Magic 8 Ball

The Windows logo appeared on the screen. The multi-coloured logo that looked wavy and in motion. The old Windows logo. Riley Lord hadn’t seen it for years. He used to use this computer to play Minesweeper after school. Did anyone really know and understand the rules of that game? He laughed at his eleven year old self repeatedly playing a game he didn’t understand. You took what you could get when it came to technology back then. He couldn’t imagine any eleven year olds nowadays playing a game they didn’t understand because it was all they could get their hands on. Well, that and solitaire. Everyone loved solitaire.

Riley was in his old bedroom in his parent’s house. It was now being used as a storage room and barely resembled the room it had been when he occupied it. He couldn’t believe his mum had even kept the old family computer, though he was glad she did as he really needed to see the photos on it. Riley was terrified he was going to forget what his dad looked like and needed to download those old photos to make sure that didn’t happen. 

David Lord was diagnosed with cancer of the pancreas five years ago and his death came quickly after that. Patrick Swayze had not long died from the same disease. Samantha Lord had kept repeating that’s how Patrick Swayze died over and over after her husband’s diagnosis and Riley, never having seen a Swayze film, decided he hated him. For it was somehow his fault that his dad was going to die. Because if Hollywood superstar Patrick Swayze with all his wealth and private health care couldn’t beat pancreatic cancer, then how was David Lord, postman from Essex, going to beat it? Sadly, he didn’t.

Riley’s sudden and irrational fear of forgetting what his dad looked like had been brought on by the news that his girlfriend was pregnant. He was desparately happy that he was going to become a dad but at the same time desparately sad that he wouldn’t be able to share his child with his father. David had been what you would call “an involved dad”. Riley hated that term, as did Sam. No one congratulated her for being “an involved mum”. It broke Riley’s heart that he wouldn’t be able to include his dad in weekend activities with his grandchild, the same activities David and Riley had embarked on together whilst Sam worked nights as a nurse. He’d wanted his dad to be there when he taught his own son or daughter how to ride a bike. Riley laughed at the memory of David taking him by the hand and leading him down the street and saying “we’re not going back home until you can ride this bloody bike!” And they hadn’t, despite it taking most of the day.

The folders of photos which had been taken on his parent’s old digital camera filled the screen. Riley wondered how long it had been since his mum had looked at this photos she had so carefully organised into these folders. The computer hadn’t been touched in many years. Riley plugged in a portable memory drive which he had bought online and downloaded all the folders to it.

I’ll have a quick game of solitaire, Riley thought. For old times’ sake. The last time he’d played the game had been on this computer. He clicked on the games folder and hovered the mouse over the Solitaire icon. He was just about to double click it when he noticed a game he’d never seen before. It was called “Magic 8 Ball” and the icon was of a purple ball with a bold black number eight in the centre of it. That’s weird, he thought. He knew every single game on this computer, he’d played them enough times, and there weren’t so many that he’d forget one. He doubted either of his parents had been computer literate enough (at the time) to know how to download a new game, and besides he would have seen it on there during one of his after-school Minesweeper defeats. Riley double clicked on the purple icon. The screen went completely black for a couple of seconds then a larger pixelated version of the games’ icon appeared in the middle of the screen. This faded away and was replaced by some text:

WELCOME TO MAGIC 8. PLEASE ASK A Y OR N ANSWER QUESTION

A cursor appeared, flashing on and off, waiting for him to type. Riley asked the first thing he could think of. Is my baby a girl? He typed. YES the answer replaced his question almost immediately. Riley laughed under his breath. 50/50 chance, he thought. He clicked out of the game and turned off the computer, the game of solitaire he’d intended to play forgotten about.

~

Riley had been researching the games that came pre-loaded onto the old Windows computers. There wasn’t one called Magic 8 Ball. He had attended Grace’s twenty week scan this morning and they’d found out they were having a girl. The Magic 8 Ball game had popped into his head on the drive back home and he’d had a look online to see if he could find it. He thought again how neither of his parents would have known how to download a new game and anyway, the couple of websites on retro games he’d looked at confirmed that Windows computers did not come loaded with a game called Magic 8 Ball. Weird. The expectant parents were visiting Riley’s mum later that day to celebrate the news that she would be having a granddaughter. Riley intended to have another look at the mysterious game then.

