Why not look into the Video Arcade?

Something about the soft chiming digital music and dim shadows draws you towards the Video Arcade. Its dark shaded interior seems out of place in the world of sunlight and splashing water that the rest of the park offers but you have a few happy memories of afternoons spent in places like this as a child.

Stepping through the gaudily painted archway, out of the bright sun and into the cool gloomy space of the arcade you inhale deeply. That familiar smell of stale carpet, spray polish and old popcorn washes over you and you smile at it like an old friend.

Your eyes take a moment to adjust but soon you make out the winding maze of lit-up arcade cabinets, pinball machines and table-top video games. Somewhere at the far end of this shadowy maze you can make out a faintly lit kiosk with a sign above it with the words ‘Tokens & Prizes’ painted in large garish red and yellow letters.

You wander your way up to it, looking over the blinking, flashing machines and noting how empty the entire place is. Why these water-parks insisted on having arcades didn’t make sense to you; people came here for the sun and water, the kids that wanted cool darkness and video games went to one of the big arcades in town.

Ahhh well, more for me then… you ponder as you finally make it to the small kiosk and the face you see behind the dusty glass surprises you. Many of the female park attendants you had seen so far were young college girls, fair haired and golden skinned who seemed to treat their jobs in the park as an opportunity to work on their tans more than actually earn their wages. This girl behind the kiosk window was a bit of a contrast to those sun-drenched nymphs…

She was pale skinned with long dark almost black hair falling in loose curls around her face. She was flicking idly through a magazine and you could see her eyes and lips had touches of dark make-up around them. If her style wasn’t already obvious, her langid long nailed hand was adorned with a studded black leather cuff around the wrist.

She still wore the same tight white t-shirt with the water-parks bright logo and the yellow hot-pants of the uniform but they seemed out of place on her. They were stretched over fuller young curves than her sister attendants had but she wasn’t fat. Her white limbs where still youthfully slender but her breasts and hips were full and strained at the little uniform enticingly.

She reminded you a little of Elvira from the display on the ‘Scared Stiff’ pinball machine, one you had loved as a teenager and you had even spotted, sitting in a dark alcove at the back of the arcade. A smile tugged up at your lips, you could see why she was stuck here in this dark empty arcade rather than out in the sun. No doubt she liked it that way…

“How many?” The bored monotone breaks you out of your silent musings. It was her, your little Elvira…

“Sorry?” you ask a little taken aback. She looks up at you from her magazine, those darkly bordered eyes seeming to ask if you are slow or stupid or maybe both…

“How many tokens… would you like?” she says slowly, spelling it out for you. “They’re 50 cents each and you need them to play the games.”

She has returned to flicking through her magazine again, content to ignore you while your slow brain process this mass of new information. Well if that’s what she thought then it didn’t matter, you knew how to liven up even the coldest hearts… and bodies.

“Games?” you ask pretending to mull over the word with deep ponderous thought, “You mean games like Simon Says…?”