“But he wasn’t caught,” argues Caleb.
Isabel is still fuming. “That was just luck! I mean, do whatever you want, but to put your mom’s job in jeopardy like that…”
“It wasn’t just luck,” I say firmly. “I knew exactly what I was doing, and the plan worked. I got in the room and got the remote.”
“How did you know?” demands Isabel. “To gamble your mother’s job—”
Okay. That does it. It’s time to let them know.
I go to my room and return with my laptop.
“I think you need to see this.”
“What is it?” asks Isabel.
“I was planning to show Caleb, but I want you to see it too.”
An uncomfortable silence settles over us as the laptop boots up.
Finally, I make my confession.
“It’s…the truth. The truth about how I figured out about Great-Uncle Ted’s apartment. And getting into the hospital. You both think I’m some sort of genius or something, but I’m not. I lied to you. Both of you. I didn’t solve those puzzles on my own. I…had help.”
“What kind of help?” Caleb asks incredulously.
I take a breath and say, “I know it’s going to sound crazy…but there’s a game of my life online.”
Isabel and Caleb stare at me for a long moment. Finally, Caleb speaks.
“Right, Ted…and there’s also a magical land where unicorns barf rainbows.”
“Look, I don’t expect you to believe me,” I insist. “But that’s how I was able to figure out the patterns in Great-Uncle Ted’s apartment. And all the other stuff. I just let you think it was me being smart.”
Isabel looks concerned. “Ted, that’s silly. You mean there was a game that was like your life—”
“No!” I’m shouting now. “It is my life. That’s how I solved it. It wasn’t me. I can’t pretend it was anymore.”
I type “www.thegameofted.com” in the browser window and press the Enter button, then turn away.
I don’t want to see my friends’ faces when they’re confronted with the truth.
Isabel and Caleb lean in and peer at the screen.
“This is pretty unbelievable,” Caleb says in a low voice.
“I never thought something like this existed,” agrees Isabel. “Never.”
“See? What did I tell you?” I cry.
Caleb and Isabel burst out laughing.
“You really had me going there, dude,” says Caleb.
I turn and look at the screen.
What I see is: a happy elderly couple waving at the camera, holding playing cards, surrounded by a frame of little hearts. Underneath is a quote: “Tom Mortimer and Barb Everdell—‘We met through TED! It was the best thing we ever did!’ ”
Underneath them is a banner announcing: “The game of TED—Terrific Elder Dating! Finally, a place for singles in the prime of their lives!”
Then, in a blinking square in the corner: “Come to the American Legion Hall on Ventura Boulevard every Wednesday for Game Night! We have all your favorites! Bingo, canasta, mah-jongg! Meet eligible singles 65 and up in a fun, no-pressure atmosphere.”
“Thanks for showing us this. Looks like fun,” Isabel remarks.
“And no-pressure!” Caleb adds.
“Too bad there’s that age limit thing…,” Isabel manages to get out before breaking into another spasm of giggles.
I stare at the screen in shock. “Must have typed in the address wrong,” I say.
There’s one sure way to call up the page.
I pull up the history menu on my browser and note with satisfaction the address from the night before. Bingo!
The Game of Ted. Confidently, I click on the link, and the home page loads in.
There are Tom and Barb, waving happily back at me.
I sit, frozen in place, staring at the image, willing it to change to the mysterious game that got me so far when I needed it, and is now making me look like an idiot in front of two people doing their best not to laugh in my face.
“Maybe you fell asleep and just thought you played the game. It was your unconscious mind working out the puzzles,” Isabel suggests.
“That makes sense, man,” Caleb says. “Either that or you were getting your advice from Tom and Barb.”
“You guys think I’m crazy!” I yell.
“We don’t think you’re crazy,” Isabel says, in that voice that you use when you think you might be talking to a crazy person.
“It’s just that it should be there if you said it was, shouldn’t it?” asks Caleb.
“I guess that’s true,” I admit.
