Old Friends

Fuck!” Sapped Abby Murphey as her hand grazed the pizza stone in her oven. It was her weekly game night with her best friend from college and she had made an artichoke and spinach pizza for him and her to share from scratch. (Okay, MAYBE the sauce was from a can and she had used ready-made dough.)

Abby used to have a flame for her buddy when they were together at college in Toronto. But she could tell he wasn’t really interested in her that way and eventually decided to turn all of her romantic enthusiasm into building the best friendship ever. After graduation, Abby landed a job as a graphics programmer for videogames with her dream company, Bethesda. She was thrilled to bump into her college pal and finding out that they were living in the same city.

Abby ran her fingers under cold water to halt the burn then left the pizza to cool on the counter. She pulled the cheese tray (Colby, Pepper Jack, and Colby Jack with green grape garnish) and set it next to the package of double-stuff Oreos on her living room coffee table. She had laid out some games she had chosen for the evening; Trivial Pursuit, Pictionary and Settlers of Catan. (The sketchpad for Pictionary could serve for a number of pen-and-paper games as well.) Just in case, she also had a deck of cards she had won off a would-be card shark/boyfriend, but she didn’t think the artwork on them was exactly appropriate for a friendly game.

Plopping down on the sofa, Abby watched the clock and waited for her buddy. A few minutes later their “secret knock” thumped out on her apartment door.

Damien could not remember ever having been this nervous before, not in high school’s last class of the day when he knew Doug Ellerhast was going to be waiting after school with his mates to unleash yet another round of pain and humiliation, not during college exams while he’d been studying to become a vet, not even just a few days earlier at the job interview with mid city vets.

No there was one thing that had him more nervous than that and it was going up against Abby one on one at any kind of game! My god the girl was formidable! He laughed to himself as he remembered the many times during college when she’d doled out another piece of humble pie to some new and unsuspecting idiot who’d made the mistake of underestimating her because she had breasts and didn’t need to shave her face.

Abby had been the centre of Damien’s world. He’d admired her above anyone else he knew. They’d met in first year and Damien had been smitten. She was cute, witty, smart as all hell and she could stick up for herself. Everything that Damien was not. She quickly became a central figure to a small group of friends that remained very close throughout college and yet she seemed relatively unaware of the effect she had on him. As far as he could tell she just wanted to be friends and not wanting to risk what they had he accepted that and moved on but if that’s what she wanted then he would be the best damn friend ever.

There separate studies kept them apart quite a bit. Damien was studying hard to become a vet and she was studying some kind of computer sciences and graphics which was all well over Damien’s head but every week their group of friends got together for a games night.

At first the games had been simple. Things like cards or scrabble but mostly through Abby's influence the game's complexity developed from there. Soon the games nights became full evenings of intense strategy or nights of eye watering laughter and fun. They played everything from ‘Axis and allies’, ‘Settlers of Cattan’ and ‘Age of Wonders’ to ‘Chess’, ‘Grass’ or ‘Texas Hold’em Poker’. They were the best days of Damien’s life.

After college they all moved in different directions but stayed in touch over social media. Abby got a job working for Bethesda, it was a dream start to her career and she would send Damien big messages telling him about the work she was doing. None of it really made sense to him till one day he sent her a message telling her about a game he was playing called Skyrim and how amazing the graphics were. Especially the sky. She sent him a one word reply, ‘Thanks,’ and then it hit him what she was doing.

Wow!

One day an opportunity came up that Damien couldn’t ignore. He found a listing for a situation vacant at a vet clinic in the same city as Abby had moved to. Could it be fate?
He sent her a message letting her know he would be there for a job interview and she invited him to stop by for a games night while he was in town. The invite had been a month ago and he’d spent this last month so nervous about the night with Abby that he'd barely been able to think of the interview. Still it went well. He hoped he was at least on the shortlist for the job.

He spent hours preparing for the games night. He would bring a bottle of wine but needed time online researching before he could choose one. He knew nothing of wine before that, they used to drink beer and cheap spirits. Who knew wine was so complicated? In the end he settled for two bottles. A white wine called a Gewurztraminer and in case she didn’t like white a red wine called shiraz. He bought new clothes. He had a haircut and a shave. He was as ready as he would ever be.

His Uber driver on the way over was an older man who had a laugh at Damien’s expense.

“Don’t try too hard lad, I’m sure it will go well if you just act yourself.”

“You can tell I’m nervous?”

“Let’s just say that two bottles of wine might be going a bit far.”

Damn!

What a lucky driver, he got paid with a nice bottle of shiraz for one of his rides that night.

Damien was nervous and almost bungled the secret knock.

The door opened and there she was framed in warm light. He drank the image of her in. She was looking good, hell she was looking fantastic. Healthy, happy to see him and relaxed.

Damn! She was in a perfect state to kick his arse at any game she chose. And while he might look calm on the outside inside he felt like he was in a hurricane. Brace for the shame of defeat! Go down gracefully in a blaze of glory and hope she is merciful in her scorn!

“Hey Abby. Long time no see! My god your house smells delicious? Is that pizza I smell?”

That’s it! Casual cool! Give nothing away. You can do this Damien.