How to Stand Up for Yourself

The Place Where Promises Aren’t Kept [Chapter 23]

I made it through the rest of the school day feeling good about making Kyle tell the truth. My Rune Quest items were still gone though. There was that Max kid, too, who had tossed all of them. Even if I knew his name, I probably wouldn’t have said anything to him about it if I ran into him.

After school, I waited what felt like a really long time for my mom to get home.

“Are you going to call Kyle’s mom?” I asked her at least five times after she had came back. Right before she started making dinner, she finally sat down, phone in hand and made the call.

I tried to listen in to what she was saying. Any time she saw me, she made one of those grumpy mom faces at me and waved me away with the back of her hand. I listened the best I could from around the corner. She said everything nicely, explaining the situation. I couldn’t hear what was decided.

I helped set the table before dinner, without even being asked. I hoped it would trick my mom into talking about it. I think it worked.

“Well, Kyle’s mom was kind of sad about how things turned out for your video game,” she said. “She agreed that Kyle did do something wrong, like looking at your password. Did you change it like Mr. Tate said?”

“Yeah,” I answered, leaning on the kitchen wall. “So what’s going to happen to Kyle?”

My mom shrugged. “She said she’s going to take the power cord from the back of the computer. She said that Kyle was always on it, even before she got home from work. He was ignoring most of his homework because of it. I’ll have to remember that I can do the same thing if you decide to stop doing your homework, Mike.”

“I haven’t done anything wrong!” I shouted.

My mom laughed. “It’s a joke. For now. Go tell your sister and dad that we have twenty minutes ‘till dinner.”

I had time to think about Kyle’s punishment. If he couldn’t get on the computer, it would take forever for him to give me my stuff back. That sucked. But it gave me time to stop being so mad about what he did.

I didn’t like it, but my day at school was the topic for that night.

“I heard about your stolen treasures, Mike,” my dad said to start out dinner. “And also that you found out the culprit.”

I nodded. I didn’t want to say much more.

“Yeah, it was quite the thing,” my mom said. “He brought in the school’s technology guy to explain how someone else had pretended to be him. I’m quite proud of Mike for going through all that and standing up for himself.”

“That Kyle kid did kind of seem like a punk,” Jess said after.

“He’s not a punk,” my mom corrected. “He’s just trying to have fun and make new friends. But that ended up being at the expense of others. He knows now what he did was wrong. He’s going to find a way to make it up to Mike somehow.”

My sister sighed. “If Mike even wants to see him ever again.”

“Well, Kyle is grounded right now,” my mom explained. “But once he’s served his time, I hope that you two can work it out.”

I nodded slowly. I saw my mom change her mind right at that moment.

“Not that we’ll force you into being anyone’s friend,” she added.

“It’s crazy how boys can just do that,” Jess spoke up. “Just make up and be friends again. If a girl does something terrible to another girl, it’s like, all their friends will pile on and make the other girl’s life a nightmare.”

“It doesn’t have to be like that,” my dad set down his fork and answered quickly. “Sure, boys and girls solve problems in different ways sometimes. But if two people can talk and forgive each other, then there’s no reason they can’t be friends again.”

“Well, then I hope Kyle will be able to pile on a whole bunch of niceness for Mike,” my sister said, looking my way.

“As Mike will do in return,” said my mom.

“Huh? Why?” I asked. I couldn’t think of one thing I would have to be forgiven for.

“You said the word ‘liar’ a lot,” she said. “And you tried to blame everything on Kyle, even before you had proof of it. And we now know that Kyle wasn’t entirely to blame. So even though Kyle did bad things himself, it’s important that you make up for the things you did wrong.”

I definitely didn’t want to say sorry to Kyle. I hoped by the time we met up again, nobody would remember those tiny things I did wrong.

Rebuilding

Even though I had nothing to my name, I still returned to Rune Quest. Jakey passed me over plenty of gold and extra gear so I could get back to some of my regular activities. For the next few weeks, I tried to get back all of the materials I had once had stored up.

I had been gathering ores (raw metals) for turning into the good, usable stuff. Then after I made enough of those, I could work with even better ores. With better metals to work with, I could then make better tools and gear. I think I could have done that forever and never have gotten tired of it. Eventually, both me and Jakey would have the best stuff in the game. We would be invincible.

I still had that instant messaging program on my computer. It was the one Kyle had made me install during our sleepover. He was my ‘friend’ there. Of course, being grounded, he hadn’t been on to chat. Sometimes I did look and see if he returned. But only so I could ask him give me the remains of my stuff back.

Thanksgiving break was supposed to be the time where I played nonstop. The first few days, I was able to do as I wanted. Then I was reminded about the holiday activities.

“Mike, we need to clean the house,” my mom said one morning. “Your uncle and cousins are coming over for Thanksgiving day. And then you’re going to go on your little trip the day after.”

I sighed and made annoyed noises inside my head. My cousins were nice and were about the same age as me, but they definitely didn’t like anything I did. They played sports and did stuff outside. There was no way I was going to play Rune Quest while they were around. I had enough problems showing other people the game.

I tried to squeeze in plenty of time playing before then. Jakey had the same idea.

MakeMeJake88: u gonna be on 2morro

MakeMeJake88: or doing thanksgiving stuff?

IcyMike203: ugh

IcyMike203: family visiting

IcyMike203: its stupid too

IcyMike203: uncle and cousins want me and my dad 2 go hunting on fri

MakeMeJake88: hunting????

MakeMeJake88: like irl???

Yes, the hunting trip was IRL, also known as In Real Life. It was something my uncle and cousins did every year. This time they wanted me and my dad to go with them.

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