Now what? Was I dreaming? I close the laptop (bye, Tom and Barb) and stare at it. Great.
At least Isabel isn’t mad anymore.
Now she just thinks I’m nuts.
“So…um…where’s the key?” she asks gently.
“I told you. All that was there was this paper.”
I show them the three symbols.
“Those look so familiar,” Caleb says.
“Yeah, I know. I think I’ve seen them somewhere too,” I answer, grateful that we’re talking about something else. “But I can’t remember where.”
“It’s Japanese. It is possible it came with the remote? You said it was a Sony. That’s a Japanese company, right?” reasons Isabel.
“I don’t think so,” I say firmly. “Mrs. Krausz said Great-Uncle Ted was always fiddling with the remote, so it would have fallen out then, and she said it hasn’t worked right since he left. He definitely put something in there. But why this paper?”
There is the sound of a door opening behind us.
My mom pushes her way in, holding two bags of groceries. Caleb and I get up to help her.
“Mom! What are you doing here?” I ask as I place the bags on the kitchen table.
“I live here, remember?”
Ho ho. Mom humor, level one.
“I told you I was going shopping before work. Just like your father—you never listen. Why, hello, Isabel!”
My mom’s tone turns from irritated to honey-sweet in a nanosecond as she sees the third person in her living room.
“Hello, Mrs. Gerson. It’s always so good to see you,” says Isabel.
As my mom begins to put away the food, I casually pick up the piece of paper.
“Mom, there’s something I found when I was going through Great-Uncle Ted’s things that I wanted to ask you about.”
“As soon as I get this stuff sorted, Teddy,” Mom answers from inside the fridge.
Caleb and Isabel exchange grins as I stand by, handing my mom items as she calls for them. Finally, satisfied with the arrangement of her foodstuffs, Mom stands up, smiles, and turns to her oh-so-helpful son.
“Now, what did you find? Photos?” She turns to Isabel. “I hope he hasn’t shown you any pictures of me from the seventies. It was a bad decade for hair and fashion. I even had a perm, for gosh sake!”
Isabel assures her I’ve done no such thing.
I hold out the paper. Mom looks and sighs.
“Oh, Teddy, why do you have to embarrass me in front of your friends? You know I don’t read Japanese.”
“So it is Japanese.”
“Of course it is.” My mom turns to Isabel. “Uncle Ted was always trying to get me to learn it when I was a kid, but it seemed so hard, and I never had any need for it, really. The only thing he taught me that I remember is if you get a mosquito bite on your leg at the beach, you should rub sand on it.”
“I’m sorry?” Isabel says pleasantly, obviously thinking Mom is speaking gibberish.
My mom laughs. “It’s a mnemonic. You know, a way of remembering something? That’s how to remember how to count the first five numbers in Japanese. If you get a mosquito bite on your knee, it itches, and if you rub sand on it, the itch goes away. So…ichi ni san shi go…‘itchy knee sand, she go.’ Get it?”
“Itchy knee sand, she go,” Isabel repeats, nodding. “That’s pretty cool.”
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“I only wish I’d learned more,” Mom groans. “My brother Peter picked up more Japanese than I did. But that was at least partially because of all those video games he played.”
Without warning, Caleb jumps to his feet. “Is the stuff from your great-uncle’s apartment in your room?” he asks.
“Yes, but—” I reply, looking after Caleb as he dashes upstairs.
A moment later, he returns with a white cardboard box. It’s the one we filled with the old video game cartridges and controllers from the store.
“We were wondering about these,” Caleb asks, bringing them over to my mom.
Her eyes light up when she sees them.
“Oh my gosh! Those were your uncle Peter’s! He’d die if he knew you had them!”
“That explains why ‘Wakabayashi’ is written on them in marker,” I jump in. “They weren’t Great-Uncle Ted’s—Uncle Peter’s last name is also Wakabayashi.” Mom peers into the box. “But in all these years…you never mentioned Uncle Peter played video games,” I say. “As a matter of fact, you never want me to talk to him about them.”
