Chapter 408: Chapter 407.

Chapter 407. Visiting a Small City from my Childhood with my Girlfriend. (4/4)

I headed out on my own while Rosa approached the register to pay.

Stepping out of the store, a memory of mine flashed through my mind. An image from my childhood surfaced. This perspective when exiting the store, though it was from a lower angle. It was superimposed with what I currently saw in front of me.

The store I used to buy video games. I remembered it. It was right across from this one.

My first thought was to get Chris a souvenir, a game from there, but when the video game store in my memories faded, what replaced it was… an empty storefront with a steel gate in front of it. It was closed. No, not just closed, it was out of business. It wasn’t simply devoid of customers, there was literally nothing inside it at all.

A somewhat dejected laugh leaked out, “Haha… things really change quick, huh?”

It made sense though, the gaming market had moved away from physical copies to digital ones over the years. These days most people would just download the game online rather than buy a physical copy at a store.

It made things extremely difficult for such stores to survive. It was a looming sign of an era coming to its end. It only really sank in now. I was reliving that era’s end again.

The transition to an era where the consumer doesn’t truly own many of the things they purchase. 

The so-called metaverse was coming.

A place where you would own nothing but be happy. That was the slogan.

But there wasn’t much that could be done. Social media and tech giants pioneered and paved the way for its inevitable integration with society.

However, maybe it will go differently this time around. No, it’d be naive to think it would. The most that could be done was to delay the inevitable rise of the metaverse.

The only way to do so was to delay or outright stop a certain global event three and a half years from now. It was thanks to that event that those in the tech industry were able to capitalize and take advantage of the situation to push their shitty vision of the metaverse into the mainstream that no one asked for or wanted.

As with social media, I stayed clear of the metaverse. I saw the great danger that came with it. Your entire livelihood was under the direct control of a bunch of narcissistic lunatics. If they wanted to get rid of you, a single press of a key was all it took to effectively end your life.

They had far too much control. Governments didn’t understand the dangers, and as always, were too slow to react or do anything to limit the control being exerted over the populations they governed. In the end, governments became loyal dogs of those corporations who’d amassed too much power and influence over society.

If a politician tried to touch them, all those corporations had to do was sway public opinion in their favor. Doing so wasn’t hard at all. They just had to tweak the algorithm a bit and influencers would hop on board whatever trend got them promoted by that algorithm.

Influencers were a large problem for governments, they had a greater ability than them to mobilize brainless followers. That by itself wasn’t the worst thing ever, the problem came with the fact that those corporations had leashes on those influencers. Influencers knew that so they bowed their heads low and acted like their loyal dogs unable to bite the hand that fed them.

That was the endpoint of capitalism. Ruling through money.

The extreme opposite was socialism leading into communism, ruling through power and authority.

Either the mega corporations won or the governments did. It was a situation where you had to pick your poison.

Unless a delicate balance was established between the two extremes, society would inevitably grow dysfunctional. That was the conclusion I inevitably came to a long time ago.

But even if I knew how things would play out, there was nothing I could do about any of it. I was just a tiny little nobody in the world. I neither wished for wealth nor power. I did not desire to control or discriminate.

I suppose I’m what they would call a fence sitter.

None of it had anything to do with me as long as I stayed out of it and didn’t get involved or participate.

As such, there was really no point thinking about any of this.

One day I’d like to buy up some farmland, become self-sufficient, and enjoy a peaceful life away from everything. Completely, or at least mostly, disconnect myself from society. It would be extremely difficult to pull it off all on my own and would by no means be a walk in the park. Even so, I think I’d still want to try it.

“You sure like to stand around spacing out.” Rosa elbowed me lightly from my side.

“You paid already?”

“Yeah. Did there used to be a store you went to with your mother over there or something?”

“Huh? Uh… yeah, there was. It sold video games and was where I got a lot of my used PlayStation games from as a kid.”

“The ones you gave to Chris?”

“Yeah, I was thinking of getting one as a souvenir for him from there… but it seems they’re gone now.”

“Well, it’s not like all video game stores are gone, we’ll probably run into another one somewhere along the line. You can just get one when we do.”

“Yeah... you’re right.”

“What do you sound so down for?”

“The changing times. It’s sad to see somewhere you had fond memories of from your childhood suddenly gone.”

“Since they’re memories you had of your mother?”

“That too I guess. But life moves on. We should go now.”

“Before that, why don’t we get something to eat from the food court? We’re going to be on the road for a while.”

“Right... I forgot that they had a food court.”

“Then let’s go see what they have.”

We checked the map posted on a pillar and made our way to the food court.

Though there were some food vendors I didn’t recognize, the majority were ones I recognized from back then. Somehow I felt strangely relieved to see them. I’d tried some of them with my mother and it’d been a long time since I ate anything from these food vendors.

We both ordered from one of the vendors I remembered with the best food and took a seat at one of the tables in the mostly empty food court. Out of the fifty or so tables, only ten of them were occupied. It was a rather pitiful sight. 

Seated at the table with Rosa I let out a sigh and reminisced, “Haaaah. In the past, it was hard to even find a single free table in this food court. You either had to get lucky or watch like a vulture for one to free up.”

“It was that busy back then?”

