Chapter 1

It was 11:00 AM when I finally got back to the dorm after my gym session. I opened the door and walked in, and there he was—my roommate, Aryan. Since it was a weekend morning, both of us had the day off from college, and I saw him just lounging on the couch. As I stepped inside, I tossed my jacket and keys into the basket and holder by the door. The noise caught his attention, and he greeted me with sudden excitement.

“Oh, Zack! Finally, you’re back. Remember last night you told me you were gonna give Game of Thrones a shot?”

Oh, shoot. I instantly remembered that stupid promise I had made him yesterday. He had been being really irritating, wanting to vent and discuss the bad ending with someone, so I had just told him I’d start watching it today just to get him off my back. But looks like I actually had to stick to my word.

“Oh ... yeah, of course, dude. I remember,” I said with a nervous laugh.

Untying my shoes, I sat down right beside him on the couch. I was still in my gym clothes because I was way too tired to change yet, and the cold breeze from the AC felt absolutely amazing. Aryan excitedly grabbed the remote and turned on the TV, rambling about how I needed to pay close attention and that I could ask him anything if I got confused. Aryan is a massive nerd, both in college and with any piece of media he likes. I just gave him a reassuring nod; honestly, I just wanted to relax on the couch in the cool air conditioning.

Aryan got Game of Thrones loaded up on the screen. Right before hitting play, he looked over and asked, “Ready?”

“Yeah, dude, just play it,” I replied.

We both kicked back on the couch as the first episode started. I wasn’t really paying attention at first, but Aryan was staring at the screen with absolute intensity, even though he’d already watched the show before and had even read the books.

For me, all I saw on screen was some happy family living in a cold, northern region who kept giant wolves as pets. The main character seemed to be the head of the family, a guy who had two young adult sons, two daughters, and a younger son who loved climbing walls. As the episode went on, I learned that this northern family was getting really tensed up because the King was arriving at their castle to meet them for some important reason. Aryan nudged me from the side, telling me to focus because this was a huge part. He explained that King Robert Baratheon was coming to Winterfell—which was the northern family’s house—and that the King was bringing his kids, his wife, and his wife’s brothers along because they needed some favors from the Stark family.

I got distracted by the window of our dorm, as the happy sunny day outside just turned to dark storm like weather.

“Yo, Aryan, look outside. It’s getting so dark and windy,” I muttered, glancing toward our dorm window.

But Aryan didn’t want me getting distracted. He poked me, telling me to keep my eyes on the screen because King Robert had just arrived at Winterfell to meet the Starks.

In the episode, it turned out that the main character, Ned Stark, and King Robert were childhood best friends. They even announced that Ned’s daughter, Sansa, would marry Robert’s son, Joffrey, to become the future queen. This made Aryan let out a subtle chuckle. “Foreshadowing for the future story?” he muttered, but then he quickly apologized, saying he wasn’t going to spoil anything and told me to keep watching. Next, we saw a blonde woman character named Cersei Lannister. She was the Queen and Robert’s wife. You could immediately tell she was cunning and definitely gave off some heavy negative energy, like a textbook rude queen.

When that Cersei character started interacting with her brother, Jaime Lannister— who was supposed to be the king’s best soldier—Aryan chuckled again.

“Why do you keep doing that? Do they have some weird history, dude?” I asked.

Aryan denied it, waving his hand, and told me to just keep watching, teasing that it was way worse than I thought.

The episode also had some weird plot point about a mysterious letter that got the main character really stressed out, something about the “Hand of the King” and a bunch of political stuff that went totally over my head for now. Anyway, a few scenes later, the youngest Stark boy, who was a great climber, started rushing up the walls of a high tower in Winterfell. Aryan got visibly excited, telling me to watch carefully and spoiling that something massive was about to happen.

When the kid finally reached the window at the very top of the tower, Aryan braced himself for the big reveal. But on the screen, the kid just climbed right through the window, and absolutely no one was inside. The tower room was completely empty.

The kid just turned around and calmly started walking down the tower stairs.

I was completely confused as to why Aryan had been hyping this scene up so much.

But when I turned to look at him, he looked totally shocked. His face was twisted in pure confusion.

“Dude, you okay? There was nothing there. Why were you telling me to brace for impact?” I joked.

Aryan stood up, completely baffled, and grabbed the remote to reverse the scene.

“There’s no way,” he muttered. He replayed it, and I watched him sink deeper into confusion.

“Dude, stop, what are you doing? Let me see the rest of the episode,” I complained.

But he turned around, looking entirely shocked and confused. “Dude ... in this scene,

Cersei and Jaime were supposed to be having sex with each other, and Bran was supposed to stumble upon them.”

Hearing that actually shocked me. “What?! Dude, are you insane?” I said, bursting out laughing. “Dude, you gotta play fewer porn games. That is so weird. What the fuck are you talking about? A kid stumbling upon adults having sex?” I continued to laugh.

But Aryan kept insisting. “Dude, seriously, in the actual show, it happened! It was like the big twist of the premiere. I remember it clearly!”