The Story of Us ☔ G1, #2

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‘If I’m going to survive, I need to have some kind of income.’ Jen glanced at her rows of plants. ‘It’s true that my plants will bring in cash, but not nearly enough to survive. I need to find a job.’

Feeling nervous but determined, Jen decides to head to the library in the middle of town – Quad Manor.

Looking through the list of options, she starts to lose hope. She doesn’t have the skills for any of them! The only thing she’s ever been good at is playing video games and working with computers.

Her eyes scanned the screen. ‘Rainy Day Entertainment is hiring for a live chat support agent. It’s the Tech Guru career… I’m good with tech, I think?’ Chewing her lip, she fills out the information needed before calming her nerves by working on her programming skills.

She had just started learning the skill in her last year of high school, so she had a basic knowledge of it and she wanted to learn more. Several hours passed without her even realizing it. Her phone buzzing in her pocket is what snapped her from her out of being engrossed in the task at hand.

Curious, she opened her e-mail, eyes widening. She got the job!

‘I’m so glad…’, her eyes lifted to the clock. ‘It’s already seven PM? I guess I should head home.’ Her lips tugged down at the word ‘home’. Did she even have such a place anymore? Could she make her little space her new home?

At the moment, she wasn’t given much of a choice.

Returning to her plot of land, she grabbed some granola from the cooler, plopping down on top of it with a plastic spoon in her hand. Honestly, it isn’t that great without milk – it’s really hard and dry – but granola is the cheapest food she can buy and it lasts a long time. It doesn’t even need to be refrigerated, but she’d rather not wake up to find her granola invaded by ants.

After finishing her food, she crawls into the tent and quickly falls asleep to the sounds of crickets chirping in the distance.

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When she steps out of her tent the next morning, she was happy to see that some of her plants were ready to harvest. They won’t sell for much, but it’s still more money than she had before selling them.

As she’s harvesting her plants, a light rain starts to fall from the cloudy sky above.

‘I guess I should have bought an umbrella, huh.’ She glanced up at the sky, drops of water falling onto her glasses. Despite the water seeping into her clothes, she couldn’t stop the smile from spreading across her face.

Ever since she was a small child, she’d always adored the rain. No matter what she was doing, she would always drop whatever she was doing when it started to rain so she could sit out on the porch and just watch it fall to the earth. It was peaceful and calming to her, and in this stressful situation, she definitely needs the peace.

‘Isn’t it best to fish in the rain? I remember Jimmy teaching me that but I never did look it up to see if it was true. I remember seeing a fishing hole nearby…’ She set off down the path to the shore, stopping to collect flowers when she saw them. She even managed to find a frog.

Jimmy was an old friend of her godmother’s – they had gone to high school together, so he often came by to check on Jen while her godmother was out of town for work. He was the one that taught her how to fish when she was younger. It certainly wasn’t something she wanted to learn, but he had insisted and, not being one for confrontation, she reluctantly let him take her down to the river in the next town over. He claimed it was the best fishing spot.

Jen smiled softly as she recalled the memory. It had been a few years since she saw him last because he had retired over in Brindleton Bay, several towns away from her home in Oasis Springs.

‘Maybe when I settle in a bit, I’ll go visit him. Brindleton is only a town over from Windenburg, after all.’ Her thoughts were cut when she felt a sharp tug on the line. Biting her lip, she carefully reels in the fish – it’s a small Guppy.

For the next few hours, she continues to fish but only gets on more bite – an equally small Minnow.

‘Well, at least I caught something, right?’, she shakes her head as she reels in the line, carefully attaching the hook to the rod so it wasn’t swinging around. Jen decides it’s time to head back to her lot, but not before taking a moment to pause and admire the beauty around her.