How old am I? Riley typed into the Magic 8 Ball game. Y OR N QUESTIONS ONLY popped up the reply. He’d forgotten. Was I born in 1989? He typed. YES flashed up the reply straight away. Do I have brown eyes? NO. Riley’s eyes widened slightly. He shifted slightly in the computer chair he was sitting on. He had green eyes and yes, he was born in 1989. There’s a 50/50 chance of getting a yes or no answer, it’s just a coincidence he reassured himself. 

After typing several more questions and the 8 Ball getting every single one of them right, Riley was sweating slightly. Surely fifteen right answers couldn’t all be coincidences? He tried to think of logical reasons for how the game could know the things it did, but he couldn’t come up with an explanation. This computer wasn’t even connected to the internet! 

~

Riley and Grace visited Samantha regularly, sometimes leaving baby Charlotte, now ten months old, with her grandmother for a few hours. Every time they visited Riley turned on the old computer and asked the 8 Ball a few questions. Every question the ball answered correctly. Eventually Riley moved the computer to his own house. He tucked it into the corner of the spare bedroom. He fed Grace a line about wanting to take the computer apart and put it back together again, which she accepted as she knew Riley loved to learn how things worked. 

He had discovered that the 8 Ball could predict the future. When Charlotte had started nursery chicken pox was going around. Will Charlotte get chicken pox? NO. Okay, not definitive proof as there was always a chance she wouldn’t catch it, but when he asked the 8 Ball Will Grace win the prize draw she entered online yesterday? And the answer was YES and surely enough, £500 appeared in Grace’s bank account, Riley was convinced. The chances of winning those things were pretty slim.

~

Will Arsenal win tonight? NO

Will Charlotte’s first word be “daddy”? NO

Will Grace cook spaghetti bolognaise tonight? YES

Will my mum call tonight? NO

Will my mum call tomorrow night? YES

Does Grace want driving lessons for her birthday? YES

Will those diamond earrings Grace has been looking at go on sale any time soon? NO

Will Arsenal win tonight? NO (again?!)

Riley was obsessed. He couldn’t do anything without asking the 8 Ball the outcome first. He even asked every week Will my lottery numbers win tonight? The answer was always NO, and he knew it would always be NO, but he still had to ask. The 8 Ball had stripped his life of any anticipation, any excitement. Riley didn’t realise how much in life was unknown until he’d discovered the 8 Ball. Nothing was a surprise anymore. But he just couldn’t stop asking it about eveything. That flashing cursor and white text on a black background had completely enthralled him.

Grace had noticed a change in her partner’s behaviour. She was worried about him. She didn’t understand how that old computer was taking up so much of his time! Riley wasn’t as responsive to Charlotte anymore, she’d hold her chubby little arms out to him and he’d stare straight through her as if he couldn’t even see her. Their relationship seemed to be suffering too, they hadn’t had a proper conversation in weeks let alone any physical contact. Grace could accept that he was determined to finish his computer project but she could not accept Riley ignoring her or their daughter. Especially their daughter.

One day whilst Riley was at work, Grace went into the spare bedroom and looked at the old computer. The monitor and computer tower were completely intact (so much for taking it apart) and appeared to be switched on. There was a Windows logo bouncing around the screen.

~

Grace had been staying at her mum’s house with Charlotte for the past week. She hadn’t even told him in person. He’d received a text at work, Going to stay with mum for a bit whilst you decide what’s more important to you, us or that fucking computer. He deserved it, he knew he did. That still didn’t stop him running up the stairs two at a time when he got home to get to the spare room to ask the computer if Grace was leaving him for good. 

The Windows logo screensaver was bouncing. The multi-coloured logo that looked wavy and in motion. The old Windows logo. Riley Lord wiggled the mouse. The screen came on, the games folder still open. He scanned the icons. Where is it?! He saw the Minesweeper icon. The Magic 8 Ball icon should have been before it in the list. The icon before it was FreeCell. FreeCell then Minesweeper.

Magic 8 Ball had disappeared. Which was probably for the best.