This is my first attempt at writing something, I've been thinking and planning it for quite some time but could never bring myself to actually start it.
Once I did though, I couldn't stop writing and I'm still going.
While I've written more, I'm only going to start with the first part for now until I get some feedback, so I can hopefully improve the other parts.
So, here's part 1:
Last few words and there, done for the day and the week, I thought to myself as I hit send on my email, time to get home and have some fun!
My work wasn’t anything exciting, just a mid-level manager position at one of those soul-less mega-companies that dominate the modern world. I’m not complaining here, the position wasn’t particularly hard, my team were great, it paid well and I managed to reach it at only 23, giving me great career prospects.
I headed out of the office, down to the bus stop and waited for the number 7 bus. I’d got this routine down to a science, able to exit my work, say goodbye to security and arrive with around 30 seconds spare, it felt good. As the bus rolled along, landing in potholes or bouncing over speed bumps, I pulled out my phone to start talking to the gang. You see, today wasn’t just any Friday, it was release night for a new dungeon in our favourite online virtual reality game and we had been waiting for weeks for it to arrive.
I started furiously tapping away in our group chat.
“Who’s ready for tonight? Getting excited, it’s been ages since the last mage boss and I’m hoping for a decent challenge”
“I am!”, replied Tom, my best friend of 18 years, “Did you see the drop tables yet?”
“They released those already?” I replied, “I thought they said they wanted this to be a surprise?”
“They did, but some idiot made a leak post for the drops online, but they made it all up and were miles off, so the developers put out this post to clear up the confusion”
I started to get excited, do I look it up and spoil the surprise or just see what happens? I’d like to think this was a long, carefully considered decision but it in reality, it was less than 5 seconds before I was heading to their website to check out the post. They had only listed the drops, nothing about the bosses which meant at least there was still some surprise for tonight. I started skimming through them, until I found the drops from the final boss of the dungeon.
“Tom, there’s some pretty good magic equipment in those drops, some major upgrades for you! Maybe you’ll finally catch up to our level and be able to do hard mode dungeons with us!”.
“Did you see the headpiece?” he replied, not reacting to the comment. “It’s so much better than anything available right now”
“I want it!” came a quick second comment from my girlfriend of 2 years, Mary who was also in the chat, “I can’t make tonight but I’ll do hard mode with you tomorrow”
Mary was almost the perfect girlfriend, smart, beautiful and loved all the same games I did. I say almost, because she lacked one thing that an optical obsessive such as myself would want, a pair of glasses. Mary had 20/20 vision and as only 1 person in her whole 15 family members I’d met wore glasses, and very weak at that, my odds of her needing them later was very low.
I’d thought long and hard about this when we first met, even drawing up a pros and cons list and had quickly realised that while it was a shame, the cons list was very short. So I threw myself into the relationship and 2 years later was happy that I did.
I scrolled down and found the headpiece:
Grand Sage’s Specs
Health +50
Intellect + 120
Increases damage and healing done by spells with a cast time of more than 1 second by 20%
Specs? That word got my attention immediately and I almost forgot to read the rest of the stats.
“Wow, I can see why you guys want that, it’s great for both of you, let’s hope it drops tonight”
About 15 minutes and a bunch more messages later, I got off the bus and started walking home, my mind racing, trying to imagine what the item would look like in game. I was never going to see Mary in glasses but her online character was a good alternative. As I got to my house I was slightly out of breath, I’d been walking as fast as I possibly could without realising it and started to fumble my keys in the lock as I opened the door. I dropped my bag, coat and keys on the table and hit the power button on my computer, grabbed my VR headset and sat down ready to play.
I logged onto the voice chat program we used and said hi to everyone who was there. Tom immediately asked “are you ok? You sound out of breath”
“I am a little, I’m just excited to get going”
I immediately heard 3 different laughs before Tom added “you can be such a try hard sometimes!” This kind of good-natured back and forth was common for us and I just joined in the laughter as I heard the game sounds in my headset, signalling it had loaded and was ready to go. As the world appeared in my headset, I saw the familiar setting of our favourite tavern and my team mates sitting in our usual spot with some food and drinks and I quickly headed over. Tom was on the left in his trademark bright red robes, John with his glistening silver armour complete with sword and giant tower shield and finally Kate, sporting a fancy leather top with some ornate scrollwork around the shoulders.
“New chest piece Kate?” I asked as I walked over
“Yes, I got it yesterday from a random chest, I was pretty lucky actually and a big upgrade from my last one”
The virtual food and drink flowed as we all waited for the server update that would release the new dungeon and with 5 minutes to go, we packed up and headed to the dungeon’s future location.
After the update went live we looked around but only saw 1 other group, not what we’d expected for a major update.
“I figured there would be more people” I commented to the group.
“Well, it is the new hardest boss and a lot of players are still progressing through normal mode, not everyone progresses as fast as we do” said Kate.
“Hmm, I guess, well lets go” I said as I headed off towards the dungeon entrance.
The dungeon itself was pretty standard, waves of enemies, boss, more enemies before another boss, nothing we hadn’t seen before. It was certainly harder than other normal difficulty dungeons, but as we had previously completed other dungeons in hard mode, it wasn’t really stressing out our group. The 2nd boss, however, had a brand-new ability that we’d not seen before. It caught us all off guard, resulting in a lot of damage to our party. Tom, being the weakest was knocked out, leaving us with only 3 members. We quickly stabilised and finished off the boss soon after and were rewarded for our efforts with a slight upgrade for John, which was a nice surprise.
Tom was complaining as we were healing his character but we reminded him we were here for the drops from the final boss, not these other ones, which quickly cheered him up again. 5 minutes later, we reached the final boss room and entered together, a giant circular room lay before us, walls disappeared up into the dark rafters above and everywhere you looked were bookshelves and tables full of books and scrolls.
Suddenly there was a swirling of sparks and fire in the centre of the room and the final boss appeared.
I noticed immediately that she was wearing glasses, but this was different from every other game I’d played, these glasses had actual lenses and very strong ones at that. Her eyes were huge behind the large silver round frames and I could feel my heart start to race. Would the actual item she dropped look the same? What would it look like on Mary’s character? John’s comment immediately broke me out of my thoughts however as he blurted out “wow look at her bug eyes, she’s blind as a bat, this will be easy” and before I could even comment, he was charging ahead of us to start the fight.
He was very quickly shown the error of his ways as the boss launched a high damage spell directly at him, without uttering a word.
“OH FUCK!!” is all we heard through our voice chat as his character took the blast head on, Paladins in heavy armour aren’t known for being particularly agile and the string of profanities that followed let us know that John was not happy.
“Scatter so we don’t all get hit”, I yelled out to the group “She’s a lot harder than other bosses”.
Over the next 5 minutes we were frantically dodging or interrupting spells as much as we could, while poor Kate was working overtime keeping us all alive with her healing. Finally however, the boss was defeated and we let out a collective sigh of relief.
“I can see why she’s the new hardest boss, that was brutal” said Tom as he walked over to the treasure chest that now stood where the boss was previously, “let’s see what the rewards are”.
The chest opened with its usual triumphant sounds and glowing rays and we see 3 popups, showing the contents. A magic users robe, a recipe scroll allowing the user to make a powerful new potion and the item I was hoping to see, the Grand Sage’s Specs. We all congratulated Tom as the robe and headpiece were both a big upgrade to his items, however, I was excited for a very different reason.
“Put them on Tom, let’s see what they look like” I said, trying to not sound too excited, he was the one getting the items after all, not me, the seconds felt like hours as I waited, then his character changed, of course, he put the robe on first. Then a few seconds later, his hat disappeared and the frames appeared on his character’s face.
Immediately after we heard a yell “what the hell was that?“ coming from Tom over the voice chat.
“Are you ok?”, “What’s going on?” we all asked in unison as it sounded like a mix of surprise and pain to me.
“As soon as I clicked that second item, I got a massive white flash in my headset, it was so bright, I’m still seeing spots wherever I look.”
“I’ve never heard of that before, sounds like a nasty bug” said John, I however, while concerned was staring in amazement at Tom’s character, who, just like the boss, now had huge eyes behind the silver frames. I was positively shaking with excitement as my mind started going through so many different questions, does the item drop every time? How long until tomorrow? Will Mary be happy with the normal mode version? How fast can we get here tomorrow?
Other than the sudden surprise, Tom sounded ok so everyone calmed down a little, he was the first to change the topic.
“Wow, my character’s eyes are just like the bosses were, they’re huge, it looks kind of weird. The headpiece is a big upgrade though so I guess I’ll have to keep it for a while. What does everyone else think?”
“I think it suits you” I said quickly “very wizardly, and the new robe is your colour too”.
“He’s right” added Kate “it’s a little different but I like that they’re adding some new different types of items into the game, glasses in games don’t usually have real lenses”
That comment from Kate also caught me off guard, did she have an interest in glasses too? I made a mental note and wondered how I could bring up the topic in future.
“Looks funny” said John “but no more than some of the other items in the game, you guys remember the compensator?”
“The plate legs with the large bulge in the front?” I asked
“That’s the one” he replied, “games are a fun way to do something a bit different, find your own style I say” and with that, everyone started sharing stories of other weird items and congratulating Tom on his new look and equipment.
