Page 28 of The Christmas Extra

Stillman, it’s a sin to lie.

Shit. Fine. I enjoyed knowing he was fiery. And I enjoyed knowing he ran hot most of the time while I was more chill.

“Like going to the movies? Shit like that?” Wow, look at all the words. That college education was rebooting. Pretty soon I might complete a whole paragraph.

“Shit just like that.” Okay yeah, he was smuggy now. “Or dinners out or dancing or playing board games. Well, maybe we’d do date things like older folks. I’m not sure young people even really date in person anymore. Which is incredibly sad. You really can’t get to know a person unless you interact with them face-to-face, I think. Talking through a screen is fine, but nothing can replace that human touch.”

Board games. Did I even have any board games? Unlikely since playing a board game by yourself was damn depressing and predictable. You always win, right? I used to enjoy the hell out of board games. We’d play them for hours back in our poor student days. Play games, fuck, eat junk food, study in between. Life was so much easier back then, idyllic. Shame life has to shit all over us as soon as we leave campus. Guess that’s life lesson number one.

“Maybe,” I mumbled after a lengthy think. Tony scooted his chair closer and pecked my cheek.

“I’ve never heard a ‘maybe’ sound so good. Do you still like playingBattleship?”

“I don’t know. It’s been ages since I played it.”

“Well, we’ll just have to have us a few rounds to see.”

Chapter Nine

“Idon’t get it. Whyare there little pegs? Aren’t they choking hazards?”

I stared at Mignon over the top of the game board. For some crazy reason, Tony had invited him and Teddy to our Thanksgiving meal. Sure, it was my house and I should have the final say about not having people over—it was a rule of mine that I kind of enjoyed—but Tony had bought all the food and cooked it so...whatever. I could play host for a few hours. Maybe.

“You put the white pegs in the top grid for misses. Red pegs are for hits. As for the other comment, we grew up in the days of jarts so swallowing a tiny plastic peg was a nothing. Now, are you ready to play?” I asked because we’d already dicked away ten minutes as he argued for a different game to play, preferably something online or with an app. The fact that Tony had brought these thrift store finds, one of my fave board games plusMonopoly, was reason enough to not look for stupid digital versions. Sometimes you had to shove a red peg into your grid by hand. Gen Z just didn’t have a clue.

I heard Tony chuckling behind me as his PA scowled at the highly used red play set in front of him. Teddy was nursing a glass of beer, moping into his cold brew as he had been all day. The guy was a good lawman but a poor boyfriend. He tended to jump from one lily pad to another like a randy frog and then wonder why, when he needed somewhere dry to sit, all the pads he’d once rested his keister on told him to fuck all the way off.

“So I blow up your ships or you blow up mine. Then what?”

“Then I shout, ‘I win!’ and we go have pie.”

“Why don’t we just have pie and skip obliterating each other? I mean, what kind of lesson are we teaching kids here?” he asked, took a sip of his latte, and picked up a red peg to study it in depth.

“Tony, why don’t you just serve the pie and we’ll skip board games for now,” I called over my shoulder.

“We can do that,” he said, reaching around me to place a slab of pumpkin pie in front of me. Teddy was too busy drowning his broken heart in beer bottle number six of the day to react to dessert. Poor guy. Seems the little wardrobe assistant had gotten under his skin, big time. She’d left for the holiday break with a burr under her saddle after catching him making eyes at one of the fans who had lined up outside the library two days ago when a scene was being filmed on the steps. My mom used to have a saying about sauces, geese, and ganders. With the battleships pushed to the side for later—Tony and I would have a rousing seafaring encounter, I was sure—and pie being enjoyed by all aside from Teddy, I sat back, belly full, and had a flashback. Generally, I did my best to not let the holidays get to me, but the lingering taste of clove, nutmeg, and all those other glorious pie spices yanked me back to my youth.

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