Re No

            by Leslie Lu

 

Every vacation our family has ever had was in the city of Reno.  It wasn’t because we had family there.  My parents view Reno as a great place for kids. When I once suggested a place like Hawaii, they told me we could swim at home.

 When I first visited the city, what caught my attention was the huge sign full of lights that read, “The Biggest Little City in the World”. 

“Isn’t that gorgeous, I wonder how they do that,” my parents would make comments to each other every time it was in sight.  I never understood what the hell the term was supposed to mean.  It was certainly nothing to brag about.  Once inside, my parents dropped my brother and me off in the arcade with a few quarters. 

“Stay here, you’re not allowed in the casino part.  We’ll be back,” they instructed.

 Weren’t we just in the “casino part”?  I shrugged as I carefully placed a quarter into a machine, but I wasn’t tall enough to play the game.  My brother played while I watched. We went back to the hotel and slept afterwards. As soon as my eyes opened in the morning, we had to go home. 

            We came back to Reno a month later.  I was determined to make this trip more exciting.  My parents took me to the arcade, and left… again.  I was noticing a pattern and figured I would end up here every trip.  Vacations were supposed to be fun, which from experience, I learned fun would not be found in the arcade.  I needed to go somewhere different.  Somewhere different was simply through the doors to the casino; the “casino part” I was not allowed to wander into.  However, this was an emergency, I was bored.  Exceptions are always allowed during emergencies.   I left the arcade and adventured into the casino.  The first appealing view I saw was how each machine had a decent chair in front of it.  There was no need to get lost searching through the room for the one cold, hard, heavy, stool the arcade owned.  I sat in one of the comfortable chairs and put a quarter in one of the machines.  Now this I was tall enough to play.  People were so engaged when they played and I couldn’t wait to experience what they found so fascinating.  I pressed random buttons expecting to see an explosion on the screen.  Fruits moved up and down making bell-like sounds.  Disappointed, I went down an escalator and walked around the first floor.  I saw someone familiar.  Right away, I came to a complete stop and froze.  My mom was pressing buttons on one of the machines.  She turned and looked in a direction towards me.  Remembering her instructions about staying in the arcade, I dashed to hide behind a trashcan full of fear.  The smell of mixed miscellaneous items wasn’t so satisfying.  I gagged as I switched my hiding place over to a pole, but the odor of cigarettes there was stronger than usual.  It was crucial that I remained unseen so I held my breath.  I peaked around a crack on the pole over to where my mom was sitting; my neck was ready to explode from the scarcity of oxygen I was taking in.  She was gone.  Good, now all I needed to do was turn around and return to the arcade; no one would know I had not listened to the rules.

 “What are you doing here?” The tone of a voice stung my left ear.  I wanted to storm away, but I couldn’t even move the muscle that allowed me to blink.

“You, know, just because I can’t see you, doesn’t mean you can’t see me,” my mother continued ready to interrogate.  

 “I’m here because…” I tried to reply.  I could feel the shaking in my voice vibrating the words that came out of my mouth in a way that shook the floor as well.  I paused to give myself time to think.  “I’m looking for the bathroom,” I finished my lie and waited for her, anticipating the reaction.   She tilted her head and pointed at a door right in front of me with the word “WOMEN”.  I nervously laughed as I ran inside, trying to avoid further questions.

            After the frightening encounter with my mom, I had learned my lesson.  The next time I adventured into the forbidden casino area, I made sure to turn and walk in the opposite direction every time I spotted a parent.  I eventually turned it into a game, “Avoid the Parent”.  However, I forgot to avoid someone else.

“Excuse me, where are your parents?”  A tall security guard asked. He took a seat next to me on the bench.  Great.  Why would I pay to get caught by some demons when I could have it happen in reality, at no cost?

“Heh, in this building?”

“Ok, let’s wait here until we see them then,” he said it in a way that indicated he used the common phrase daily.  He tried to start up a nice conversation.  “How old are you?”

“Eight,” I responded.  I wondered why I was letting a stranger learn my age.

“What’s your name?” He scratched his head.

“Julie,” I answered.  “Your name?”  I had just read the name off a nametag somewhere.  I avoided staring at the intimidating mole on his nose.

“Wow!  I had a niece named Julie; she’s about your age.  She likes stickers, do you like stickers?”

I was asking him how old he was when my dad walked by and recognized me.  He apologized and the security guard waved goodbye. 

“Why aren’t you in the arcade?” My dad wanted to know.  I couldn’t tell him how dull the arcade was, he loved Reno.

“I had trouble finding the bathroom.”  

            On the next visit, my parents told my brother to watch me while we were in the arcade.  I was reminded an annoying amount of times about not going into the casino.  I was forced to follow my brother around the arcade, watching him win, watching him lose, and hearing his laughter when I lost. 