We headed back to the tavern together; we had no other plans for the evening as you could only clear a boss once a day and spent most of the evening talking and laughing together. I kept looking at Tom’s character, his eyes were huge, I’m not the best at guessing prescriptions but if I had to guess I’d say it was definitely in the double digits, maybe +12 or +14. I wasn’t really paying much attention to the conversation, lost in my own thoughts of Mary’s character wearing glasses like that.
Kate was the first to log off and John followed shortly after, leaving just Tom and me together. We talked about life, the game, work life, nothing of great import. After about another 30 minutes, Tom said good bye and logged off. I was just finishing something on my character, about to log off myself when a frantic Tom rejoined the voice call.
“David, I can’t see” he stammered
“What do you mean you can’t see?” I quizzed, rather surprised by his sudden reappearance.
“I took off my headset after I logged off and I can’t see, everything is a massive blur, what happened?” He sounded scared and confused
“Did you bang your head or something?” I asked, not sure what to say to his statement
“No, I just took off my headset and went to grab my phone but I can’t see it, I’m looking at my desk right now, it’s a massive blur, I can’t see shit, what happened, help me”. He was starting to panic now, I could hear it in his voice.
“I have no idea what this is but just hold on, I’ll be right over.”
“Thanks” he replied, his voice rather quiet now.
I logged off, grabbed my keys and phone and headed out of my apartment. Part of the reason Tom and I were friends for so long is that our families had lived near each other since we were little kids and even after we moved out, we’d stayed close. 2 minutes of rapid walking later, I was at his apartment building, 2 flights of stairs and I was at his door and I knocked on the door.
I waited for him to open the door and while later I heard a muffled thud and Tom cursing, then some fumbling with the keys in the door. Finally, the door opened and there stood my best friend, looking like he always did, no, not quite the same, his eyes were a little bloodshot but nothing glaringly obvious. He immediately started talking at super speed, about how he can’t see, how he tripped over something, how his eyes were fine, but now they hurt a bit, but not that much, not like that time we …
“Tom, stop” I interrupted, “let’s take this step by step, first, we should close the door and go sit down”
He muttered a quick sorry, turned around and very slowly walked towards his couch and sat down. I closed his door behind me, walked over and sat down next to him. In the back of my head, I was starting to guess what caused this but I didn’t want to jump to conclusions.
“You said everything is a blur, can you describe it?” I asked, trying to keep my voice as calm as I could.
“I can’t see shit!” he snapped back, “what do you want me to say?”
“I’m trying to help you” I replied, ignoring the anger in his voice “let’s try something else, can you read your phone?”
He reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone, held it at arms-length, then brought it closer and closer, right up to his face.
“No, nothing”
“Ok, next question, how long was your last shift at work?” I knew this was definitely not what I thought the true cause but my mind was working overtime in the background, thinking how I could use this to my advantage. I hated that my best friend was going through this and hated myself for these very selfish thoughts, but this type of thing just never happens.
“I did 2 and a half shifts, my replacement called in sick and then his replacement was stuck due to a car accident”
“Wait, what?” I exclaimed, “you’ve just worked a 20-hour shift, how are you still standing?”
“I wanted to play with you guys, I hate falling behind in progress, you’ve cleared almost all the hard mode bosses, plus a few mythics and I’ve barely started” he replied looking down, I could hear the sadness in his voice, but selfishly, rather than trying to actually solve his problem, I jumped on this opportunity.
“So, you got up, worked 20 hours, came home, played with us for another 4 hours and then this happened? You’ve not slept in over 30 hours; do you not think it could be linked?” I asked quizzically.
“Maybe, I do feel pretty exhausted” he said yawning.
“Right, let’s get you into bed and if this is still a problem when you wake up, I’ll take you to the hospital”
I helped Tom to his bedroom, making sure to let him know his phone was next to the bed. I then said goodbye and headed out and back home. Tom had done these huge shifts before and would usually sleep for more than 12 hours afterwards so this had bought me some time. It was late at night on Friday, meaning I had tomorrow off and so did Mary. If my guess was correct, I had a chance to use this freak event to my advantage.
On the way home I wrote a message to Mary.
“Hey darling, we just finished with the new boss, she’s a challenge but we completed it first time. Want to play tomorrow morning? We could probably do both normal and hard mode if Kate and John are around, if not then there are a few others in the guild that have the gear to take it on.”
I looked at the message before sending, did I really want to do this? What if I was wrong, what if this caused some kind of damage, could I live with myself? My stomach was doing flips, I felt so guilty but I still hit the send button, I couldn’t give up on this chance. I saw Mary immediately typing a reply
“Wow that was fast, glad you guys had fun, yes go first thing tomorrow, I’ll be on around 9, see you then!”
I wished her a good night as I walked through the door to my apartment and sat down. My head was swirling with what if’s and I was both excited and apprehensive at the same time. I shook my head and went for a shower and bed, though I got little sleep as my mind wouldn’t stop going over everything. I finally fell asleep from exhaustion, probably around 1am.
At 8:30 my alarm went off and I quickly got up, made myself a simple breakfast and went over to my computer and checked my phone, no message from Tom yet. I logged onto the forums for the game, looked at the news section, no updates there yet about this, more good news. I went into the player messages and almost all of them were complaining about the dungeon being too hard.
After reading through all the messages, I couldn’t find a single one talking about what we’d experienced, had I imagined it?
Just after 9, Mary joined our voice chat program and we logged onto the game together. I secretly hoped Kate and John weren’t around because I didn’t want them talking about what happened. They weren’t often on this early either and I’d deliberately not sent them a message about it.
“It looks like Kate and John aren’t on, shall we get 2 others and go?” I asked her
“Shouldn’t we wait for them?” She replied, “They know the fight and that’s always useful”
“We could, but I need to pick something up from the store before it closes this afternoon, so if we want to get normal and hard mode done, the more time the better” This was a complete lie but I was saying it without thinking, anything to not lose this chance, I must not panic I told myself, calm down.
“Ok sure, let’s see who’s online” she replied
There were a few guild mates online but I specifically invited only those who wouldn’t need the item, I didn’t want to lose this chance by someone else getting it instead.
I invited the other 2 members and let them know I’d already cleared it last night so I knew the tactics, they were happy about this and were up for both normal and hard mode, more good news, this was all going to plan.
We headed to the dungeon and due to my knowledge of it, we were able to clear through the enemies and first 2 bosses quickly without any issues. Everyone was in good spirits as we headed towards the final boss. This was helped by the fact the basic rewards from the dungeon were pretty generous. As we entered the familiar final room, I could feel my excitement and anxiety growing. What if the glasses don’t drop? what if we don’t kill the boss? what if this was all in my imagination? I again pushed those thoughts out of my mind and instead calmly explained the boss fight to the team.
The boss appeared and it was just like last night, standing in front of us with huge eyes behind round silver frames. Mary spoke up, “those glasses of hers are cool, I hope I get lucky and they drop”. I know she wanted the item for it's stats but it made me feel a little less bad about the whole situation.
“Fingers crossed for you” I replied, “let’s go”.
With that, we started the fight off. Like before, the boss did a lot of damage but as we knew what to expect, it was considerably easier than the previous night. This was also helped by the fact all our members were in high level equipment.
After only a few minutes, the boss was defeated and the chest appeared. My heart felt like it was going to burst out of my chest in excitement and it took all my effort to keep my voice calm and congratulate everyone. Mary walked over and opened the chest and up popped 2 info boxes, first a pair of leather boots, that’s not what I wanted but then the second item appeared, the glasses dropped!
“Yes!” I shouted, a little too excitedly and I quickly composed myself and congratulated Mary. Now for the moment of truth. Time seemed to slow down as she picked up the item. I was staring right at her, willing her to put them on her character, to hear her exclaim to hear about the flash but nothing, she didn’t equip it, what was going on?
“Aren’t you going to equip the new item?” I asked, frantic at this point
“I’m not sure” she said slowly, “it’s a good item but it’s not much of an upgrade, I figured we should try hard mode first, if the item drops again, then someone else can get this version.”
I quickly muted my microphone and shouted out loud, no, how could this happen, I was so close, just equip the damn glasses, but I couldn’t say that, I couldn’t give the game away.
“Makes sense to me” I replied, calling on the reserves of my sanity to try and sound as normal as possible “shall we go do hard mode then?”
Everyone quickly agreed and we headed back out of the dungeon. This was hell for me, my chest physically hurt, my hands were shaking I was a wreck. My hopes and dreams were right there in her inventory and all she had to do was equip it, but no, her good nature was coming through. This is why I loved her so much, she was such a good person always thinking of others but right now, it was causing me such pain.
We exited the dungeon and set the difficulty to hard mode and headed back in. I immediately noticed a huge jump from the previous dungeon. Where before I could pay partial attention to what was going on, even the basic enemies were a bit of challenge this time, I had to focus. I pushed all my worries out of my head, the quicker we completed this, the quicker I would get what I wanted.
It was taking ages though, 30 minutes later we finally reached the first boss of the dungeon and started the fight. Hard mode gave the boss new abilities and this added surprise proved to be too much for us causing our party to all be knocked out, one respawn and a few minutes of walking through the dungeon, we attempted the fight again and were lucky this time. The chest appeared and I started moving deeper into the dungeon
“Don’t you want to check the loot?” Mary asked.