Mom looks up at me. “It’s…a sore subject. I remember when Uncle Ted took those away from him. That summer, Peter was a little older than you and worked part-time at the liquor store, helping out in the back, stocking the shelves. He even hooked this up to the TV Uncle Ted had in the storeroom. Uncle Ted got sick and tired of watching Peter doing nothing but playing these games, so he confiscated them. Peter stopped playing games right after that.”
“Uncle Peter is my mom’s brother,” I explain to Isabel. “He’s a really successful software engineer.”
“Then it makes sense he was an early gamer,” Caleb adds.
“See?” I say. “He played computer games all the time when he was my age. Now look at him.”
“He also had a 4.0 grade point average and took apart and rebuilt a 1975 Mustang without a manual,” my mom answers. “After what happened between him and Uncle Ted, maybe you can understand why I haven’t been so fond of your spending so much time with your games.”
“There has to be more to the story with Uncle Peter and Great-Uncle Ted,” I press. “Adults confiscate games all the time. No reason for a family feud.”
Mom sighs and sits down on the couch. We all sit across from her.
“I guess I can tell you,” she begins. “But your uncle Peter is still embarrassed by it.”
She looks out the window.
“You see, Uncle Ted hired Peter for the summer when he was fourteen. Peter was told to watch the store, but he was so busy playing one of his games that some local kids came in and walked off with a couple of six-packs of beer without him seeing it. Ted sent Peter back to Hawaii the next day. Mom and Dad were so furious with him they let Uncle Ted confiscate his games, the consoles, and the controllers. Peter felt so guilty he never played video games again. He apologized over and over, but Uncle Ted wouldn’t hear it. My folks tried to talk to him, but for some weird reason he made a huge deal out of it. He said he’d put his trust in Peter, and Peter betrayed that trust.”
I see Isabel jerk her head in Mom’s direction.
Picking up on the clue, I reach out and pat her hand. She continues. “Peter really tried to make it up to him, but somehow, once he broke that bond, Uncle Ted wouldn’t budge.”
“So that was the big story between Peter and Great-Uncle Ted?” I ask incredulously. “For the rest of his life, he wouldn’t talk to him because of that?”
“Yes. He had Peter pegged as a disappointment from then on. I guess my brother has spent most of his life trying to prove him wrong.” Smiling at the memory, Mom adds, “Not only that, but Uncle Ted threw out all of Peter’s comic books too! They’d probably be worth a fortune today.”
A sad silence filled the room.
Caleb looks like someone stabbed him in the heart. “That is so harsh,” he’s finally able to utter. He turns green, and I know he’s convinced himself that his precious Amazing Adventure #1 was in that pile of comic books.
Hearing Caleb’s voice brings me back to the present. I look down at the box at his feet.
“So what made you get those out?” I ask him.
Caleb pulls one of the boxes of games out and holds it up. “I knew I’d seen those symbols before.”
On the box, above the title, is the name of the company.
KONAMI
I pick up an old controller from the box and push the buttons. I then begin pressing them in a certain sequence, again and again.
“Of course.” I feel like a world-class moron for not realizing it sooner.
Caleb meets my gaze, and the thunderbolt hits him as well. “You think?” he says in amazement.
We continue to stare at each other in shock.
“Mom,” I say as casually as I can, “you said Great-Uncle Ted was sick of watching Peter play his video games?”
“It wasn’t that, really. It was more his not paying attention to the store that caused all the trouble. Actually, if I remember, when Peter first brought the games in, Uncle Ted was quite interested in learning about them. Peter said he used to ask him all sorts of questions.”
“So it was just—Uncle Peter was playing them too much….” The words are tumbling out of my mouth. I can feel my body tensing up as I push the same sequence of buttons on the keypad again and again.
“Yes, dear. Everything in moderation, right?” Mom glances at Isabel with a smile.
“Um, Mom…don’t you have to get to the hospital?” I ask without looking at her.
