It was a Sunday afternoon. The kind of day where you’re supposed to relax, eat jollof rice, and think about life decisions. But not me and my boys. Oh no. We had other plans. We had FIFA. And nothing, not even a locked door, could stop us from having an epic gaming session.
Let me set the scene for you. There was me, Kofi — the self-proclaimed FIFA king — my cousin Kojo — who was always the “underdog” player (but really just bad) — and Nana, my younger brother, who was just happy to press random buttons and see the chaos unfold.
Now, I should probably mention that the TV we were playing on wasn’t exactly ours. It was our landlord's. Yes, you read that right. Our landlord had this enormous flat-screen TV, the kind that makes you feel like you're in the cinema. It had all the best features. Clear picture. Surround sound. Even the remote looked like it came straight out of a James Bond movie.
And of course, we weren’t supposed to be playing FIFA on it. It was forbidden. The landlord had clearly told us, “Don’t touch the TV, don’t even look at it wrong.” But like any good rebellious children, we ignored the warning. We had FIFA to play. And who needs rules when you have a controller in your hand?
So there we were. Three grown men sitting on the floor, each with a controller in hand, battling it out over the most important thing in life: pride. Who would be crowned FIFA champion? Would it be Kojo, who had zero skill but a lot of confidence? Or Nana, who mashed every button in sight, hoping for the best? Or me, the self-declared king, who always promised to teach them how to play… but never did?
It all started when I picked Manchester City — a top team — of course. I was feeling good. I was sure this would be my victory lap. Kojo, however, was overconfident as usual. He chose Chelsea. I don’t know why. Chelsea hadn’t won anything since, well, the 90s in my opinion. Nana, for reasons only he could explain, picked a random team in the Italian league — Genoa. I didn’t even know Genoa played football. But I wasn’t worried. Nana was the type who would kick the ball out of bounds just to see how far it would go.
We started. And things went well at first. Kojo was shouting at his screen every two seconds, “Ooooh! I’m about to score, ooooh! Watch this!” And of course, I was just quietly waiting to destroy him with my slick skills. Nana? Nana was just mashing buttons, staring at the screen like a confused goat watching its reflection.
But then, the unthinkable happened.
I had just scored an amazing goal with Kevin De Bruyne. I was doing the “I’m the boss” dance in my head when I noticed something strange. The TV started to flicker. Just a small flicker, like the power was about to go out.
“Did you see that?” I asked, eyes narrowed.
“What?” Kojo asked.
“The TV just flickered. Like, it was glitching,” I said, suspiciously. “Kojo, did you press something?”
“No,” Kojo said, eyes glued to the screen, still bragging about his non-existent football skills. “You’re just mad because I’m about to score.”
Suddenly, the screen went completely black. Not just a little black. I mean black as midnight with no stars.
The kind of black that makes you question your life choices. My heart dropped. The sound cut off. The remote? Unresponsive. My hopes of being crowned the king of FIFA were gone in an instant.
“Guys,” I said, voice trembling. “The TV is off.”
“Impossible,” Kojo said, standing up and shaking the remote like it owed him money. “It’s probably just a glitch. Calm down.”
I reached for the power button on the TV. Nothing. I turned the TV on and off again. Nothing. I hit the remote a few more times, just in case it was a magical remote that needed a little persuasion. Still nothing. Panic started setting in.
“I told you we shouldn’t have used it,” I said, feeling the weight of my bad decisions crashing down on me.
“You’ve broken it!” Kojo yelled. “You broke the landlord’s TV!”
I looked at Nana. Nana looked at me. Then we looked at the TV. The silence between us was deafening.
“You know what this means, right?” Nana whispered, his voice shaking. “The landlord is going to kick us out.”
I wasn’t sure if that was true. But I wasn’t willing to test it. There was only one thing left to do.
We needed a plan.
The Plan (or Lack Thereof)
We stood there, staring at the dead TV like it was the last piece of bread in a famine. The reality was hitting hard. The landlord was the kind of man who wouldn’t hesitate to throw us out for something as trivial as a broken TV. He wasn’t a bad guy — just... very particular about his things.
I had to think fast. My mind was racing. “Okay,” I said, feeling the sweat on my forehead. “We need to fix this. Fast.”
Kojo and Nana both turned to me, waiting for a brilliant solution. I could feel the weight of their expectations. The truth was, I didn’t have a plan. My first instinct was to run. But running was not an option. Not when we were in his living room with his expensive TV.
“Alright,” I said. “Let’s start by acting like nothing happened.”
“Like... pretend the TV just... went black?” Kojo asked, scratching his head. “How do you do that?”
I had no idea. But sometimes, when you’re in trouble, pretending to be calm can work wonders. “Exactly. Just act natural. It’ll be fine.”
We stood there, not moving, waiting for the inevitable confrontation. My thoughts drifted to the landlord. He was a tall man, with a deep voice that could shake you to your core. He had this way of looking at you, like he was trying to read your soul. And at that moment, I felt like he could hear our hearts beating through the walls.
