The buzzer alarm rang.
It’s horrible when you forget to turn off something like an early alarm on the weekends! I groaned and roused myself outside of my dry slumber only to switch the mechanical toggle to the silent setting. It was still early and my parents weren’t awake. They were snoozing and my dad was still snoring. I could tell because it’s always like they’re hiding a hibernating bear inside my parent’s bedroom.
It didn’t matter… It was a good time to use the upstairs bathroom. I freshened up; today was going to be great. When I got back to my bed, I reopened the tin from last evening. Separating the 20 or so cards I had set aside from the other chaff that can come in the packs, I dropped them onto my bed so that I could take them with me today. I left the rest of the cards loosely in the tin and shut the lid.
Within an hour, my parents had filed into the dining room and I anxiously waited through breakfast while my dad had cereal and my mom had coffee. As a rule, I wasn’t allowed to leave the house before my parents had seen me in the morning, and I had to dawdle a bit after to give the impression that I wasn’t restless. But as soon as things were settling into routine, I ripped out of the house ready to bear adventure at any time or place!
It wasn’t long until trouble showed up.
“Hey there Johnny-boy!”
Only one person ever called me that way. It was fine to call me Johnny, most people who know me did, on occasion. However, my name was actually John, and it was only Rosie that persisted in calling me “Johnny” on a regular-basis. This voice was more dimwitted and more antagonistic…practically 7 foot tall.
“Jack, how nice to see…”
Jack had already gotten his arm around my shoulder and was parading me into his world.
“Johnny-boy I’ve heard things in the underbelly. Heard like you had a new deck?”
“Um…just a few cards.”
“Johnny –this is Great! We should really have a game sometime, just you and me. I’d love to see those new cards of yours.” The talk on Jack was always slimy. This time it felt like drool.
“How did you know abou–“
“Oh it was Rosie. She backed into me on her way home last evening. She always finds a way to tell me things.”
Rosie had always considered Jack a freak, ever since the day he transferred to our school from the South-side. She loathed him. And still, I couldn’t blame her telling him, though. He was intimidating.
The thing about Jack was that although he was the scourge of the earth, he did have a soft spot for me. I was his buddy… for all intents and purposes. That’s probably because when he transferred over from the South-side, I was the only one that was brave enough to act decently around him and he took notice. “Bad influence”, my mother always said. And she couldn’t have been more right.
“My deck’s not ready…haven’t got the cards I need to make it work.”
Jack was only slightly dissuaded, “You tell me when it’s done and I’ll share the news all over the network. We’ll host an underground match so that you and that Rosie-chick can come and observe. ‘Teach you the real game.”
If Rosie had heard him call her “chick”, I think she might have clawed his eyes out.
“That will be great Jack! Sounds wonderful. We’ll be there.”
“Johnny! It’s great having you a part of all this…was thinking you were going to be one of those…” I think it took him a second to recollect the word, “Hermits!” And with that the giant with too much bravado left me alone to think.
