Phantasos by Robert Barnard Page A

model airplane. Then there were the more dull gifts that always seem to worm their way into children’s birthday parties: a package of plain, white t-shirts; a bundle of socks. A pencil set from a distant Aunt, which Alley graciously said thank you for anyways, despite the fact that it was a pencil set and today was the first day of summer vacation.
    “Here, Al,” Mrs. Emerson said. She handed Alley a small, wrapped box. It was very heavy. “It’s from your Uncle Martin.” Uncle Martin smiled from the corner of the kitchen, held up a hand with a beverage in it as a salute to Alley.
    Alley set the box down on the table and it rattled with a clunk. He unwrapped it, and inside was an ornate wooden box. But the box felt so heavy, so Alley flipped it open. It was filled to the brim with quarters. His eyes lit up.
    “Thank you, Uncle Marty, thank you, thank you, thank you.” Alley dug his hand through the quarters. “There must be—”
    “Twenty-dollars,” Uncle Martin said. “All in quarters. I didn’t know which game to get you for that contraption in the living room (he was referring to Alley’s Nintendo) so I figured this would be the next best thing. Of course, you don’t have to spend it all at the arcade. You can roll them up, buy yourself a game. Or, deposit it into a college savings account. Or buy a war bond. Hell if I know.”
    Alley laughed. Uncle Martin was his funniest relative after a drink or two.
    “I think I’ll just stick to spending them at the arcade.” He turned to Benji, then to Lauren. “I’m sorry, we would have never spent the day quarter fishing if I had known I would be getting this!”
    “It’s okay,” Lauren said. “We had fun.”
    “That’s right we did,” Benji added.
    Alley sat for a moment. There were two gifts left on the table. He didn’t want to seem ungrateful—he was truly happy for every present he had received—but the one gift on the left, from Lauren, was clearly in the shape of a VHS box. So he knew it was a movie of some sort. The present on the right, from Benji, was impossibly big—Alley hadn’t figured out what it was quite yet.
    Neither of the remaining gifts were in the shape of a box that Nintendo cartridges came in. And Alley didn’t want to sound like a brat, but all he had asked for his birthday was a copy of Super Mario Three. The first time he had seen it, it was featured in a movie he saw with Lauren and Benji the summer before: The Wizard. The game was only shown for a few minutes on screen, but Alley lusted over it ever since. Some video game magazines he subscribed to teased it with previews and images of the game. Alley had to have it. He had all the Mario games, and Super Mario Three was being touted as the best one yet.
    The twenty dollars from his uncle would get him close to the forty-five he’d need to buy a copy himself. There were also some birthday cards strewn about with loose one and five dollar bills tucked inside. Alley did the math in his head—even if he pooled all his money together, he’d still be short.
    He shrugged, a quick shrug that no one in the room seemed to notice, and Lauren picked up her gift and handed it to her brother.
    “Here,” she said.
    “Gee, I wonder what this could be,” Benji said.
    “Don’t be a brat about it,” Lauren said.
    Alley shook the VHS shaped box. “A baseball? A new pair of shoes?”
    “Hey, I said don’t be a brat about it! I know that you know it’s a movie.”
    Alley tore the wrapping paper back, and quickly saw Jack Nicholson looking back at him. Beside Jack Nicholson was a man in a black mask—
    “Oh my God!” Alley shouted. “Oh my God, oh my God!” He leapt from his seat and wrapped his arms tightly around his sister. “You got me Batman!”
    “I can’t breathe.”
    Alley plopped back into his chair and read the front and back of the box over and over. Benji and him had seen the film twice while it was at theatres, and Alley had wanted to own the movie ever