Midnight sounded on the ancient grandfather clock next to the fireplace and with it, Carlos jumped a little on the couch. The three men were a multitude of beers deep into the evening, and the fun of exploring the woods surrounding this rented cabin had given way with the evening to a roaring fire and lots of friendly chatter.
It had been three years since they had graduated; grad school becoming more and more a distant memory. They celebrated their early graduation from law school every year with these retreats and this cabin in the woods was their most remote reunion yet. The warmth of the fire and the drowsiness of the beer were deepening as the clock tolled its final chime.
Carlos took another thoughtful sip of his beer and looked at the crackling hearth. To his right, Erik was rolling his eyes and trying to finish a conversation with his girlfriend, who had called every hour on the hour to check in. He smiled at Carlos and made the gabbing movement with his hand. Girlfriend soon to be fiancé, Erik had confided to them. It had been met with slaps on the back and congratulations by the other two men. Mitch had poked the little belly Erik now sported and commented that Erik’s settling down definitely explained the gut. Erik sheepishly laughed and Carlos had smiled good-naturedly at his friend. He was only a few pounds heavier than when Carlos had last seen him.
Carlos had seen several friends put on a few pounds over the last few years out of college; it seemed to be the way of things with men. Carlos himself hadn’t lost his six pack and either had Mitch. Both still got up to run together in the foggy Boston mornings. They had been increasing their runs the last four months and Carlos felt his body’s slim musculature’s soreness from that morning’s endeavor. Carlos intended to be in the marathon this year. Since they had started dating their senior year, Carlos had always cheered on Mitch in the marathon and finally felt fit enough to run alongside his boyfriend. He burped loudly and laughed when Erik laughed, then quickly had to explain to his girlfriend that he was laughing at the burp and not her.
“Whatcha got babe?” Carlos asked as Mitch rejoined the two men on the couches circling the worn wooden table in front of the fire. Mitch set a dusty looking wooden box on the table and picked up the beer with glistening perspiration sweating down its neck. He took a long swig with one hand and wiped the cover of the box with the other.
“Not sure, handsome. I found it in the closet while I was looking for more trash bags. It’s some sort of game”, Mitch said, wiping his dusty hand on his jeans. His blue eyes pored over the cover. Squinting, he took out his glasses and put them on.
“It says ‘The Growing Game’.” Mitch took another sip of his beer. “Babe, you’re the nerd. Ever heard of this? Some sort of Dungeons and Gathering type thing?”
Carlos playfully slugged his boyfriend in the arm, ignoring the purposeful misnomers. He leaned forward to peer at the game. The box itself seemed to be a glowing mahogany now that Mitch had run his hand over it, with inlay mother of pearl borders. In raised Art Deco letters, the words “The Growing Game” titled the middle of the lid.
“It’s pre-Depression era, that’s for sure. It’s the prettiest game I’ve seen,” Carlos said, turning the box on its side with one hand. The rest of the box was unmarked, save for the two gold hinges at the back adhering the lid. Setting his beer down, Carlos took hold of the lid and lifted.
Inside, neatly packed into divided compartments, were an onyx colored board, cream cards lined with gilt writing that said “Fate”, two dice, and four playing pieces. The playing pieces and dice looked like they might be carved from ivory, which gave Carlos a momentary pause of ethical disapproval. His boyfriend had already opened the board and spread it out the table. It matched the cards on its interior, cream with gilt lines delineating the game board into near one hundred squares. The squares traveled a path leading from the word “Start” to the word “Return”. Periodically, a space had the word “Fate” written inside of it which Carlos assumed meant to draw a card.
