A Day of Disappointment

Melissa nodded at me before responding. “That’s right! You can’t have a horse race without gambling. It’s like watching a movie without eating popcorn. Unthinkable! C’mon Nika, let’s put our bets in on Tati. You coming, Johnny?”

“I’m good. I hate gambling,” I said.

“Suit yourself, killjoy!”

The two of them hurriedly left before soon returning to their seats.

“Are you sure you don’t want to at least put in a little? It’s a traditional pastime, John,” Nika prodded as she sat down.

“No way! Gambling’s idiotic. You’re literally throwing away money for a fraction of a chance of winning. It’s stupid.”

“Yeah,” Melissa interjected, “that’s kind of the point. It’s fun!”

“They say gambling helps build martial virtue, ” added Nika.

“What? No, you two don’t get it. Why should I take a chance to get more money and lose it all when I could use it to get more money guaranteed. I’d just take that money and invest it in a high-yield mutual fund, and basically get more money guaranteed in the long-run. Let’s say someone told you that you could get double your money if you won a coin flip, but you’d have to give up that same amount if you lose. But you also find out that if you give him that same amount now, you’ll get it back doubled in a year. Which option would you pick?”

“The second one, obviously,” Melissa said. “Because then I’d have more money later for gambling”. Nika laughed at that, and I collapsed in my seat in frustration. Nika lightly swatted my arm.

“Pay attention! The race is about to start!” she hissed.

A few seconds later a gunshot rang out. The starting pistol was fired, and the horses burst onto the track. I had a hard time keeping track of the individual racers, but with some effort I was able to find Tatiana. The crowd’s shouting grew more intense. I don’t consider myself to be sensitive to loud noises; in fact, I frequently listen to music at volumes that doctors warn damages your ears. But all this shouting was becoming overstimulating, even for me. I looked over at Nika and Melissa, who were completely transfixed by the race. They didn’t seem to regard the din as a disturbance at all. I’m not even sure if it even registered in their minds. Human beings must truly be able to adapt to any situation with enough time and effort. It’s a testament to the power of will. Still, I don’t think I’d be able to do that anytime soon.

I struggled to ignore the pain in my eardrums and turned my focus back onto the competition. Tatiana had been lagging behind the crowd for some time. I missed exactly what she had done, but at the last corner, her horse rushed into a sprint, gaining on the other racers before leaving them in the dust. She was now the clear frontrunner. There was only a straight piece of track between her and victory. We all watched with bated breath. And then—

“That was bullshit!” Melissa roared as she kicked a trash can.

Nika, Melissa, and I were loitering outside the stadium. We had all walked away downcast after seeing Tatiana’s close loss. Another rider had barely managed to catch up at the last second and won by his horse’s muzzle. I had only seen races decided by photo finishes in movies before, so this was a novel experience. I was a bit sad at seeing her lose, but Nika and Melissa were notably more upset. It was easy to tell that Nika was sullen because her friend had lost. It was even easier to tell why Melissa was upset.

“So, are we going to wait to meet Tatiana?” I asked.

“Absolutely not! Do you know how much money she cost me?” Melissa raged.

“Tatiana wasn’t the one who told you to bet so much, Melissa. I lost money too, and I’m not angry,” chided Nika.

“She could at least have had the decency to look a little disappointed. Tati was smiling the entire time,” Melissa complained.

That part was true. She did appear rather happy at her loss. I’m not very good at reading these types of social interactions, but from what I could tell, Tatiana’s joyful mood was primarily directed at the winner. I wonder if the two of them had a history.

“So what are we going to do now? There’s still plenty of time left in the day,” I remarked.

“That’s a good question. I don’t have anything in mind,” Nika said.

We both waited for Melissa’s response. She didn’t acknowledge us and instead kept kicking the same trash can over and over. This went on for a while before I turned back to Nika.

“Where do they sell phones here?”

“It’s not too far from here. I’ll lead the way.”

The two of us began walking towards the shopping district. Melissa must have realized we left. She wasn’t with us for some time, but she soon popped up after making a mad dash to meet us. The three of us chatted about random topics until we got to the cellular store. We somehow got onto continuing our earlier conversation about gambling versus investment. I figured this was the perfect opportunity to explain the finer details of the superior Western financial system to the girls.

