sit, sort, visor, stir, sir, rots, riots, trios, iris, sort, visit
BUT I GUESS a guy should never say ‘never’ because, by the following Wednesday, I was even boreder, which I realize is not a word. But if some of the words used at the Scrabble Club were actual words, then I vote that ‘boreder’ should be one too.
When my mom left for work, she said she might have a drink with Jane again. ‘I’ll be home before midnight, and I’ll have my cell.’
‘Great,’ I said. ‘Don’t worry about me. I’ll be having another wild and crazy night at home with me, myself, and I, choosing what show to watch in our one-channel universe.’
Her face crumpled and I regretted my words instantly.
‘I’m doing the best I can, Ambrose.’
‘I know, Mom,’ I said quickly. ‘I know.’
After she’d gone, I played solitaire until I heard Mr and Mrs E leave for their weekly dance night at the Greek Cultural Center, then I went outside and sat in the passenger seat of Cosmo’s Camaro.
If he was surprised to see me when he stepped out at ten to seven, he didn’t show it. He just got into the driver’s seat, started the car, and said, ‘You pay for both of us this week.’
I did even worse that night, losing all three games, including my game against Cosmo, which was truly humiliating.
‘I had the worst letters ever,’ I told him, on the way home. ‘A monkey could have beat me with the letters I had.’
Cosmo whistled under his breath. ‘Wow, little friend. I wouldn’t have pegged you for a sore loser.’
But even though I lost, something was beginning to click. I was starting to see the board differently, or at least, how some of my opponents, like Mohammed and Joan, looked at the board. And even though I was grumpy at the end, I definitely wasn’t bored.
Now, during my evenings at home alone, I studied words. Amanda had photocopied some lists for me, and I studied all the two-letter words, plus ‘U’-less ‘Q’ words, and ‘vowel dumps’, words that use up a lot of vowels in a single turn.
On our fourth visit to the Scrabble Club, in early March, I won a game against Joan, thanks to playing the word ‘QWERTYS’ on a triple word score, the ‘S’ placed at the end of her word ‘SKUNK’. I beat her 303 to 299, mainly because she had some tiles left over that were added to my score, but I didn’t care. I still beat her, and I got my first-ever score in the 300s. The victory was so sweet, I leaped up and did a little dance on my chair, waving my arms around and chanting, ‘Uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh.’
‘Cool your jets, smarty-pants,’ Joan said to me.
‘At least I fit into my pants,’ I said, under my breath.
When I looked at her, her face had gone kind of slack. For a moment, I wondered if she’d heard me.
But I decided she hadn’t. She was just miffed that she’d lost against a twelve-year-old boy-wonder.
On our way home that night, Cosmo was humming again, even though he’d had another 3 to 0 losing streak.
‘What are you doing Friday night?’ he asked.
‘Me? Nothing. Why?’
‘I invited Amanda to go bowling with us.’
‘Us?’
‘That’s right.’
‘I hate bowling.’ I didn’t add that I hated all sports.
‘You’ve got something better to do?’
‘I didn’t say that.’
The truth was, getting to go anywhere on a Friday night, even bowling, sounded better than another night at home watching CBC’s ‘The National’, their nightly newscast with Peter Mansbridge. Not that I had anything against Peter Mansbridge. In fact, I liked him a lot. His face and manner gave me comfort. Sometimes I even fantasized that he was my dad and that he would walk through the door around the same time as my mom. It was in a different, much bigger house that had rooms with names like ‘den’ and ‘media room’ and ‘solarium’, and he would be tired after another night of delivering the news to Canadians, but not so tired that he wouldn’t have time to chat with me about my day and make a date to play catch in the backyard. Then he and my mom would tuck me in and kiss me good night and go into their own bedroom, holding hands.
But then I would feel guilty about imagining anyone, other than my actual father, as my father.
‘There’s something you should know,’ Cosmo was saying. ‘She thinks it’s one of our Big Brother activities.’
I rolled my eyes. ‘Why did you ever tell her that?’
‘I don’t know. It was dumb. I wanted her to think—’
‘That you’re better than you are.’
He laughed and gestured to himself. ‘Can you blame me?’
‘No,’ I said, which, for some reason, made him laugh harder. ‘Does she know you smoke?’
‘She’s seen me smoking, yes.’
‘Does she know you’re unemployed and living at home?’
‘She knows I’m between jobs and temporarily staying with my parents.’
‘Does she know you’re an ex-con and an ex-drug addict?’
‘No,’ he said firmly. ‘And you’re not going to tell her. I’ll tell her when I’m ready.’
We were quiet for a moment, then he said, with a hint of impatience, ‘Look, are you in or out?’
I was in, no matter what. But I saw a little window of opportunity and I ran with it. ‘I’m in on one condition,’ I said.
‘What’s that?’
‘You teach me self-defense.’
‘Forget it.’
‘You said yourself I should learn.’
‘I meant a karate teacher, or tae kwon do, or something like that.’
‘We could never afford it. Plus, even if we could, Mom would never let me. She thinks it’s violent.’
‘Then she wouldn’t want me to teach you, either.’
‘Just a few moves? Please.’
He sighed as we pulled into the driveway. ‘Well, I guess you of all people should learn to defend yourself.’
‘What do you mean – me of all people?’
He looked me right in the eye. ‘Face it, Ambrose. You rub a lot of people the wrong way.’
‘I do not.’ But I knew I did. ‘So it’s a deal?’
‘Deal,’ he said.
We shook on it. He had an extremely firm grip. I got out of the car, shaking the feeling back into my hand. I was just about to head around the side of the house to our apartment when Mrs E stepped onto the porch, all dressed up in a matching floral skirt and blouse. I hadn’t even noticed their car parked in the driveway. They weren’t supposed to be home from the Greek Cultural Center yet. Thinking fast, I ducked out of sight, using the passenger side of the Camaro as my shield.
‘Ma, you’re home early,’ said Cosmo.
‘Your father has a bad stomach,’ she said, as she hurried down the steps to join him. ‘That man, he came looking for you. Your old friend, Silvio.’
Cosmo didn’t say anything for a moment. ‘What did he want?’
‘He said he needed to talk to you. I don’t like him, Cosmo.’ Mrs E sounded upset. ‘You told me you don’t hang around with people like him anymore.’
‘I don’t, Ma. I swear.’
‘He asked me to give you this.’ There was a brief silence, then the sound of someone scrunching up paper. I saw the balled-up wad hit the pavement on the driver’s side.
‘C’mon, Ma. Let’s go inside.’
I waited till I heard their front door close. Then I stood up and dashed around to the other side of the car and scooped up the ball of paper.
Once inside our apartment, I locked the door and got into my rocket-ship pajamas. Then I smoothed out the note.
There was only one word on it, and it wasn’t a word I’d ever seen before, even at the Scrabble Club: ‘UOME.’
It wasn’t until later, when I was lying in bed staring at my glow-in-the-dark stars and waiting for my mom to come home, that I understood.
UOME. You owe me.