Skipping over to the counter with high hopes, I handed them my card.

“You have 270 tickets,” The man said with a smile.

Ugh.. I thought. I thought for sure it’d be more than that!

Seeing the disappointment on my face, he leaned in and whispered, “If you want to get something for 300, that’s cool.”

This completely flew over my head. I got some candy, and as I was heading out the door, it hit me about this man’s kind gesture.

I turned to my older sister, “Did he technically give me free tickets?”

She nodded, “Yep.”

My heart felt so warm. Feeling a smile spread across my face, I turned back to the man, who was already looking at me.

“Thank you for the free tickets!” I yelled, to which he shrugged and told me it was not a problem.

As I walked out of the arcade, I could hear my brother-in-law say to my sister, “I bet she got that guy fired,”

“What do you mean?” I chimed in, feeling my face scrunch.

“You let everybody know in the arcade that he gave you free tickets. What if his boss heard that?”

And that’s the story of how guilt and embarrassment ate my teenage self alive: literally and figuratively.