My mom glances at her watch and gives a start. “Oh my gosh! With all this reminiscing, I completely lost track of the time!” She leaps up, gives me a quick kiss on the cheek, and heads out.
“See? He can be so thoughtful when he wants to be!” she calls over her shoulder to Isabel.
As soon as the door closes, I exchange high fives with Caleb.
“The Konami Code!” I whoop.
“The Konami Code! That has to be it!” Caleb says, excitement rising in his voice.
Isabel has had enough. “Could someone enlighten me as to what the Konami Code is?”
“To anyone who plays games, the Konami code is, well, the worst-kept secret there ever was,” I explain. “Game developers always need to be able to play through the levels to do bug fixes and smooth out the playability. Early on, the Konami company used a series of button pushes to give unlimited lives and power to the player. It got leaked and became legendary in the gaming world.”
I reach in and began to line up the various game controllers that are in the box.
“Ever since then,” Caleb continues, “it’s been used on over three hundred games. Sometimes it gives you eternal life in the game, or unlimited power. Stuff like that.”
“Up up, down down, left right, left right, B, A,” we chant in unison.
“That’s the Konami Code,” Caleb says excitedly as I begin entering the code into a small red controller. “You enter it into almost any game controller over the last twenty years and it will unlock extra powers or levels.”
“So you think—” Isabel starts to say.
But we aren’t listening. We’re busy pressing the buttons on all the controllers.
“It has to be here,” I say. But I enter the sequence into the last controller with no obvious effect.
“Maybe you have to put the code into the controllers in a certain order,” suggests Caleb.
“It’s worth a try,” I answer.
As we laboriously try various combinations of controllers, Isabel sighs, reaches into her bag, and pulls out a large book.
“You could help, you know,” I say with annoyance.
“I am,” Isabel shoots back, not looking up from her reading.
“How? By reading about the Konami Code?” snipes Caleb.
Isabel snaps the book shut and looks up at us. “In case you were wondering, I was reading about your great-uncle.”
She holds up the book. It’s titled Go for
Broke: A History of the Japanese American 100th Infantry Battalion and the 442nd Regimental Combat Team.
“Where did you find that?” I ask.
“In the library,” Isabel answers. “They have all sorts of books there. You should visit sometime.”
I decide to ignore that jab, and go on. “So did you learn anything?”
“Remember the four coins we found? Do you remember what countries they were from?”
“Let’s see…,” says Caleb, “Um…France, Germany…Italy, I think…”
“And Austria,” Isabel finishes for him. “Those were the four primary countries where the 442nd fought. That’s why he picked them.”
I’m only half listening. I’m looking at the cover of the book. It’s a photo of a young Japanese American soldier holding several men wearing Nazi uniforms prisoner at gunpoint. I wonder if my great-uncle was anywhere near where that picture was taken, and what he saw in the war.
“So why is it called Go for Broke?” I ask.
“Apparently that was the motto of the regiment,” Isabel explains. “It was a Hawaiian expression originally, and they brought it with them.”
Caleb looks down at the remote in his hand and throws it down in disgust.
“Well, if it isn’t here, he had to put it somewhere.”
All of a sudden, I can feel the hairs on the back of my neck tingle.
Always, it’s something right in front of my nose.
Like a sleepwalker, I get up, turn around abruptly, and leave the room.
I head upstairs, rummage around in my room, and then back into the kitchen.
“Guys, I think this is it.”
Isabel and Caleb follow my voice into the kitchen and find me staring at the black rectangular object I’ve gotten from my knapsack, now on the kitchen counter.
It looks like any other cable remote, with a round Select button surrounded by arrows on the top, bottom, left, and right, to navigate on-screen menus. And, I note with satisfaction, there are even buttons marked A, B, C, and D.
Holding my breath, I slowly press the buttons in sequence.
Up. Up. Down. Down. Left. Right. Left. Right. B. A.
There’s a clicking noise, and the entire back of the remote falls away.
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