I was a damn near high school grad when my paranoid parents decided that I no longer needed to be babysat. By then, the damage had been done.
I don’t blame mom and dad for entrusting me in my aunt’s care. She was a charismatic bitch who meant business, although never striking anyone as a lady who liked kids. She wore a dainty white cowboy hat and a big bedazzled belt buckle, made a living renting out the dank unfinished basement in her single-story shack, held the tri-state Boggle champion title from ‘91 to ‘98, and was only ever mean to men, which included myself, and my dad. Dad was her younger, shorter brother who she spoke to only in insults. Veggietales, she’d call him at family reunions, much to the confusion of our extended family who didn’t understand the Christian vegetarian reference. And you call yourself a man, she’d often interrupt his lame stories with, to which my mother would sheepishly laugh and I would visibly cringe. The site of that big-boned, beef-fed woman towering over my shrimpy father, who would cower under her gaze, embarrassed me.
Despite this, there was no money for reference-backed sitters in those days, so of course, they’d send me to stay with the only stay-at-home relative we had.
I had a love-hate relationship with Aunt Peg’s house. Loved the Nintendo Entertainment System hooked up to the big forty-inch living room TV. Hated the cigarette stench on the ‘70s shag carpet that I was forced to sit on since there was no sofa and I didn’t dare take the old bag’s recliner. Loved when Peg would play two-player with me and I’d smoke her ass. Hated when I lost, and she called me a pathetic twerp and banished me to the kitchen to do my homework alone.
The years went by, but my after-school routine at Peg’s stayed the same. Daytime TV, start homework on the floor, ignore the dude who lived downstairs that would occasionally come up to microwave an early dinner, play the odd video game with Peg, and walk the fifteen minutes back home once she started cooking. Aunt Peg would fry steaks in a pan, sweating in grease. The smell would spoil my dinner, which was usually a bowl of overcooked, under-seasoned lentils.
It was the last year that I spent under Aunt Peg’s care where my relationship with her became less black and white. To this day, I still don’t know how I feel about the events that transpired. I hate her, but I still jerk off to the twisted memories.
It started with Dr. Mario and a lost bet.
"Put your books away," she commanded as she lit up a menthol. "Got us a game at the flea market."
She threw a cartridge down onto the shag carpet beside me.
I was thrilled. It was Dr. Mario - a game I had only ever demoed at Toys R Us. I was a loser in high school and had no friends to game with, and my parents got rid of our NES that winter after we attended a sermon about how the Mario Brothers were Satan's servants.
I asked for permission to pop it in. Peg's pins were loose - the cartridge easily slid in and out and didn’t jam up like in our old system. It was a delight.
Aunt Peg was the only older adult I knew that played video games, and she didn’t just play them - her competitive ass was good at them. I should have known better than to take her up on that sick bet.
Peg set the game level to four. She changed the "Chill" music mode to "Fever" before announcing the terms, "You lose, you give me a foot rub."
She threw her bare feet up on the footrest. Peg was usually barefoot in her house. It must have felt good, the old shag carpet between her toes. Toes that were always pointed and painted red. My aunt reminded me of a deadly falcon in a denim skirt.
I didn’t know how to talk to this woman. Although we played games together, she was not my friend, and I was still better seen than heard, so I responded with a compliant “Okay” and didn’t bother negotiating my terms.
Peg negotiated them for me. "If I lose," she chimed in, "what the hell, I’ll give you a rub."
I remember shuddering at the thought of this woman giving me a foot rub. Oddly enough, that visual grossed me out more than the thought of me rubbing her.
She tapped the back of my head with her bare foot. I was caught off guard, surprised at how long her legs stretched from that recliner.
"You got that?"
I nodded and handed her the first player controller.
What felt like seconds later, my screen filled with pills and I lost by submission.
She took a drag and muttered, "Pathetic."
I looked down at the shag. I was probably fidgeting with the coarse carpet hairs, as I normally did. Despite how that carpet grossed me out, I couldn’t keep my hands off of it.