Parents Really Don’t Understand

The Place Where Promises Aren’t Kept [Chapter 28 – Final]

School was back in session the next day, that Wednesday. Kyle wasn’t there in first period, of course. I doubted I was ever going to see him again.

I kept expecting someone to call me out while I was going from class to class. They might have said something like, hey, the kid with the gun! The kid who shut down the school! I couldn’t even think about why someone would bring a gun to school. I mean, maybe if they were really upset, but even that would be terrible. Luckily, nobody noticed me any more than usual.

“That loser is definitely kicked out,” Jakey said somewhat joyfully in the computer lab that day. He had learned about the whole situation the day before when we played Rune Quest together.

“I need to uninstall the chat program he made me install,” I reminded myself out loud. “I don’t want to talk to him ever again.”

“Don’t forget to block him on Rune Quest,” Jakey added.

“Of course!”

One evening the following week I heard my mom on a phone call. It was most definitely Kyle’s mom. She sounded like she was crying a little bit, and my mom kept apologizing. Our two moms could have been friends maybe if Kyle wasn’t involved. I guess that’s another thing he ruined.

I heard a little more about Kyle when my mom talked to my dad and they didn’t think anyone was listening. I guess he was going to a special school, one where they are stricter and you don’t get to have as much fun. Even if I didn’t want him as a friend, maybe he could make a halfway decent friend there.

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I think as a result of all this crazy stuff, my mom started listening to me more instead of just talking at me. Of course, as an adult, there was still plenty she didn’t understand. Here’s another story as an example.

My mom came home one day after a trip to to grocery store. I, of course, was knee-deep in a battle of life and death. That was pretty common those days since I was still getting some of my lost gear back.

“Mike, help me get this stuff in the fridge!” She called out to me. Of course, that was an impossible task.

“In a little bit!” I answered. If I were to abandon my keyboard and mouse, my character would become no more than target practice for the enemies, leading me to my downfall.

“Now, Mike, or it’s going to go bad! Just put it on pause.”

Pause. That was the word that my mom chose. Those magic words could have worked in some places, but not online, the place where time never stops. In a world where everything happens without end, there is no pause. If I could tell one thing to any parents or older people reading this, it would be those words above.

When I’m older and have kids of my own, you know they won’t have to explain that. But that’s a long way from now, of course.

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