Friday, January 22, 2021 The Game

Rats, Kelly thought to herself. She hadn’t wanted to come to this party, but had felt maneuvered into it. Well, not so much maneuvered as having fallen prey once again to her reluctance to say no when people at work included her in any sort of social gathering. And now she had gotten sucked into the orbit of a particularly high-brow group conversation. They were blathering on about something esoteric having to do with the intersection of art and literature.

Well, she’d played this game before. The trick was to nod your head thoughtfully and keep a pensive look on your face. She drew the line at laughing uproariously when everyone else did, however – this was a minefield she’d stepped onto before and regretted it when she laughed louder and longer than the others, causing them to lift the dreaded Eyebrow of Disdain. After that, she’d developed a new technique which consisted of allowing a mysterious smile to play on her lips – sort of the Mona Lisa approach. She was a devotee of the Advice to Hapless Party-Goers which came directly from the Good Book: “Even a fool, when he keeps silent, is considered wise. When he closes his lip, he is considered prudent.” This was easy enough since she was essentially an invisible part of the group, anyway – most of them probably didn’t even know her name.

She was in the middle of one of these mysterious smiles (which she’d perfected by practicing in front of a mirror), when the question came like a thunderbolt.

“What do you think, Kelly?”

She didn’t see who’d asked the question. Although startled, Kelly prided herself on her poker face. She hadn’t really been listening, but they didn’t need to know that. A bold note went zipping through her brain, accompanied by a little trill of mischief. She grabbed at the most random thing she could think of and threw it right out there. “I find it’s always helpful to reflect back on what Bennet said in one of his lesser known works – so simple and yet so profound.” She paused for effect, and said it, the words that had come to her in a dream fragment recently: “Encourage chickadees.” Uh oh…so much for staying silent and being considered wise.

Silence. Someone gave an uncomfortable half-chuckle as the group pondered this bit of fluff. Kelly worried she’d gone too far, but right on schedule, Brett, who never liked being caught with his academic pants down, nodded sagely and said, “Yes, I’ve always admired Bennet’s avant-garde views. His insights always take one by surprise – he makes you work for it, doesn’t he?”

At this the whole group, grateful for the cue, nodded thoughtfully and looked pensive. The conversation ebbed and flowed as they all tried to outdo one another with comments about Bennet and his seminal work. Kelly’s mysterious smile threatened to turn into an unflattering snigger, but she managed to stifle it. She’d been reading Pride and Prejudice again and “Bennet” was the first name to come to mind. It looked like she was off the hook, so she prepared to break out of the orbit of this conversational planet and head over to the snack table.

“That phrase – ‘encourage chickadees…’ – What do you think it means, Kelly?”

Rats again. She’d noticed that one of the guys in the group had been eyeing her with a mysterious, knowing smile of his own. It appeared that at least one person in the group suspected her intelligentsia credentials and meant to expose her. In fact, she’d bet he was the one who asked the first question. Nothing doing, buster, she thought to herself. All eyes were on her.

“The elegance of Bennet’s wisdom, of course, is that he means to let you come to your own conclusions, Alex.” More nodding from the group, but Alex merely stared and called her bluff. Very well. The gauntlet had been laid and she would pick it up. Time to nip this in the bud with a strong finish.

“But I think what Bennet clearly meant is that we need to return to an appreciation of the natural world around us for our inspiration. What could the chickadees represent, but the many delightful thoughts that arise when we leave our inner sanctums and take in the fresh air of this glorious and beautiful world in which we live? Do we want our souls to flourish? Encourage those thoughts, those chickadees! That’s what he meant, and I, for one, will always live by that rule.”

The group nearly applauded this burst of eloquence. Alex’s stare became a grin of admiration. She’d won the game.

Kelly walked over to the snack table. Alex followed.

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This has been Fiction Friday brought to you by Lynniebeemuseoday.

I’ll probably delete this in the morning, while wondering how much mileage I can get out of the phrase “encourage chickadees.”