September 21, 2005
Week 21 - The Quest 1
Episode 3
"See!" Hal says. "I knew it! I knew you'd say no!"
"If you knew I'd say no, why did you ask? You know I hate that game!"
"But why! It's my favorite thing to do in the whole world! And it doesn't hurt anyone!"
"You run around shooting each other with machine guns!"
"They're plasma cannons, not machine guns…"
"Whatever! It's violent and it's sick. You're lucky I let you play the version you have, let alone lend you money to buy a new one."
"But it's just a game! It's all make believe."
"The line between fantasy and reality gets blurred all the time. Kids play games like that and then they shoot up their schools!"
"First you say you trust me, then you say you think I'm going to shoot up my school!"
Liza takes a deep breath. "I didn't say you'd do that. I just said some kids do. And it's against my principles to help support companies that peddle violent filth like that to kids."
"So your principles are more important than my happiness!"
"They don't contradict! It's not good for you to spend so much time in front of that computer anyway. You should be outside more! You should make more friends! Believe me, you'd be a whole lot happier that way."
"So you definitely won't loan me the money?"
"Not for anything to do with that horrible game!"
Hal stands up. "This sucks. This whole thing sucks. This is just what I knew would happen. You won't help me and you just want to tell me what to do. Well, you know what? Forget it! Forget I even asked… I'm going to my room!" He stomps out of the kitchen.
Liza stares after him. Then she shakes her head and picks up her book.