Later that night, Seth sat on the gray carpet of his living room, elbows propped up on the coffee table. It was the only piece of furniture in the main area of his apartment, and with the pile of boxes gone, the entire place felt even emptier.
From where he sat, he could see into the kitchen. There was an empty space where the table would have gone, with worn brown laminate floor marred with scratches and stains. The countertop wasn't much better. Only a grandmother would appreciate the beige marbled look. Even the appliances were the old yellowed veterans that continued plodding along past the lifespan of their original owners.
When choosing an apartment, Uncle Fenn had gone with the cheapest, but Seth didn't mind. He knew that Fenn had only paid the rent for the first six months, and that eventually the responsibility of paying for it would fall on his own shoulders.
You'll have to get a job, Fenn had told him. Once you get settled in and adjusted, of course. It doesn't have to be anything crazy, but just something to help pay the bills. There's a gas station, a Subway and a little mall within walking distance. You can find work there, I'm sure.
Seth rubbed at his eyes. He knew he couldn't rely on Fenn to pay for everything forever, but just the thought of approaching strangers and asking for a job terrified the daylights out of him. It was one thing in a game where it was all pretend and the people weren't real, but in reality? What if he made a fool of himself? There was a chance he'd run into those people again someday, and they'd recognize him as the dumb kid who couldn't even walk across the street without tripping on his face.
He groaned, and flopped onto the table. The wood felt slightly sticky against his face, but he didn't care.
A job. Ha. Like he'd even manage to hold one, never mind find one. At least he had a few months yet. He could worry about that later. For now though, he'd bask the glow of having his own space. Who cared if it was small and outdated and smelled a little funny? It was quiet, and it was his.
He sighed against the table. It still didn't feel real. None of this did. It was like a miraculous dream, one that felt fragile enough to shatter at any moment. This whole day felt like an extension of that dream.
Mrs Beakor was nice, if not a little unhinged, but the lasagna she had made was hands down the best food he'd ever tasted. Four layers of meat sauce, noodles, and gooey cheese—he'd practically devoured half the dish before he even realized what he'd done.
She'd only cackled and sent the leftovers home with him.
Seth lifted his head, checking out his kitchen once more. The refrigerator hummed quietly. It was no longer was entirely empty, for it now housed his precious breakfast. He smiled.
Maybe he'd run into Mrs Beakor again sometime in the future.
His phone on the table lit up, and the sound of croaking frogs filled the apartment. His gaze shot to the phone. Scowling fiercely, he slapped a hand over it.
"Why frogs?" he demanded after he picked it up.
"Why not," came his uncle's amused reply. "Frogs are cool."
"They are not," Seth retorted. "Stop changing my ringtone."
Fenn laughed. "I thought you might like that one."
Seth rolled his eyes. No one in their right mind would enjoy that awful noise blasting at them every time the phone rang. Not only that, what if he'd been in a public place? He'd die of embarrassment.
"Yeah, right. It's worse than the cow one. Why can't you pick music or something like a normal person?"
"Who wants to be normal? Normal is boring."
"Whatever." Seth huffed. He happened to like normal very much, thank you. "How'd your flight back go?"
"Fantastic. Got a great sleep, though I got a lot of dirty looks on my way off the plane. I must have been snoring pretty loud."
Such a thing would have been embarrassing to most people, but Fenn spoke with shameless pride. He was a man with truly thick skin. He'd often answer his door in his underwear, uncaring of how others saw him. But even more than that, he was the most unflappable person Seth had ever known.
He could remember one time where Fenn had fearlessly stood up to his mother's angry tirade. Fenn had been over for dinner, and Seth accidentally spilled his water all over the new tablecloth. That had been all it took for his mother to lose her mind. She'd started yelling, and even Carly didn't say a thing. Seth's father simply sat like a statue in the midst of a storm, as if unaware it was even going on. But Fenn - Fenn had quietly pushed his chair back, got up, and came over to Seth. He'd smiled warmly and held out a hand.
