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Age Restriction

by Shift-Change

(Disclaimer: All images were generated with the help of AI tools)

Now that Christmas and even New Year’s were in the rear view mirror, the glow of the tree lights had been switched off, the last of the leftover turkey sandwiches had been eaten, but the awesome, yawning chasm of winter break stretched out before me for several more days. No homework, no 6 AM alarms, just me, my gaming laptop, and the beautiful, pristine $250 Steam gift card my parents had given me.

I ran my thumb over its glossy surface. They’d nailed it. W gift. Seriously. When I opened it on Christmas morning, I hugged them so tight I literally made my biceps sore. They could have gotten me clothes I’d never wear or some cringey “teen” thing from a daytime TV ad, but they’d paid attention. They knew what my sanctuary was. This little piece of plastic was the key to infinite worlds of adventure, a perfect refuge for a tragically single senior-year gamer girl whose idea of a wild Friday night was a new RPG, a family-sized bag of Cool Ranch Doritos, and a liter of orange soda. Not that I hadn’t tried to be less single. It’s just hard when your primary flirting technique is referencing obscure lore from fantasy games. I held out hope I’d find my kind of crowd at college next year. At least that’s what Mom kept telling me would happen.

But that was all a problem for Future Emily. Present Emily had a gift card burning a serious hole in her pocket…

I booted up my laptop, my beloved gaming rig, the familiar whir of the fans kicking into gear, ready to support whichever games I selected. The Steam Winter Sale was in full swing, a digital carnival of discounts and discovery. I clicked on the storefront, my wishlist already pulling up like a beloved shopping catalogue.

A few titles were greyed out. I clicked on one and “Age Restriction” flashed on my screen. I sighed, rolling my eyes, exasperated. “Content in this product may not be appropriate for all ages.” Give me a break. I was seventeen, for god’s sake. I’d seen things. I’d navigated high school; that was more harrowing than any virtual zombie apocalypse. I was practically an adult already. The arbitrary line of eighteen felt like a taunt, a final fence keeping me from my future and the truly cool, mature games my favorite streamers played.

I clicked on another one of the so-called “restricted games.” That same prompt popped up, asking me to verify my age to view the restricted content.

A date dropdown menu appeared. Enter your birth date. I put in my accurate day and month and then I didn’t even think. I just clicked the year selector, dragged the scrollbar up with a casual flick of my mouse, and clicked on a year that looked sufficiently ancient and adult, almost not even bothering to check which one. 1994? Sure, whatever. I hit enter. The window prompted me check a box to state that the “information I shared was accurate” or whatever. I checked the box. My cursor hovered over the ‘Cancel’ button for a second. Then, with a defiant click, I hit ‘View Page’.

The page flickered weirdly for a moment but then loaded instantly, revealing a dark, gritty fantasy RPG with a stunning cinematic trailer. “Awesome,” I whispered, my minor act of digital rebellion already forgotten in the face of such cutting edge graphics.

A faint, warm tingle started at the base of my skull, like the fizzy static of a soda bubble popping. I absently shook my head, my eyes glued to the screen. The synopsis for the game was intense, full of moral choices and complex narratives and on-screen sex(!!). My usual tastes ran more toward bright, anime-style JRPGs, but this… this looked sophisticated. Adult. I considered adding it to my cart, but just added it to my wishlist. For now. I had a whole lot more browsing to do.

The tingle spread down my spine, a not-unpleasant warmth flooding my limbs. I blinked, and for a second, the screen seemed to swim. A memory, crisp and sudden, flashed behind my eyes: the nervous-excited flutter in my stomach on my first day of college orientation. The smell of stale beer and textbooks in the dorm hallway. More flashes of memories. The cute, lanky guy from my Calculus class, Billy, with his own gaming laptop covered in esports stickers, the only other student using a gaming powerhouse for lecture notes, asking for my Discord.