Kojo, ever the optimist, spoke up. “Maybe it’s just a fuse or something. Let’s check the power source.”
I nodded, grateful for his practical thinking. “Good idea. Let’s check the wires.”
We marched to the back of the TV like we were on a mission. I peered behind the set, and my heart sank. The plug was securely in the socket. Everything seemed normal. I poked it a little, like it was a stubborn child who wouldn’t get out of bed. Still nothing.
Meanwhile, Nana was busy pacing around the living room, looking like he was about to make a run for it.
“Stop walking around,” I whispered. “You’re making things worse.”
“I can’t help it!” he hissed back. “We broke the landlord’s TV! Do you know what he’ll do to us?”
Before I could answer, the front door creaked open. We froze. It was him. The landlord. The man who could end our lives with a single glance. We didn’t even move when he walked into the living room.
“Afternoon, boys,” he said, a bit too casually.
“Afternoon, sir,” we replied, all in unison.
He looked at the TV, then at us. Then back at the TV.
“Everything alright?” he asked, a hint of suspicion in his voice.
“Oh, yeah! All good!” I said, smiling like a madman. “Just... enjoying the... uh... silence.”
There was a pause. The landlord stared at the TV, then at me. Then at Nana. Then at Kojo. He wasn’t saying anything. He was just... looking.
I thought for a second he might pull out a knife and ask us to make our final wishes. I mean, how could we explain what had happened? How could I explain that our FIFA session had ended with us sitting on the floor in front of a dead TV?
“Hmm,” he finally said, scratching his chin. “Well, if you’re done with your FIFA, I’ll just leave you to it.”
My heart skipped a beat. Was he going to let us off the hook that easily? Could it be?
But no. The suspense was killing me. And I had the sneaking feeling that he wasn’t buying my “everything is fine” act.
Kojo, in an effort to ease the tension, did what Kojo does best. He started talking. “Actually, sir... we were just... uh... testing the sound quality on your TV. It’s a... a little too... silent, don’t you think?”
The landlord squinted. Then he chuckled. “Ah, you boys. You know you can’t just press buttons and expect it to work, right?”
I smiled awkwardly. “Yeah, yeah. We know.”
He leaned in, then said the words I feared most.
“Did you try turning it off and on again?”
We all stared at him. “Yes,” I said, my voice cracking. “Yes, we did.”
The landlord laughed again, this time harder. “You know, sometimes the best solution is just patience. Don’t worry about it. It’ll come back on.”
I blinked. Could it be? Could the landlord be... forgiving?
Then he turned to walk away and added, “But if it doesn’t... I’m going to charge you for a new TV. Consider that your warning.”
The Great Fixing Fail
The landlord’s words were like a weight lifted from my shoulders. I felt the tension dissolve a little, but I knew we weren’t in the clear just yet. There was still the matter of the broken TV. The more I thought about it, the more I realized: The landlord was probably just being nice, but he wasn’t going to let this slide for long.
The idea of paying for a new TV, especially when I barely had enough to get by with my daily gari and beans meal, made my stomach churn. I needed to fix this. But how?
I turned to Kojo, who had a smug look on his face, as though he’d just won the lottery.
“What?” I asked, suspicious.
“Relax,” Kojo said. “I’ve got this.”
“Got what? The TV’s still broken, and the landlord is watching us. How is this going to fix itself?” I was about to lose it.
“No worries,” Kojo said, as if he had the secret to world peace hidden in his back pocket. “I have a plan. It’s a simple one. We just need to ‘reset’ the TV.”
“Reset?” I repeated. “How do we even reset a flat-screen TV? We’re not trying to do surgery here, Kojo.”
“Relax, relax,” Kojo said again, waving his hand dismissively. “It’s easy. We’ll unplug it, wait for a while, and then plug it back in. It works every time.”
I looked at Nana, who was staring at the TV like it had personally wronged him. Nana didn’t speak. Instead, he took out his phone, probably Googling how to “fix a broken TV” or watching football highlights from a better place in life.
“Okay,” I said, trying to keep my hope alive. “Let’s do it.”
Kojo confidently walked over to the TV, yanked the plug from the socket, and stood there, looking like a genius. We waited. One minute. Two minutes. Three minutes. It was starting to feel like we were praying for a miracle.
“Okay, that’s enough waiting,” Kojo said. “Let’s plug it in and voila, the TV will come back to life.”
He plugged it in. We held our breaths.
Nothing.
The TV remained as black as a moonless night.
“Kojo!” I screamed. “You’ve killed it! You’ve killed the landlord’s TV!”
But Kojo, ever the optimist, tried again. He unplugged and plugged the TV in another five times. No result.
“I think it’s dead,” I said, resigned to my fate. “We need to face facts. The TV is gone. It’s over.”
Nana, who had been mysteriously quiet up until this point, suddenly broke his silence. “Wait... wait,” he said, his voice shaky but full of excitement. “I have an idea.”
“You? You have an idea?” Kojo said. “You can barely figure out how to play FIFA, and now you have an idea about fixing a TV?”
