“Curiosity killed the cat. Curiosity killed the cat. Curiosity. Killed. The cat.” I repeated the cliche aloud, hoping I’d convince myself to return the used console and second copy of Eagle’s Quarry sitting in the plastic bag on the seat behind me.

Two weeks had passed between my first and second visits to Dragon’s Den. That meant I’d already had at least fourteen dreams about octopuses. Some nights I would dream that I was at an aquarium, where a small one was nestled in the corner of a large tank. Other times I was scuba diving and watching several crawl around a coral reef. Usually I was floating in a dark void, a spread of grey-and-red tentacles before me and nothing else.

Last night, I realized the tentacles were mine.

This is just to shut up your stupid, overactive imagination, I told myself. You’ve done this before. Remember how you worried for three days about how gross Dragon’s Den was going to be? The nightmares you had about finding mold on everything in the fridge? This is the same thing.

My palms started to burn. At some point I’d put my poor steering wheel in a chokehold. I loosened my grip.

You’re overthinking. You’ve talked with your therapist about this. Play the game. Then you’ll realize you’re making shit up, and the weird dreams will go away.

It was a risk-free plan, even for my wallet. Everything from Dragon’s Den had a fourteen-day return policy. I only had to plug in the system, play the game for an hour or two, then return everything. Based on the cover, the game was in that tired “knights-of-old” genre. That meant it would lose my interest, my anxiety would be eased, all the octopus dreams would stop, and I didn’t even have to worry about the $150 that I just dropped.

I heaved a sigh. In a few hours, I would finally be over those damn eyes.

I rammed against the front door to get it unstuck from its frame. The muggy season was officially here, and with it all the problems unique to an old apartment where an AC unit was against fire code. Several well-placed box fans kept the apartment cool, but did jack shit about the moisture in the air.

I threw my purse onto the kitchen table and headed to the living room area, collapsing onto the worn-out living room couch. Deep breathing techniques the entire ride home didn’t ease any of my worries. What if Mac accidentally sold me a broken controller? Was the console compatible with my LCD screen? What if I actually wasn’t imagining that Tentachill’s eyes…

Nope, not doing this right now. I smashed my face into one of the couch cushions and breathed deeply. The smells of my childhood came rushing in – cigarettes from before dad kicked the habit, mom’s favorite perfume, dust from the last forty years, a hint of spilled grape juice. My heartbeat softened and slowed. Feeling calmer, I punched “How to hook up FantastiMega 3000” into my web browser.

When I was seven years old, one of the neighbor kids invited me over to play some game about a purple cat with a ray gun. He jammed in the cartridge, jabbed the power switch, and the room instantly filled with tinny music. But when the FantastiMega 3000 flickered to life, instead a title screen, a host of buttons appeared– Shop, Internet, Profile, Settings. A bossa nova groove wafted out of my speakers. I stared at the complicated startup screen. Did I just buy a game system or a new computer?

After selecting the icon marked Eagle’s Quarry, a blue sky with puffy white clouds came into view. A gold hawk-boy character, dressed as a medieval peasant, walked onscreen. He stared into the distance with eyes that were big, blue, and clear. A brown bird peasant, this one short and plump with beady eyes and big, round glasses, appeared behind him and placed a winglike arm on the first one’s shoulder. A duck with curly lashes joined them, tears wobbling at the corners of her enormous green eyes. The world spun around, revealing that the characters were at the edge of a seaside cliff with an enormous, rampaging whirlpool before them. Angry trumpets blared, cymbals crashed, lightning bolts leaped out of the whirlpool. The words Eagle’s Quarry faded in over the scene. Then, two smaller words in white: Press Start.

Which button was “Start?” My thumb accidentally bumped against one marked B.

“Select File,” an angelic voice cooed. (Guess I didn’t have to press the tiny button marked Start after all.) I moved the cursor—a feathered pointing hand—over New Game and pressed B once more.

“Since ancient times, us Wingfolk have done battle with the greedy Octopods of the Sea Cave Domain.” I wasn’t surprised that the game began with an old man’s voice narrating over scrolling hieroglyphics. Mac had warned me that Eagle’s Quarry was “cutscene” mini-movie heavy and that it “interrupted play flow.” Seafoam covered the hieroglyphics, muffling the music for a few seconds. When the wave ebbed away, a carving of MC Tentachill’s silhouette filled my screen.

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“The Octopus God is cruel,” the old man said. “He manipulates the will of his own people with malevolent hymns. It is only by the grace of our Village Goddess that we are unaffected by his twisted music.”

Seafoam covered the hieroglyphics again, uncovering a new scene with a squat, robed, yellow bird-man. He had a pointed hat, curly walking stick, and hairy white eyebrows that took up a quarter of his face. The hawk-boy from the title screen walked beside him with a crudely made slingshot in his feathery hand. Nearby were several grass huts. I snorted as I realized that flowers were somehow growing out of the clouds that made up the ground.

