You may see me on TV, in your magazines or even in the newspaper. This is a location I have been in since I was 12 but you may be wondering how I got there. That is a story no one knows and can only guess the details but now, I guess, you get to know. I used to frequent the arcade on the weekends, this particular day I had stayed a little longer than usual. I had dug through the car, the couch, my backpack, my mom's purse and any other usual locations for loose change. I had amassed a whole six quarters compared to my typical two. I rushed over with my loot ready to spend it all in an instant. You know the pin ball machine that has the wizard and three trolls on it. Ok... of course you do, you wouldn’t be here with me if you didn’t. I had just set my second to last quarter in the line, I was third. That was when a man, long jacket, purple scarf, long hair and beard, kinda reminded me of the wizard on the machine, asked all three of us what we thought of the game.

​

“It's a classic isn’t it?”

“I guess...”

“It was pretty popular when I was a kid too.”

It was strange, he was one of the only adults in the room, even the employees of the place were younger than twenty. Looking back on it he was super out of place but I guess I know why now. He wanted to know what games were the best, which ones were the easiest to play, what high scores we had, you know questions twelve year olds want to brag about. Something like, “it's been awhile since I’ve played these games.”
He wanted to walk around the place and have us point the best games out but we had a line and I was next up. So the boy who had finished the round said he would show him the next game he was going to play and left with him. It was strange, but we were inside. He wouldn't make the boy leave the building would he. Well...not exactly. The thing is this boy would never leave the store until we were all with him.

It had been 20 minutes, the girl in front of me was finished but wanted to play again so she placed another quarter on the glass and was ready to watch me play the game. Before I had a chance to place my quarter in the machine the man came walking back over, the boy was gone, it was just him. Where did he go? I guess he had joined another line. A thought that couldn’t be further from the truth.

The man tried to get the girl to leave with him, for her to show him her favorite game but she did no such thing.
She stated inquisitively, “What game did the boy show you? I can’t see him in any of the lines.” “It was some skee ball game, the line was very long so I decided to ask you girls for the tour instead”.

“I’m up next so I won’t be leaving. Why do you want to talk to us anyway? It's quite strange.” The words that came out of her mouth seemed to bother him. Her question was ignored and was replaced by a statement from the man a bit harsher than his usual conversational tone.

​

“I am simply asking because I have my own kids at home. I would like to bring them here but I want them to have the best time they can. Now, what is your favorite game here?”

She didn't budge. But neither did he. He sighed and looked around, the arcade was still as busy as usual but something was off, no one was looking at us. It was like we had been separated from the room. The other thing was this pin ball game was super popular, you had to wait in line for hours to play it. There should have been more people behind her, behind me even. That was when the man pulled out his wallet, it had an accordion file looking picture set up. It was one of those wallets that a line of pictures could be stored in.

“Here”, he said, “proof that I'm telling the truth.”

​

In the stack were several pictures of children, he must have a huge house because there was no way all of these kids were his. I scanned the pictures with the girl, something was a bit off, all the pictures of the kids were in this arcade, each one standing next to a game. If he hadn't brought his kids here, why were the pictures of them in this arcade? That's when I saw it or more accurately him. In the last picture, there stood the boy from before smiling in front of his favorite game in the arcade. It wasn’t the skee ball machine but the pac man game that was right across from us. A million questions went through my head. Where’s this man's camera? Why did he say he left the boy at the skee ball machine? Why is the boy not in line? How did he get the picture so fast? This boy wasn't related to him, was he?

The girl and I made eye contact, we had both seen the same thing. In unison we ran towards the nearest group of kids playing on another machine but that's when I felt a terrible pain raced up my arms and traveled down to my feet. My skin felt like it was tearing from the bone like you would tear paper from a notebook.
Suddenly the girl and I were standing alone next to the stupid wizard pinball machine we were just playing, our quarters still on the glass. But that was the only thing we could see. It was like the edges of my vision was black, I couldn't move from side to side, I stayed in the same spot.

I think the worst part is every time a new kid gets placed in the wallet I can see it happen. He uses us as proof of his innocence and then snatches his next unsuspecting victim. Each new kid brings new information into our prison, memories of ads in the paper with our faces on it, milk carton pictures and news interviews. The odd thing is, we can all see each other when the wallet is closed. Our faces pressed up against one another.
I guess now that you are here, what’s your favorite game?