The Legacy of Goku wasn’t the best video game in the world, but at the age of 14, it seemed like the only game I had to have in my life. I was head first into everything Dragon Ball Z and the thought of a DBZ video game with role-playing elements excited me in a way no other game could.
Mario? No. I already had all of those. Sonic? They were just remakes of the games from the Sega Genesis. Most of the other titles in stock were sports games, and you don’t want to get me started on why I wouldn’t soil my GameBoy Advance with that smut.
When you’re waiting around the hospital for an undetermined amount of time, you need to go with a role-playing game. The worst thing that could happen is beating he game and then ending up alone with your thoughts and the realization that your grandfather was dying.
Sometimes you need to escape from the harsh realities of the world. What better way to do that than kill aliens as a superhuman that shoots fire from his hands?
I was just about to destroy one of the main antagonists in the game. He killed my friends, so payback was going to be swift and unforgiving.
I franticly spammed the A button, in an attempt to skip the seemingly endless amounts of text-based dialogue. Pressing the button didn’t actually speed up the action, but it’s all I could do. It was either that or read.
The final line of text was about to appear and the battle was going to start, I just knew it. I was so close…
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw someone standing in the doorway of the waiting room. “Great,” I thought to myself. “It’s probably someone with a kid that would ruin my epic battle with constant whining.”
When I realized the text stream was far from finished, I looked up to see who was there. He hadn’t moved or entered the room, I thought that was enough of a reason to remove my eyes from the game.
It was a cop. He had his back turned to the room, blocking the doorway but standing far enough from it to allow other people to enter. There must have been a criminal about to be escorted out of the hospital or maybe escorted in.
I was getting excited at the thought of a criminal entering the hospital in handcuffs. Maybe he’d be kicking and screaming. Maybe I’d catch a glance of some bullet wounds…
With my GameBoy now sitting firmly on my lap, I watched the hallway intently, waiting for the action. After several minutes of nothing, I went back to my game.
Finally, the moment I was waiting for had finally arrived. No, not the convict. I forgot all about that. It was time to fight the boss in the game.
Right after the battle started, I had a gut feeling that something more was going on with the cop. I paused the game and looked up. Much to my surprise, I saw an entire SWAT team staring back at me. I slowly raised my hand up and offered a wave, but they just stood there and stared back, completely emotionless.
I knew something was wrong. Really wrong.
I should have known it had something to do with me, but I turned my head back down to my game and tried to block out the negative imagery I had going on.
Wait. That doesn’t even make sense.
If he died why would they have a SWAT team?
I’ve been playing a game, this can’t have nothing to do with me.
Oh, God. Does this involve my parents? Is one of them dead?
It as too much negativity for my young mind to handle, so I focused on my game instead. After all, what good would worrying do?
Maybe they are talking to someone in the hallway.
Maybe if I hold my head down and play my game, everything will work out fine.
He would be talking to me.
I sounded nervous. Shit, I was nervous. All of the cop shows I had watched taught me that sounding nervous makes you sound guilty in the eyes of the law.
“Did you make a phone call from that phone?”
The officer pointed to the corner of the room, opposite of where I was sitting.
I looked up, responded with a simple “No,” and then turned my attention back to my game.
“Well, someone made a phone call from that phone. Was anyone else in this room with you?”
I had to think for a minute. A couple of boys left as I was entering, but they didn’t really look like they were up to no good.
“Uh, no. I’ve been the only one in here. I mean, there were a couple of kids leaving as I entered.”
“What did they look like?”
“Uh, I don’t know. I think one had an orange vest on.”
I was so focused on playing my game; I hadn’t even looked up since I left my grandfather’s room. I thought he was wearing orange, but that’s all I caught out of my peripheral vision. It could have been neon pink. Hell, it could have been a girl with four legs for all I know.
“We didn’t see anyone matching that description on the premises. And the girl at the front desk said the call came from this phone.”
I hung my head, looking at my black game screen. I pretended to play my game while thinking of something to say, with the buttons clicking loudly with nothing but the silence of the SWAT team watching me.
“What’s so important about that phone call?”
“Kid, someone in this room made a bomb threat.”
Oh, shit. The anxiety I previously hand was upgraded to a biohazard level.
Immediately, I was in tears.
I don’t know why my response was to immediately deny doing it and break down in tears. At that point, I wasn’t able to think clearly. I knew I was going to get blamed for it. It was post 9/11, someone made a bomb threat in the empty room I was occupying, and I was an unsupervised teenager.
I may have been failing my math class, but even I knew that equation…
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Disclaimer: This piece of writing was originally submitted for an English writing assignment, which earned an A. However, there were a couple minor mistakes that needed to be ironed out to turn it into an 100%. This is the revised, 100% version. It's based on true events that occurred in my life.
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