The claw machine by Nadia Born

now offers babies for prizes. limited-edition grow-in-water ones that you can take home. no special instructions. just set it in the bathtub until it expands into a life-sized child. your sister thinks it’s a lame prize, she’d prefer a hello kitty or a pokémon. but you spend your evenings under the neon kaleidoscope of the seaside arcade. all you need is a roll of quarters and a steady hand. you jimmy the joystick and imagine testing the bath water with your elbow, shielding newborn eyes from the suds. you’ve studied the claw for years, have memorized its trajectory. your strategy is the same: hover over the child on the top of the pile, it’s supposed to be the easiest to win. after a while, you’re sure the game is rigged except then you get frozen custard and see new parents on the salt-licked boardwalk holding their babies like trophies. the custard drips into the cradle of your fingers. gotta get the angle right, says the arcade manager. it’s just a matter of time, says your mother. maybe try another machine, says your sister. you tap the button and watch the claw descend. you hold your breath as it grips the baby in a heart-sized fist. this is it, you think, your lucky break. you peer through the plexiglass, wait and see if the baby slips on the way up. it’s too early to tell so you thumb the quarters in your pocket, check how many chances you’ve got left.

Nadia Born’s stories are featured in SmokeLong Quarterly, Electric Literature and elsewhere. Learn more at www.nadiaborn.com.