My Friends Are Mine (Don’t Cross the Line and Stop Wasting Your Time)

Concerned about her growing reputation for “unseriousness” and “ungratefulness,” Elmire immediately went to Brett for advice when she arrived at school.

Elmire: Can we talk? I want to ask you something.

Brett: Sure, what’s up?

Elmire: Do I seem unserious or ungrateful about music to you?

Brett: No. Of course not. How could you?

Elmire: Honestly?

Brett: Seriously, you’re the opposite of unserious. You’re not as obses—serious as you used to be, but you’re a pro who gets upset at “mistakes” that no one can hear but you and concert pianists who’ve been playing for fifty thousand years. That’s not unserious behavior.

Elmire: I have my personal standards.

Brett: My point, exactly. You always practice diligently. Don’t listen to stupid criticism. Anyone with a clue knows how hard you work.

Elmire: Thanks! You’ve made me feel better. 🤍

---

Dominic Vatore, who had suspiciously circled Elmire and Brett several times during their conversation, asked Elmire “to speak with him” as soon as Brett left. He dragged her to a corner of the school’s café. She didn’t know him well, but he was a cute upperclassman so she thought it would be fun to get to know him better.

Elmire: Hey. What’s going on?

Dominic: Why do you spend so much time with Brett?

Elmire: Huh? He’s my friend, obviously.

Why did Dominic care? This conversation was already weird.

Dominic: How can he be your friend? He’s not like us. His family’s broke.

What?!

Elmire: We’ve been friends forever. Why would I care about how much money his family has?

Dominic: Elmire, be serious and grow up! Why wouldn’t you care about that?! There’s no way you’re not making him uncomfortable. He’s poor AF. Think!

Dominic: If you hang out, you have to pay for everything. You’re embarrassing him. Friendships aren’t actually friendships if the same person gives all the time while the other person always takes. There has to be balance. Have you ever even been to his house?

Elmire: Why would he pay for anything when we’re close and my family has tons more money? We don’t need 50-50 balance. That would be nonsense equality without equity. And okay, I’ve never been to his house, but that’s because mine has more space and more to do. It’s easier.

Dominic: I’m sure that’s why. That makes perfect sense …

Dominic: It could not be that he’s embarrassed to have a “princess” who will never need to work for money come to his family’s home that’s smaller than her room. No—that could never ever be it. I’m not saying that poor people are bad, obviously. But we can’t be genuine friends with them after elementary school. We’re too different. We can’t relate. It’s awkward. Don’t try to force it. That’s messed up. All we should do is be polite to them at school and observe them, so that we aren’t completely ignorant about them.

Elmire: It’s not awkward. We’ve honestly been close since we were tiny. We get along great. We even have some similar interests.

Dominic: You can’t seriously believe that. I just heard you complaining to him about piano and I almost cringed to death from secondhand embarrassment. You’re making us look out-of-touch. I’m not telling you these things to be mean, but as an upperclassman looking out for a lowerclassman and as a friend. You’re smart. Be realistic. You’re at the top of the pyramid: you have luck, insane talent, money, passion and you’re kind of pretty. That’s why you have a manager and a whole team behind you when you’re just in high school. Many talented musicians who graduate from the best conservatories don’t even have managers. And he’s not even going to be able to attend a top university. What does he even have? Slightly above average intelligence and a decent work ethic. He has no money, no luck, and no looks.

Dominic: I don’t know what he wants to be, but he’s going to have to be something that makes money, and you were complaining to him about what exactly? Actually, it doesn’t matter, but there’s no way some poor kid can relate to that. You should stop talking to him.

Dominic was making her head spin. He had a point. She would be more considerate of Brett in the future, but something also felt really off. Friends liked helping one another. Coming from different backgrounds made things challenging, but not impossible. Regardless, the bottom line was that her friendship with Brett was absolutely precious and not something she wouldn’t fight for—she would never one-sidedly trash it because some misguided acquaintance told her to get rid of it. Instead, she would get rid of that acquaintance.

Elmire: Why are you white knighting for Brett so hard? Stop. We don’t know you. I also ALREADY TOLD YOU: BRETT AND I ARE FRIENDS! If he has a problem, he’ll tell me.

Dominic: I’m just trying to help.

Elmire: No! I think you’re trying to sabotage my friendships, which I’m not ruining over nothing. Focus on yourself, get a new hobby, or go touch grass or something. I don’t care! Just leave me alone!

---

Elmire tried not to let Dominic’s words get to her. If her problems were stupid and out-of-touch, Brett would tell her. That’s why she had told him about them. Some people were so unnecessarily weird about their friendship. She ignored Dominic and forced herself to enjoy the rest of her day. It was funny how he’d gone from hot to a -10 out of 100 in her mind.

---

That night was the karaoke contest. Everyone had been practicing their singing, especially Elmire, and wanted to try the contest again since last time it had been hilarious and thrilling. Elmire also secretly checked for creepy vampires because she didn’t care to have one sneak up on her in the bathroom again.

Somewhat unbeknownst to her, her mother stayed nearby to 100 percent guarantee that everything stayed safe. As a cover and not to interfere with Elmire, Adelise pretended that she was there to sell food. Since it was a cover, she didn’t have a full spread and only came with cake to sell. But the cake was beautiful, inspired by culinary artists petrichoro and oni, completely Simstagramable, and delicious. Adelise had been cooking for ages and she knew how to make a mousse masterpiece.

Fortunately, no vampires showed up and Elmire won the karaoke contest with a perfect score.

She also confirmed that things were good between her and Brett. 🤬 Dominic 😈🎶.

Brett admitted to feeling slightly uncomfortable about his home, but he knew he should not be ashamed. He invited her to come over later to make that point to himself and because he trusted her, valued their friendship, and didn’t want to hide basic things.

---

Despite Adelise’s stand being a cover for vampire-monitoring, it starting to rain while she was outside, her not having an umbrella, her waffle maker breaking

and one woman removing all her clothes to shower naked in the rain fewer than twelve inches away from Adelise,

Adelise had a great time selling unique food to customers (and her lovely, supportive son, Darius).

She wanted to do it again and perhaps even make a small business out of it.

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The Fiers’ finances for the quarter were in. Instead of losing money as Asher had expected, they made 6k, which was great because now he wanted his wife to have a café. They would start simply (for Asher) with a new 3-story building in the Spice district (first floor: café and kitchen, second: gallery and practice/small performance space for Elmire, third: currently empty, to-be living space).