"Let's go for a walk," he'd said. And Seth had gone, even though his mother's shrieks had risen to catastrophic levels of rage. The sound of dishes breaking had chased them out of the house, but with Fenn there, not a single one had been thrown after him. She'd never risk harming her own brother.
Seth ran a finger over the table, finding the sticky spot. He scratched at it with a fingernail. "Uh huh. And now they'll never you let on a plane again."
"Or the overnight ones, at least," Fenn cheerfully said. He paused, then asked, "How are you doing, kid?"
"Good."
"Yeah? You sound it." Fenn seemed pleased. "Did you manage to get some shopping done?"
Seth rolled his eyes. Of course his uncle would ask that, even though it'd barely been a day since he was over. "No, but I got the boxes unpacked."
"You did? That's great!"
"I guess," Seth returned. The sheer delight in his uncle's voice was embarrassing. All he did was put away a bunch of things. It wasn't anything to get all giddy over. But if Fenn wanted to get all excited about nothing, then Seth would give him something to get excited about.
"I also had dinner with a girl," he said.
There was a beat of silence on the other line. It went on a little too long, and then his uncle went, "Oh?"
It was said in the kind of tone where someone was desperately trying not to sound too interested.
Seth grinned. He could tell he'd thrown Fenn for a loop. "Yeah. I met her outside when I was taking out the trash, and she asked me over for dinner."
"You're joking with me, right?"
"Nope," Seth's grin grew wider. If he hadn't thought it to be a freak occurrence himself, he might have felt insulted by his uncle's dubious tone. "It really happened."
"Seth..."
It was hard not to burst out laughing, but Seth managed to stifle the urge. Both he and Fenn knew very well that the chances of him going out with a stranger were next to nil, never mind it being a date.
"Okay, fine." He gave in with a huff. "She's eighty years old, and she's my neighbor."
Silence. Then, in disbelief, "You went out with a granny?"
Heat rushed to Seth's face. "She asked me over for lasagna."
"And you went?" Now Fenn sounded even more incredulous.
"Yeah, I did. She seemed nice." Also a little crazy, but Seth decided to keep that bit to himself.
"You actually..." His uncle made a strangled sound. After another pause, he cleared his throat. "Well. That's...that's really impressive. And good. Very good. I'm glad you're making friends with the grandmas."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Seth narrowed his eyes.
"Nothing. Nothing at all. I'm just proud of you." Another muffled sound, and this time, Seth realized that his uncle was sniggering.
"Fine," Seth retorted. "Next time you come, you should meet her."
In fact, he'd love to see what Fenn thought of Mrs Beakor. He'd probably be just as surprised as Seth was. She was a force that defied nature.
"I'd love to," Fenn readily agreed, the fool. Poor guy had no idea what he was in store for. "Anyway, did you try out the game?"
"Yeah, I did."
"And? How was it? Did you have fun?"
Seth's lips quirked at the sheer amount of eagerness radiating from the speaker of his phone. "It was okay. You didn't tell me I had to choose a class."
"Ah, right. I knew I was forgetting something. I left that because I wasn't sure which one you'd want. The game has a pretty solid tutorial though, so it should have been easy to figure out. Which one did you pick?"
"Cleric."
"The healer? That's a great choice, Seth. I think it suits you."
"You think so?" Seth felt somewhat embarrassed. "I wasn't sure which one to pick, but the administrator guy suggested it."
Fenn made an affirmative sound. "Mm. He's pretty intuitive, isn't he? So, tell me what happened in the game? Did you do some quests?"
"I did two of them." Seth sat up straight, feeling a little proud of himself. "The orphanage one was really intense."
"Orphanage? What quest was that?"
"There was an orphanage that burnt down and Lady Joveline sent a bunch of us to help heal the kids." Seth tilted his head. "You didn't know about that quest?"
He thought his uncle would have been aware of it because he'd helped make the game. Maybe he wrong, though.