“Give me your quarters,” he grumbled at a “Continue?” screen. 

“No.”  

“Please?!”  He said it in a tone that hinted a catastrophe would occur if I gave him a certain answer.  I had no choice.  I gave him one quarter.

“If I lose I’m gonna kick your ass,” he threatened while jamming in my quarter. 

I gave him the rest of the quarters.  He eventually had to lose at some point.  I snuck off in the middle of his game.  As I exited, I saw my mom.  I needed more quarters, so I decided to follow her.  When I caught up with her, out of breath, I realized I was only following someone who looked like my mom.  I noticed a guard looking my way and was reminded that I’m not allowed in the casino part of the casino.  The entrance to the casino was right in front of me.  “Time to follow the rules,” I thought as I left the building. I walked around the streets and felt eyes on me where ever I stepped.  I turned around to go back.  My brother was at the front of the arcade when I returned.

“How did you spend a whole hour in the restroom?”

“The line to the restroom was long,” I said the words before I thought of them.  I was beginning to feel comfort whenever I lied.  He nodded and went back inside. 

Whenever there was nothing to do, I always found myself exploring the city.  I knew the risks, all the dangers on the news of certain activities that could happen to me, but each time I returned safely running into no problems at all, I was more encouraged to leave again.  I explored farther into the city every time I left the hotel.  I was so hungry to witness something exciting.  It became such a common aspect of the vacation; I knew how to get around the city better than my parents.  One time, I left during the night.  I came to a conclusion about the lights on the buildings I once found amazing. They looked better in the sky.  I heard a distinct pattern of footsteps on my way back to the casino we were staying at.  I slowed down, the sound was probably nothing at all, and I could let the walker pass by me and stop myself from being paranoid.  Unfortunately, the sound of the footsteps slowed down as well.  This was not what I meant by something exciting. I moved faster, but the pace of the footsteps increased.  I stopped walking altogether and the steps decided to also take a rest.  I finally just ran straight toward the hotel, full of sweat, no looking back, and ignoring the sounds.  The strategy worked perfectly for the first three feet.  A hand forced itself on to the front of my shoulder and pulled the right side of my body backwards.  I turn around to face the owner of the mysterious steps.                                         “What the hell do you think you’re doing,” the voice pronounces it as a statement rather than a question.  I turned around to see the face of a dark figure, which moved into the light.  My brother gave me a crazy glare like he had just discovered a hole in his sock.

The family was on our way to dinner once when my brother and I could not avoid seeing a half-dressed woman as tall as a giraffe walking around.  My brother couldn’t stop laughing and I joined in. 

“I’d be so cold those clothes,” I commented.

“Those aren’t clothes,” my brother taught.  My dad looked back and saw we stopped walking towards the buffet room.  He came over to join us.  Was he coming to lecture us about staring at people or to take out our eyes?  He had a straight face and seemed pretty upset.  He was about an inch away from me, when he turned and went up to the woman.  He, along with my mom walked up to the woman and had their picture taken.  Next the woman walked up to us and our picture was taken with her as well.  That picture hung as a magnet on the door of our refrigerator for seven years. 

During the day my dad played at the tables while my mom played at the machines.  My brother played the arcade games while I played with the ticket games.  Dinner was the only event our family spent together during the vacation.  The place I dreaded most was the buffet.  For my mom, “all you can eat” meant, “eat everything you can without dying”.  She wanted those ten dollars to be worth more.  My brother was always able to find food that looked appetizing.  I wasn’t tall enough to serve myself, so my mom chose the food for me. My only concern was that my mom would not stop refilling my plate whenever I was ready for desert.  The refilling was not the problem; it was the “food” she refilled my plate with.  She always mixed all the contents in the plate together until it was unidentifiable.  I would eagerly eat a piece of shrimp, but almost choke at the surprise that it was a soggy baby carrot mixed with the sour cream from the potato.  She always ended up sitting next to me at the dinner table.  She loved bragging about how slow I ate.

“How come everyone else has gotten up to get more food three times and you’re still on you’re first plate?  You’re wasting money.  Wasting money is bad,” she spoke in one breath.  I noticed a pattern; my mom would grab as much food as she could on to her plate and distributed it all to me when she returned.  She never ate much in the first place!

“Why don’t you just not eat at all?” my mother would ask after hearing my complaint.

“I won’t,” I agreed.  It was a great idea.  Besides, with what she was serving me, eating was an understatement.

“Don’t talk back to your parents, it’s bad.  Finish your salad,” my mom responded.