“What? Oh, ye, sorry the loot, I was just thinking about the next set of enemies, trying to remember what their abilities were”. Another lie, but I hoped it sounded convincing.
The box opened, a weapon and not just any weapon, it was an upgrade for me, I happily picked it up and equipped it, that was a nice surprise. I sat back slightly and took a deep breath, I needed to focus on what was going on right now, not the glasses and one self-pep-talk later we were heading for the second boss.
Right then, my phone buzzed, it was a message from Kate. “Do you want to do the new dungeon again today?”
“Sorry Kate, I’m already in it with Mary, she wanted the new items and I have something to do this afternoon. We cleared normal mode about 45 minutes ago and we’re in hard mode right now. It’s definitely hard, probably on par with some of the first mythic dungeons, we were wiped out on the first boss.”
“Oh, no problem, I was hoping to get the specs drop as Tom has it now”. Now that was an interesting reply, why would she want that? Her character couldn’t use it, it was the wrong type of armour. I pressed her on it.
“You can’t use that type of armour though, what are you going to do with them?”
“Oh, it’s not for this character, I’ve started a new character about a week ago and it’s for her”.
Another interesting reply, she’s suggesting we boost her character for the reward. Everyone knows boosting is frowned upon, it makes the dungeon way harder as 1 member can barely help and is at high risk of being knocked out by even the weakest enemies. It’s a strategy you only use if you’re really desperate for something. My mind started to wonder, was there more to this comment.
“Are you coming?” asked Mary, breaking me from my thoughts once more.
“Sorry, Kate sent a message asking if we were free to do this dungeon with her but I said we were already in it” I quickly replied.
“Ah, maybe tomorrow” she said while continuing deeper into the dungeon.
We continued on and I was paying far more attention now to what was going on. We got to and killed the second boss without issue, resulting in an upgrade for one of our team mates. 5 more groups of enemies and we were back at the final boss. I was counting down the groups, willing our team to clear the way as quickly as possible and finally, after another 10 minutes we reached the final boss room. I took a deep breath before I typed into group chat to be very careful of the boss’s first spell. I explained all of the abilities of the boss, the high damage spells, which abilities to dodge. I was very thorough, I did not want to screw this up, this was my dream, this is what I wanted more than anything right now.
We discussed how we were going to approach the fight and then headed through the door. A few seconds later, I saw the now familiar light show that marked the boss’s appearance and there she was with her huge eyes and round silver glasses. I looked at her, then did a sort of double take, something was different. I said earlier I wasn’t the best at guessing prescriptions but I could have sworn her glasses were even stronger than before. I used a feature on the VR headset to zoom in slightly and there subtly at the edge of the lens was a line, they were lenticular lenses, they were stronger than in normal mode. I smiled to myself and thanked my lucky stars, this just kept getting better.
We engaged the boss and I fought like my life depended on it, I dodged all the high damage spells, I called out to my team with warnings, whatever we needed to win I was doing it.
As the boss was finally defeated, I leaned back in my chair, my hands were sweating from the fight, but now, was it all worth it? The chest appeared and I walked over to open it, willing with everything I had inside me for the item to be in the list.
4 Items, that’s a good start, item 1, not the glasses, item 2, not the glasses either, I was starting to worry, item 3, GLASSES! I muted my microphone and shouted for joy, who cares what the 4th item was, so I un-muted myself and congratulated Mary. In reality, there were 2 item upgrades for Mary and 1 each for the other 2 players in our group, I didn’t care though, my reward was coming.
“I’m glad I didn’t use the normal mode item, that would have been a waste, do you know anyone who needs it?” she said happily.
Thinking on my feet I replied “I think so, if you trade it to me, I’ll look into it”.
She opened a trade window and handed me the normal version of the Sage’s Specs, I accepted and it appeared in my inventory. I could use the item but the stats were of no use to me, so I just left it for later.
I then looked across at her, crossed my fingers and waited. A few seconds later, I saw her equip the item and heard what I was hoping for, a sudden gasp of surprise from Mary. I looked at her character in amazement, there she was, wearing a pair of super thick plus glasses, magnifying her eyes with the lenses bulging out of the front of the frame and just like the boss, the lenses were definitely lenticular with the distinctive line.
I feigned innocence “Everything ok Mary?”
She replied, sounding just as confused as Tom was “I just got a sudden bright flash in my headset when I equipped the item, it was weird, like a flash of lightning or something.”
“Wow that’s weird, have you ever seen it before?” I replied, keeping up the pretence.
“No never, I guess we chalk it up to a new boss bug, how do I look?” she asked turning to face me.
“Amazing” I replied with complete honesty.
“You don’t think my character’s eyes are too big? I didn’t think that the effect on the boss would carry over to the actual item too, it’s certainly a new addition to the game”
“Your character always did have nice eyes, if I remember you spent a lot of time on them in the character creation?” I said and could immediately tell that made her happy as she quickly replied “you remember that? I thought it annoyed you because you made your character in 5 minutes and it took me more than half an hour”
“Not at all, I’m just happy I can play this with you” I responded honestly. I was happy I could play with her, but now, I was the happiest I’d ever been.
We thanked the other 2 members for their help and disbanded the party, heading back to the main town in the game, happily talking to each other.
“I’m not sure, but everything in the world seems bigger since I equipped these new glasses” Mary mentioned as we strolled along “It’s nice, it’s like everything has more detail in it and it makes reading signs and the UI easier”.
“That’s great darling, I’m glad you like your upgrade”. I couldn’t bring myself to say your glasses yet, I had to be sure that this had had the effect I desired in the real world too.
“Don’t you have to go soon” Mary asked with concern in her voice.
“Oh, yes, thank you for reminding me” I quickly replied, “The stores shut in 15 minutes, I’d better be quick. I’ll be back on later, bye”. I then logged off and breathed out a sigh of relief, that was a crazy 3 hours with emotions running crazy, I was genuinely tired. I did however, want to get out for a bit so I figured I might as well go do what I said I was going to do. I grabbed my phone and wallet, opened the door and started walking towards town, maybe I should get myself something nice for dinner tonight.
I had a sudden thought as I walked to town and checked my phone, still no messages from Tom, it had been about 13 hours since I last saw him, he was probably going to wake up soon. I switched my phone to loud so I didn’t miss anything.
Town was uneventful, I didn’t see anyone I knew and I’d finally decided what I was going to get so over towards the supermarket I went. Just as I got there, my phone chimed, letting me know there was a message. Ah, Tom must be awake I thought to myself, but no, it was another message from Kate. She’d managed to get a group to help her new character and said I didn’t need to help her out. That was fast, I wonder if she’d worked out what was going on, if so, that means she wanted to wear strong glasses? This day keeps getting stranger by the second but I smiled to myself, maybe she was like me and if so, I was happy that she’d found a way to make her dreams come true.
I started typing up a message. “I’m glad you were able to find a group and get the glasses, I hope they are everything you want them to be”. I was fishing, was this too risky? I hoped the message was vague enough that it could be written off as a friend being happy for her. A quick 2 word reply left me with more questions though; “They are”.
Like Mary and Tom, I knew Kate in the real world from our time together in secondary school, she lived in the same town as us but on the opposite side as it was closer to her job. I didn’t own a car so I couldn’t just pop over and see her easily but there was a pretty direct bus route that would get me there in 15-20 minutes if I needed to be.
Then, my phone started ringing, it was Mary, I quickly picked up.
“Can you come to my place? I need your help with something, please be quick” and with that she hung up. Her voice had the same worried tone that Tom had used and I knew what was coming so I quickly paid for my items and hurried over to her house.
Mary lived in a quiet part of town in her old grandparent’s house, we’d talked about moving in a few times but just hadn’t found a good point yet, she kept joking that she’d let me move in when I proposed. If this goes the way I hope it does, I thought to myself, that proposal will be coming very soon.
I knocked on the door and like with Tom, there was quite a long delay before she opened the door. She looked out at me and immediately squinted furiously, that’s not going to help at all, I thought to myself as she questioningly asked “David is that you?”
“Of course it’s me, what do you mean is that you, can’t you see me, what’s wrong?” I asked trying to sound as concerned as possible and to be truthful I was a little. This had been a huge gamble and now as the time to find out if things had worked out or if I’d screwed up everything.
“Since I stopped playing, I can’t see a thing, everything is a massive blur” she quietly said, a subtle note of panic like before. “What should I do?”
“Well, it sounds like your eyesight has deteriorated a little bit, maybe it’s all these games we play, it’s ok, let’s take you over to an optician and I’m sure they can help, I’m sure it’s nothing serious”.
I played things down as much as I could, full well knowing she was utterly helpless right now and if my wishes came true, would be dependent on extremely strong glasses from this day onwards.
“Thank you” she said and swiftly grabbed my arm tightly for security and shut the door behind her.
Our town wasn’t large but there were 2 opticians, 1 chain and 1 independent. The independent one was closer so I started walking there, it wasn’t far, maybe 5 minutes. I could tell Mary was scared, a car drove past us and she jumped, grabbing my arm even tighter, though she kept quiet the whole time. I kept reassuring her that everything would be fine, that we’ll get this cleared up. I don’t think she believed me as she didn’t reply but I was trying.
We arrived at the opticians shortly and went in together, I asked the receptionist if the optician had any time to see Mary for an eye test and she checked the timetable. “You’re in luck” she said “we had a cancellation and the optician will be free in about 5 minutes, can I get your details please dear?”
