Read Online Imperfections by Bradley Somer - Free Book Online Page B

between your ankles and off you go, hopping.”
    I smiled with equal enthusiasm.  
    Nobody could ever see me use this thing.
    â€œLike a pogo stick but a rubber ball,” Auntie Maggie said. “Leonard loves his.”
    Bullwinkle pulled a bear’s head up from his top hat. A static roar played over the sound system. One kid laughed.
    The Pogo Ball was neon pink with a fluorescent green ring.  
    Nobody could ever know I had this.
    â€œI don’t have one,” Leonard said.
    â€œAnd now for something we hope you’ll really like,” Rocky flopped precariously to one side of the stage.
    â€œLet’s go to the arcade,” Leonard said to me.
    â€œCan we go to the arcade?” I asked.
    â€œGo to the arcade,” Father sighed and started cleaning up around the table, stacking plates and cutlery, crumpling wrapping paper and boxing the remaining pizza from our plates.
    As Leonard and I walked past the stage and into the next room, there was a scream and bells started ringing. The room was full of video games, mini basketball games and mini bowling games where you earned tickets for sinking a ball in the right hole. You could redeem your tickets at a booth manned by the adolescent server’s clone. In exchange, there were things like a whistle or a toy car, a small plastic army man with a parachute or a plastic dinosaur in a top hat.
    Leonard and I worked our way through the crowds and sidled up to the group of kids around the Rampage video game. Some kid was playing as the Godzilla-inspired character, Lizzie, and had made it to the Tokyo level. The pixellated lizard jerked her way up the side of a building, punched a window and ate a woman.
    I glanced around the crowd of kids and wondered quickly if any of them would have come to my birthday party if they knew me. Were they here for someone else’s party? I wondered what the other boy had said or done to get so many friends to show up at his party.
    In the meantime, I decided, they were all at my party. That thought brought a smile to my face, a smile that was returned by a girl standing close to me. She looked familiar.
    â€œHello,” she said.
    â€œHi,” I replied, stealing a quick glance at Leonard. He was busy watching the screen.
    â€œHe’s doing really good,” she said, tossing a quick glance and a raised eyebrow at the boy playing.
    â€œIt’s my birthday,” I said.
    â€œHappy birthday.” She smiled. “What’s wrong?”
    â€œOnly one person came.” I pointed at Leonard. “And he’s my cousin.”  
    The girl gave me a sad look and reached out for my arm. We stood awkwardly, her hand on my arm, and watched the boy tear buildings down, swipe helicopters out of the sky and throw a city into chaos. She kept her hand on my forearm while the city collapsed; people were dying. The giant lizard hammered away at a tank, people ran screaming in every direction and her touch calmed me. Her arm resting on my forearm was all I could focus on. I stole the occasional sidelong glance at her calm face, flashing yellow and blue in the arcade-lit fires of Tokyo burning to the ground. I also stole the occasional glance at Leonard, not sure what I would have to endure having wilfully let a girl touch me but, at the same time, something kept me from moving away from her.
    There was a collective groan from the group of kids. Lizzie had been shot off the side of a building. The electronic lizard’s expression was a mix of pain and sorrow, as if it wasn’t ready for death, it still had things it wanted to do and death had come too soon. There were still so many people to eat and buildings to smash up. Add to that the pain of falling ten storeys after being shot off of a building—it was unfair.
    The crowd started to disperse. Leonard looked my way and gave an almost imperceptible frown, catching the girl’s hand on my arm a second before she said goodbye and wandered