Tegan

I stared down at the battered board, blinked, and then looked at Bradley. “Are you serious?”

He rested his arm on the side of his wheelchair and nodded toward his achievement. “Challenge it, you little shit.”

I stared at the five letters that he’d placed on the tattered board alongside an existing M.

M-U-Z-J-I-K.

“It doesn’t look like a word.”

“Challenge it, or close your gob,” he said.

“I said it doesn’t look like a word. It doesn’t.”

“I don’t have to tell you shit, but I will. Word of the day, muzjik. A muzjik is a Russian peasant. Mark me down for forty-eight. Your turn.”

Following a lengthy discussion, Bradley and I agreed to alter his schedule. After lunch, we added a game of Scrabble to our daily routine. His lifetime of reading left him with a tremendous vocabulary, and competing with him was equal parts frustrating and rewarding.

“Thank you,” I said. “I’ll remember that.”

After marking down his score, I looked at my options. I had a P, R, a blank tile, D, T, I, and an A. After a few seconds, I placed my letters on the board, using the Z in muzjik, which was spelled vertically.

“P-I-Z-Z-A. I get twenty-five for that. Ha!”

“You kids and pizza. That shit’s not fit to eat.”

“I don’t eat it. But it doesn’t mean I can’t spell it.”

He looked bewildered. “You don’t eat pizza?”

“Not unless I have to.”

“What would make you have to?”

“If someone served it to me,” I said. “I’d be polite and eat it. But, I’d never eat it by choice.”

“What’s your favorite food?”

I thought of my mother’s Swedish meatballs. I hadn’t eaten them in ages, and absolutely loved them as a kid. It was one of the things I truly missed since her passing.

“Swedish meatballs,” I said.

“Good solid choice.” He nodded a few times. “So, you like caring for others, you’re almost bearable to be around, and you’ve got manners. Must have been raised somewhere other than in this state.”

“Nope. California born and raised.”

“By good parents, obviously.”

“Parent. Singular. Yes. She was a saint.”

“Was?”

“Yes, she passed my freshman year of college. Someone robbed her at gunpoint while she was at a stoplight. They caught him, though.”

“I’m sorry. What about your father?”

“He left when I was four.” It was a sore subject, so I kept my response short. “No comment.”

“Some people are shitheads. Remember that.”

“More knowledge from Bradley’s vault of wisdom?”

“I’ll try and give you a slice of good advice every day. That’s today’s.”

“I’ll cherish it.”

He smiled a sarcastic smile and then situated his letters on the board. Using the K in muzjik, he spelled K-A-U-R-Y.

“Gimme eight.”

“Hold on a minute,” I said. “Kaury? Really?”

Although I was sure he’d never cheat, I wanted to challenge the word anyway. Doing so would be the highlight of his day. He’d probably even tell his wife about it when she got home.

“Challenge it or stop yapping.”

“It’s not a word,” I spouted.

“It sure as fuck is.”

“What is it, then?”

“It’s a god damned word, that’s what it is. You want to know? It’ll cost you a turn to find out.”

“Only if it’s in the dictionary. If it’s not, you’re lose a turn.”

“I’ve been playing this game for about forty-five years of the sixty-seven that I’ve graced this earth with my presence. Never lost a turn yet.”

“That’s because no one challenges you.”

“They know better,” he said dryly.

I jumped up and pointed to the board. “You, sir, have been challenged.”

He shot me a laser sharp glare. “Are you shittin’ me?”

“No. I am not. Prepare to lose a turn. Kaury.” I chuckled. “Sounds like a name for a redheaded kid.”

“It’s a tall, white, straight-grained tree indigenous to New Zealand.”

“It’s a lost turn if you can’t prove it’s a word.”

He glared at me, reached for the box, and pulled out the dictionary.

“Let me look it up for you,” I said.

“Sit down, you little shit. I can get by just god damned fine. Prepare to lose a turn.”

He rested the dictionary in his lap, and then began flipping through the pages with his fingertips. After fighting to keep the book open with one hand, he used his hand that was protruding from the sling to steady the cover of the book and keep it from closing.

It was the first time he’d used his left hand for anything.

“There. Right god damned there,” he barked. “Kaury. Noun. A Tall timber tree of New Zealand having white straight-grained wood.”

I peered over his shoulder.

“Crap!” I stomped my foot on the floor.

He closed the book and tossed it in the box. “Crap is right. Maybe that’ll teach you to challenge the old man. You fuck with the bull, you get the horns.”

“More wisdom from the vault?”

He shook his head. “No, that’s just common sense.”

“I’ll cherish that one, too.”

“Now, you can just sit there on your keister while I take another turn. It burns, doesn’t it?”

“What’s that?”

“That sinking feeling you get deep down in your gut when you know there’s no way you’re going to dig yourself out of the hole you’re in.”

“Kind of,” I said, but only to satisfy him.

Knowing that I played a part in the progress he was making in his day-to-day life was very rewarding. If losing a turn in Scrabble made him feel that his vast vocabulary was useful, it was a small price for me to pay.

“Guess what, kid?”

“What?”

“I’ve only got four letters left.”

“Too bad you can’t make a word with them. I’ve got seven, and I’ve got my eye on a special spot on the board.”