Mary quietly gave the receptionist her details like name, address and age. She then asked if she’d ever worn glasses or contacts before, to which Mary replied no. I could see the receptionist’s eyebrows and forehead furrow at that answer, she could tell Mary couldn’t see much but didn’t say anything. I’m sure her years had taught her that the last thing a patient wanted to hear was that something was wrong.
Almost 5 minutes to the second, the optician came out talking to an elderly lady about her test results, I couldn’t hear what they were saying but I wasn’t that interested anyway. He pointed the old lady to the receptionist, probably to help with frame selection. He then looked over at us, smiled and began walking over.
“I’m guessing you’re my next appointment; would you follow me please?” and with that he turned around and headed to the back of the shop.
Mary quickly grabbed my arm again as I stood up and slowly walked to the back of the store, I guided her to the seat and helped her sit down. The optician hadn’t seen any of this as he’d been fiddling with something off to the side but soon turned around and walked over.
“So, what can I help you with today young miss?” he asked kindly and I could see it worked, Mary’s shoulders relaxed slightly before she told him about how she’d stopped playing a game and suddenly couldn’t see anything.
“These new computer games are certainly something aren’t they” the optician said happily, “but they’re not the best for the eyes, let’s see if we can sort this out”. I knew he was expecting this to be a run of the mill low prescription, he was in for a big shock.
He grabbed a trial frame and placed it on her face before adjusting the nose and ear pieces.
“Now, please look over at the chart on the wall and tell me what is the smallest letter you can read”. He turned around to look at the chart as well.
“What chart?” Mary replied, her voice breaking a little as she said so.
That got his attention, he turned to me with a questioning look then turned to his files, “my notes say you don’t wear glasses or contacts, is that correct?”
“Yes” she replied quietly.
“Hmm” he replied, “we’ll get to the bottom of this”.
He then reached over and grabbed a very high power plus lens and placed it in front of her left eye, he then started to reach back for a weaker lens but stopped as Mary excitedly exclaimed “that’s a lot better, I can see the chart now with one eye but I can’t really see much on it”. Another puzzled look across to me from the optician to which I shrugged my shoulders, pretending to not know what’s going on. I couldn’t see the exact value of the lens but it was from about halfway up the set, so if I had to guess it was around +10.
The optician removed the lens and grabbed another one from higher up the set, I would guess around the +13 mark.
“That’s even better, I can just about see a blurry E now” Mary said, the fear and quiet disappearing from her voice, she was clearly happy that her vision was returning.
Over the next few minutes, the optician went up and up the lenses, asking Mary what she could see. Finally stopping when she could read the 20/20 line. He was clearly surprised by this as he asked her to read something of approximately the same size on a nearby poster, which she read out to him.
He then covered up that eye with an opaque lens and started on the right eye. This time, he started much higher and after a few minutes she was reading the 20/20 line again. The optician then took the trial frame off her face and said he was going to have a look at her eyes with his light, he took a quick look before recoiling very subtly, clearly, he’d seen something he wasn’t expecting. He did the same with the other eye and wrote down a few notes.
He then removed the black lens and put the trial frame back on Mary’s face, I could see just how large her eyes were from where I was sitting and I was getting very excited. He asked her what line she could read and she read both the 20/20 and the 20/15 line, though after she also said “I’m getting some double vision”.
The optician picked up another type of lens and after a few more changes on both eyes, he’d added what I guess were prism lenses as Mary said the double vision was gone.
The optician wrote down a few more notes and then turned back to face Mary.
“I’m not sure what to say my dear, you have one of the strongest prescriptions I’ve seen in my career and yet your vision quality with them is fantastic. When I looked in your eyes however, it seems like any normal eye except with a very thin natural lens, which would explain why you can’t see very well.”
“What does that mean?” Mary asked, a little concerned again
“Well, it means you’ll need to wear glasses to see properly but other than that, I believe you’ll live a perfectly normal life”.
“Oh, that’s ok” she said, “one of my best friends wears glasses and she always looks fantastic.”
“Yours will be a little different” he replied then stopped, clearly not wanting to scare her any more “let’s see what we can do about ordering some, keep that trial frame on for now, I can’t have you walking around without correction, you might trip over something”
I quickly walked over to help her up but Mary just slid out of the chair and started to look around. I think this is the point she started to realise how limited her field of vision was as she was turning her head back and forth to look at things. “Everything is a bigger than I remember” was the only comment she made as she followed the optician out.
I however, wanted to see one thing, her prescription. He’d handed it to her before walking out and I asked Mary if I could see it, my eyes went wide as I read it:
R: SPH +19.25 CYL +0.50 AXIS 140 PRISM Out 4
L: SPH +19.75 CYL +0.25 AXIS 160 PRISM Out 4
This was a dream prescription for me, I guess the hard mode glasses were stronger and I inwardly cheered with happiness.
“Thanks” as I handed it back to her, trying not to grin.
The optician was having a word with the receptionist who was nodding but looking concerned. He turned around to us and said “you’re lucky there’s a lens lab nearby that we work with, it means we’ll be able to get you glasses nice and quickly. If you can choose a frame, you like then I’ll get the order over to them so they can start making the lenses. The owner is an old friend of mine and I’m sure he’ll work as fast as he can” and with that he picked up the phone and headed back to the testing room dialling a number.
I looked around, there were a lot of choices of frames, but, despite me being an optical obsessive, I didn’t have a type of frame I liked, for me it was just one that suited the wearer. I therefore asked the receptionist if she could advise and help us out.
She came out from behind the desk and helped pick 4 frames she thought would look good on Mary. Mary clearly couldn’t see anything when she removed the trial frame so had to rely on us to let her know which looked best. We quickly discounted 2, leaving us with 2 others that both looked great on her. I knew she’d need a spare pare so I told the receptionist we’d take both, she replied that was a good idea as Mary would be helpless without a spare if her glasses broke.
The optician then returned to the front, "I have some good news and some bad news, the good news is that he has some lenses with the power you need in stock and he can get them made up today, the bad news is they are low index lenses so they won’t look as good as some thinner lenses."
I quickly replied that we were very grateful for his help and I that I am sure they will look great anyway. He nodded and took the 2 frames we’d selected, checking out the sizes before handing them to the receptionist.
“Vera, could you take these frames over to Ben, I’ll hold the fort here while you’re gone”. She nodded, grabbed her handbag and headed out the door. “Mary, I’d like to see you back in 3 months from now if that is ok, if you have any issues before that though, please come back straight away”.
I then asked “how much is this going to cost?”, he was a little surprised then chuckled, “yes, we should probably sort that” and then headed over to the till. Mary got up as if to pay and I quickly sat her back down. “you’ve been through enough today, I’ll sort this out, don’t worry”. She asked if I was sure and then sat down. She pulled out her phone and with a little bit of head movement was able to easily read it like normal.
The optician shook his head in surprise at this and continued with the transaction. He quietly talked to me while I was paying “she’s lucky to have you, that prescription is very high and it will likely impact her life greatly. It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen before but I’m glad she was able to be corrected so well”.
I nodded and replied “she’s the world to me, it’s just a pair of glasses, we’ll be fine”. He smiled and finished the transaction. It wasn’t cheap but it had been payday recently so I could cover it easily.
I then went back and sat down with Mary and we started to talk like normal, each time she’d look up from her phone, then turn her whole head to look directly at me through the centre of the lenses she wore in the trial frame, I have no words for how excited I was. The time completely flew by, though in reality it had been almost 2 hours when the receptionist returned, thanked us for being patient and handed over 2 glasses cases.
Mary opened up the first case and right there was the frame we’d selected with thick lenticular lenses. She then opened up the second and there was the second frame looked exactly the same, with thick lenticular lenses.
She carefully took off the trial frame and put on the first pair before walking over to the mirror.
“Oh my god”, she exclaimed, “my eyes are huge”.
“They’re beautiful darling” I quickly replied as I stood behind her, “why don’t you try the other ones”. I handed her the second pair and she swapped them over and looked in the mirror.
She swapped back and forth a few times, before settling on the second pair, a gold oval where the eye size was slightly larger than the bowl of the lenticular, showing off the complete circle.
“Why do the lenses look like that” she asked the receptionist.
“Your lenses are strong, so those types of lenses keep all the power right in the centre to reduce the overall thickness.”
“Oh” Mary replied, I could tell this was taking some getting used to for her, but I was amazed at just how well she was taking it. “I’d like to go home now” she said as she looked at me, she turned and thanked the receptionist, placed both glasses cases in her purse before heading out the door.
We walked back to her house in relative silence, I could see she was still getting used to the glasses as she was turning her head constantly to look at things, she even tried lifting the glasses up at one point before quickly putting them back in place. Each time she looked around, I could see the reflections bouncing off the bulging lenses and especially off the lenticular part that stuck out the front.
When we got back to her house I asked if she’d be ok to which she replied yes. There was a slight pause during which I was lost looking into her now massive eyes, then she asked if I didn’t mind, she’d like to be alone right now. I agreed, gave her a kiss on the forehead and told her to call me if she needed anything at all.
Mary closed the door and I turned around to go home, but as soon as I was out of sight of her house, I threw my hands in the air and cheered in happiness, letting out all my pent-up excitement. This was a dream come true, everything I’d ever dreamed of.
