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“Hey,” she snapped, dragging my focus to the little woman glaring up at me with her hand out. “You there? I need a quarter.”
“Oh, right,” I said, popping a coin in her palm.
Elizabeth was either an excellent claw machine operator and this machine was a scam, or she was delusional and one of the worst, most stubborn claw machine players the world had ever seen. I still couldn’t decide, but damn if I wasn’t enjoying the show.
I’d never seen so much emotion from Elizabeth. Each time she failed, she’d slap the machine, curse, sometimes kick it, and then she’d stick her palm out for another quarter.
I was nearly down to my last quarter when the claw finally caught itself in the tag on the teddy’s ass. It hooked right into the fabric, and it slid up the curved end of the hook, ensuring the bear wouldn’t fall this time. The hook wobbled its way to the drop chute and Elizabeth just stared, wide eyed and laser focused.
When the bear finally dropped, she jumped a solid inch and a half in the air, pumping her first. I expected her to grab the bear, but she just flashed two middle fingers to the machine, yelled, “fuck you very much,” and walked right outside.
I cleared my throat, apologized to the four-year-old and his mother who were watching, and grabbed the bear out of the machine for Elizabeth.
I found her outside shaking her arms out like she’d just finished a prize fight.
“You good?” I asked.
“That machine was rigged.”
I grinned. “So, uh, should we get more quarters?”
“Yes.”
I was a little surprised by that, and even more surprised when she led the way around the penny arcade for the next few hours. We played almost every game there was, and for a blissful hour or so, Elizabeth seemed to forget to be angry at the world. Instead, she got angry at every machine. The woman was a raging lunatic when it came to the games. She’d curse and hit the machines when she lost, but she celebrated hard when she won. I found it all hilarious.
We eventually got hungry for dinner and found a Mediterranean place near the arcade. We both ordered gyros that came dusted in some magical blend of spices and some of the best fries I’d ever had.
“Can I call that a success?” I asked.
Elizabeth licked the seasonings from one of her fingers, then shrugged. “I guess it was okay.”
I laughed. “You were like a kid in a candy shop. A kid with a slight murderous streak, that is.”
“And if you tell anybody about that, I’ll kill you.”
“Do I get to know the story behind your manic obsession to win this teddy bear?” The prize she’d fought so hard for was small enough to fit in my jacket pocket. I fished it out and held it up for her to see.
“You got it for me?”
“I mean I probably paid about seventy dollars in quarters for this thing. You bet I bothered to bend down and pick it up.”
She grinned. “My mother used to always tell me how stupid those claw machines were. Every time we’d walk out of a grocery store when I was a little girl, I’d ask for a quarter. She’d say no. So I’d always imagine how I’d play if I got the chance. I thought I’d be really good at it. And I was. She reached out and took the bear from me, grinning down at it in satisfaction.
“Uh, yeah,” I said. “I’ve never seen someone… win after that many tries.”
She smiled like I’d just given her a genuine compliment, so I smiled, too.
“Your mother sounds like she wasn’t the easiest to grow up with.”
“She’s very successful. She just wants what’s best for me.”
“I’ve found a lot of parents don’t actually know what’s best for their own kids. Weird, but true.”
Elizabeth frowned. “I don’t think that’s right.”
“A lot of parents just want us to do the things they regret not doing. Dad never got to play college football, so he pushes his kid to practice all the time. Mom never went to homecoming, so she spends a thousand dollars on her daughter’s dress and tries to micromanage her social life. Some parents get fucked up and think their kids are some reincarnation of themselves. They need to learn to listen to their kids and encourage them when they show interests, not force feed their goals into their kids mouths.”
Elizabeth absently rubbed some seasoning off what was left of her gyro. “I don’t think that’s what my mother is doing.”
“What do you think she’s doing?”
“I think she wants me to be successful. She wants me to…”
“Have the same kind of life she did? But better?” I suggested.
Elizabeth sighed. “Maybe. But that doesn’t mean I don’t want it, too. Some kids do want what their parents had. It matters to me. The work. The business. I’m still young and I’ll have plenty of time to build a personal life once I’ve built a career.”
