Then, when I was fourteen, my mom died, and any luck I had got blown to smithereens, just like Paul Wilson’s finger.
Since then I’ve avoided this place like the plague. I’m not interested in trying my luck anymore, even if it’s as simple as playing a game of bingo.
But watching Donna Taylor pick up a yellow ball in between her soft-pink acrylic nails, I feel the same pull I felt when Principal Nelson held up the fruit-punch-stained, crease-down-the-middle bingo card.
A feeling like that bingo cage inside me is one spin away from all the balls tumbling out.
“The first number of the night,” Donna calls into the microphone, pausing as a group of elementary school kids three tables over start a drumroll. I catch a glimpse of Sue Patterson sitting in the corner just beside them, actively saying the rosary and sprinkling holy water over her set of four cards.
“B-twelve!” she calls, eliciting a cheer from some and groans of disappointment from others.
I reach out to grab a chip, knowing even before I look that it’s on card 505. Even now I could name every number in every row, the card ingrained in my memory like a home address or a favorite song.
I hesitate over the chip pile and cast a quick glance down to see that it’s on Blake’s card too. As I slide the red chips over the respective twelves, I look over to see Jim Donovan eyeing me like this is the start line for the hundred-meter dash at the Olympics and I’m here to win gold. I stare back at him, amused that I’m counted as any kind of competition after three whole years, a swell of my long-forgotten competitiveness pulling my lips up into a smirk.
Donna calls a few more numbers: I-29, G-48, B-9, O-75, I-23, and N-40. Slowly the cards start to fill up, people eagerly eyeing one another’s to compare, the cellophane over the stacked prize baskets in the front of the room glittering underneath the fluorescent cafetorium lights.
I catch sight of a basket filled with movie theater popcorn and a $100 gift card to the historic movie theater in the center of town, which Matt and I always used to go to on date nights, resting in the exact center. The thought of Matt makes my cheeks burn, and I have to resist the urge to look at him, just past my dad, a wave of guilt keeping my eyes glued to the table in front of me as I slide the red chips carefully into place, one after the other.
“Good thing I got those extra cards!” my dad says to me, letting out a long exhale as he shakes his head. “I’m striking out over here.”
I glance over to see he has somehow managed to get only a single number past the free space. “Oh my gosh,” I say, laughing. “How is that even possible?”
“Dang. Look at you, Clark,” a voice says from just over my right shoulder. “Still can’t count for shit.”
My dad’s face lights up as Johnny Carter’s thin, tan arm reaches across the table to give him a firm handshake. I haven’t seen him this excited since Zach Ertz caught that touchdown pass during the Super Bowl the winter before my mom died, securing the win for the Eagles.
I look up to see that Johnny looks almost exactly like he did when they visited for Christmas ten years ago, plus a few extra wrinkles. A loose white button-down hangs limply on his tall, lanky frame, while a mess of dirty-blond hair sits atop his head. He’s even unironically wearing a puka-shell necklace, and actually pulling it off.
But I guess you can do that when you peaced out to Hawaii six months before high school graduation to become a surfing legend.
“Hey, Em,” a voice says from next to me, as the person it’s attached to slides onto the bench beside me.
My head swivels to the other side to see Blake.
I’m fully expecting to see a slightly taller version of the lanky seven-year-old who wore oversize T-shirts and had apparently never heard of a hairbrush, but that’s definitely not who just sat down next to me.
It’s safe to say Blake won the puberty lotto a million and one times over.
Her skin is a deep glowing tan, a color that nobody else in Huckabee has by the end of August, let alone now in early July. Her hair is long and wavy, darker than her dad’s but with the same bright streaks of blond, like the sun rays that put them there.
It’s her eyes, though, that startle me the most. Long eyelashes giving way to a warm, almost liquid honey brown. Ten years ago they were hidden behind a pair of glasses bigger than the state of Texas. Now they’re on full display.
And I’m not the only one noticing. Literally everyone is looking at our table right now. So much for flying under the radar.
“I have your card,” I blurt out, once I realize I haven’t actually said anything back to her. Her eyes swing down to look at the two cards in front of me, and I slide hers over, careful not to send the chips scattering everywhere.
Could it be any more obvious I’ve been a social pariah for the past three weeks?
“Thanks,” Blake says, smiling at me, the gap in her teeth the only constant between the girl sitting in front of me and the girl that convinced me setting off sparklers indoors would scare Santa just enough to get us both ponies.
“You’re one away from a bingo in two places,” I add, like that’s not completely obvious.
I hear Donna call out a number, but it’s nothing more than a hum in my left ear, my fingers wrapping instinctively around the quarter in my pocket.
“Hey!