Once I did though, I couldn't stop writing and I'm still going.
While I've written more, I'm only going to start with the first part for now until I get some feedback, so I can hopefully improve the other parts.
So, here's part 1:
Last few words and there, done for the day and the week, I thought to myself as I hit send on my email, time to get home and have some fun!
My work wasn’t anything exciting, just a mid-level manager position at one of those soul-less mega-companies that dominate the modern world. I’m not complaining here, the position wasn’t particularly hard, my team were great, it paid well and I managed to reach it at only 23, giving me great career prospects.
I headed out of the office, down to the bus stop and waited for the number 7 bus. I’d got this routine down to a science, able to exit my work, say goodbye to security and arrive with around 30 seconds spare, it felt good. As the bus rolled along, landing in potholes or bouncing over speed bumps, I pulled out my phone to start talking to the gang. You see, today wasn’t just any Friday, it was release night for a new dungeon in our favourite online virtual reality game and we had been waiting for weeks for it to arrive.
I started furiously tapping away in our group chat.
“Who’s ready for tonight? Getting excited, it’s been ages since the last mage boss and I’m hoping for a decent challenge”
“I am!”, replied Tom, my best friend of 18 years, “Did you see the drop tables yet?”
“They released those already?” I replied, “I thought they said they wanted this to be a surprise?”
“They did, but some idiot made a leak post for the drops online, but they made it all up and were miles off, so the developers put out this post to clear up the confusion”
I started to get excited, do I look it up and spoil the surprise or just see what happens? I’d like to think this was a long, carefully considered decision but it in reality, it was less than 5 seconds before I was heading to their website to check out the post. They had only listed the drops, nothing about the bosses which meant at least there was still some surprise for tonight. I started skimming through them, until I found the drops from the final boss of the dungeon.
“Tom, there’s some pretty good magic equipment in those drops, some major upgrades for you! Maybe you’ll finally catch up to our level and be able to do hard mode dungeons with us!”.
“Did you see the headpiece?” he replied, not reacting to the comment. “It’s so much better than anything available right now”
“I want it!” came a quick second comment from my girlfriend of 2 years, Mary who was also in the chat, “I can’t make tonight but I’ll do hard mode with you tomorrow”
Mary was almost the perfect girlfriend, smart, beautiful and loved all the same games I did. I say almost, because she lacked one thing that an optical obsessive such as myself would want, a pair of glasses. Mary had 20/20 vision and as only 1 person in her whole 15 family members I’d met wore glasses, and very weak at that, my odds of her needing them later was very low.
I’d thought long and hard about this when we first met, even drawing up a pros and cons list and had quickly realised that while it was a shame, the cons list was very short. So I threw myself into the relationship and 2 years later was happy that I did.
I scrolled down and found the headpiece:
Grand Sage’s Specs
Health +50
Intellect + 120
Increases damage and healing done by spells with a cast time of more than 1 second by 20%
Specs? That word got my attention immediately and I almost forgot to read the rest of the stats.
“Wow, I can see why you guys want that, it’s great for both of you, let’s hope it drops tonight”
About 15 minutes and a bunch more messages later, I got off the bus and started walking home, my mind racing, trying to imagine what the item would look like in game. I was never going to see Mary in glasses but her online character was a good alternative. As I got to my house I was slightly out of breath, I’d been walking as fast as I possibly could without realising it and started to fumble my keys in the lock as I opened the door. I dropped my bag, coat and keys on the table and hit the power button on my computer, grabbed my VR headset and sat down ready to play.
I logged onto the voice chat program we used and said hi to everyone who was there. Tom immediately asked “are you ok? You sound out of breath”
“I am a little, I’m just excited to get going”
I immediately heard 3 different laughs before Tom added “you can be such a try hard sometimes!” This kind of good-natured back and forth was common for us and I just joined in the laughter as I heard the game sounds in my headset, signalling it had loaded and was ready to go. As the world appeared in my headset, I saw the familiar setting of our favourite tavern and my team mates sitting in our usual spot with some food and drinks and I quickly headed over. Tom was on the left in his trademark bright red robes, John with his glistening silver armour complete with sword and giant tower shield and finally Kate, sporting a fancy leather top with some ornate scrollwork around the shoulders.
“New chest piece Kate?” I asked as I walked over
“Yes, I got it yesterday from a random chest, I was pretty lucky actually and a big upgrade from my last one”
The virtual food and drink flowed as we all waited for the server update that would release the new dungeon and with 5 minutes to go, we packed up and headed to the dungeon’s future location.
After the update went live we looked around but only saw 1 other group, not what we’d expected for a major update.
“I figured there would be more people” I commented to the group.
“Well, it is the new hardest boss and a lot of players are still progressing through normal mode, not everyone progresses as fast as we do” said Kate.
“Hmm, I guess, well lets go” I said as I headed off towards the dungeon entrance.
The dungeon itself was pretty standard, waves of enemies, boss, more enemies before another boss, nothing we hadn’t seen before. It was certainly harder than other normal difficulty dungeons, but as we had previously completed other dungeons in hard mode, it wasn’t really stressing out our group. The 2nd boss, however, had a brand-new ability that we’d not seen before. It caught us all off guard, resulting in a lot of damage to our party. Tom, being the weakest was knocked out, leaving us with only 3 members. We quickly stabilised and finished off the boss soon after and were rewarded for our efforts with a slight upgrade for John, which was a nice surprise.
Tom was complaining as we were healing his character but we reminded him we were here for the drops from the final boss, not these other ones, which quickly cheered him up again. 5 minutes later, we reached the final boss room and entered together, a giant circular room lay before us, walls disappeared up into the dark rafters above and everywhere you looked were bookshelves and tables full of books and scrolls.
Suddenly there was a swirling of sparks and fire in the centre of the room and the final boss appeared.
I noticed immediately that she was wearing glasses, but this was different from every other game I’d played, these glasses had actual lenses and very strong ones at that. Her eyes were huge behind the large silver round frames and I could feel my heart start to race. Would the actual item she dropped look the same? What would it look like on Mary’s character? John’s comment immediately broke me out of my thoughts however as he blurted out “wow look at her bug eyes, she’s blind as a bat, this will be easy” and before I could even comment, he was charging ahead of us to start the fight.
He was very quickly shown the error of his ways as the boss launched a high damage spell directly at him, without uttering a word.
“OH FUCK!!” is all we heard through our voice chat as his character took the blast head on, Paladins in heavy armour aren’t known for being particularly agile and the string of profanities that followed let us know that John was not happy.
“Scatter so we don’t all get hit”, I yelled out to the group “She’s a lot harder than other bosses”.
Over the next 5 minutes we were frantically dodging or interrupting spells as much as we could, while poor Kate was working overtime keeping us all alive with her healing. Finally however, the boss was defeated and we let out a collective sigh of relief.
“I can see why she’s the new hardest boss, that was brutal” said Tom as he walked over to the treasure chest that now stood where the boss was previously, “let’s see what the rewards are”.
The chest opened with its usual triumphant sounds and glowing rays and we see 3 popups, showing the contents. A magic users robe, a recipe scroll allowing the user to make a powerful new potion and the item I was hoping to see, the Grand Sage’s Specs. We all congratulated Tom as the robe and headpiece were both a big upgrade to his items, however, I was excited for a very different reason.
“Put them on Tom, let’s see what they look like” I said, trying to not sound too excited, he was the one getting the items after all, not me, the seconds felt like hours as I waited, then his character changed, of course, he put the robe on first. Then a few seconds later, his hat disappeared and the frames appeared on his character’s face.
Immediately after we heard a yell “what the hell was that?“ coming from Tom over the voice chat.
“Are you ok?”, “What’s going on?” we all asked in unison as it sounded like a mix of surprise and pain to me.
“As soon as I clicked that second item, I got a massive white flash in my headset, it was so bright, I’m still seeing spots wherever I look.”
“I’ve never heard of that before, sounds like a nasty bug” said John, I however, while concerned was staring in amazement at Tom’s character, who, just like the boss, now had huge eyes behind the silver frames. I was positively shaking with excitement as my mind started going through so many different questions, does the item drop every time? How long until tomorrow? Will Mary be happy with the normal mode version? How fast can we get here tomorrow?
Other than the sudden surprise, Tom sounded ok so everyone calmed down a little, he was the first to change the topic.
“Wow, my character’s eyes are just like the bosses were, they’re huge, it looks kind of weird. The headpiece is a big upgrade though so I guess I’ll have to keep it for a while. What does everyone else think?”
“I think it suits you” I said quickly “very wizardly, and the new robe is your colour too”.
“He’s right” added Kate “it’s a little different but I like that they’re adding some new different types of items into the game, glasses in games don’t usually have real lenses”
That comment from Kate also caught me off guard, did she have an interest in glasses too? I made a mental note and wondered how I could bring up the topic in future.
“Looks funny” said John “but no more than some of the other items in the game, you guys remember the compensator?”
“The plate legs with the large bulge in the front?” I asked
“That’s the one” he replied, “games are a fun way to do something a bit different, find your own style I say” and with that, everyone started sharing stories of other weird items and congratulating Tom on his new look and equipment.