“Just listen,” Nana said, tapping his phone screen. “I saw this guy on YouTube. He says there’s a way to fix any TV. We just need to reset it using the power button.”
“Where’s the power button?” I asked, suddenly interested.
Nana was already Googling furiously. “It’s on the side. Right here.”
We rushed to the side of the TV, squatting like we were about to discover treasure. Nana was pointing at a small, almost invisible button on the side of the TV. He pressed it. Nothing happened.
“Come on!” I screamed. “What do we have to lose?”
Nana pressed it again. A small light flickered on the TV.
“Did it work?” Kojo asked, leaning in like a hawk.
We all held our breath. The TV made a faint, electric sound — a small pop. Then suddenly, the screen blinked. A flash of color. And then...
It came back on.
WE HAD DONE IT.
The TV was back.
We stared at it in awe, as though we had just resurrected a dinosaur. The image appeared. The sound returned. It was as if nothing had ever happened. We were like three triumphant engineers who had just discovered the secret to life itself.
But just as we were about to celebrate, we heard the front door creak open again.
It was the landlord.
“Ah, I see the TV is back on,” he said, stepping into the living room with a grin.
I smiled awkwardly, trying to pretend I wasn’t sweating like a thief caught red-handed. “Yeah, we... we just had to give it some time,” I said, my voice cracking. “Sometimes these things just need... rest.”
The landlord stared at the TV, then looked at us with a knowing smile. “Well, I’m glad you boys are enjoying yourselves. Just remember, no more playing FIFA on my TV, okay? It’s for watching news and football matches, not video games.”
We nodded quickly.
Kojo, trying to redeem himself, stood up and said, “Of course, sir. You have our word. We will never touch your TV again... unless we have to reset it, of course.”
The landlord chuckled. “Just make sure you don’t break it again, or I’ll have to charge you for a new one.”
“Understood, sir!” I said, practically bowing.
With that, he left. We were free. The landlord was none the wiser. And the TV? Well, it was back, and we had learned an important lesson: Never, ever, ever play FIFA on the landlord’s TV again.
The Unseen Consequences
After the landlord left, we collapsed onto the couch like we had just survived a natural disaster. The tension in the room finally started to ease up, but the reality of what had just happened hit me all at once. We had nearly destroyed the landlord’s TV, but somehow, by some miracle, we had gotten away with it.
But, of course, this was not the end.
A few days later, as I was sitting in my room, minding my own business and thinking about what a close call we had just had, I heard a knock on the door.
“Hey!” Kojo yelled from the other side. “Get up! We’re going out!”
I sighed. “I’m not going anywhere, man. I’m still recovering from the last adventure.”
But Kojo wasn’t having it. He burst into my room and dragged me out of bed. “Come on! We can’t just sit here and do nothing. We need to celebrate our victory.”
“Victory?” I said, groaning. “We didn’t win anything. We just survived the wrath of the landlord.”
Kojo grinned. “Well, then it’s time we do something normal for a change. I’m taking you out for some jollof and chicken. And I’m paying.”
That got my attention. “You’re paying?” I asked, raising an eyebrow. “You’ve got money?”
Kojo pulled out a crumpled wad of notes from his pocket and waved them in front of me. “I’m rich today! I just got paid for fixing the landlord’s TV.”
“Wait, what? You fixed it?” I asked, confused.
“Yep. I told him I fixed the TV... after you guys tried to break it with your ‘reset’ technique. He doesn’t know the half of it. I told him I ‘reset the system’ or whatever. He bought it.”
I blinked. “You actually got paid?”
Kojo nodded proudly. “I did. And now we’re going out to eat!”
I was still processing the situation. We had technically broken the landlord’s TV, but Kojo had somehow turned the whole disaster into a profitable situation.
“Okay, let’s go then,” I said, still in disbelief. “But if he finds out, you’re the one who’s going to explain this whole thing.”
“Don’t worry. He’ll never know,” Kojo assured me as we headed out the door.
We went to our usual hangout spot and treated ourselves to some delicious jollof rice and fried chicken. Kojo, as promised, paid the bill. Nana joined us later, having somehow managed to survive the entire FIFA debacle without breaking a sweat. He’d spent the entire day watching football matches on his phone, as though nothing had happened.
As we dug into our food, I realized something important: we’d survived. Sure, we’d almost destroyed the TV, and yes, we had played FIFA like we were invincible, but somehow, we were still standing. And we were going to enjoy this moment of victory, no matter how small.
Later that evening, as I was walking back home, I felt a sense of accomplishment. Not because we fixed the TV, but because we had gotten away with it. In the grand scheme of things, breaking a TV was a minor inconvenience compared to the chaos we’d faced over the past few days. I thought about how easy it could have been for the landlord to kick us out — or worse, make us pay for the entire TV.
But somehow, we made it through. We were like cats with nine lives, surviving one close call after another.
And as I reached the door of my room, I stopped and looked at the landlord’s TV. It was still there. Still working. Still looking innocent.
But I knew better now.
The End.
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