“Yes. Very busy. So busy, there would sometimes be people rushing to get to it first. The competition was fierce back then. My mother sometimes took advantage of the fact that I was a child and used the ‘single mother with an aching back and feet from overwork’ card to get people to offer up their table to her.”

“Hahaha, like seriously? That’s pretty smart though.”

“Yeah, she had all sorts of little tricks she’d use to get by.”

While seated, Rosa leaned forward over the table, supported her cheek with her left palm, and said, “Hey, let me try some of your food.”

“Sure.”

Rosa opened her mouth and I fed her some from my container with a fork.

She closed her eyes and chewed while she analyzed the flavor.

“How is it?”

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“Hmm, it’s not bad, but it could be better.”

“Yeah, it’s not as good as I remember it being. It tasted a lot better when I was a kid.”

Rosa opened her eyes and nodded, “Well, that’s how things go.” 

“They probably got a new cook by now. Or they might be using lower quality ingredients to cut down on costs. Since the number of customers they’re getting is likely nothing compared to the past I wouldn’t be surprised. It’s a shame, it was so good before.”

“Here, try some of mine too.”

Rosa scooped up some of her food with a fork and fed me back.

“Oh, yours is unexpectedly good actually. I don’t remember them selling this before.”

“Seems I lucked out then,” Rosa smiled, with her head tilted to her left on her palm while staring into my eyes. She had her right elbow on the table, her right arm up with her wrist bent and fork pointed down at the table.

Seeing her right now, I couldn’t help but think that spending my leisure time eating together with her like this for the rest of my life wouldn’t be bad at all.

“Do I have some food on my face or something?”

“Huh? Uh, no. Why?”

“You’re staring a lot. Heheh, if I didn’t know any better, I’d think you were captivated by me,” Rosa teased while poking my lower lip with her fork playfully.

“I am.”

Clack.

Her hand froze up and the fork slipped out from between her fingers

“Did that surprise you?”

“It did. It surprised me a lot that you’d say that so honestly without there being some sort of twist to it. So, what’s the twist?”

“The twist is that there is no twist.”

“This is bait. I’m not falling for it. There’s definitely something to it.”

“I love you.”

Her lips squirmed a bit as she tucked her head down to the right and rotated her left hand to obstruct her lips with her fingers.

“Don’t go throwing straight balls at me out of nowhere when I’m not ready for them, that’s playing dirty, jerk.” 

“How heartless of my girlfriend. She doesn’t even love me back,” I joked.

She peaked up from the corner of her eyes and said, “Shut up, I love you too, jerk.”

I raised my fork up with some food to her mouth.

She opened her mouth, took the fork with food into her mouth, and chewed while still covering her lips with her fingers.

By the time we finished eating, the gloomy feeling I’d felt since we entered the mall had cleared up.

With our stomachs filled we departed from the mall.

We didn’t immediately leave the city though. Rather, we stopped by a major retailer, one that didn’t have a store in our city.

This time it wasn’t for Rosa, rather, it’d been somewhere I wanted to drop by.

When I led Rosa to the aisle with the product I was after she finally asked, “What you wanted to get was frozen food?”

“Yeah.”

“But it’ll spoil.”

“I’ll only get one. It should at least be good until we set up camp today.”

“What is it you want so badly?”

“Well, when I was a kid there was this brand of frozen pizza I really liked that I’d always get from here. They don’t sell it in our city.”

“I see. But frozen pizza? It can’t be that good, right? I mean, it’s just frozen pizza.”

“It is that good though. I’ve been dying to eat one of these for a long time now but you can’t get them shipped from anywhere online. My mother used to buy twenty of them in bulk each trip and we’d bring them back home with us. When they were on sale they only cost $1 for each one.”

For decades I’d kept my eyes out for this bloody frozen pizza from my childhood. I’d dreamed of those 13.8 ounces of goodness for years on end. But no matter how much I wanted them, I wasn’t going to drive for hours to this city just to get them.

“Only a $1? There’s no way it’s as good as you remember it. You’re just going to end up disappointed when you eat it.”

“I swear on my life, it’s the best frozen pizza I’ve ever had.”

“Haaaah. Well, we’ll see about that. I guess I’ll just have to comfort you when you start crying about how it’s not as good as you remember.”

“But now that I think about it… how do we cook it without an oven?” I’d never cooked it without an oven.

“Just seal the pot we brought with the frying pan. Put the pizza in the pan and seal the pan with the pot’s cover. With the pot over a fire, the air inside the pot will heat up and transfer to the frying pan. Like this, we should be able to cook it.”

“Oh, good idea. That should help cook it evenly.”

“Yeah.”

Once we resolved the problem on how to cook it, I groaned one from the freezer and lamented over inflation, “Haaaah. It’s $2.50 now.”

“Cheap.”

“What do you mean cheap? That’s a 150% price hike.”

“It’s still freaking cheap.”

The two of us bickered back and forth about the price all the way up until we left the store. We’d even gotten the cashier involved and made her take a side when paying. Sadly, I was defeated two to one when the cashier took Rosa’s side. I could only suck it up and accept defeat.

We argued about some really pointless stuff at times, but doing so was unexpectedly enjoyable. 

With the frozen pizza packed away in our bag, we departed from the city and continued our journey.

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