We headed back to the tavern together; we had no other plans for the evening as you could only clear a boss once a day and spent most of the evening talking and laughing together. I kept looking at Tom’s character, his eyes were huge, I’m not the best at guessing prescriptions but if I had to guess I’d say it was definitely in the double digits, maybe +12 or +14. I wasn’t really paying much attention to the conversation, lost in my own thoughts of Mary’s character wearing glasses like that.
Kate was the first to log off and John followed shortly after, leaving just Tom and me together. We talked about life, the game, work life, nothing of great import. After about another 30 minutes, Tom said good bye and logged off. I was just finishing something on my character, about to log off myself when a frantic Tom rejoined the voice call.
“David, I can’t see” he stammered
“What do you mean you can’t see?” I quizzed, rather surprised by his sudden reappearance.
“I took off my headset after I logged off and I can’t see, everything is a massive blur, what happened?” He sounded scared and confused
“Did you bang your head or something?” I asked, not sure what to say to his statement
“No, I just took off my headset and went to grab my phone but I can’t see it, I’m looking at my desk right now, it’s a massive blur, I can’t see shit, what happened, help me”. He was starting to panic now, I could hear it in his voice.
“I have no idea what this is but just hold on, I’ll be right over.”
“Thanks” he replied, his voice rather quiet now.
I logged off, grabbed my keys and phone and headed out of my apartment. Part of the reason Tom and I were friends for so long is that our families had lived near each other since we were little kids and even after we moved out, we’d stayed close. 2 minutes of rapid walking later, I was at his apartment building, 2 flights of stairs and I was at his door and I knocked on the door.
I waited for him to open the door and while later I heard a muffled thud and Tom cursing, then some fumbling with the keys in the door. Finally, the door opened and there stood my best friend, looking like he always did, no, not quite the same, his eyes were a little bloodshot but nothing glaringly obvious. He immediately started talking at super speed, about how he can’t see, how he tripped over something, how his eyes were fine, but now they hurt a bit, but not that much, not like that time we …
“Tom, stop” I interrupted, “let’s take this step by step, first, we should close the door and go sit down”
He muttered a quick sorry, turned around and very slowly walked towards his couch and sat down. I closed his door behind me, walked over and sat down next to him. In the back of my head, I was starting to guess what caused this but I didn’t want to jump to conclusions.
“You said everything is a blur, can you describe it?” I asked, trying to keep my voice as calm as I could.
“I can’t see shit!” he snapped back, “what do you want me to say?”
“I’m trying to help you” I replied, ignoring the anger in his voice “let’s try something else, can you read your phone?”
He reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone, held it at arms-length, then brought it closer and closer, right up to his face.
“No, nothing”
“Ok, next question, how long was your last shift at work?” I knew this was definitely not what I thought the true cause but my mind was working overtime in the background, thinking how I could use this to my advantage. I hated that my best friend was going through this and hated myself for these very selfish thoughts, but this type of thing just never happens.
“I did 2 and a half shifts, my replacement called in sick and then his replacement was stuck due to a car accident”
“Wait, what?” I exclaimed, “you’ve just worked a 20-hour shift, how are you still standing?”
“I wanted to play with you guys, I hate falling behind in progress, you’ve cleared almost all the hard mode bosses, plus a few mythics and I’ve barely started” he replied looking down, I could hear the sadness in his voice, but selfishly, rather than trying to actually solve his problem, I jumped on this opportunity.
“So, you got up, worked 20 hours, came home, played with us for another 4 hours and then this happened? You’ve not slept in over 30 hours; do you not think it could be linked?” I asked quizzically.
“Maybe, I do feel pretty exhausted” he said yawning.
“Right, let’s get you into bed and if this is still a problem when you wake up, I’ll take you to the hospital”
I helped Tom to his bedroom, making sure to let him know his phone was next to the bed. I then said goodbye and headed out and back home. Tom had done these huge shifts before and would usually sleep for more than 12 hours afterwards so this had bought me some time. It was late at night on Friday, meaning I had tomorrow off and so did Mary. If my guess was correct, I had a chance to use this freak event to my advantage.
On the way home I wrote a message to Mary.
“Hey darling, we just finished with the new boss, she’s a challenge but we completed it first time. Want to play tomorrow morning? We could probably do both normal and hard mode if Kate and John are around, if not then there are a few others in the guild that have the gear to take it on.”
I looked at the message before sending, did I really want to do this? What if I was wrong, what if this caused some kind of damage, could I live with myself? My stomach was doing flips, I felt so guilty but I still hit the send button, I couldn’t give up on this chance. I saw Mary immediately typing a reply
“Wow that was fast, glad you guys had fun, yes go first thing tomorrow, I’ll be on around 9, see you then!”
I wished her a good night as I walked through the door to my apartment and sat down. My head was swirling with what if’s and I was both excited and apprehensive at the same time. I shook my head and went for a shower and bed, though I got little sleep as my mind wouldn’t stop going over everything. I finally fell asleep from exhaustion, probably around 1am.
At 8:30 my alarm went off and I quickly got up, made myself a simple breakfast and went over to my computer and checked my phone, no message from Tom yet. I logged onto the forums for the game, looked at the news section, no updates there yet about this, more good news. I went into the player messages and almost all of them were complaining about the dungeon being too hard.
After reading through all the messages, I couldn’t find a single one talking about what we’d experienced, had I imagined it?
Just after 9, Mary joined our voice chat program and we logged onto the game together. I secretly hoped Kate and John weren’t around because I didn’t want them talking about what happened. They weren’t often on this early either and I’d deliberately not sent them a message about it.
“It looks like Kate and John aren’t on, shall we get 2 others and go?” I asked her
“Shouldn’t we wait for them?” She replied, “They know the fight and that’s always useful”
“We could, but I need to pick something up from the store before it closes this afternoon, so if we want to get normal and hard mode done, the more time the better” This was a complete lie but I was saying it without thinking, anything to not lose this chance, I must not panic I told myself, calm down.
“Ok sure, let’s see who’s online” she replied
There were a few guild mates online but I specifically invited only those who wouldn’t need the item, I didn’t want to lose this chance by someone else getting it instead.
I invited the other 2 members and let them know I’d already cleared it last night so I knew the tactics, they were happy about this and were up for both normal and hard mode, more good news, this was all going to plan.
We headed to the dungeon and due to my knowledge of it, we were able to clear through the enemies and first 2 bosses quickly without any issues. Everyone was in good spirits as we headed towards the final boss. This was helped by the fact the basic rewards from the dungeon were pretty generous. As we entered the familiar final room, I could feel my excitement and anxiety growing. What if the glasses don’t drop? what if we don’t kill the boss? what if this was all in my imagination? I again pushed those thoughts out of my mind and instead calmly explained the boss fight to the team.
The boss appeared and it was just like last night, standing in front of us with huge eyes behind round silver frames. Mary spoke up, “those glasses of hers are cool, I hope I get lucky and they drop”. I know she wanted the item for it's stats but it made me feel a little less bad about the whole situation.
“Fingers crossed for you” I replied, “let’s go”.
With that, we started the fight off. Like before, the boss did a lot of damage but as we knew what to expect, it was considerably easier than the previous night. This was also helped by the fact all our members were in high level equipment.
After only a few minutes, the boss was defeated and the chest appeared. My heart felt like it was going to burst out of my chest in excitement and it took all my effort to keep my voice calm and congratulate everyone. Mary walked over and opened the chest and up popped 2 info boxes, first a pair of leather boots, that’s not what I wanted but then the second item appeared, the glasses dropped!
“Yes!” I shouted, a little too excitedly and I quickly composed myself and congratulated Mary. Now for the moment of truth. Time seemed to slow down as she picked up the item. I was staring right at her, willing her to put them on her character, to hear her exclaim to hear about the flash but nothing, she didn’t equip it, what was going on?
“Aren’t you going to equip the new item?” I asked, frantic at this point
“I’m not sure” she said slowly, “it’s a good item but it’s not much of an upgrade, I figured we should try hard mode first, if the item drops again, then someone else can get this version.”
I quickly muted my microphone and shouted out loud, no, how could this happen, I was so close, just equip the damn glasses, but I couldn’t say that, I couldn’t give the game away.
“Makes sense to me” I replied, calling on the reserves of my sanity to try and sound as normal as possible “shall we go do hard mode then?”
Everyone quickly agreed and we headed back out of the dungeon. This was hell for me, my chest physically hurt, my hands were shaking I was a wreck. My hopes and dreams were right there in her inventory and all she had to do was equip it, but no, her good nature was coming through. This is why I loved her so much, she was such a good person always thinking of others but right now, it was causing me such pain.
We exited the dungeon and set the difficulty to hard mode and headed back in. I immediately noticed a huge jump from the previous dungeon. Where before I could pay partial attention to what was going on, even the basic enemies were a bit of challenge this time, I had to focus. I pushed all my worries out of my head, the quicker we completed this, the quicker I would get what I wanted.
It was taking ages though, 30 minutes later we finally reached the first boss of the dungeon and started the fight. Hard mode gave the boss new abilities and this added surprise proved to be too much for us causing our party to all be knocked out, one respawn and a few minutes of walking through the dungeon, we attempted the fight again and were lucky this time. The chest appeared and I started moving deeper into the dungeon
“Don’t you want to check the loot?” Mary asked.
“What? Oh, ye, sorry the loot, I was just thinking about the next set of enemies, trying to remember what their abilities were”. Another lie, but I hoped it sounded convincing.
