I still remember those late nights sitting in front of the TV as I got my small fingers wrapped around the gray N64 controller. It was all so magical back then, the glow of the screen wrapped me like a film. Every game felt like a whole new world and I could spend hours sitting there, hardly noticing the sun had come up.
Back when I could fall without feeling my body ache for days or when I could chug can after can of soda without putting a pound on. Video Games used to be a shelter, an escape from whatever might have been bothering me at the time. That escape however became less and less potent as the years rolled by. I would still look forward to new releases and would typically stay up all night the first time I got my hands on a new game.
It still just never felt the same. That wonder was gone. The cynicism of the world chiseling away at my child-like wonder. So I was hardly even phased when they first announced that a new PlayStation was coming out. “Cool,’’ I thought, just that it was cool. Seven-year-old me would’ve been tugging at my dad’s pant leg begging him to get it for me. I’d bargain, telling him that I wouldn’t ask for anything ever again. What a lie.
I kept up with the news about the console still, passing interest occasionally prying my eyes to retail websites. Even if I was psyched about the console it’s not like I’d even be able to buy one. Scalpers and bots bought the first wave before anyone genuinely interested in playing it was able to load the website. It continued like that. Sites would announce they’d gotten PS5s in stock and within the hour they would be sold out again.
People thought that it would level out eventually, myself included. Once the hype died down people would be able to get their hands on one. But that was never really the case and you were lucky to come across one in your local Walmart. The idea of the console eventually slipped my mind and life carried on. I… Well, I hit a rough spot. I’ve always had something in my brain that didn’t tick quite right. Like a gear that would struggle to function, throwing the whole system off.
I go through bouts of it, that’s neither here nor there I suppose. Just suffice to say that things were tough. Especially this time around, I started to withdraw from those around me. The energy just wasn’t there. I remember my dad asking me if there were any cool games I had been playing. I told him there were a few and tried to sound excited but he could see right through me. Knew the truth. That I would just sit there shuffling through the collection of games hoping something would spark. Any desire.
My dad… is a sweet man. After mom passed he tried his best to play both roles and when you got a kid who has the problems I do. It can be hard. He wouldn’t always live up to the expectations he set for himself. So he’d always do whatever he could to cheer me up. So when I found the PlayStation 5 box in the living room, I knew it was his doing. I didn’t know how he had gotten his hands on one but it made me happy that he did it to cheer me up.
I had gotten the thing hooked up by the end of the day and started to play it that night after however many hours of system and game updates I sat through. While the wonder I once felt didn’t return. It was admittedly nice to slip away for a little while. To just sit in the living room and play without my mind wandering elsewhere. That was until I heard the first thump.
I thought it was from the game initially. It was fairly loud and caused me to sit up straight, the hairs on my arm followed suit. My fingers stopped moving on the controller and I let the game rest for a moment. My head swiveled around the room, trying to see if anything had dropped off a bookcase or the table. The place looked as neat as ever.
Then my efforts shifted to trying to recreate the noise within the game. I watched the character moving around on the screen. I bumped her into walls and made the gun in her hand go off, nothing sounded like the bump that startled me. I even ventured to the next room so I could shoot at enemies, thinking maybe my foes had produced the noise.
Nothing sounded enough to like it though. Maybe a rogue pop from the speakers. That’s what I was thinking anyway. Then as the game was still once more, I heard the noise again, only it wasn’t from the speakers. I sat in the living room listening to the silence afforded by the pause screen. Slowly I swivel my head observing the space around me looking for any disturbances.
Within the quiet, I could hear something low and constant. Like eyes adjusting to the dark the more, I focus on the noise the more I could make out. It was a soft scratching, something being dragged. Setting the controller down I rose to my feet and started walking slowly in the direction of the noise. I could feel the chill of the hardwood floor slipping through the cotton on my feet. Continuing to follow the noise brought me to the hall leading to the front door.
As I stood and stared at the front door I could hear the soft and rhythmic scraping that was coming from the other side of the door. I could see through the small ornate window at the top of the door that the porch light was on but was unable to gleam further information. I stepped forward a little, trying to decipher what might be causing the noise.
Getting closer to the front door I could feel something deep in my thoughts telling me how stupid I was being. I’ve seen enough movies, there was a smarter way to investigate. No, why investigate at all? Just call the police. What if it’s just some animal that runs off when the cops arrive. I made my way back to the living room and slowly crept over to the couch, gently compressing the cushions with my knees as I leaned towards the front window.
I could hear the noise a little more clearly with only the pane of glass between me and the outside. My cheek was pressed up against the glass by the time I was able to make anything out. It was a person. It was hard to tell at first but they must have had their bodies pressed against the door because I could hardly see them. A white shirt with blue jeans and the faint hint of an elbow, that’s all that was visible.
My mind became fixated, I was trying to figure out what the person was doing. Stuck somewhere between curiosity and fear. Were they trying to pick the lock? It sounded like they were scratching the wooden door though. As I watched the figure, their slight movements started to dawn on me. I could see a thick dark strand of leather around the waist, their belt. It must be the belt buckle rubbing against the door.
An expression of disgust twisted my face as I considered the possibility that they might be rubbing against my door, getting something out of it. There wasn’t much more convincing that needed to be done. I had decided to call the cops and as I backed away from the window, I felt my heart sinking. It was like I stood up too fast. My vision blurred and my body became heavy which caused me to fall off the couch.
I don’t know how long I was watching the person by my door but it was too long. Pressed up against the window, was another face. Their cheek was squished against the glass as mine had been. Her body was folded in such a way that she seemed alien or like there was no consciousness. Her fingers spread while pressing the window and her torso twisted so only her left shoulder met the glass.
