Alessandro
“Youbitch!”Elenahissesfrom the dining room as I’m coming home in the evening.
I grit my teeth and change course towards that room, expecting to deal with drama. Although that hasn’t even remotely been the case in the past week since Sofia and I made up. It’s been domestic bliss. The three of us eat dinner together most nights, although Elena lets us have some date nights alone as well.
I hear a crashing sound before I enter the dining room, then realize they’re playing a silly game and no one is genuinely mad.
Elena slaps her hand on the table among some wooden pieces. “I’m done.”
Across from her, Sofia is seated in front of a tower that’s still intact. My eyes flick to the game’s packaging—Bandu.I’m not familiar with it, and one of them must have rummaged through a storage closet to find it; it looks old.
“Sandro,” Elena greets me as she heads out of the room, leaving me alone with my wife.
I take over Elena’s seat across from Sofia.
“Sorry, I broke rule number three and found this in a bedroom closet.” There’s a twinkle in her eye. Those stupid rules that I tried to enforce are nothing but a joke between us now.
“I’ll deal with that tonight.” I play along with her and then grab the box, holding it up to her with raised eyebrows. “Is it any fun?”
She nods and keeps her voice low. “I beat Elena three times in a row, so I think she got sick of it.”
I smirk. That sounds about what I’d expect from Sofia.
“Do you want to try?” she asks.
“I’m not familiar with this one.” Or… any game for that matter, but I don’t want her to get that look in her eye whenever I say something depressing about my childhood.
“This is the first time I’ve even heard of it.” She shrugs. “Come on, it’s easy…”
She explains the directions for the game in detail, but I'm too distracted to pay attention. My mind has been focused on what I should do about her family, and the game seems basic enough for me to learn as I go. It looks like an extreme version ofJengaexcept we’re trying to build a tower from the base up and we can force the other to build with some of the more awkward pieces.
“Simple enough.” My eyes scan the table, taking in the various shapes on the table. Some seem impossible to incorporate into a stable structure, like the ball or the pyramid or the skinny cylinders. Others are angled wooden rectangles that could be steady if placed in a strategic position.
“You can go first.” She smiles and pushes her assembled tower onto the table with a clatter. Her brown eyes have a warmth to them. Her thick hair is pulled back into a sloppy bun, I’m sure done in haste so she could focus solely on the game. Sofia has mentioned that she’s competitive, but aside from our bickering, I haven’t been able to see that side of her yet.
I pick up sturdy-looking block and set it at the base of my tower then we continue on back and forth in concentration until I place an awkward piece on a tower that grew much higher than I originally expected, only to see it collapse in front of me.
She opens her mouth to say something, but I beat her to it. “We’re playing again.”
The start of this next game goes smoother for me, and I feel like I have a chance at winning. In fact, I feel confident. The middle of her tower looks vulnerable, like it could collapse at any moment.
And it does.
I want to keep playing, but I assume she’s bored with it, seeing that she played this with Elena before I came into the room. And I know that I’m the weird person who gets obsessive about things—I’ll probably feel compelled to build the intricate tower on the box after she leaves the dining room.
“Again,” she says.
“Best two out of three.”
As we move the pieces towards the middle to start over, I ask, “Did you play a lot of games with your family growing up?”
“Kind of. They’d get annoyed that I’d never lose, so… I’d ask but expect them to say no. And on the off-chance one of them said yes, it didn’t last long. Especially Max, we fought so much when we were young. Did you fight with Elena a lot growing up?”
I lean back in my chair, naturally having the urge to shut down at a personal question directed towards me. But I want to try with Sofia. The few times I have let her in, I’ve felt a sense of relief.
“Not really, no. But I believe the difference in our ages is larger than yours and Max’s—I viewed her as a baby for the longest time. And…” I realize that I could have stopped there, but I continue on anyway. “Well, Marco kept us separated so often that when I finally could spend time with her, I was just happy to be in the same room as her.”
I look up from the table and meet her eyes, worried that I came off like a sad sap. But she doesn’t look at me with pity and instead keeps a neutral expression and graciously points at the center of the table. “Now, quit stalling and let’s get started on this next game. I know you’re just worried that you’ll lose.”