The box opened, a weapon and not just any weapon, it was an upgrade for me, I happily picked it up and equipped it, that was a nice surprise. I sat back slightly and took a deep breath, I needed to focus on what was going on right now, not the glasses and one self-pep-talk later we were heading for the second boss.
Right then, my phone buzzed, it was a message from Kate. “Do you want to do the new dungeon again today?”
“Sorry Kate, I’m already in it with Mary, she wanted the new items and I have something to do this afternoon. We cleared normal mode about 45 minutes ago and we’re in hard mode right now. It’s definitely hard, probably on par with some of the first mythic dungeons, we were wiped out on the first boss.”
“Oh, no problem, I was hoping to get the specs drop as Tom has it now”. Now that was an interesting reply, why would she want that? Her character couldn’t use it, it was the wrong type of armour. I pressed her on it.
“You can’t use that type of armour though, what are you going to do with them?”
“Oh, it’s not for this character, I’ve started a new character about a week ago and it’s for her”.
Another interesting reply, she’s suggesting we boost her character for the reward. Everyone knows boosting is frowned upon, it makes the dungeon way harder as 1 member can barely help and is at high risk of being knocked out by even the weakest enemies. It’s a strategy you only use if you’re really desperate for something. My mind started to wonder, was there more to this comment.
“Are you coming?” asked Mary, breaking me from my thoughts once more.
“Sorry, Kate sent a message asking if we were free to do this dungeon with her but I said we were already in it” I quickly replied.
“Ah, maybe tomorrow” she said while continuing deeper into the dungeon.
We continued on and I was paying far more attention now to what was going on. We got to and killed the second boss without issue, resulting in an upgrade for one of our team mates. 5 more groups of enemies and we were back at the final boss. I was counting down the groups, willing our team to clear the way as quickly as possible and finally, after another 10 minutes we reached the final boss room. I took a deep breath before I typed into group chat to be very careful of the boss’s first spell. I explained all of the abilities of the boss, the high damage spells, which abilities to dodge. I was very thorough, I did not want to screw this up, this was my dream, this is what I wanted more than anything right now.
We discussed how we were going to approach the fight and then headed through the door. A few seconds later, I saw the now familiar light show that marked the boss’s appearance and there she was with her huge eyes and round silver glasses. I looked at her, then did a sort of double take, something was different. I said earlier I wasn’t the best at guessing prescriptions but I could have sworn her glasses were even stronger than before. I used a feature on the VR headset to zoom in slightly and there subtly at the edge of the lens was a line, they were lenticular lenses, they were stronger than in normal mode. I smiled to myself and thanked my lucky stars, this just kept getting better.
We engaged the boss and I fought like my life depended on it, I dodged all the high damage spells, I called out to my team with warnings, whatever we needed to win I was doing it.
As the boss was finally defeated, I leaned back in my chair, my hands were sweating from the fight, but now, was it all worth it? The chest appeared and I walked over to open it, willing with everything I had inside me for the item to be in the list.
4 Items, that’s a good start, item 1, not the glasses, item 2, not the glasses either, I was starting to worry, item 3, GLASSES! I muted my microphone and shouted for joy, who cares what the 4th item was, so I un-muted myself and congratulated Mary. In reality, there were 2 item upgrades for Mary and 1 each for the other 2 players in our group, I didn’t care though, my reward was coming.
“I’m glad I didn’t use the normal mode item, that would have been a waste, do you know anyone who needs it?” she said happily.
Thinking on my feet I replied “I think so, if you trade it to me, I’ll look into it”.
She opened a trade window and handed me the normal version of the Sage’s Specs, I accepted and it appeared in my inventory. I could use the item but the stats were of no use to me, so I just left it for later.
I then looked across at her, crossed my fingers and waited. A few seconds later, I saw her equip the item and heard what I was hoping for, a sudden gasp of surprise from Mary. I looked at her character in amazement, there she was, wearing a pair of super thick plus glasses, magnifying her eyes with the lenses bulging out of the front of the frame and just like the boss, the lenses were definitely lenticular with the distinctive line.
I feigned innocence “Everything ok Mary?”
She replied, sounding just as confused as Tom was “I just got a sudden bright flash in my headset when I equipped the item, it was weird, like a flash of lightning or something.”
“Wow that’s weird, have you ever seen it before?” I replied, keeping up the pretence.
“No never, I guess we chalk it up to a new boss bug, how do I look?” she asked turning to face me.
“Amazing” I replied with complete honesty.
“You don’t think my character’s eyes are too big? I didn’t think that the effect on the boss would carry over to the actual item too, it’s certainly a new addition to the game”
“Your character always did have nice eyes, if I remember you spent a lot of time on them in the character creation?” I said and could immediately tell that made her happy as she quickly replied “you remember that? I thought it annoyed you because you made your character in 5 minutes and it took me more than half an hour”
“Not at all, I’m just happy I can play this with you” I responded honestly. I was happy I could play with her, but now, I was the happiest I’d ever been.
We thanked the other 2 members for their help and disbanded the party, heading back to the main town in the game, happily talking to each other.
“I’m not sure, but everything in the world seems bigger since I equipped these new glasses” Mary mentioned as we strolled along “It’s nice, it’s like everything has more detail in it and it makes reading signs and the UI easier”.
“That’s great darling, I’m glad you like your upgrade”. I couldn’t bring myself to say your glasses yet, I had to be sure that this had had the effect I desired in the real world too.
“Don’t you have to go soon” Mary asked with concern in her voice.
“Oh, yes, thank you for reminding me” I quickly replied, “The stores shut in 15 minutes, I’d better be quick. I’ll be back on later, bye”. I then logged off and breathed out a sigh of relief, that was a crazy 3 hours with emotions running crazy, I was genuinely tired. I did however, want to get out for a bit so I figured I might as well go do what I said I was going to do. I grabbed my phone and wallet, opened the door and started walking towards town, maybe I should get myself something nice for dinner tonight.
I had a sudden thought as I walked to town and checked my phone, still no messages from Tom, it had been about 13 hours since I last saw him, he was probably going to wake up soon. I switched my phone to loud so I didn’t miss anything.
Town was uneventful, I didn’t see anyone I knew and I’d finally decided what I was going to get so over towards the supermarket I went. Just as I got there, my phone chimed, letting me know there was a message. Ah, Tom must be awake I thought to myself, but no, it was another message from Kate. She’d managed to get a group to help her new character and said I didn’t need to help her out. That was fast, I wonder if she’d worked out what was going on, if so, that means she wanted to wear strong glasses? This day keeps getting stranger by the second but I smiled to myself, maybe she was like me and if so, I was happy that she’d found a way to make her dreams come true.
I started typing up a message. “I’m glad you were able to find a group and get the glasses, I hope they are everything you want them to be”. I was fishing, was this too risky? I hoped the message was vague enough that it could be written off as a friend being happy for her. A quick 2 word reply left me with more questions though; “They are”.
Like Mary and Tom, I knew Kate in the real world from our time together in secondary school, she lived in the same town as us but on the opposite side as it was closer to her job. I didn’t own a car so I couldn’t just pop over and see her easily but there was a pretty direct bus route that would get me there in 15-20 minutes if I needed to be.
Then, my phone started ringing, it was Mary, I quickly picked up.
“Can you come to my place? I need your help with something, please be quick” and with that she hung up. Her voice had the same worried tone that Tom had used and I knew what was coming so I quickly paid for my items and hurried over to her house.
Mary lived in a quiet part of town in her old grandparent’s house, we’d talked about moving in a few times but just hadn’t found a good point yet, she kept joking that she’d let me move in when I proposed. If this goes the way I hope it does, I thought to myself, that proposal will be coming very soon.
I knocked on the door and like with Tom, there was quite a long delay before she opened the door. She looked out at me and immediately squinted furiously, that’s not going to help at all, I thought to myself as she questioningly asked “David is that you?”
“Of course it’s me, what do you mean is that you, can’t you see me, what’s wrong?” I asked trying to sound as concerned as possible and to be truthful I was a little. This had been a huge gamble and now as the time to find out if things had worked out or if I’d screwed up everything.
“Since I stopped playing, I can’t see a thing, everything is a massive blur” she quietly said, a subtle note of panic like before. “What should I do?”
“Well, it sounds like your eyesight has deteriorated a little bit, maybe it’s all these games we play, it’s ok, let’s take you over to an optician and I’m sure they can help, I’m sure it’s nothing serious”.
I played things down as much as I could, full well knowing she was utterly helpless right now and if my wishes came true, would be dependent on extremely strong glasses from this day onwards.
“Thank you” she said and swiftly grabbed my arm tightly for security and shut the door behind her.
Our town wasn’t large but there were 2 opticians, 1 chain and 1 independent. The independent one was closer so I started walking there, it wasn’t far, maybe 5 minutes. I could tell Mary was scared, a car drove past us and she jumped, grabbing my arm even tighter, though she kept quiet the whole time. I kept reassuring her that everything would be fine, that we’ll get this cleared up. I don’t think she believed me as she didn’t reply but I was trying.
We arrived at the opticians shortly and went in together, I asked the receptionist if the optician had any time to see Mary for an eye test and she checked the timetable. “You’re in luck” she said “we had a cancellation and the optician will be free in about 5 minutes, can I get your details please dear?”
