Shoot Club: Quit or Continue
TomChick - Columns - Comments - 06/02/04
Trevor called the afternoon before Shoot Club.
"Hey, so are you guys having Shoot Club tonight?" he asked.
"Yep, as usual."
"I just ask because I didn't get the email this week. Did you take my name off the email list?"
"Oh, well, I didn't know if you'd still want to get the emails." Ever since Trevor left, I had been trying to mentally adjust to having him in the category of friends who weren't into Shoot Club. There's a very clear line between Shoot Club and the rest of the world. It's a hard line to move.
"Well, yeah, sure, just to keep up with everyone. You know, just because I'm not into all that stuff any more doesn't mean you guys aren't my friends."
"Yeah, I know. But this is new to me. I don't really know how to act."
"Just be normal," Trevor tells me. "If anything's a problem, I'll let you know."
***
A few months ago, Trevor called in sick at work. He wasn't really sick, but that morning he'd just finished downloading the BitTorrent of the Worlds of Warcraft beta. He started installing it and by the time it was done, he realized he was already a half hour late for work. He also knew he wasn't going to be able to get up from the computer without at least making a character and looking around the starting town real quick. So he called his boss and tried to make his voice sound weak. He said he had stomach poisoning. For good measure, he also said his car had broken down.
Five days later, Trevor still hadn't gone in to work. Instead of sleeping at night, he was taking naps. We tried to get his Mom to intervene. But she freaked out and called an ambulance. I drove over to Trevor's to make sure there wasn't going to be some sort of problem. I don't know what happens when someone makes a false ambulance call?
Trevor was showing the EMT his 31st level gnome warlock. "Check it out. See that Shadowthorn Stag? Watch me fuck it up."
"How much damage did you take?" the EMT asked.
"None. Zero. And look at my inventory. Check out all the shit I have. See that staff. I made it."
After the EMT left, Trevor was pretty pissed. He said we were totally overreacting. "It's not like those people with EverQuest. I'm not, you know, sitting in my own feces or anything. I had a shower two days ago."
"Two days ago?"
"It's not like I'm even doing anything to get sweaty."
But when Trevor shut down Worlds of Warcraft, I saw that he had Lineage II and Horizons windows running behind it. He quickly minimized them and then shot me a look to see if I'd noticed. I had.
"Trevor, those games aren't even good."
"Well, yeah, no duh. Why do you think I have them running in the background?"
I told him the first step was admitting he had a problem. Then I asked him when was the last time he fed Zelda. He checked in at Meierton three days later.
***
Trevor got here early and now we're waiting on the other guys to arrive.
"I read a bunch of books when I was in there. I've actually now read all of the Robert Jordan Wheel of Time books. And get this..."
"Yeah?"
"There were times when I was bored."
"Reading those books?"
"No, just in general. But, actually, yeah, reading those books, too. That got pretty boring. But I'm mainly talking about overall. There were times I was just bored. Can you believe that? It was pretty cool. I never used to get bored. There were always at least a couple of games I wanted to play. I used to wonder how people could ever be bored. That just seemed so strange."
"Yeah, I don't get that."
"Hey, you know who was there? At Meierton?"
"Who?"
"Gary Coleman."
"Yeah? Was he a nice guy?"
"No, he wasn't there while I was there. I think this was like ten years ago."
"Oh."
"Yeah. Bob Denver, too."
"Gilligan?"
"At least that's what they said."
"I guess Meierton is pretty famous."
"You know, Gary Coleman is in Postal 2," I offer.
"I know. That's from before I went in."
"I think you're supposed to be able to pee on him or something."
Trevor wrinkles his nose. "What?"
"Yeah, that's in there. In Postal 2, I think you can pee on Gary Coleman."
He considers this. "Man, sometimes I think I'm not missing anything at all."
"You're not," I lie, trying to make him feel better. What I really want to do is tell him how cool Painkiller is and that the Riddick game on the Xbox isn't bad and about how a bunch of us are playing City of Heroes regularly and how my wallpaper is a screenshot of my character, AnvilFistMan.
"One of the guys in there was really into board games," Trevor is telling me. "These complex wargame things, you know? He used to read the rule books and then set them up to play against himself. He'd be playing both sides. Poor guy. He had it really bad."
Trevor's voice trails off. He stares quietly into the Re-Animator yellow glow of his glass of Mountain Dew.
"But ever since I got back," he continues, "I've been reading manuals. Just reading them. Any sort of rules books for games. There was a Monopoly set in my Mom's closet. I took it down and read the manual. I tell you, you think we have it bad with short manuals these days? They used to print them inside the box top. They didn't even get a little booklet in front of a CD case."
"Do you want to borrow some of my manuals? I know you threw your games away, so I'm happy to let you borrow some manuals. If it helps."
"Maybe just one or two. Do you have any strategy guides?"
"You know I don't do that shit. Those are no good."
"Oh, you're here," Bobby says when he come in and sees Trevor. This is pretty much everyone's reaction before engaging Trevor in the awkward hetero affection combo.
"Yeah, I just stopped by to say 'hi' to everyone," Trevor says, each time sounding more uncertain as the guys drift off to play Battlefield: Vietnam. Trevor watches them from across the room. He goes a little pale. Trevor is sweating. His hands tremble a little. When Peter takes off in a helicopter and switches on the radio to play 'Surfin' Bird', Trevor snaps. It's like Jack Lemmon in the greenhouse in The Days of Wine and Roses.
***
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