“Octopod greed extends beyond the Sea Cave Domain,” the old bird continued, motioning the tip of his walking stick towards an empty pedestal. “The Blue Crystal, which keeps us prosperous and enhances the powers of our dear Village Goddess, has once again fallen into their hands. You already know the power which it holds.”

“Why me, Elder?” the hawk-boy asked. “Why not send one of the trained warriors to retrieve the Crystal?” The Elder stared off into the distance and stroked at the white feathers below his beak, which were puffed out to resemble a beard.

“My boy, the Crystal is fickle,” he said. “It favors, even above the Gods, those innocent enough to not abuse its power. Though my soldiers fight well, they have seen too much to take advantage of its grace. But you! You are still young! The Crystal will surely bless you.”

The hawk-boy closed his eyes and nodded solemnly, making a soft “Nn” noise to let the Elder know that he understood.

“We will see you at the ceremony tonight,” the Elder said. “Make sure you’re ready!” With that, he shuffled off. The hawk-boy was now standing still in the middle of the village.

The tiny amount of experience I had with video games told me to press every button and see what it did. I wiggled the joystick in a circle. The hawk-boy twirled around. I pressed the B button and hawk-boy jumped. The A button made him shoot a pellet from his slingshot. The X and Y buttons didn’t seem to do anything.

Five minutes later I was ready to give up. The gate leading out of the village was locked shut, a bird villager was constantly yelling “yoo-hoo,” and a circular icon in the corner of the screen constantly flashed different words at me –leap, open, chat, crawl. The game made no sense. I growled and shut the FantastiMega off.

That sucked more than I thought it would. I thought. I’m going to return it as soon as I can.

A pale blue light, wavering as if I were looking at it from underwater. There was nothing else but a black void around it.

Tentacles, many. Where my legs should be. Where my hair should be. I felt them twitching, writhing, curling into perfect spirals. It was normal, natural to be this way.

A song, fast and steady, my body moving in time with it. My three heartbeats quickened to match its tempo. The music sounded urgent.

A voice, deep, raspy, powerful, and familiar. The voice of someone that my soul trusted. It spoke in a gurgling language that I somehow understood.

“Rise, Octopus!”

My eyes shot open to a dark bedroom. The bead-curtain-covered ceiling faintly glimmered by the light from the street lamp outside. It was still the middle of the night. There was a thick layer of sweat coating my chest and neck. Blech! I stumbled out of bed and headed for my out-of-date pink bathroom.

An octopus dream? I thought as I turned the shell-shaped shower faucet from cool to hot. Why? I hated Eagle’s Quarry! Why didn’t the dreams stop?

The water from the shower was just hot enough to raise goosebumps up and down my arms. I squeezed an enormous glob of sugar-scented shower gel onto my bath puff and scrubbed vigorously at the sweat-slime on my chest. It had been years since I’d had a nightmare that caused me to wake up drenched.

It wasn’t a nightmare. A doubting thought had snuck in. You felt nice. That was a good dream.

Oh, shut up, brain, I snapped at myself. Who gets the sweats from dreams that aren’t nightmares? It was either a bad dream, or I’m using too many blankets.

My mental logic made perfect sense. Nobody ever woke up with heart pounding and enough sweat to quench a desert’s thirst from a nice dream. And it wasn’t a wet dream either, no smooth-talking hunk panting while lying on top of me. Therefore, it must have been a nightmare.

I turned the shower off. Water dripped from my hair, making heavy thud, thud, thud noises against the coral and cream bathroom tiles. I was lying to myself. The dream wasn’t a nightmare at all.

A calling. The thought caused me to pause. Was I being contacted by something more than human?

It’s him! It’s MC Tentachill!

No, anxiety, it is NOT that stupid octopus man, you’re just being extreme, I said to myself. I’m going back to bed, and this time, no octopus dreams, please!

The alarm clock next to my bed read 3:45 as I snuggled into my blankets. Stars dotted the night sky outside. The fan propped up in my window hummed softly. It should have been enough to lull me to sleep. Instead, I tossed and turned.

Should I schedule an earlier appointment with my therapist? I wondered, squeezing my knees around one of my extra pillows. There was a strange homesickness gnawing at my stomach, but I’d lived in the same area for all my life. There wasn’t another “home” for me to go to.

The fact that my thoughts kept returning to a cartoon character was bothering me more than the homesickness. The fictional men I daydreamed about were from adult-only romance novels, not kids’ video games. Why couldn’t I get him out of my head?

I put on my glasses, made a note in my phone to call the doctor’s office in the morning, and opened my e-reader app. I knew I wasn’t going to be able to sleep any time soon.