Page 31 of Playing Flirty

We discussed Neema’s wedding (my parents were coming!), her current work (painting portraits), her love for my father (unnecessarily explicit), and finally, my board game (she insisted I finish it and submit it to the competition or she’d disown me).

“I mean it, we’ll cut you off!” she teased, her voice breaking up due to their shaky internet connection. “I watched you create this game. I watched you build it. You were so little, with no idea what the world had in store for you, and your dreams were uncontainable. Finish it, please. Show the world what you made for them.”

I rolled my eyes, even though my chest pounded with want. I couldn’t play it down and pretend I didn’t want that. “It’s not such a big deal…”

“For someone who loves these games, you sure are afraid to roll the dice.”

“I’ll see,” I said, wanting to be freed from the truth bomb she insisted on dropping. I was afraid it would shatter all the lies that currently held my life together. “I have to go.”

“Do you still love him, Rosie?” she asked before I could hang up.

I paused. My heart raced in the seconds that passed.

The one thing I could always rely on was my mother’s intuition. Before I stumbled in search of an answer, she gracefully changed the topic. “I think a ghost visited me last night.”

“Tell me everything.”

Round 11

Even after I’d backtracked on my concerns about Mr. Markham, Shaun took it upon himself to ensure I was never left alone with my boss at work.

I’d always thought of Shaun as my brother, and I imagined it would feel something like this.

He wheeled over with two foil-wrapped squares and handed me what I knew would be the stretchiest, cheesiest sandwich in town.

“Your unread emails drive me nuts.” Shaun peeked at my screen, his mouth full of food.

I tore open the foil with my teeth while scrolling. “I get so much promotional mail.”

“Do you know that you don’t get a prize for subscribing to everything? Is this one of the strange things you’ve turned into a game?”

“No, I just don’t like missing things.”

“As if any of that is important. You’ve left them unread for a reason.”

I huffed and read the bolded text. “There’s some useful stuff here. A newLady of Waris being released next month, andthere’s a discount in this email.” I kept scrolling. “And this…” I paused, my heart hopping to my throat.

Shaun’s eyes landed on the subject line I had selected:

There’s still time to submit your original board games!

His chewing stopped.

I ignored the email, like I’d ignored the original one, and like I was ignoring the way my stomach fluttered at the possibility of it.

Shaun grabbed my computer mouse before I could press delete. “Too slow, Rose.” He read through the email without stopping until he found the link to the submission guidelines.

I sunk deeper and deeper into my seat. Having Shaun read that email made it feel all too real, as if it was actually possible that I could win.

“You have to do this!” He faced me, pinning me with his gaze. “Aside from the cash prize, your board game would be developed and distributed worldwide. Rose, your game would be played everywhere.”

I shook my head despite my fluttering stomach twisting into an ache in my chest. “I don’t have time. I didn’t have time when they made the initial announcement, and now I have even less time.”

I reached for the mouse, and he wheeled away.

“You have to,” Shaun said. “Isn’t your game like almost done?”

“You know nothing about my game.” Anger crept up, but it wasn’t meant to be directed at Shaun. The only other person that I’d ever tried showing my game to, outside of my parentsand Gandalf, was Patrick, and he wasn’t interested in playing it. “This isn’t real life.” I swiped the mouse and gestured at the screen before closing the window and replacing it with my office emails. “This is.”

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