I shook my head again, harder this time. What was that? I’d just been daydreaming about college acceptance letters last week. But this felt… real. Like a legit recalled moment, not a fantasy.

I chalked it up to holiday exhaustion and scrolled further. My wishlist was looking different. Longer, for one, and full of games I’d researched in-depth: my existing RPGs and puzzle platforms were joined by complex strategy titles, psychological thrillers, stuff that my high-school self would have found boring. My cultural touchstones had shifted, too; I found myself dismissing a hyped indie game as derivative of stuff from when I was fourteen, five years ago. Five years ago? Wasn’t I twelve five years ago, a small, distant part of me thought, but the thought was muffled, like it was shouting at me through a closed door.

The warmth in my body intensified, settling into my muscles. I felt… slightly taller. My back straightened in my chair without me telling it to, my posture improving somehow. The childish posters of cartoon characters on my wall seemed to recede, their colors dimming. My room… it looked the same, but felt smaller somehow. More cramped. A pile of textbooks on my desk labeled “CompSci 101” and “Intro to Visual Design” caught my eye. Of course they were there. Fall Finals had just ended. I was so glad to be done with those essays.

I was a sophomore in college. Almost a junior, I reminded myself. Billy wasn’t just a cute guy from class anymore; he was my boyfriend of over a year. We’d game together regularly. He’d outdone himself with his Christmas gift this year - a sleek refurbished monitor for me to game on a bigger screen at my desk. He was such a sweetheart. I’d crash at his dorm room on campus whenever I was too tired from studying to drive home. We’d spent last spring break at a cheap beach motel in Miami, and planned on interning in the same city together this summer. My parents were cool about me staying with him, now that I was… wait… how old was I? Twenty? Twenty-one? The numbers glided through my mind, smooth and unquestioned.

I pushed the thoughts of Billy and my comp-sci readings for next semester out of my mind. I was here to game. The Steam card was a freaking godsend. Money was stupidly tight, even with my part-time job at the campus library. I was so grateful my parents were letting me live at home during college, saving me a fortune. This gift was a perfect little luxury, a treat I could never justify buying for myself.

I clicked on a highly-rated puzzle platformer. It looked fun, but maybe a little… juvenile? Had my taste changed that much? I used to love these in high school.

Another wave of warmth, deeper this time. It wasn't a tingle; it was a profound, internal shift, like a gear clicking into a new position. The world shimmered around the edges of my vision.

When it cleared, I wasn’t in my childhood bedroom.

I was in a modest, slightly messy living room. A framed diploma for a Bachelor’s in Graphic Design from Evergreen U hung on the wall. The air smelled faintly of coffee and the residual scent of the lemony cleaner I used on the kitchen counters this morning. Our apartment. Mine and Billy’s.

We’d moved in together six months ago. It made sense financially, and after four years together, it felt right. The reality of cohabitation, however, was a relentless tide of chores. I seemed to be the one who always noticed the trash was full or that we were out of milk. My Steam library had gathered digital dust. Work was demanding, and by the time I got home, cooked dinner, and tidied up, I was often too drained to do much more than watch Netflix or just hang out with Billy.

But not tonight. Tonight, I had a gift card to spend. And I was going to make it count. I was browsing my MacBook Pro (my gaming rig had crapped out on me shortly after college, and a MacBook had been the sensible thing to replace it with), exploring the Steam Winter Sale like I still did every year, one of those youthful rituals you just can’t set aside. I had to put in some thought as to what games I would choose. Some real thought. Both money and free time were tighter than they used to be, and I didn’t want to waste either, especially with the boon of my parents’ generosity. I knew if Billy were in my shoes, he’d just save it for the next few FPS titles and be done with it, but obviously I had a slightly more discerning palette when it came to my gaming, something Billy never ceased to remind me about. He’d always jokingly called me a “game snob” and I’d leaned into it, of course. God, he always knew just how to make me laugh. Adulthood was tough, but having him in my life, and not being so lonely all the time, definitely made life feel easier these days.

