Seven

The silence after the yelling hung over the dinner table like a heavy cloud. I continued to pick at my food, even though I had lost my appetite, in an effort to avoid having to make eye contact with anyone. I could feel the heated glares being exchanged by my father and brothers. My father cleared his throat loudly, daring either one of my brothers to restart the argument. My older brother sighed loudly and slouched back, making the lines on my father’s face tighten in anger. All of a sudden, my mother’s high pitched cheery voice interrupted the tense silence.

“So how was everyone’s day?” she looked around at the table filled with frowning faces. The only response she got was complete and utter silence. My mother wasn’t someone who gave up easily though, so she tried something else.

“I have a wonderful idea!” she began and I could see my brother slouch down even further. “We should play a board game. Together, as a family.”

When she didn’t get a response from the rest of us, she continued with her story. “I found one at a garage sale last week. It looks really interesting, and I think we could all benefit from a fun family game night.”

My dad managed to pull his act together enough to agree with her, but quickly glared at my brothers again to remind them to behave. 

“Well, it looks like everyone’s done with dinner so let's clean up and go play this game your mother wants.” my father announced in his gruff voice

Once all the dishes were washed and we were all sitting in the living room, my mother brought out an old looking box. It had an intricately carved wooden design, and rather than words, it had a 7 carved into it. Dust jumped out when she opened it, and I could practically smell the attic that it had probably spent years rotting away in.

“Look there’s a spider in there!” my younger brother commented, knowing I would tense up at the thought of it. I shoved him when I saw that he was just trying to bother me. My father glanced over at us and cleared his throat, warning us. 

“Peter, here you read the instructions. Everybody pick a piece.” My mother handed a small leaflet to my father. He cleared his throat and began to read.

“Welcome to 7, please choose your pieces. With each piece, comes a special card. You may not look at your card until you use it later in the game.”

“Hey! Will’s looking at his card!” I announced smugly, catching my brother red handed

My dad kept reading, unbothered by the event. “William, please choose a new piece.” As soon as the words registered with my father, a startled expression appeared on his face.

“I just read that. That’s part of the instructions, I didn’t come up with that. How did it know Will’s name? And how did it know he’d do that?” he turned to my mother “Where did you say you got this game?”

“A garage sale.” she stammered out 

“Well it’s not that hard to predict that Will would do something like that. It’s really not that surprising.” my older brother chimed in

“Accusing someone of cheating, are we Daniel? Well, well, well, look who that’s coming from.” my father read from the instructions

“Daniel, why’d it say that?” my mother prodded

“It doesn’t matter, the game’s just making up stuff.” he responded defensively

“Daniel.” my mother commanded

“Can we just get this over with and play this game?” I exclaimed, unsure how much more fighting I could stand

“Great idea. It says that all players should start at the GO square. We will take turns picking a card from that pile and following its instructions. Whoever gets to that last square wins the game. Seems pretty simple.” my dad informed us

“This sounds boring. Can I leave?” Daniel complained

“No. Your mother wanted a family game night, so that’s what we're gonna do.” my father said sternly “Now, would you like to start?”

“Fine. Pass me a card.” Daniel glared back at my dad. My mother handed him a card and he began to read it. Suddenly, he looked up at the rest of us with a confused look on his face. “It’s blank. I told you this game was dumb.”

“Let me see.” my mother said, as my father looked through the rest of the cards, which were all identically blank. She passed it around to Will, since he wanted to see for himself.

“Maybe you’re right.” I could see the disappointment on her face. “Maybe it is just junk that someone was trying to get rid of.”

“What do you mean it’s blank? There are words right here.” Will pointed at the card, shocking everyone else. “See it says, ‘Roll the die’ right there.”

Daniel took the card, angry that he had been made look like a fool. He picked up the die and rolled it rather violently. It showed a three on it. When he looked back at the card, surprise covered his face once again, and he showed the rest of us as the words on the card changed again. It said, ‘Three: Move ahead to the blue square’. Daniel followed the instructions and groaned at the simplicity of the task. 

We took turns, moving in clockwise order with the same pattern repeating. The player would pick up a card, where words telling you to roll the die would appear. Once you did, instructions would appear telling you where to move your piece, whether that was forwards, backwards or not at all. We were all bored by the game by the time it was my father’s turn, but then things changed. 

His turn started regularly, he picked up the card and rolled the die. It landed on a seven and the dots on the die flashed a bright green, surprising everyone. My father looked at his card, and a tense expression came over his face.

“What’s it say?” I asked inquisitively

“Uh, it says…” he cut off “It says ‘List your children in order of your favorite to least favorite’.”

“Oh that’s silly, I’m sure you don’t have a favorite. We both love you all equally!” my mother helped out

“Your mother is right, I don’t have a favorite. You’re all just as annoying.” he chuckled. As he went to put the card down, he suddenly exclaimed.  