“Read ‘em and weep, shithead” He placed the four letters on the board.

I smiled at his word choice. “C-O-H-O-R-T.”

He clasped his hands together. “Tally up the score.”

I gave him the points for the word, and totaled the score. “541 to 324.”

“Me on top, of course.”

I nodded. “Of course.”

“Keeping track of the games played?”

“Four to nothing. Yes.”

“Well, keep on keeping track. When you win one, I’ll buy you a pizza.”

The thought of him buying me a pizza made me laugh – because I knew he’d do it, just to be a shit.

“Just another reason to continue forfeiting these games to you.”

“Oh.” He widened his eyes and cocked his head to the side. “Losing on purpose, huh?”

“Yep.”

“More therapy for me?”

I poured the letters into the bag and folded the board. “Something like that.”

“Well, it’s working. Being around you makes me feel young again. You know, I’ve been playing this game every Friday for damned near fifty years with my wife. It’ll be fifty in a few weeks, anyway. We started when we got married. This game builds relationships, you can remember that, too. And you know what? After fifty years of playing it, I ain’t sick of it – or her – yet.”

“Wow. Fifty?”

“The big five-oh is coming.”

“Have any kids other than the circus clown?”

“Nope. He’s it. We started late. Complications.”

“Well, I’m glad you got everything sorted out. He’s…well…he’s uhhm…” I stammered, wanting to say something nice about him, but failed to come up with anything. “He’s interesting.”

He shook his head slowly as he gazed down at the table. “He’s something, that’s for sure. Love him, nonetheless.”

I put the lid on the game’s taped-up box, pulled my chair away from the table, and sat down. “I’ve got questions.”

“I’m all ears.”

“Have you always been a jerk?”

He spit out a laugh. “You always so blunt?”

“I don’t believe in sugar coating things.”

“Probably one of the reasons I don’t make an honest effort to hate you. Never cared much for people who didn’t have the guts to say what was on their mind.”

“I’ve got more guts than I’ve got sense, sometimes,” I admitted.

“Proved that out on the porch,” he said. “But it seems that’s a subject we’re not allowed to discuss.”

I grinned. “So, you’re a perceptive jerk?”

“I can be.”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

“Don’t know that I want to.”

“Why not?”

He slumped in his chair, and his gaze lowered to his lap. He rubbed the underside of his nose with the edge of his finger for quite some time, and then looked up. He fixed his eyes on the Scrabble box. He looked defeated. “I’ve always been a prick, but in recent years a little more so.”

I realized he wasn’t done talking, but felt the need to acknowledge his statement. “Okay.”

“Figure if I’m an asshole, people won’t care so much when I’m gone.”

I was afraid to ask why, but after a few seconds, simply had to. He was far too young to be worried about dying.

“You’re not old enough to be worrying about--”

He shifted his eyes to me. “We got any kind of confidentiality clause? You being a nurse, and me being a patient?”

I decided I didn’t want to hear any more. There was a reason he’d made that statement, and I didn’t want to know. I fought to swallow and stood up. “No.”

“Where you going?”

“I need to get the game put up, and it’s 2:00. It’s time for your pills.”

He let out a long breath. “Sit down.”

I didn’t want to, but I did.

“You and me. Can we reach an agreement?”

“I’m sure we can, why?”

“Haven’t got any real reason to, but I’m going to trust you, kid. What we talk about? It stays right here. You don’t discuss it with the circus clown, or anyone else for that matter. Agreed?”

My throat had tightened into a dry knot.

Every man who had entered my life had left, and when they did, they took a small part of my heart with them. If Bradley was going to tell me what I was afraid he was going to tell me, I didn’t want to hear it.

But he wanted to tell me.

“Agreed,” I murmured.

“My heart’s a mess. It’s weak, weaker than anyone, short of me, knows. It started a few years back, and--”

“Have you had a bypass?”

“Several.”

I locked eyes with him and leaned forward. “There’s all kinds of things that they can do to make it--”

“I’ve got congestive heart failure. That’s what I’ve got to show for thirty years of smoking. I’ve had ‘em all. Bypasses. Angioplasties. Ablations.” He patted his cast against his chest. “Have a defibrillator in my chest to get it going again each time it quits, and lately, that’s been pretty often.”

I’d only known him for a week, but we’d made a strong connection in that short period of time. The thought of losing him caused my heart to rise into my throat.

I deeply regretted asking the question. I reached for the Scrabble box. “So now I know.”

I knew he could see my disappointment. My mother always said I wore my emotions on my shirt sleeve, and although I’d tried not to, I must have failed.

His face washed with sorrow. “Didn’t mean to piss you off.”

I pushed myself away from the table and stood. “I’m not mad. I’m just going to put this up.”

“You know where I’ll be when you’re done.”

I took a few steps and then turned around. “There’s nothing that can be done to--”

“Nothing short of a new heart, and no one wants to give an old fucker like me a good heart. Hell, don’t know that I’d take one if I was offered.”

At that moment, and for every moment that followed, I wished I had two hearts, so I could give him one.

“I see,” I said.

I walked to the pantry, slid the game into its place, and gazed blankly at the contents of the shelves, wishing I hadn’t asked the question.

But I had.