Decisions, decisions. I had to pick something. I was actually free tonight and between all this browsing time and the inevitable install buffer, I was leaving myself precious little time to actually PLAY. Time to make a choice. I was scrolling, scrolling the “most popular titles” on the sale page when yet another wave of warmth flowed down my spine and buzzed through my extremities. Another shift.

I was twenty-five. A quarter-century old. It felt like a real, solid milestone. Billy… God, we’d been together for seven years. Since freshman year. It was crazy. And he’d finally proposed last month! The diamond on my left hand—a simple, beautiful solitaire—clicked softly against the laptop keys as I typed.

The joy of that memory was immediately tempered by a new, adult anxiety: budgets. We were saving for the wedding, for a honeymoon, for a down payment on a place that actually had a second bedroom. I couldn’t quite remember when Billy had gotten so sensible, or me for that matter, but I was so proud of us, even if adulting was well and truly exhausting. Just about every dollar of my own money was spoken for months in advance. This Steam card wasn’t just a gift; it was a vital injection of fun into a very responsible life. I had to choose my games wisely. I dove into reviews, comparing playtimes and mentally calculating dollar-per-hour value, my engagement ring gleaming under the screen’s light.

I was reading a deep-dive analysis of a new game’s open world exploration strategies when the next shift hit. It wasn’t a wave; it was more of a landslide.

My back gave a faint ache, the kind you get from sitting too long at a desk. The skin on my hands looked… different. More defined. The cozy apartment shimmered and melted away, reforming into a bigger but still cozy house. A house. With a mortgage. I was standing in the kitchen, dinner well on its way in the oven. I glanced back at the living room, this vague sense growing at the back of my mind that I had just been over on the sofa. I noticed the wedding photo of me and Billy—no, Billy was a nickname from college; he was going by William now—hung above the fireplace. We looked so happy.

I was twenty-seven. Officially a 90s kid, though being born in ‘98 I didn’t actually remember the 90s personally. Nevertheless, my nostalgia was a marketable commodity now, and game developers knew it. I scanned the Steam store, not for the hottest new releases, but for something that would scratch that specific itch, that would make me feel the way I did when I was just a lonely kid playing Kingdom Hearts for the first time, or messing around in Wii Sports.

Gaming had become more of a theoretical hobby lately, something I used to have time for. Between my job, which had advanced enough to be even more demanding (though somehow not enough to earn much of a raise) and maintaining this house, the hours often vanished. William still managed his weekly Call of Duty nights with his friends, a sacred ritual I’d never interrupt. But on the occasions when I found a spare hour or two, I usually chose to deadhead the roses in the garden or try a new banana bread recipe. It was more… immediately satisfying. Less mentally taxing.

My parents’ gift was incredibly kind, but as I leaned against the kitchen countertop and browsed the app version of the Steam Store, a wistful sadness crept in. What would I even play? Would I ever finish a game again? The rings on my finger, my wedding band now nestled against the engagement ring, clicked a lonely rhythm on my smartphone as I tapped and scrolled.

The change came again, swift and brutal. The warmth was gone, replaced by a deep, cellular fatigue.

A high-pitched wail shattered the silence. Then another, softer snuffling sound joined in.

I wasn’t standing in the kitchen of a quiet house. I was back(?) in the living room seated on a couch stained with something suspiciously sticky, which I couldn’t deal with right now, not with a toddler having a full-blown tantrum at my feet because his goldfish crackers were the “wrong shape” or some such catastrophe. In my arms, a baby squirmed, and a warm sensation and sour smell bloomed against my chest. Spit-up. All over her, and all over my shirt. And just when I was hoping she'd go down for a nap, too.