This was hopeless.  Salad?  Who was required to eat salad on vacation?  But there was nothing to worry about, whenever my mom stood up for refills, I would tell a waitress I was done, done and ready for my plate to be taken far away.  Good service.  

I spent the day in the hotel room once.  I was sick of being stuck in an arcade with five dollars to spend for five hours.  The first thing I did was jump around bouncing from twin bed to twin bed.  I wasn’t allowed to jump because the guests on the floor below us would hear me, but I figured they wouldn’t be in during the day, and no one was around to stop me.  On one jump I made a wrong turn and knocked a cup of coffee on to the bed.  The cup had not tipped over yet; I tried to stabilize myself because I couldn’t stop moving.  The cup slid off the bed and spilled on to the floor.  I spared no time speeding straight to the bathroom to rip the roll of toilet paper out of the wall.  Despite how wet each sheet of toilet paper became, the stain remained on the carpet.  It started to form into a pacman-like shape as it laughed at me.  I was punching the toilet paper on to the stain when the door clicked which meant one of my parents had returned.  I grabbed a chair and stood on it to lock the chain part of the door and went back to focus on my stain.  The door opened and made a sudden stop as the chain held it back.  The door closed, and someone knocked.  I quickly threw a magazine over the stain and went to the door.  I tried to fabricate a lie for the stain; I couldn’t let my parents know I jumped on the bed.  There was another knock; this knock was accompanied by a voice.   

 “Housekeeping.  Can I come in?”  

The weight on back shifted downward with relief.                                              

“Yes,” I said gently.  I let her in.

“Where are your parents?  You’re in here alone?”  She looked like she was about to call security.  Was I allowed to be in the room by myself?  It sounded plausible, Reno had so many rules. 

“Oh, nooo, I’m on my way downstairs, I needed to use the bathroom so I told them I would meet them when I finished.”  I was surprised at how quickly I was able to lie.  Right after my last word I left and ran over to the elevator.

My parents decided I was smart enough to start monitoring myself.  They allowed me to decide when I would go to the arcade and when I would go back up to the hotel room.  They even gave me my own hotel key card.  I was waiting for the elevator to come when I thought about taking a detour.  I always saw the “in case of emergency, use stairs” sign next to the door of the elevator, and using the stairs would kill time.  The elevator arrived and I walked in the opposite direction.  I went down the hall towards the door marked exit.  I pulled the heavy door open and poked my head inside.  The stairway was a dirty white, yet it managed to be so bright I thought I was dreaming about an unpleasant heaven.  I pulled the handle harder and let my whole body inside.  The door squeaked as it slowly closed and made a loud “clunk” noise when it was finally shut.  I moved towards the rails of the metal stairway.  I looked up and saw no ceiling; I looked down and saw no floor.  I placed a foot on one of the stairs and it made a high pitched “ting” noise with each metal step.  The stairs creaked along with every movement.  I thought only wooden stairs could creak.  Each of my steps became more careful than the previous. A piece of gravel plopped on to my arm from above, and then rolled down a step of the staircase.  I looked up and heard four distinct taps moving through the pipes. The stairs were never ending and my stomach was growling.  The growl sounds were repeating themselves as the echoes raced up and down the walls.  A growl with no owner answers back.  This room clearly wasn’t fit to handle a fire.

When I arrived at the last staircase, I came across an unexpected situation.  There were two doors:  One was marked, “Casino/Lobby” The other read, “Authorized Personnel Only”.   I had never seen what was behind an “Authorized Personnel Only” door before so I tried the handle on the door.  It was unlocked.  I opened it wide enough to squeeze myself through and let the door close quietly behind me.  A triangle of fire blinds my eye.  I recalled casinos performing unpleasing actions to those who cheated.  This place must have burned people.  However the smell didn’t match.  The scent in the air was full of fried foods and pastries.  The smooth triangle of fire grew smaller until it disappeared and revealed a man dressed in white wearing a popcorn shaped hat.  He gave me a curious stare and chopped some meat.  My heartbeat moved in faster intervals, but before I could turn around, a knife slid across the floor.  A man in a suit wearing glasses glided over to retrieve it.  His head slowly turned after he picked up the knife as he coldly eyed me.  “Whaa blar oin har?  Waaacnk.”    My attention was more focused on the knife pointed at a direction I didn’t want it to point at.  He moved closer to me, offered a lemon, motioned me out the door.  I walked out into the lobby area and pondered eating the lemon.  Poison? 

Every single one of the numerous attempts made to enjoy my stay in Reno has had a negative result: boredom or disaster.  I recalled a lesson my parents once quoted.  “Only an idiot tries the same thing over and over again, and expects different results.”  For now, they are correct, but then again, my several attempts for excitement would not exist if my parents had never repeatedly tested their luck in Reno.