Just a Game

Before the Game [Spectator Side]

Mr. Gregory Locklear wasn't one to watch TV. He was a healthy kind of person. The kind that loved nature and hiking and riding bikes and broadening his horizons. Watching TV was a waste of time in his opinion, especially when it involved the type of melodramatic soaps his wife loved. If people in his household actually listened to his opinions, which they didn't, they would have tossed out the TV ages ago. But hey, who was he to argue? Gotta put his wife first, of course, because that was the right thing to do according to everyone else, was it not?

Today, however, was an exception. For the first time in a grand total of three days, Mr. Locklear sat down in front of the TV, ready to watch the new reality show Brutal Realms. His son, his one pride and joy, would be on it, and no way was he going to miss his favorite child's debut in the showbiz. Now, if only he had some food, it would have doubled the enjoyment, but his wife was being as lazy as usual—said she had a headache. Headache his ass! Mr. Locklear had no patience for sickly people. He told Felicia, his sad excuse of a wife, that if she wouldn't do her job in the kitchen, she should order Chinese takeout and bring it back for him. He didn't really like Chinese takeout—the food was too oily and the fried rice almost always burnt. But what choice did he have? His useless wife positively wouldn't cook, and his equally useless daughter hadn't left her room since morning. Which was unacceptable, really. It was her brother's big day. Her brother who, despite being younger, had never stopped taking care of her ever since he learned to walk. And she was repaying him by entirely ignoring his first appearance on TV!

Definitely unacceptable. Mr. Locklear stormed to the room of Cheyenne Locklear and banged on the door with his fists. He would have just opened the door and marched in, but Cheyenne had it locked. Typical—she had been a recluse and a disappointment since the start. Well, yes, she did have heart problems and hadn't been expected to live past ten years old—it was a miracle that she even reached her current twenty-two years of age—but was leaving her room and socializing that difficult? Mr. Locklear thought not. Socializing was part of life, and Cheyenne couldn't run from it forever.

"Hey, you, girl," he shouted, jiggling the doorknob. "Out this instant. Your brother's show is gonna begin."

Her reply came, in her annoyingly weak, reedy voice. "I'm watching, Dad. I'm watching online on my computer."

Mr. Locklear crashed his fist into the door. "I said come out this instant!"

Mr. Locklear had no patience for things like the internet. What was the use of it, when the real world was just as fine as it was? His mind flashed back to the time when he caught Cheyenne chatting with her online boyfriend. Online boyfriend! That kind of thing was unheard of in Mr. Locklear's circle. Instead of settling down with a decent, local boy who would maybe kindly take responsibility for this worthless girl who was incapable of walking from her room to the bathroom without getting winded and let her dad enjoy his life in peace, Cheyenne had to go and get herself a boyfriend on the internet. That was the last straw. Mr. Locklear would have taken away internet access from her altogether, but then her brother started sharing his wi-fi hotspot with her. That wouldn't do, of course—Kurt needed internet access for his schoolwork at university, and he couldn't just go about sharing bandwidth with his stupid sister who couldn't go to school due to her weak heart. So Mr. Locklear ended up giving Cheyenne back her internet access—humph, the sacrifices he made for his family!

The ungrateful git finally opened her door and awkwardly shuffled out. Her entire appearance rubbed Mr. Locklear the wrong way. Her shoulders were too broad and unfeminine, her neck short and stumpy, and she was sweating hard despite having done no physical labor. A glimpse into her room almost gave Mr. Locklear a heart attack, and he wasn't even the one with the heart disease.