"You're actually here." I say as I see dad sitting on the living room couch.
"Of course I'm here, I live here." He shrugs it off.
"Doesn't always feel like it." I reply as I plop my self down on the couch beside him. I was being rude but that didn't change the fact that I wanted his company.
He sighs, "I'm sorry." He apologizes.
"Okay." I say as I lean into him not wanting to argue, "I missed you." I say as I close my eyes.
"I was never completely gone." He replies as he wraps his arms around my shoulders.
I just shrug in response, not wanting to communicate everything I am feeling, "I still missed you."
He lets out a sigh, "I'm here now." He says.
"Is Jack okay?" I ask
"Oh, uh, yeah," He starts, "for now I guess."
"What's wrong with Jack? Its been months, and everytime I see him he seems fine." I explain.
"The breakup is still hitting him hard, some people take more time than others." Dad explains.
"Okay." I drop the conversation.
We sit there for a while in silence, I was just enjoying my father's company, he was just watching the television. Everything was peaceful until his phone started ringing. His phone was located on the coffee table, I tried to look at it to see who was calling but the phone was face down. Papa leans forward and pick his phone up.
"Hello?" He says as he puts it to his ear.
I can hear a males voice on the other end but I can not make out what he is saying.
"I'm with Stella right now, why?" He asks into the phone.
"No, I've been there almost every day, I want to spend time with my family." He replies defensively.
From this I could tell the person on the other side of the line always Jack.
"No I-" He gets cut off by the voice.
"Jack, you know I have a family." He defends.
"Of course I care about them, are you stupid?" He sounds very defensive now.
"No, I'm sorry." He sighs into the phone.
"I was just-" He's cut off again, "Maybe tomorrow, I'm kind of busy."
"Seriously, you need to stop, I have a family, they come first!" He sounded very angry at this point, "Stop getting mad at me for wanting to spend time with the people I love."
Jack yells something threw the phone but I can not manage to make out what he said.
"Oh my god," he sighs, "of course I love them more, they're my family."
"Stop it." He demands, "Don't you hold that against me."
Dad glances at me who had been very shamelessly snooping on his phone call.
"I can't talk about this right now." He says in annoyance.
"I have to go." He states firmly.
"I said, I have to go." He was more angry with this one, except before Jack can say anything else he hangs up.
Dad let's out an annoyed sigh and sinks into his seat. "Are you okay?" I ask.
"Yeah, don't worry about it." He closes his eyes.
I am going to worry about it, "Okay."
Papa walks in the room, "What's going on?" He asks. I was not sure if he heard the phone call or could just read the room.
Dad does not say anything so I just shrug in response. "You okay?" Papa's question was directed at dad.
Dad does not even acknowledge the question, "Alex?" He says to get Dad's attention.
"Huh?" He opens his eyes, "Oh, yeah, I'm fine." He brushes off the question.
"Well, since you're here, do you want to do something as a family?" Papa asks.
"Yeah, that'd be great, what do you want to do?" He asks.
Papa stays silent, probably not knowing what he would even want to do. "Let's play a card game." I suggest.
"I like that idea, we haven't done that in a while." Papa adds.
"I'll get my cards." I say happily as I stand up.
I go to my room and grab my two decks of playing cards before going back downstairs. "What do you guys wanna play?" I ask as I take a seat at the coffee table.
"Uh, what's that one game we played?" Dad tries thinking, "With Jack when I brought you over there." He tries to remember. It had been a while since that day but I remember it vividly.
"Nasty neighbor?" I ask for clarification.
"Oh, yeah, that one." He proclaims, "That was fun." He adds.
"Yeah because you cheated." I accuse.
"I think you're just a sore loser." He jokes.
"No way, you told me you cheated, you cheater." I accuse.
He stops joking, "I wont cheat this time." He explains.
"You promise?" I ask.
"Of course." He replies.
"Good." I state happily, " We can also play spoons or BS if you want." I reply
"BS?" Papa asks.
"It's where you put down a certain number of cards in numerical order, so if I put down one ace you could put down three twos or something. But if I thought you were lying I could say BS and if you were lying you would take all the cards in the center but if you were not lying I would take all the cards in the center." I explain, "I thought we've played this before." I shrug.
"Maybe." Dad shrugs.
"I don't remember." Papa adds.
