A Single Ticket
All of the pinging noises and flashing lights were immediately overwhelming when you walked into the arcade. The navy blue carpet had a pattern reminiscent of a spiderweb but far more unnatural. The faint sound of race cars exploding and aliens being vaporized could be heard from the coin exchange machine at the entrance. As much as Jace liked video games, she did not like crowded spaces. But it was Wendy's birthday, and that always meant at least a few hours at the arcade followed by frozen yogurt with a plethora of toppings. She stepped in front of the coin machine and deposited a five-dollar bill, and received twenty gold tokens in return.
“Ready?” Wendy asked her while holding her five-pound sack of tokens. Behind her, Emily and Maggie waited with their pocketfuls to begin shooting lasers and driving NASCAR.
“Ready,” Jace replied and followed just behind the three girls. First up was always Dance Dance Revolution. Wendy and Maggie knew each routine by heart and would play it as a guaranteed way to earn a bunch of tickets. The two hopped up onto the platform, posed like samurais ready for combat. The funky music started, and in unison, the girls would jump and cross their legs and twist around following the glowing arrows.
After two minutes or so, the machine announced they were, “Champion Dancers,” and spat out a never-ending snake of pink tickets. They squealed and shoved the tickets into their pockets.
“I’m going for that giant chick,” Wendy stated with affirmation in her voice, “it’s so frickin' cute, and I’m always like a hundred tickets short. Not today. Not on my fifteenth birthday.” The prize she spoke of was a giant, yellow, fluffy stuffed animal. It was supposed to be a baby chicken but was comically the size of a German Shepard and had a large tuft of white hair on top of its head. Any more hair and it would’ve started to resemble those tiny troll dolls with wild manes. This was not the first time Wendy had mentioned it, and it sounded like it was going to be the last time she left this arcade without it.
Maggie smirked at Jace and Emily and then shoved all her pink tickets into Wendy’s pocket. “The chick it is!” Maggie declared, and it became their mission for the night.
“I’ll go zap some extraterrestrials,” Emily yelled to them as she faded into the noise of the arcade to find Defender.
“We should do Revolution one more time? To get all the tickets?” Maggie suggested to Wendy. The two girls looked at Jace expectantly, “Your turn, Jacey.”
She looked at the glowing arrows on the floor and immediately felt her stomach drop. Jumping and dancing around on that platform was hell; everyone watching you while you start to sweat and hop around like a weirdo.
“I’ll be more useful at a less physical game. Go again, guys, I’m gonna go find Skee-Ball or something.” She walked away slowly as the girls inserted their tokens and assumed the samurai position once again, poised for victory.
Jace walked over to the concessions area and sat down at a table to observe the action in the arcade. She bought herself a Sprite and returned to her table, watching people handing in their tickets and collecting their prizes. A tall teenager pointed to a tiny stuffed bunny holding a flower in its paws. The employee handed it to the guy, and he walked a few paces away to a teenage girl wearing a flannel holding a lollipop they give out when you didn’t win enough tickets to actually win anything. Her face lit up when he placed the bunny on top of the lollipop in her hands. They held eye contact for a moment before she placed a gentle kiss on his lips. Jace blushed and immediately felt that she was intruding on something private and turned her gaze away.
Jace’s eyes continued to wander over the prize store until they fell onto the giant chick, which grinned at her maniacally. She huffed and stood up as her people-watching had to end because if she returned with zero tickets for Wendy’s chick she’d be riddled with bad-friend-birthday guilt all year. She dropped a few tokens into one of the Insane Jackpot games, where all you do is pay and then press the button to spin the wheel. Basically a lottery game of luck; no skill required. After using eight of her tokens and winning zero tickets on the obviously rigged game, she decided she needed to find a more lucrative option.