“So that’s why you always want to hold in the long run,” I lectured. “The stock prices will always go back up if you give them enough time. And if you’re in a situation where you can’t handle the prices going down, you’ll have already moved your investments to safer low-risk stocks. The trick is to never panic sell. Panic selling never turns out well. Trust me on that.”

Nika and Melissa had blank expressions on their faces.

“John,” Nika said, “you’re so smart. You can make computer programs look and act like they’re real, living people. You could change the world with technology like that. Why are you so fixated on unimportant things like stocks?”

“Oh, you mean Lacey? I actually originally made her to help me make investment decisions.”

“Seriously? You made something as impressive as her for something as petty as that?”

“I wouldn’t call it petty. Making money is a pretty important skill. It’s what makes the world go round, after all. I’d say it’s more productive than gambling at least.”

“You wish! Your lame stocks will never compete with the joy of rolling the dice! You know what they say: a bird in the bush beats two in the hand!”

I was about to correct her before Nika interrupted me.

“We’re here!”

We entered the store. Window shopping for technology had been something of a pastime of mine back home in Ustasia, so I was looking forward to seeing what Miklagardia had in store. This was definitely the most excited I had been since I entered the country. I couldn’t decide if I should be sad about that or not. I brushed that self-reflection aside and zeroed in on the digital devices available for purchase.

Browsing for a few minutes soon made me realize that I was going to be continually baffled by Miklagardian culture, no matter how long I resided in the country. Flip phones lined the store shelves. Where were the smartphones? I wasn’t asking for anything fancy, just a touchscreen.

“These are the old models. You want to look over here for the newest selection,” Nika said as she guided me to another section of the store. That’s good. I’ll admit that I was worried for a second, but I’m glad this isn’t what Miklagardia considers cutting-edge technology.

The two of us strolled over to a glass case on the side of the room. Nika showed me what she dubbed as the “latest and greatest”, and I instantly became despondent. They were smartphones, sure, but I recognized them as BlueBerry smartphones. Those weren’t even the latest ones they had before the brand folded. These had no touchscreen; instead, each came equipped with a tiny, physical keyboard. My eye gave an involuntary twitch. These had to be at least twenty years old.

“These are the latest models. They’re pretty cool. It’s got a music player, a camera, and other multimedia functions! The trackball here is pretty innovative. You don’t even need to press a key to navigate the UI! Impressive, huh?” Nika said.

“I thought these were all discontinued,” I stated.

“No? These were just released last year.”

So either these are knock-offs, or BlueBerry operates nowhere else in the world except backwards countries like Miklagardia. I may simply jailbreak my phone at this rate. The only question would be to find a provider that could get me an e-sim, and that was a separate trouble in itself. As I was mulling over all this, I noticed the room was strangely quiet.

“Hey, where did Melissa go?” I asked.

“Oh, she’s probably in the arcade room in the back. I swear, she’s addicted to those stupid things.”

Games? That sounded interesting. I searched for the back room and found Melissa playing a light gun game. Her eyes were wide with hatred as she sported a bloodthirsty grin.

“Die! Die! Die!” she shouted at her virtual enemies. Her bloodthirsty expression quickly turned to one of frustration as a “Game Over” message flashed on-screen.

“Hey, Melissa, mind if we try two-player?” I asked.

“Well, well, well, I never would have expected this. I always took you for the pacifist type, Johnny,” she replied.

“It’s just a game. Pacifism has got nothing to do with it.”

The two of us readied up. Nika was watching us from behind. She was being pretty quiet, but I didn’t read too far into it. There were more important things to focus on. For example, a swarm of alien bugs rushed out to try and eat our poor player characters. Unfortunately for them, Melissa and I were in complete sync, mowing down anything that came our way and covering each other’s weak spots. I was completely hooked in and lost my sense of time as I was shouting at the game with Melissa.

It was about midway through the game that Nika finally spoke up.

“I’m going to get going now. You two can stay and enjoy yourselves. I have to go do some errands.”

I couldn’t see her expression, but I felt a pit forming in my stomach. I didn’t turn around, or maybe I should say I didn’t want to turn around, but I tried to stop her.

“Hey, are you sure? I can come with you if you’d like.”

“No, it’s fine. If you need any help, I’m sure Melissa can take care of you just fine.”

It was only when we cleared the level that Melissa looked over to me with an expression of sympathy.

“Sorry, dude, I think you got dumped,” she said to me.

This was turning out to be a really crummy day.