“What’s wrong? What happened, are you okay?” my mother looked worried

“It burns! The card burns!” he yelled

“Let go of it then!” Will blurted out

“I can’t, it’s stuck to my hand!” He began to try to rip it off, when all of a sudden we all became quiet. Bold red words had appeared on his card. ‘LIAR!’ was all it said.

“Dad I don’t think you’ll be able to get rid of it unless you tell the truth.” I commented as he continued to try to scrape off the card.

“That was the truth! I don’t have favorites!” he shouted

“Clearly you’re lying.” Daniel stated matter of factly

“Fine then. I guess if I had to pick…” he looked down at the burning card “Daniel, Meg, Will.” he finally said under his breath. The card floated out of his hand, revealing a burn mark where it had been. He shook his hand in pain and announced, “Family game night is over. I’m done playing.”

As he went to get up, Daniel followed his act. All of a sudden, an invisible force knocked them back down in their seats. When they attempted to get back up again, the force pinned them down to their seats. The text on my father's card changed once again, this time simply saying ‘The game isn’t over.’.

“Are you kidding me?” my father complained “Let’s just get this over with. Hurry up, Will it’s your turn.”

Will had a horrified expression on his face as he picked up the die and rolled it. He let out a deep breath when he saw it had landed on a two. His card instructed him to switch places with one other player, to which he responded by switching his piece with my mother’s. Then it was Daniel’s turn, and he was instructed to move back two spaces. We went around again, all of us watching carefully as my father rolled a four and smiled in relief. 

On our third time around, I picked up the die and rolled it gently on the table. When I saw that it had landed on a seven and flashed green, I groaned and leaned my head back. Looking down at my card, I immediately regretted deciding to play the game. 

“What’s it say?” Will said excitedly, trying to peek.  

I placed the card down so everyone else could read the words, ‘Who are you currently dating?’. I picked it back up, not excited to have to answer.

“Wait, you’re dating someone?” my mother questioned, exactly as I knew she would. She was always asking about things like that. 

“Um, no one. The card probably got the wrong person.” I stammered out

Unsurprisingly, the card flashed the red ‘LIAR!’ again. My family all looked up in anticipation at what I was going to say. After a couple seconds of hesitation, the pain grew to be too big, so I finally opened my mouth.

“Well, her name is Lola…” I murmured

“Her?” my father questioned

I knew he would get hung up on that “Yeah, I know it’s probably not what you want. But she’s a really sweet person.”

“Oh honey, it’s okay, we still love you just as much. No matter what!” my mother said in her cheery voice

“She’s right, as long as you’re happy.” My father joined in, and took me by surprise as he wasn't usually one to show much love. “I would hug you, but I don’t think I can move much at the moment.” He chuckled and returned to his normal self.

“Great, but can we finish this game?” Daniel ruined the moment

“Daniel! This is serious.” my mother scolded him

“Yeah, yeah I was just kidding.” He reached over to give me a fist bump. “That’s actually pretty cool little sis.”

We continued on playing, and stopped once again in a moment of excitement when Will rolled a seven. He picked up his card and read it out to us.

“It says, ‘Go to the left corner of your bottom drawer. Come back with the one item in there that isn’t a sock. You have five minutes to retrieve it.’”

He groaned, but afraid of the burning cards, quickly got up and ran upstairs. When he came back a few minutes later he had something hidden behind his back. 

“What’s that you got there?” Daniel questioned

Will pulled it out from behind him and placed it on the table. Daniel chuckled when he saw it.

“Where’d you get the weed from?” he laughed

My mother was not amused. “Young man, we’re having a talk after this game is over. Is that all you have? Do you know how dangerous drugs can be at your age? Promise me you’ll stay out of them.” 

Will looked down in shame. “I promise.” he whispered

The silence grew as we continued playing, waiting in fear until the next secret was revealed. The lucky next player to roll a seven was Daniel. 

He too read his card aloud to us. “Cheater, cheater. Confess your wrong doings.”

Confused, we all waited for him to say something. When he finally spoke, it was the most ashamed and regretful I’d ever seen him.

“It’s talking about Delilah. My ex. I messed up, I messed up really bad. I don’t know why, but I did. I cheated on her. For some stupid reason I betrayed her. And it’s the worst mistake I’ve ever made in my life.”

We all sat in silence, feeling the weight of the secret sink over our shoulders. A small part of me knew that a little had been lifted off his shoulders. In fact a small bit of the burden was lifted off each person as they confessed their secrets. Maybe this game wasn’t as horrible as it seemed. 

A few times around later, my mother finally picked up the last card. The card that would get her to the last square. The card that would end this miserable game. As she moved into the last square, text appeared on the card. ‘Congratulations, you’ve completed 7.’ I could feel the nervous energy in the room be released, as we all sighed in exasperation.