GTA San Andreas loaded on a Tuesday in September, the disc tray sliding
open like a jaw. I drove CJ through fog and rail yards, the map revealing itself
in squares of permission. In Halo 2, I learned to die repeatedly against the same
wall, the same Covenant sword splitting my shield into a sound I still hear
when I fail at ordinary things. Final Fantasy X kept me in Zanarkand long after
the story asked me to leave. Tidus fading at the end taught me how to hold
a person who is already light. I played Tony Hawk’s Underground until 3 a.m.,
the kickflip physics burned into my thumbs, the trick combos a rosary I could
repeat without faith, only momentum. Kingdom Hearts gave me a keyblade
and a loneliness shaped like an island. Sora’s friends scattered across worlds
the way mine scattered across new area codes. In Vice City I just drove. No missions.
The radio on Wave 103. Synthpop washing through palm-lined streets while
I avoided everything the game wanted. Silent Hill 2 was a letter from a dead wife and
a town made of guilt’s own weather. I paused it once for twenty minutes,
unable to open the next door. Metal Gear Solid 2 asked who was real. Raiden or me.
The Colonel glitching, telling me to turn off the console. I obeyed. Then turned it
back on. The PS2 hummed its blue startup screen, those rising towers of light,
and I believed briefly in a world responsive to my smallest motion. Now I carry
those save files in my body. Muscle memory for places that never existed.
The hours logged, unrecoverable, precious as any life I actually lived.
Graciela Margaux Acedera is a writer from Calapan City, Oriental Mindoro. She earned her Bachelor of Arts in Literary and Cultural Studies from the Polytechnic University of the Philippines. Her poems have appeared in Manila Literary Magazine and TLDTD. In 2025, her collection Ocean Lanterns was named a finalist for the Maningning Miclat Poetry Award (English Division).
