Four Thousand Weeks

Nita put down the red king. Sanjay slid it back across the table with one finger.

"That only works after a six," he said.

"There are no sixes."

"There were last time."

They were in the licensing-office waiting room with three plastic chairs between them and a television mounted too high in the corner. Nita had a number folded into quarters in her pocket. Sanjay had found the cards in the glove compartment while looking for a pen.

Priyanka came back from the water dispenser holding two paper cups. "Can I play?"

"You need four cards," Nita said.

"Unless you get a queen," said Sanjay.

Priyanka set the cups down, took four cards, and waited while they argued over whether a queen was one card or four. On her first turn she placed a black seven on top of the red king.

"That doesn't count," Nita said.

"Why?"

"Because the king has already been pushed back."

"Only by him," Priyanka said.

Sanjay considered this, then nodded. Priyanka collected the pile. Two rounds later she won again by putting down three jacks at once. Sanjay said jacks could not travel in threes. Nita said they could if the player had declared a corner. Priyanka asked what a corner was.

"Not that," Sanjay said.

At the next table, a boy was arranging sugar packets into a square. Priyanka watched him for a minute, then handed Nita her cards.

"You can have these," she said. "We're making a shop."

The boy gave her a blue packet and told her it was expensive. Priyanka told him the yellow ones were for doctors.

The number board changed. A receptionist began straightening the empty chairs along the wall and swept the loose cards into the magazine rack beside Nita's knee.

"She only won one proper round," Nita said.

"She won three," Sanjay said. "The second was impossible, but it still happened."

"That is not how it works."

"Then why did you let her keep the pile?"