She wandered through the dizzying room of games, catching a glimpse of Maggie and Wendy still dominating Dance Dance Revolution only now they had accumulated a lot of tickets and a small audience. Jace was heading towards the back of the arcade where the older-school games lived. She wasn’t much better at them, but they intimidated her less as did the crowd that surrounded them. Usually, players alone or with one other person used these games and were often slightly older than the screaming kids that inhabited the rest of the arcade. She surveyed the wall of ‘fun’ and decided she’d stick to her word and try to play some Skee-Ball.
Two coins clinked down the slots, and eight brown balls rolled down the right side of the alley. She had used half her coins and still had yet to win a ticket. Gripping the ball in her right hand, she rolled it down the alley perfectly up the center. Sadly she lacked some forward force, and the ball rolled up, and back down the small hill without scoring any points. Jace cursed in her head and waited, embarrassed, for the ball to roll back to her. She certainly wasn’t alone but was relieved that it didn’t seem anyone was paying attention to her. On her right were a father and very young daughter just practicing rolling the ball at all. And on her left were three guys around her age that were in an impassioned conversation about the Mandalorian and the exact age of Baby Yoda.
After an eternity, the ball was within reach of her fingertips again, and she reset herself. This time she would make it over that hill. This time she’d get on the scoreboard. Using all of her limited strength she hurled the ball down the alley, but there was a miscalculation and the ball did not fly up the center. Instead, with all its velocity it shot up out of Jace’s lane and aggressively landed in the left lane’s 100-point slot.
One of the guys had been taking his turn but his ball was smacked away by Jace’s and lay pathetically in the center of his alley. The guys’ conversation ceased when they heard the loud clack, and they turned to look at Jace, who was as red as a cardinal. The father and daughter had paused their lesson to stare at Jace in wonderment. Her lips parted to utter an apology, but nothing came out of her throat, and she stood there bright red with her mouth hanging open.
The guy who had been taking his turn walked over to her. He was a few inches taller than her and had dark brown hair that had been buzzed down short. His brown eyes moved closer to her, and she felt her heart begin to pound. He leaned in, cupping his hand against the side of his mouth, and whispered, “Thanks for the points, they were kicking my ass,” and chuckled softly, causing his shoulders to rise and fall underneath his AC/DC t-shirt.
She felt like her balance had left her when he leaned towards her and was wary to take a step in fear of tipping right over. When she regained her clarity, she smiled at him and whispered, “You’re welcome. I thought you could use some help.” He turned away from her and began to walk up and onto the lane to retrieve the stranded ball.
“DON’T do that.” An exasperated employee called from a corner of the room and began walking quickly towards the three Skee-Ball lanes.
“I’m sorry, sorry, she needed her ball. My bad, man.” The guy quickly scooted off the alley, and the employee let out an annoyed sigh and walked away.
Smirking, he said, “This is a gift from me, for the extra points,” he winked and pointed his finger towards her lane, “Aim there,” he said teasingly, as he dropped the ball into her palm and returned to his friends. Jace hurled the ball, this time more gingerly, and managed to score 50 points. She glanced over to the three guys, while the other two had returned to their Yoda talk, her arcade vigilante had been watching. He turned towards her and bowed his head jokingly while silently clapping for her achievement. A little giggle erupted out of her and she felt her stomach flutter.
Soon after, the three guys finished their Skee-Ball game and moved onto the air hockey table. And Jace won about thirty tickets, enough to return to Wendy with a birthday offering. Well, Wendy and Maggie as it turns out, never left Dance Dance Revolution and had earned a walloping 2,000 tickets.
“The chick is 2,500 tickets, right?” Maggie yelled to Wendy over the funky music as she spun around and touched the ground.
“Yes! So close!” Wendy hollered back through heavy breathing. Jace slinked through the crowd of teenagers that were watching in awe until she was standing directly behind them. Wendy turned around for a combo move and excitedly noticed Jace. “Hey, stranger! How’d ya do?” Jace held up her thin stack of tickets for them to see, and their eyes both widened.
Maggie exclaimed, “Jace! You actually won some games, oh my god you rock. Did you play Skee-Ball?”