"Nearly all of the quests are dynamic," Fenn explained. "That means they're generated by current situations. Everyone will get different quests depending on what's going on in Eliona. I'd love to hear about what happened with this orphanage, though."
Seth nodded slowly. From what he'd seen so far, that made sense.
"Well, we had to go down there and heal five kids. Other players who were good at fighting were sent to help track down the people who set the fire." Seth paused, wondering if they ever found the perpetrators. Then he shrugged, as it wasn't his problem to worry about. "I healed a lot more than the kids. There were a lot of injured people, so I stayed until I ran out of time. It was kind of scary."
"What was?"
"It looked real," Seth lowered his eyes to the table. His fingernail scraped against the surface. "The fire, the smoke, the burns... they were pulling dead kids out of there, and it was awful."
"I can imagine," his uncle said. He sounded sober. "But it sounds like you helped a lot of people."
"Yeah." He'd done everything he could, hadn't he? It was strange to be able to just erase people's injuries and pain like that, but it was also kind of amazing. "I did. That part was really cool."
In fact, he wouldn't mind doing more of that.
"I'm glad. The cleric class is pretty strong, and if you stick with it, you have some neat options down the line."
Seth perked up. "Like what?"
"I'm not telling," Fenn laughed. "You're just going to have to keep playing and find out. Now tell me what else you did."
Seth talked about the Guardsman, and the ensuing adventure in the forest. He didn't mention the odd encounter with the man in black, or getting murdered, because he didn't want to admit that he'd already died once in the game. That was just embarrassing.
Just as he expected, Fenn nearly choked himself laughing at Seth's encounter with forest wildlife. It took him a full minute to quit snickering.
"It's not that funny," Seth sourly said.
"Yes, it is. Did you know the maditas are very timid? If you stood your ground or shouted at it, it would have turned around and fled."
"Maditas?" Severance repeated. "Are you sure that wasn't a krako? The thing was huge!"
Fenn burst out laughing. "No, it's definitely not a krako. Look at you, learning new lore! Krako are like big hairy cows. A maditas looks scary, but they're herbivores. They're all bark and no bite. Completely harmless."
"Harmless." Seth shook his head. He didn't believe it. That thing would have stamped him flat if he'd let it.
What followed was more intensive discussion on the creatures of Eliona. Fenn was very knowledgeable, which wasn't surprising since he'd helped make the game. Seth learned more about cuddleworms and krakos than he'd ever wished to know. For example, cuddleworm slime was like a natural fertilizer for plants.
An hour later, when the conversation began to die down, Fenn asked, "Are you going to play again tonight?"
Seth considered it. He'd actually enjoyed discussing the game with his uncle. Fenn's passion for all things Eliona was contagious, and Seth found himself wanting to discover even more things about the game. That way he'd have plenty to talk about with Fenn.
He found himself nodding, even though Fenn couldn't see him. "Yeah, I think I will."
"That's great! I can't wait to hear about which cliff you'll fall off of next."
"Shut up," Seth said, smiling. "Why don't you make a character and fall off your own cliff?"
"Nah, that's your job. I'm too busy with work to spend time in Eliona, so you're just going to have to tell me all about your adventures instead."
"Fine. When you are coming down again?"
"Three weeks, if things work out. The launch is going smoothly, but there's still some bugs to sort out."
Seth felt a wave of disappointment. Three weeks was entirely reasonable, and it was what they discussed earlier, but he couldn't help but wish it was sooner. He looked at his phone, taking note of the time. It was getting late, and knowing Fenn, the man would be getting up at an insanely early hour. He didn't want to cut into what little sleep his uncle would get.
"Okay. I better go. Talk tomorrow?"
He could hear the smile in Fenn's answer: "You bet, kid. Good night."
The call ended, and Seth listened to the silence of his apartment. He found himself missing the layer of boxes on the far wall. At least with them there, the place hadn't felt so empty.
"Tomorrow," he softly said. Then he got up and headed for his bedroom, where the keys to Eliona awaited.