Memories flooded in yet again. I was twenty-nine. The baby in my arms, Mia, was a happy accident who arrived just twelve months after her planned older brother, Noah. I’d gracefully bowed out of my graphic design career after two back-to-back maternity leaves; “stepping back to focus on my family” sounded so much nicer than “I am too exhausted to form coherent sentences, let alone design logos and icons.”

I looked longingly at my closed laptop on the coffee table, buried under a pile of clean baby clothes that needed folding. The Winter Sale was on. My parents had given me a Steam gift card for the holidays. They remembered my passion, even when I sometimes struggled to myself. It was so unbelievably thoughtful. But when? When would I use it? Maybe if I negotiated with William to give up one of his gaming nights… the thought was a fleeting fantasy, instantly drowned out by Noah’s escalating screams and Mia’s fussing.

Every now and then I wished, casually, for some more time just to myself, but then that deep teenage feeling of loneliness I still remembered as if it were yesterday would rear its ugly head, and I knew, I had exactly what I needed. A loving husband. Two beautiful children. Parents that cared about me. I sighed, grabbing a burp cloth to wipe up the mess, my body moving on autopilot, fueled by a love that was profound but also bone-achingly tiring.

The next shift was mercifully the last. Born in 1994. I didn’t realize or understand that my reality had finally aligned with my haphazard and childish lie. All I noticed in that moment was that the crying had stopped. A blessed, miraculous quiet filled the house. Naptime.

A familiar fatigue in my body settled in, recognizable and constant. I rested a hand on my stomach, on the gentle, yet firm swell there. A sensation I was well-acquainted with, though it had been a few… years? Another baby on the way. A planned one this time, no more surprises.

I was thirty-one. I glanced at my reflection in a mirror on the wall of our living room. There were fine lines at the corners of my eyes—laugh lines, mostly—and I’d pulled some of my hair up into a practical, messy bun that’s easier to manage between chores and grocery runs.

The gift from my parents was so helpful. Times were tight with only one income and two—soon to be three—little ones. The $300 grocery store gift card was going to be a lifesaver next month. From the moment I’d opened the card, I had already been mentally allocating it to pasta sauce and veggies and frozen chicken nuggets. Maybe some of my favorite sparkling water as a treat for myself. And eventually, if it lasted long enough, I'd be spending it on diapers too, I thought with a happy sigh.

But the other part of the gift… that was for me. It was for the kids, technically, but it was really for me. A $50 Steam card. Mom had said, “We thought you could get some of those fun computer games to play with the kids.”

Noah was four. Mia was three. The perfect ages to start getting them hooked. William would be home from work soon, and then I’d finally escape for an hour to do the grocery shopping alone. But first…

I opened my laptop, the action feeling both familiar and foreign. The Steam store loaded. But I wasn’t browsing the dark, mature RPGs or the complex strategy games of my youth. Instead I typed into the search bar: “Cooperative kids games.” The games I bought obviously needed to be age appropriate.

I found one with bright, colorful graphics where you worked together to build a little village. It had overwhelmingly positive reviews, with parents mentioning they loved playing it with their preschoolers.

A smile spread across my face, a genuine, unburdened smile of eager anticipation. It wasn’t the all-consuming solo adventure I’d dreamed of as a seventeen-year-old. It was better. I clicked “Add to Cart,” the $50 gift card more than covering it.

I couldn’t wait for William to get home. But not so I could have time alone shopping for groceries. I made a decision right then. When William walked through the door I’d send him right back out with the shopping list. I could do that; I was pregnant, after all. That way I could gather my children on our cozy sofa, their small, warm bodies leaning excitedly against mine, and watch their faces light up as I introduced them to the first digital world they would ever explore. I would share with them the hobby I had always loved most, the hobby that had, unbeknownst to me, in a roundabout way, built the very life I was living.

The gift card wasn’t just buying a game. It was a down payment on a new generation of gamers. And it was the most perfect gift I had ever received. Adventures lay ahead of me, now that I was back in my sanctuary. But this time, I wasn’t alone.

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