27. "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." George Santayana

27. "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." George Santayana

She refreshed the page for what had to be the sixtieth time in the past forty minutes.

“You know,” said Anthony, her older and yet so very foolish brother, watching her from behind what used to be her copy of The Sunday Times, “Einstein said that insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.”

“Fuck. Off.” She replied, “I will get these tickets if I have to stay here all night.”

The phone rang.

Anthony pounced onto it. It was probably his imaginary girlfriend – ie his best mate calling up to see if he wanted to hang out and play video games. He was never going to fool her into thinking he had a girlfriend. She knew better. He was much too boring and juvenile to have a girlfriend.

Refresh. 404.

Refresh. Nothing. Maybe she should write an e-mail to the organisers, try to get her tickets that way.

Emily, her best friend, was on the generic instant message chat service just blaspheming as she refreshed the page over at her house.

Refresh. Still nothing.

“Yes, twenty minutes. Right.”

Oh goody, he would be leaving.

The generic chat noise. Emily had sent a particularly long and creative insult on the questionable background of the people who manned the servers of the website.

Refresh. Well, shit. This was getting ridiculous.

“Where are you off to then? Over to your girlfriend's house?”

“No,” he said, putting the phone down, “that was Rick.”

Refresh. Wow, ok, the first page.

Enter your details – done. Click submit...

She quickly told Emily she had managed to get to page one.
Loading, still loading, come on, come on, and 404! What? No! Bollocks!

Urgh, Rick, the slimy friend that hit on her whenever he came round.

Refresh. Still nothing. Come on, website! Work, work, work!

“He's not coming here, is he?”

“Yeah. He managed to get tickets to InterCon.”

Refre- wait a minute.

“He got tickets to what?”

“InterCon. You know, the International Convention, where all the famous people and artists and gamers go every summer, in Florida?”

She looked up from the computer screen and glared at him.

“With all the people and fans of your favourite series, where they do panels, and question and answer interviews, and signings.”

Refresh, refresh, refresh.

“I swear, if you are making this up I am going to murder you, slowly, with a rusty fork and make it look like suicide. I hate you. I really, really hate you.”

“You're always so lovely, dear sister,” he replied, sitting back down on the sofa and opening the Sunday Times to a random page whilst trying to look suave, “I may have to tell him that he will need to find other people to come with us.”

“What?”

Refresh.

“He got four tickets. Two for us, and two for you.”

The chat noise. Emily sent her a long-winded message about “the epic and continued failure of this website” and a virtual sigh. She was unsure that they would ever get these tickets.

“You are just trying to deceive me,” she said, in her presentation voice, “and I shall not be deceived.”

Anthony put the newspaper down.

“You really don't think I would do something like that for you, do you?”

Refresh. Please? If it worked she would do all her chores for the rest of the year without complaining. No. Well then, fuck you.

“Anthony, over the past nineteen years you have done nothing nice for me unless you wanted something in return. Never. Not once.”

“That's not true,” he said coming over to the computer, “I bought you that DVD you wanted.”

Refresh.

“For my birthday. After being picked on by Mum and Dad.”

“How did you know about that?”

Refresh, please load.

Page one again, excellent, “It doesn't matter. But it certainly proves my point.”

He sat down heavily onto the chair next to hers.

“Ok, bad example. What about that teddy bear, when you were six?”

Please work, she had written all her details, please work, she would love them forever if it work.

“Which you gave to me because you were a boy and thought a pink bear was unsuitable to your masculine needs?”

Refresh.

Anthony was quiet.

She could almost hear the cogs creaking as they attempted to move after years of disuse.

“Alright. So I can't think of anything, but that doesn't make me a bad brother. I babysat you without complaining for years.”

“For money.”

Refresh.

“Stop refreshing. Those who can't remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”

She stopped and looked over to him.

He was frowning at her. Maybe he felt sorry for not being a better older brother.

“You're telling me that whatever happens, if I keep checking the page where they sell the tickets, I'm still not going to get any tickets?”

“Umm. No?”

The doorbell rang.

Emily sent her a message telling her how desperate she was getting. She didn't think this was going to work. And what were they going to do if they didn't get the tickets? Would they still take the trip?

Rick walked in with Anthony behind him, holding something behind his back.

Refresh. Please? No. Of course not.

“So,” said the friend, who was looking less slimy than usual – maybe he had stopped wearing hair gel, “I hear you need tickets to InterCon?”

“That would be correct,” she said and pointed to the screen, “which is why I'm on the website.”

Rick took the seat that Anthony had recently vacated.

“I got a call, last week, from your brother. He told me you were planning on going to Florida for it, but you still needed tickets. As someone who has gone to InterCon for the past five years, I know how difficult that can be.”

She didn't know where this was going, but she didn't like it.

“But having gone to InterCon for the past five years, I've made some friends in high places,” she snorted at that, “and I have arranged for four tickets to be delivered to me.”

Anthony held out the piece of paper he had been hiding.

It was the confirmation e-mail from InterCon, telling therickman22 at whatamail dot com that he was receiving four VIP tickets.

“Are you serious? This isn't a joke?”

“Yeah. Happy birthday, little sister.”

He never saw the punch coming.

“You bastard, you've been letting me refresh that damned page for an hour now! What is wrong with you? Emily is currently worrying about the entire trip and you could have told me whenever the e-mail got sent!”

“Sheesh!” He managed to get out between punches, “I get you tickets to InterCon and I still can't anything right. What's an elder sibling to do?”

Rick left, not wanting to be a part of this madness.