Her eyes were wide, deep sea blues staring into my house. She wasn’t looking at me though, she paid no mind to my existence. No, she was staring at the light from the TV. Her body pressed further against the glass, I could see it starting to bow inward. The girl’s body dipped for a moment as her foot had slipped. It looked like she was trying to push a stalled car with focus so intense drool had begun spilling from her open mouth.
I laid there for a moment, the scratching noise from the front door embedding itself into my mind. She had the mannerisms that I had seen in zombie movies, just completely brain dead, but she looked healthy. Her eyes though were so intense and unmoving. Standing up I walked back to the window, she still didn’t break her line of sight, I pressed my fingers to where her eyes were and looked back.
Pulling my fingers away from the glass I did my best to imagine a line from her eyes to see what she was looking at. At first, I assumed it was the TV as if she was a moth or something but her gaze dipped a little lower, just below the TV. Where the PlayStation 5 was sitting. Bewildered, I turned back to her, again feeling sinking in my chest. They were faint but I could still make them out.
Multiple silhouettes were making their way to the house. Different sizes, adults and children waddled over. All of them were leaning forward like threads were dragging them, puppeted to my house. That was enough, I ran over to the table and picked up my cell phone. My heart was beating as further realization set in. As the phone was calling I quickly paced over to the kitchen.
Catching my breath was difficult. Seeing the bodies pressed up against the sliding glass door, all pushing each other aside to get real estate on the glass, to be able to see the living room where the console rested. All their eyes were transfixed in the same spot. It was then that I realized how long the phone had been dialing. Why wasn’t it connecting?
I didn’t know how much longer the glass was going to hold, nor did I know what was going to happen when it broke. So I backed out of the kitchen and made my way around the house, one side at a time I confirmed that the house was being surrounded. It felt like the interior of my house was shrinking, like I was running out of room. My hand rose to my chest, feeling my heart press against it, like the faces I could see pinned to the side of the house.
It didn’t matter what I did. I tried screaming at those people, tried asking them what they wanted, who they were. I think what made me feel the most hopeless was when I saw two uniformed officers among the crowd of people. From the second floor, I could see the slowly mounting crowd. Like some slow-motion mosh-pit, they tried shoving past each other, though they exercised minimal effort to do so.
The noise, god. When it was just the first two I couldn’t hear much but with the group that was gathering, there was a cacophony of various noises. Articles of clothing scrapping the side of the house or whining against the glass. The soft thudding of people bumping into each other. There was this wet noise, like wringing out a soaked towel but I couldn’t for the life of me figure out what might be causing it.
It was around the time that I heard the first inclination of breaking glass that I realized, I didn’t know where my dad was. He was supposed to be home by then. That’s when the sliding door in the kitchen finally gave way. I turned to face it as the glass fell and chimed against the tiled floor. They, without hesitation, started shambling into my house. Just as thoughtless as they ever were.
Like toddlers piloting adult suits they wobbled over towards me, no not me, they ignored me completely. Just walked right on by. I could see out the front window that the bodies out there had vacated that space. They must have sensed there was an easier way into the home and started to make their way to it. I was horrified and didn’t know what to do. So I backed off and retreated to the basement.
That’s where I used to have my N64 hooked up. In the basement. So that if I had friends over and we were up all night it wouldn’t bother dad. I could hear them from the other side of the basement door. Carefully I made my way down the basement stairs, I was going to turn the light on but there was already something lit. Slowly making my way down, hearing the house creaking from the pressure of all those bodies above me, I followed the light.
A soft flickering amber flame greeted me at the bottom of the steps. My dad, was down there, just sitting on the floor with his legs crossed. His arms resting at his side palm up allowing me to see the red pouring out. His face looked just like theirs. Dropping to my knees I could feel my face flushing. More and more tears slipped out, as I observed the blood pouring from his wrist.
It was like the blood was alive, the way it poured from him and ran like a river creating symbols and shapes around him. Ever-changing letters that I couldn’t begin to comprehend. It was a long time before I regained any sense of composure. I just kept looking at him, his head tilted back looking up at where I knew the Playstation was sitting.
I tried. Anything I could. Talking to him, even tried to mess up the symbols on the ground but the red would just shift and create the broken bits somewhere else. Once I was drained of emotion I walked back up the steps and pushed on the basement door. I could only get it open two or three inches, just enough to see through the crack. The bodies were so dense I couldn’t push them open further.
They were all fighting for their turn, the character on screen only moving a little bit every so often as one hand after another gripped at the controller. They were climbing on top of each other like sloths crowd surfing. I clawed and fought to open the door but to no avail. The damn basement didn’t even have a window I could climb out. I worry about what will happen when the controller dies.
Worse than that though, I’m getting hungry. There’s some canned food down here, not much though, it won’t last long. All I can do is listen to the cries of the house as it does its best to hold the weight. I almost hope that the floor will collapse. It’ll either kill me or the bodies will mound until I can crawl on them. Well, that’s not ALL I can do.
I found my old N64. Managed to get it hooked up. Found a few games. Funny huh? As much as I liked these games, I never finished a lot of them. So now, once again I sit in the glow of my old tube TV, watching various 3D characters running around on the screen. I know he’s not actually watching but it feels nice to have my dad next to me as I play. He was always working so hard for me, never got the chance to show him a lot of this stuff.
What a stupid… stupid place to find me. But the more I sit, the more I play these games to forget about what’s going on upstairs. The better I feel. The more that the glow wraps me, like an old familiar blanket.