Part 31
Steve
I
am continually amazed by the ingenuity that Joey shows when it comes to this
family. Joey made the observation a couple of weeks ago that now that Aiden is
ten we weren’t really spending as much time together as we normally did. It
just isn’t that easy with Aiden spending time with Gordy and his other friends.
Not to mention all of the birthday parties, art classes and everything else. I
suppose this happens to a lot of families as their kids grow up and start to
get lives of their own.
But
that wasn’t good enough for Joey. He came up with the idea to have a family
game night every Thursday night. At first, I wasn’t sold on the idea, but I
have to admit that it was a great idea.
“Pay
up, Dad.”
I
snap out of my own thoughts to see Joey throw his head back in disgust as Aiden
cheerfully moves his Dad’s piece to Boardwalk. Or should I say Aiden’s
Boardwalk. I’m not sure how Aiden gets so lucky, but somehow he managed to get
enough money to not only buy both Boardwalk and Park Place, but he already has
two houses on both blue properties.
Smiling,
I watch Joey count out what amounts to a sizable percentage of his fake money
and hand it over to Aiden. Aiden takes it with a smile and starts to count it.
“Hey,”
Joey exclaims. “You don’t trust me.”
“It’s
not about trust. It’s about making sure. You always tell me to double-check my
homework. It’s the same thing.”
I
try to stifle a laugh as Joey’s face turns bright red. Joey gives me a
disbelieving stare as I try to pull myself together. It doesn’t work to well
and he playfully pushes my shoulder to try and get me to stop. It takes me
another few seconds, but I finally pull it together.
“You
know, you shouldn’t encourage him,” Joey says, clearly displeased.
“Hey,
he’s right. And you’re just mad that you landed on Aiden’s houses twice now.”
“You
would be to if you stopped rolling twelves.”
I
shrug. “Hey, the dice will do what they want to do.”
“Yeah,
yeah,” Joey grumbles. “Well, it’s your turn.”
Smiling,
I pick up the dice and shake them up before dropping them on the board. I land
on one of my own spaces and hand the dice to Aiden.
We
play for a little longer before Joey goes bankrupt after landing on Aiden’s
hotel-owned Park Place. We probably could keep playing for a little while, but
it is getting late and Aiden and I am pretty evenly matched. He may have the
blue properties, but I have three other property sets with various sets of
houses and hotels that were slowly bleeding him dry. So I call the game. I
think Aiden might ask for a count of the money and assets to see who won, but
he doesn’t.
So
instead, the three of us work to put the game away. When Joey goes to put the
game away in the closet, Aiden turns to me with a smile.
“You
know, I like this new game night. It’s fun. Even though Daddy’s not very good.”
“I
heard that,” Joey says, walking back into the living room. “And while I can’t
do anything about it tonight, we will see next week. Maybe I will pick the
game.”
“That’s
cheating,” Aiden exclaims.
“No,
we said we were going to take turns picking the games,” Joey replies. “And I think
I may just pick Trivial Pursuit.”
Aiden’s
eyes bug out of his head. Because he’s only ten, he doesn’t have nearly enough
knowledge to best us in Trivial Pursuit. The fact that Joey knows all sorts of
obscure facts and usually beats me by a healthy margin doesn’t help Aiden
either.
“You
wouldn’t,” Aiden questions.
“What
were you saying about me not being very good at games?”
“I
lied. You are the best ever at playing games. You just had a…bad night?”
Joey
and I laugh at Aiden’s sloppy comeback.
“It’s
okay, Aiden. I won’t pick Trivial Pursuit. At least not if you go to bed soon.”
“Bye,”
Aiden says as he dashes to the stairs.
“Hey,”
Joey calls right before Aiden reaches the stairs. “I like playing with you
too.”
Aiden
gives us a huge smile before heading up the stairs.
“I
like this game night thing,” I say as I walk up behind Joey and wrap my arms
around his waist. “Where did you come up with this idea anyway?”
“Google.”
I
snort before leaning down and kissing Joey’s cheek. “Well, Google does have
some good ideas.”
“I
thought so.”
“But
you are going to have to get better at Monopoly.”
Joey
just laughs.
And
there’s Part 31! I hope you all enjoyed it. See you next week for the next
installment of The Saga of Steve and Joey.
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