“I did.” A smile flooded her face all of a sudden, her cheeks gained a twinge of pink, and she looked down at the ugly carpet.
“Uhhhhhh WHAT was that?” Wendy demanded to know as she had noticed Jace’s expression through her various dance moves. But more importantly, she had noticed Jace trying to hide this expression.
“OH my god, Wen. Nothing. I’m just happy I got you some tickets. You know I suck at these games, just be proud of me.”
“Oh no, I smell bullshit!” She yelled jokingly and Jace waved her arms at her trying to get her to shut up. Wendy just stared at her with her eyebrows raised, waiting for Jace to spill her guts. Jace didn’t want to tell Wendy cause she knew she’d press her about it, but she wanted to appease her, especially since it was her birthday.
“Okay, okay so my clumsy self basically threw a ball at this guy but he was really nice about it,” Jace said the whole sentence in half a breath. “Where is Emily anyway?” she asked while standing on her tip-toes, looking around the room, trying desperately to change the subject.
“And?” Wendy asked in a long-drawn-out syllable. Jace rolled her eyes and tapped her foot. She wanted to push Wendy off the platform for making her turn this red.
“And he was cute…” Jace mumbled under her breath, giving Wendy an extremely satisfied look on her face. The game ended as the funky music stopped and Maggie and Wendy hopped off.
“You should give him your number, is he still here?” Wendy’s head swiveled back and forth, “What was he wearing?”
“Please, stop.” Jace looked at Wendy firmly with pleading eyes. Wendy rolled her eyes and shrugged but agreed to drop it.
Emily emerged from the darkness with a fistful of pink tickets and threw them in the air over Wendy. “Six-hundred tickets for the birthday bitch.” They all laughed, and Wendy twirled around as the tickets fell around her.
“Chick!! Here I come!” she began sweeping the tickets on the floor toward her shoving them in her pockets. The other girls helped, and it was quite a sight to see them all on their hands and knees corralling pink pieces of paper into their friend’s hoodie.
Wendy swaggered up to the counter, and the four of them began dumping fistfuls in front of the employee. The employee’s face was expressionless as they did this and remained expressionless as he informed them they had a grand total of 2,796 tickets to purchase a prize.
Before he’d finished saying the number Wendy had heard all that she needed to and pointed to the chick sitting on the counter in the back. He registered her choice and went to retrieve the stuffed animal and placed it in Wendy’s outstretched arms. She squeezed the chick in a great, big hug and then opened her arms to include the other girls. They stood there for a moment, the five of them in a group hug until the unimpressed employee told them to please step to the side.
“Thank you guys so, so much, I love him so much. This has been such a great birthday I love you guys.” Wendy squealed and squeezed her new friend.
The girls sat down at a table and shared curly fries and nachos. “Hey,” Wendy whispered across the table, “a guy is staring at you, Jacey.” Jace turned around and saw the three guys two tables away from them, and AC/DC was looking back and forth from his plate to Jace. She quickly turned back around and blushed, and Wendy leaned back with a giant smirk on her face. “Is this your Skee-Ball victim? The cute one?” She said slyly.
“What victim?” Emily’s face twisted in confusion and the other three laughed.
“Nothing,” Jace chuckled, “My ball went in his lane by accident.”
“That’s hot,” Maggie retorted quickly. They all burst into laughter again.
“Why don’t you give him our extra tickets? We haven’t used them yet…” Wendy suggested carefully to Jace. “Who doesn’t want like 300 free tickets?” Jace rolled her eyes at the thought of walking back over to him, but at the same time, she could feel him staring and wanted nothing more but to stare back. She thought about how sweet his eyes looked at her when he had leaned in and a shiver went up to her spine. She prayed he hadn’t seen the twitch, but her friends certainly did. They began oohing and poking at her to go ask him out.
“Just ask him to come back here next week,” Emily suggested.
“Or get ice cream, you love ice cream,” Maggie laughed, but Jace was silent.
