1.1 Owlbear (part two)
First commercial break.
“I’m home I’m going to use the phone in the kitchen!” Andrew calls out as he walks into his parents’ house.
Andrew moved into his parents’ basement after the dot-com implosion. Whether this was for economic or psychological reasons, neither of the senior Lattas knows. He telecommutes now, staying down there for days at a time, coming up only to pilfer hot dogs and macaroni from the fridge.
Nancy sits at the kitchen table with a cooling cup of decaf vanilla coffee, filling in two books of World’s Orneriest Crossword Puzzles (a pen in each hand) simultaneously. She has an egg timer running; probably she’s training for some kind of competition, and is certainly too absorbed in her work to reply. Upstairs, in the train room, Phil looks up from his HO-scale recreation of 1882 Muncie (the height of the gas boom) to shout to his son that’s fine, fine. He’s just shifting the model from Spring to Summer, he won’t be needing the phone for that.
Andrew drinks a glass of water, and psychs himself up. “If you can’t talk to him,” he mutters, by ‘him’ meaning the prospective Dungeon Magister, “you can’t talk to anyone. If you can’t talk to him you can’t talk to anyone. If you can’t talk to him you can’t talk to anyone. If you can’t talk to him you can’t talk to anyone.” As ready as he’ll ever be, Andrew picks up the phone, and dials.
At 53 Willow Street, in a very different kitchen, the phone rings. Alice Lauro, bent over her kitchen table and absorbed in some kind of crafts project (something involving wire, sandpaper, balsa wood, and five different colors of ink) shouts for someone to get the phone. After two rings, Cassie comes in from the living room, steps over the newspaper on the floor (placed strategically around the kitchen table so that, if Alice accidentally spills ink or spills broken glass everywhere, it will be easily cleaned up), reaches over the enormous bowl of slightly overripe fruit, and picks up the telephone receiver, an obsolete corded model the avacado color of the 1970s. “Hello?”
Andrew’s taken aback by the sound of a girl’s voice, and starts breathing heavily. “Dungeon Majesty?” he squeaks.
Cassie flinches. “No!” she tells the raspy voice.
“Dungeon Majesty?”
“…What?”
“Dungeon Majesty! Isn’t this the number for Dungeon Majesty?”
“What? No! I don’t think you have the right number.”
“Isn’t this 555 6022?”
“…Yes.”
“Dungeon Majesty?”
“Stop saying that!”
“The game, Dungeon Majesty, you’re saying you don’t have it there?” Andrew’s heart sinks into his shoes.
“…Hold on,” Cassie finally says. “Mom,” she says as she presses the telephone receiver against her shoulder, “do we have Dungeon Majesty?”
Alice Lauro looks up from her crafts project (something involving wire, sandpaper, balsa wood, and five different colors of ink) and answers firmly in the negative.
“Some kind of game?” Cassie persists.
“Give me the phone,” Alice says, and takes it from Cassie.
“Dungeon Majesty?” Andrew asks Alice.
“Listen you pervert,” Alice hisses, “never call this number again or I will call the police and you will go to prison for assaulting a minor!”
“But… but… Dungeon Majesty!” Andrew sobs, but by this point Alice has already slammed down the phone.
“Is something wrong, honey?” Nancy Latta asks her son. She’s finished her speed drill and is setting up the next one.
“No!” cries Andrew, and throws the cordless phone across the room before dashing off.
“Kindergarten,” Ferdinand says. “Don’t answer yet. Think about it. Kindergarten.”
“The answer is no,” Elena Klotz says, and swings her mallet, but her ball misses the wicket.
The Klotzes’ backyard, unusually spacious, contains a small sunken pool, a patio with grill, and a wide flat lawn ideal for badminton, horseshoes, lawn darts, bocce ball, and so on. This afternoon they’re playing croquet.
“Just for that, I’m roquetting you,” Ferdinand says, and sends his ball through a wicket before colliding it with his mother’s. Unlike most croquet sets, the Klotzes’ eschews the traditional blue, red, black, yellow coloration in favor of monochromatic stripes, checks, spots, and herringbone. The elder Klotzes avoid color, and of course Ferdinand’s colorblindness prevents him from using a traditional set.