Scrabble

Mary drank a cup of tea and put down a plate of Oreos. Veronica relaxed for the first time all day. Cadbury was resting his head on her lap, and life was livable. “Scrabble?” Mary suggested. Veronica was thrilled to oblige. She covered Cadbury with a quilt and gently twirled his ears while Mary unfolded the board and threw down the letters.

“Mary, tell me about your family,” Veronica said. Mary’s family had lived through World War II. There weren’t many of them left and the subject was usually off-limits. But under the circumstances, Veronica hoped Mary would bend. She felt like traveling somewhere that wasn’t here or now.

“Oh, my baby. That was a long time ago. And very far away. You know I don’t like to talk about it. It lives in me. That is enough.” Mary looked up and smiled a sad smile. “I made him some livers today. Just like my mother used to make. Good for his heart. He is eating, that is a good sign.”

Unlike her parents, Mary didn’t make Veronica talk about anything. Veronica fiddled with her Scrabble letters and arranged the word r-a-d-i-u-s on the board. Thirty-one points. It was a decent word, not a fancy word, but it utilized the triple word score. Mary, for all her infinite wisdom and kindness, had never mastered triple and double word scores. Veronica nearly always won.

“You know what I do, my baby, when I am worried?”

“What?” Veronica asked. She tried to relax her face so she didn’t look worried.

“I remind myself that I am loved. Don’t make a face and tell me it is cornmeal.”

“Corny.”

“Nothing is all the way bad when there is that. It is a shelf. To catch you from falling all the way down. I love you. Your parents love you very much. Cadbury loves you. Look how he loves you. And he is right there, still breathing, very much alive, on your lap. It is too soon to worry, my baby.”

Mary spelled t-o-y and got six points. “It is your turn, my baby,” Mary said.

Veronica carefully removed her hand, which had been resting under Cadbury’s barrel chest and had fallen asleep. She shook it, and the dog gave a sigh. Mary was right. It was too soon to worry. She looked back at her letters. She had a J. The word j-o-y came to mind. But there was no place to make that word with the letters on the board arranged the way they were. And even if there was, j-o-y was hardly worth the measly thirteen points.

“Do you have homework, my baby?” Mary asked.

“No,” Veronica lied. She couldn’t very well work on her Monet project if she wasn’t at the museum. Tomorrow she would go to the museum. Tomorrow she would deal with Melody because tomorrow Cadbury would be better. Tomorrow he would need her less.