Wendy eyed her friend and then turned to the other two girls and declared, “She doesn’t want to ask him out, or go over there, or give him her number or our tickets. Just drop it guys, a lost cause.” Maggie huffed, but they both agreed to let it go.
The girls finished their curly fries and trashed the remainder of their nachos. They began putting their coats on and collecting their belongings to leave. Wendy shoved the tickets into Jace’s coat pocket.
“These are for you, thanks for coming. I know this isn’t your favorite place.” She hugged her, well, she half-hugged her as one of Wendy’s arms was occupied with holding the chick.
Through the hug, Jace asked, “What am I supposed to do with these? We’re leaving.”
“Whatever you want,” Wendy answered and nodded her head towards the table the guys were still occupying. Jace looked in the direction of the nod and then back to Wendy, who gave an exaggerated shrug and turned towards Emily and Maggie to head towards the exit. Jace looked down at all tickets in her pocket and took a deep breath. She would feel so dumb handing him these tickets and doing what? Saying what? That she thinks he’s cute. That could not have a happy ending.
She saw the father and daughter that had been playing Skee-Ball next to her shopping in the prize store. The little girl kept picking up a little toy car, but her father kept informing her she had to pick something else as they hadn’t won that many tickets. Jace asked the employee to borrow a pen, and then she walked over to the little girl. “Hi, I was playing Skee-Ball next to you earlier.”
“Oh yeah,” the dad let out a chuckle that he caught and cleared his throat, “Yes, I remember.” The little girl waved at Jace with a smile.
“Well, I won these tickets, but I can’t decide what I want. Any ideas?” Jace knelt beside the girl whose face lit up with excitement and then faded to disappointment.
“You should get this car,” the girl said. “It’s red. I bet it goes fast! But I don’t have enough.”
“Well, since I can’t decide and you seem pretty excited about this car, why don’t you take my tickets?” She pulled out her tickets and ripped one-off, and slid it into her jean pocket. Jace handed the rest of the roll of pink tickets to the girl, and they immediately began to spring out her hands and onto the floor. Her dad laughed and bent down to collect them.
“Thank you, that’s kind of you,” he said to Jace as his daughter began jumping up and down with her new toy.
“Thanks for not laughing at me earlier at Skee-Ball,” Jace replied, and they shared a chuckle as she began to leave the store. She heard the dad carefully tell his daughter now she could pick out one more thing, which caused her to shriek with joy.
Jace handed the pen back to the employee on her way out and thanked him. She took a deep breath with her fists balled up and headed towards the concession area. Her heart sank as the thought of actually walking up to these three guys set in and she turned towards the exit to abandon her mission. But she saw Wendy hiding behind a trash can, watching her like the most conspicuous secret agent ever. Wendy saw her retreat and motioned with her hands emphatically for Jace to go for it.
AC/DC guy stood up from the table and went over to the soda machine. An opportunity for a private rejection, Jace thought and hustled towards him. He glanced up from his cup when she arrived by his side.
He let out a laugh and said, “Hey, it’s you—“
“Yeah, I’m leaving. Here.” She handed him a single pink ticket and then b-lined it to the exit pulling Wendy out from behind the trash and out the arcade doors.
She spent the entire ride home writhing in humiliation, but luckily Wendy had been kind enough not to mention what she witnessed to Maggie and Emily. So, she writhed in private.
After she ate dinner with her parents she sat down to watch TV, and to her surprise, she received a text message. It read: “Hey, I’m reaching out because I’m interested in the professional Skee-Ball lesson. Would love to set a time for you to show me your technique. Thanks, Kenny”
The fluttering filled her stomach, and a smile grew on her face. The weight of embarrassment lifted off her shoulders and was replaced with the excitement of a successful first move. She ran to her room to call Wendy and debrief the situation, and after some back and forth they agreed on how to respond. Jace replied with a text reading: “I am afraid I am retiring from my career as a Skee-Baller. Too many innocent bystanders were almost killed. However, I am pivoting towards mini-golf if you’re interested?”