Man Missing For 20 Years Surfaces, Is Declared Winner Of Hide-And-Seek Game

by Benjo

When I was a kid, I remember losing myself for days at a time in a game of Parsec, but this guy takes the idea of getting lost in a game to a whole different level.

Jake Litton, who has been missing since 1989, finally appeared on Tuesday, giving his family some long-awaited relief and putting an end to what historians are calling the longest hide-and-seek game ever played.

Litton's older brother, Danny, who now goes by Dan, and neighborhood youths Mike Danforth and Gilly Richardson, all came out of their hiding spots after an hour or so on the day the game began, when it was time for dinner. But Jake stayed put—until now.

“No one ever said, 'Come out, come out, wherever you are,'” Jake said. “So I assumed the game was still going.”

Jake came up with the idea for his hiding spot while eating breakfast on the day of the game. “No one would ever think to check there, so I knew it would be a winner,” he said. He declined to reveal the location of the hiding spot, citing his desire to use it again in future games.

“People think it would be boring, but to be honest, it was the best 20 years of my life,” Jake said. “Yes, I spent puberty in a hiding spot, but so does everyone, in a sense.”

Jake finally made the decision to come out when he smelled French toast. “I love my mom's French toast,” he said, “and I was really hungry—you know, since I've just been living on bugs and whatever else crawled by for 20 years.”

However, when he came downstairs for breakfast, he was met with disappointment. “It ended up being someone else's mom's French toast. Turns out my parents sold the house twelve years ago. The kid gave me a bite, though, so it's all good.”

“I'm relieved that my little brother's still alive,” said Dan Litton, who is now a commodities trader at Goldman Sachs. “But the idea that he won the game is total crap. We stopped for dinner, not because anyone ever found me. Hell, if I'd wanted, I probably could've lasted 20 years in my hiding spot, too.”

At 29 years old, but with only a third-grade education, Jake is not sure what he will do with his life. His first priority, he says, is to get his brother and the other kids in the neighborhood together for another game of hide-and-seek. “I was the winner,” he said. “So it's my turn to be it.”