throw it on the floor. Afterwards they just wander around the shop, jumping between positions, and then drinking a coffee. I don't know where they get the coffee from.

When I got home from work last night my neighbour was in the house. A fat cowboy was sat at my table thinking about films. I think I flirted with him once, and now he thinks it's okay to sit in my kitchen and think about films?

Another strange thing happened too. I don't know how I got back here. Is Tim drugging me? The first thing I remember after work is just staring at a wall in the corner of the living room for twenty minutes.

All the while fat cowboy and my neighbour did nothing, just wandered around the house like it was theirs.

I'm scared.

I have a roommate now. His name is Sad Cactusman. I can't talk right now because he's stood in a room behind the dresser in my bedroom. There's nothing in the room. He's just stood there, looking at a blank wall.

Hopefully I'll be able to tell you more tomorrow. Hopefully someone is reading this.

Harry Slater
Harry Slater
Harry used to be really good at Snake on the Nokia 5110. Apparently though, digital snake wrangling isn't a proper job, so now he writes words about games instead.