Mary quietly gave the receptionist her details like name, address and age. She then asked if she’d ever worn glasses or contacts before, to which Mary replied no. I could see the receptionist’s eyebrows and forehead furrow at that answer, she could tell Mary couldn’t see much but didn’t say anything. I’m sure her years had taught her that the last thing a patient wanted to hear was that something was wrong.
Almost 5 minutes to the second, the optician came out talking to an elderly lady about her test results, I couldn’t hear what they were saying but I wasn’t that interested anyway. He pointed the old lady to the receptionist, probably to help with frame selection. He then looked over at us, smiled and began walking over.
“I’m guessing you’re my next appointment; would you follow me please?” and with that he turned around and headed to the back of the shop.
Mary quickly grabbed my arm again as I stood up and slowly walked to the back of the store, I guided her to the seat and helped her sit down. The optician hadn’t seen any of this as he’d been fiddling with something off to the side but soon turned around and walked over.
“So, what can I help you with today young miss?” he asked kindly and I could see it worked, Mary’s shoulders relaxed slightly before she told him about how she’d stopped playing a game and suddenly couldn’t see anything.
“These new computer games are certainly something aren’t they” the optician said happily, “but they’re not the best for the eyes, let’s see if we can sort this out”. I knew he was expecting this to be a run of the mill low prescription, he was in for a big shock.
He grabbed a trial frame and placed it on her face before adjusting the nose and ear pieces.
“Now, please look over at the chart on the wall and tell me what is the smallest letter you can read”. He turned around to look at the chart as well.
“What chart?” Mary replied, her voice breaking a little as she said so.
That got his attention, he turned to me with a questioning look then turned to his files, “my notes say you don’t wear glasses or contacts, is that correct?”
“Yes” she replied quietly.
“Hmm” he replied, “we’ll get to the bottom of this”.
He then reached over and grabbed a very high power plus lens and placed it in front of her left eye, he then started to reach back for a weaker lens but stopped as Mary excitedly exclaimed “that’s a lot better, I can see the chart now with one eye but I can’t really see much on it”. Another puzzled look across to me from the optician to which I shrugged my shoulders, pretending to not know what’s going on. I couldn’t see the exact value of the lens but it was from about halfway up the set, so if I had to guess it was around +10.
The optician removed the lens and grabbed another one from higher up the set, I would guess around the +13 mark.
“That’s even better, I can just about see a blurry E now” Mary said, the fear and quiet disappearing from her voice, she was clearly happy that her vision was returning.
Over the next few minutes, the optician went up and up the lenses, asking Mary what she could see. Finally stopping when she could read the 20/20 line. He was clearly surprised by this as he asked her to read something of approximately the same size on a nearby poster, which she read out to him.
He then covered up that eye with an opaque lens and started on the right eye. This time, he started much higher and after a few minutes she was reading the 20/20 line again. The optician then took the trial frame off her face and said he was going to have a look at her eyes with his light, he took a quick look before recoiling very subtly, clearly, he’d seen something he wasn’t expecting. He did the same with the other eye and wrote down a few notes.
He then removed the black lens and put the trial frame back on Mary’s face, I could see just how large her eyes were from where I was sitting and I was getting very excited. He asked her what line she could read and she read both the 20/20 and the 20/15 line, though after she also said “I’m getting some double vision”.
The optician picked up another type of lens and after a few more changes on both eyes, he’d added what I guess were prism lenses as Mary said the double vision was gone.
The optician wrote down a few more notes and then turned back to face Mary.
“I’m not sure what to say my dear, you have one of the strongest prescriptions I’ve seen in my career and yet your vision quality with them is fantastic. When I looked in your eyes however, it seems like any normal eye except with a very thin natural lens, which would explain why you can’t see very well.”
“What does that mean?” Mary asked, a little concerned again
“Well, it means you’ll need to wear glasses to see properly but other than that, I believe you’ll live a perfectly normal life”.
“Oh, that’s ok” she said, “one of my best friends wears glasses and she always looks fantastic.”
“Yours will be a little different” he replied then stopped, clearly not wanting to scare her any more “let’s see what we can do about ordering some, keep that trial frame on for now, I can’t have you walking around without correction, you might trip over something”
I quickly walked over to help her up but Mary just slid out of the chair and started to look around. I think this is the point she started to realise how limited her field of vision was as she was turning her head back and forth to look at things. “Everything is a bigger than I remember” was the only comment she made as she followed the optician out.
I however, wanted to see one thing, her prescription. He’d handed it to her before walking out and I asked Mary if I could see it, my eyes went wide as I read it:
R: SPH +19.25 CYL +0.50 AXIS 140 PRISM Out 4
L: SPH +19.75 CYL +0.25 AXIS 160 PRISM Out 4
This was a dream prescription for me, I guess the hard mode glasses were stronger and I inwardly cheered with happiness.
“Thanks” as I handed it back to her, trying not to grin.
The optician was having a word with the receptionist who was nodding but looking concerned. He turned around to us and said “you’re lucky there’s a lens lab nearby that we work with, it means we’ll be able to get you glasses nice and quickly. If you can choose a frame, you like then I’ll get the order over to them so they can start making the lenses. The owner is an old friend of mine and I’m sure he’ll work as fast as he can” and with that he picked up the phone and headed back to the testing room dialling a number.
I looked around, there were a lot of choices of frames, but, despite me being an optical obsessive, I didn’t have a type of frame I liked, for me it was just one that suited the wearer. I therefore asked the receptionist if she could advise and help us out.
She came out from behind the desk and helped pick 4 frames she thought would look good on Mary. Mary clearly couldn’t see anything when she removed the trial frame so had to rely on us to let her know which looked best. We quickly discounted 2, leaving us with 2 others that both looked great on her. I knew she’d need a spare pare so I told the receptionist we’d take both, she replied that was a good idea as Mary would be helpless without a spare if her glasses broke.
The optician then returned to the front, "I have some good news and some bad news, the good news is that he has some lenses with the power you need in stock and he can get them made up today, the bad news is they are low index lenses so they won’t look as good as some thinner lenses."
I quickly replied that we were very grateful for his help and I that I am sure they will look great anyway. He nodded and took the 2 frames we’d selected, checking out the sizes before handing them to the receptionist.
“Vera, could you take these frames over to Ben, I’ll hold the fort here while you’re gone”. She nodded, grabbed her handbag and headed out the door. “Mary, I’d like to see you back in 3 months from now if that is ok, if you have any issues before that though, please come back straight away”.
I then asked “how much is this going to cost?”, he was a little surprised then chuckled, “yes, we should probably sort that” and then headed over to the till. Mary got up as if to pay and I quickly sat her back down. “you’ve been through enough today, I’ll sort this out, don’t worry”. She asked if I was sure and then sat down. She pulled out her phone and with a little bit of head movement was able to easily read it like normal.
The optician shook his head in surprise at this and continued with the transaction. He quietly talked to me while I was paying “she’s lucky to have you, that prescription is very high and it will likely impact her life greatly. It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen before but I’m glad she was able to be corrected so well”.
I nodded and replied “she’s the world to me, it’s just a pair of glasses, we’ll be fine”. He smiled and finished the transaction. It wasn’t cheap but it had been payday recently so I could cover it easily.
I then went back and sat down with Mary and we started to talk like normal, each time she’d look up from her phone, then turn her whole head to look directly at me through the centre of the lenses she wore in the trial frame, I have no words for how excited I was. The time completely flew by, though in reality it had been almost 2 hours when the receptionist returned, thanked us for being patient and handed over 2 glasses cases.
Mary opened up the first case and right there was the frame we’d selected with thick lenticular lenses. She then opened up the second and there was the second frame looked exactly the same, with thick lenticular lenses.
She carefully took off the trial frame and put on the first pair before walking over to the mirror.
“Oh my god”, she exclaimed, “my eyes are huge”.
“They’re beautiful darling” I quickly replied as I stood behind her, “why don’t you try the other ones”. I handed her the second pair and she swapped them over and looked in the mirror.
She swapped back and forth a few times, before settling on the second pair, a gold oval where the eye size was slightly larger than the bowl of the lenticular, showing off the complete circle.
“Why do the lenses look like that” she asked the receptionist.
“Your lenses are strong, so those types of lenses keep all the power right in the centre to reduce the overall thickness.”
“Oh” Mary replied, I could tell this was taking some getting used to for her, but I was amazed at just how well she was taking it. “I’d like to go home now” she said as she looked at me, she turned and thanked the receptionist, placed both glasses cases in her purse before heading out the door.
We walked back to her house in relative silence, I could see she was still getting used to the glasses as she was turning her head constantly to look at things, she even tried lifting the glasses up at one point before quickly putting them back in place. Each time she looked around, I could see the reflections bouncing off the bulging lenses and especially off the lenticular part that stuck out the front.
When we got back to her house I asked if she’d be ok to which she replied yes. There was a slight pause during which I was lost looking into her now massive eyes, then she asked if I didn’t mind, she’d like to be alone right now. I agreed, gave her a kiss on the forehead and told her to call me if she needed anything at all.
Mary closed the door and I turned around to go home, but as soon as I was out of sight of her house, I threw my hands in the air and cheered in happiness, letting out all my pent-up excitement. This was a dream come true, everything I’d ever dreamed of.
”