"we could just play spoons since its the easiest and fastest." I suggest.
Dad and papa make eye contact for a split second before papa replies. "Sounds good." He smiles before leaving to get spoons.
Papa returns and sets two spoons at the center of the table.
I pull my cards out of the box and shuffle them a few times before dealing each person four cards each. I started with a king of spades, a queen of hearts, an eight of spades, and an eight of hearts. I immediately decided that eights would probably be the best choice. With this knowledge in mind I start picking up cards and rapidly placing them down only allowing my self to register the cards as either being the number eight or not. Out of the corner of my eye I kept a close eye on the spoons.
I pick up an eight of hearts and discard my queen of hearts before continuing, now I felt significantly more anxious as the stakes seemed much higher. It feels like I picked up a hundred cards because I have yet to find the last eight.
Ou of the corner of my eye I see dad quickly pick up a spoon from the center which causes papa and I to both lunge across the table to try to snatch the last untensil from the center.
Unfortunately I am not the one able to receive the spoon. I lost on the first round, this never happens.
"Oh my god!" Dad says in shock as he realizes I lost.
"How dare you!" I accuse towards Papa.
"What?" He defends.
"You stole the spoon from me!" My accusations were clearly coming from absolutely nowhere.
"I won fair and square." He sticks his tongue out at me in a childish manner, "you're just a sore loser." He informs me.
Of course I was a sore loser, I was so used to winning, I rarely ever lost a game. Maybe my good luck is running out. "You just got lucky." I refuse to admit that maybe I was just a bit too slow when lunging for the spoon. Papa had a good eye this time, but I'm going to need to be better.
"We can play another round with all three of us." Dad tries to reason.
"No way, I finally won for once." Papa says triumphantly.
"Well not really, we still have one more round to play." Dad informs papa.
"Did you really have to ruin it?" Papa sulks.
"Just stating facts." Dad shrugs.
"Fine, I'll just have to beat you this round." Papa says confidently.
"Is that confidence or arrogance I hear?" Dad raises an eyebrow.
"Shut up and shuffle the cards." Papa grumbles.
"Don't be a sore loser." Dad laughs as he gathers the loose cards into a pile, "Do you want to shuffle?" Dad turns to me.
"Sure." I say as I take the stack of cards from his hand.
I shuffle the cards a couple times to make sure they are shuffled well, before handing them back to Dad. Dad passes out for cards to both him and Papa. Dad picks up his cards and arranges them according to his liking. dab then picks up the first card from the deck before quickly placing it down in front of papa. Dads pace while picking up and looking at cards quickens as he slams them down on the table in front of papa.
The room was silent aside from the sound of Papa's hand hitting the table every time he discarded a card. I watch them carefully each time exchange the card and each time they discarded a card. Papa started becoming more frantic, I had a feeling that he only needed one more card. I was very tempted to look over Papas shoulder but I knew that if I had looked at his cards I would only want to tell Dad.
Papa's reaction to me losing made me really hope that Dad would win. it was petty, but I did not care. After all, it is only a game of cards.
Tensions were high as cards kept shuffling around the table. The only thing on the line, a spoon. You would think by just reading the tension in this room that's something bigger was on the line. But there was not, we were playing for fun not for money.
Suddenly, dad exchanges a card in his deck, slams the discarded card down, and snatches the spoon from the middle of the table.
"No!" Papa yells in defeat.
"Two rounds in a row, baby!" Dad exclaims happily.
"Hell yeah!" I shout happily, "I was rooting for you dad!" I say as I put my hand up for a high five.
Dad high fives me, creating a loud slapping sound, "Thank you, favorite daughter."
"You're only saying that because I'm your only daughter." I accuse the joke.
"And you're my favorite!" He laughs.
"I'll accept it." I shrug with a smile.
"I can't believe I lost." Papa says exaggeratedly.
"How does it feel to lose!" I yell excitedly.
"Like every other time I've lost." He rolls his eyes with a smile.
"Oh, that's fair." I reply.
"Feels pretty great to win, not gonna lie." Dad says happily.
"You're going down next time" I threaten.
"In you're dreams, little girl." He laughs.
"We'll see about that old man!" I accuse.
"I'm not an old man." He says dramatically as he places his hand over his heart.
"Bro, you're ancient." I reply with a laugh.
"How rude." He laughs.
"I try." I shrug.