“Blow off steam?” the dark witch repeated.
“Yeah. Kickboxing is better for doing that.” Maria mimed what kickboxing was and Frieda understood immediately. “Here,” Maria said, holding out a neon green strip of paper with a hole in it. “Put this on.” She held up her wrist to demonstrate how to wear it. “It’s a wristband. It’s so the workers know you’ve paid and aren’t trying to rip them off.” Maria helped Frieda put the wristband on.
Gelbus walked up last, his own wristband loose and hanging off of his hand. He unzipped his hoodie slightly, his scraggly chin hair poking through, and said, “Why, Maria, this is quite amazing.”
Maria grinned. “Oh, you ain’t seen nothing yet.”
Agnes laughed. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” she asked.
Maria nodded. “Pinball.”
She looked behind her to the front desk and the snack bar next to it. Sherlock was sitting on one of the stools, his head resting on the countertop. Maria whistled for him, but the Bloodhound duly ignored her. An older gentleman dressed in an apron, his gray hair tied back in a ponytail, stood behind the counter, feeding the dog strips of potatoes from a small wicker basket lined with wax paper.
“Oh, he’s not coming any time soon,” Gelbus said. “Not if there’s food involved.”
“I told Gary not to feed him until after we bowled and played pinball,” Maria said, shaking her head.
“Ah, let the dog have his food,” Agnes said.
“So much for the diet he told me he was going on,” Maria grumbled. “C’mon, let’s go play. I’m sure Sherlock will find his way to us after he’s full.”
“If he ever gets full,” Gelbus said, zipping his hoodie up to cover his face.
“Good point,” Maria said.
They walked on toward the arcade, where a large sign taking up the back wall read: OHIO’S SECOND LARGEST PINBALL PARLOR. Both Frieda and Gelbus stopped and stared in awe at the large games lining the room. They were brightly lit and colorful. Some of them had themes. Space, dinosaurs (which Gelbus was immediately drawn to), monsters. Maria dug into her bag, which still contained the dreaded music box, and pulled out a small, purple drawstring bag with gold writing on the front of it. Gelbus’s Earth English was not as sharp as it once was—the ale and wine had a little something to do with that—but he thought the gold letters read: CROWN ROYALE. What that meant, he had no clue. The bag jingled, and when Maria opened it, Gelbus saw shiny coins within, though they were nothing compared to the coins he had seen in Oriceran. Still, he was drawn to them. He reached out, and Maria slapped his hand away.
“Easy, my Gnome friend,” Maria said. “We have to pace ourselves.” Slowly, she reached her hand into the bag and pulled out two coins. She put them in Gelbus’s palm, and then took out six more. She kept two for herself, gave two to Frieda, and two to Agnes, who shook her head.
“Just gonna watch. Should be fun.” Agnes smirked.
“You say that now, but I bet you’ll be begging for a few quarters when you hear the chimes and jingles,” Maria laughed.
“We’ll see, we’ll see.”
Maria shrugged and put the coins, which Gelbus realized were called ‘quarters’, into a slot about eye level to the Gnome. When the second one went in, the machine in front of her lit up and chimed and jingled like Maria had said it was going to.
“See?” she asked, as she pushed buttons on the side of the long, rectangular box. Doing a double take, she chuckled. “Actually, looks like you can’t see.” She left the arcade area for a second, giving Gelbus a chance to look around.
For the first time, he noticed they were not alone in the arcade room. A few younger people, who were around the same height as Gelbus, were holding fake weapons that looked like the guns he seen in his studies while they shot at a screen showing gruesome monsters. There was a taller person nearby holding a small device in their hand; the light from it painted their skin in a ghostly glow. Beyond them, two more people of taller stature but younger faces threw a bright orange ball into a red metal circle with what looked like a mesh net hanging below it. Each time the ball went through the metal ring, an alarm went off, and the people shouted out a cry of joy.
Earthlings. I’ll never understand them…that’s why I love them!
Maria came back shortly after, dragging a chair behind her. “Here, stand on this.” She scooted the back of the chair up against the front of the pinball machine, and Gelbus climbed on top of it. “So, you pull this thing back.” Maria made the motion, but didn’t actually pull the hammer. “Then you hit the buttons to control the paddles. The goal is to keep the shiny metal ball from going past the paddles.” She looked to Frieda. “Did you hear that, Frieda?”
Frieda nodded, looking eager to get on with the game. “Sounds easy enough.”
“All right,” Maria said, taking her place at the pinball machine in between the Gnome and the dark witch.
Her machine had spaceships, little green aliens, and ray guns—the stuff Gelbus recognized as ‘Pulp Fiction’ from his studies of Earth, which had been a subject of great interest to the Gnomes. Gelbus took up residence at the dinosaur themed machine, and Frieda stood in front of the monster one.
“Three games,” Maria said firmly. “Whoever has the highest score gets a free milkshake.”
“Milkshake?” Gelbus asked.
Sherlock suddenly pounced into the arcade with slobber streaming from his mouth, and his ears flopping all about.
“Yes, I did say ‘milkshake’,” Maria rolled her eyes at Sherlock, “And no, you can’t have one. It’ll just upset your stomach, and I don’t want to have to clean up after you. Gary got super pissed last time,” she reminded him.
Sherlock whined.
“Oh, man up, you big puppy! Go
