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"It's your turn, Ellen, show your hand" Iain nudged me, and I looked pensively down at my hand of cards.  

We were playing Clobyosh, a Scottish card game, and the first player to reach 501 points was to be the winner.  Cards 2-6 were discarded from the pack so that only thirty-two cards were in use, and cards dealt were scored based on certain combinations held in the hand.  

So far, despite the fact that this was my first time playing, I had managed to keep up with Colin, Iain, and Kane, who was in the lead, mayhap because I was a quick learner, and mayhap again because I had great propensity for beginner's luck.  

My friends from home, well-acquainted with my history of beginner's luck, had learned to pick me for their team when it was my first time playing a particular game, and to avoid me at all costs on my second attempt.  The first time I had played beer pong I had been a freshman in college.  My partner, Alex, had been so amazed at my apparent "skill" that he proclaimed I was the "second coming of Christ."  The first time I played corn-hole, I made fools of my so-called professional corn-hole playing opponents, and fast friends with my partner Dan, who was until that point, a stranger who thought he had been struck with the good-for-nothing girl.  The first time I'd played texas hold'em, I'd soundly beaten my father, the poker champion of the family, in his own tournament.  These were all wonderful things to brag about, but sadly I must mention, that after the tales of my glory are done, I had to admit to people that I had never played any of these games as well since.  In fact, despite my beginning successes, I always played terribly the second time.  

Given that this was my first attempt at a new game, however, I had confidence that my streak of beginner's luck would hold out.  I thought about my options as I studied my hand, and then, seeing that I had a trump seven, I lay my options on the table and arrogantly spoke the very proverb that Colin had spoken in his instruction of the game a bit earlier, "A trump seven will take an Ace of Hearts."

"Fuck!" Colin exclaimed, looking utterly disgusted with his hand.  He ran his hand through his hair in frustration, and gave me a pained expression.

"What?" I taunted him, "bad hand?"

Kane and Iain began to laugh.  "Colin, doona be an arse" Kane warned him, and then Colin began to chuckle, dropping what I at that moment realized had been a facade all along.

"Sorry lass" he said, trying to conceal the white flash of teeth that he never could quite seem to conceal, "I was trying to trick you into believing I had a bad hand."

Iain leaned over to catch and look at Colin's cards, and I looked at Kane in question.

"Ye mustna be gullible around 'im" Kane explained to me with a murmur and a teasing smile, "or Iain.  As ye now know, they each 'ave a way with duplicity."  

I didn't doubt a word of what Kane had just said, and told him so.  Then I turned my attention back to Colin, ready to discover by how many points he'd bested me.

"You just won 20 points didn't you?" I halfway accused him, raising my left brow.  

"Och..." he began, reaching for his beer, "more like 50."

"What!" I exclaimed.  "Did he cheat on the deal?" I asked Iain, who was nearest to him, "he seems to always 'get lucky'."  

Iain shrugged and smirked good-naturedly, refusing to give away any tactics of how the cards had been maneuvered.

Colin laid his hand on the table.  

"A trump seven will take an Ace of Hearts, dear lovely" he said smoothly, "but my Ace of Hearts is followed by a king, a queen, and a jack."

"Damnit!" I exclaimed, then smiled despite myself.  So much for my beginner's luck, I thought as I shook my head.  

"Welcome to Colin playing Clobyosh" Kane said laughingly.

This Colin MacAllister, I decided, was a downright riot.  He had intentionally called Iain, Kane, and I together to play this game of cards because he knew that they were fighting, and that it would drive them to insanity to be in the same proximity, especially when the object that they had been fighting over was strategically placed between them.  He loved seeing people squirm, I concluded with a close-mouthed grin.  I thought about how he and Rachel, the eager interrogator and wily schemer, would get along.  NO, I thought to myself when my sense returned, way too dangerous.  Colin needed a woman that would take his senses by strong and completely interrupt his state of being.  Rachel would not do that.  Rachel would only make him worse; it would be like pouring gasoline on fire.  Colin needed to be doused at bit, not ignited. 

"Colin, we need to find you a good woman" I said abruptly, "you need to be tamed.  You've reached the pinnacle of barbarianism.  That's what happens to men when they've reaped all the benefits of bachelorhood - they become wild spawns of Satan."

He huffed in feigned arrogance, "I was born a wild spawn of Satan, the untamed egg of a wild goose."  Then he grinned, and the dimples appeared underneath his dark stubble and contrasted with his sharp jaw.  I shook my head.  "And" he added, "I will never be tamed by a woman, eh?" he said as he looked at Kane, and then at Iain.

"I canna nae agree to tha'." Kane said quietly as he pretended to study his cards, his long fingers thumbing through them as if to count his points for the umpteenth time.

"Nor can I" said Iain, eyes darting to me for a moment, boldly.  

I felt myself growing warm, strangely having a feeling that I could have been the reasons why both men had answered that way.  However, I tried to appear small and unaware of their intents, as I did not want them to resume their nasty behavior towards each other.  I had dealt with all the odious spirits that I care to deal with from the two of them tonight.

"Bah" Colin said in response, and took a furious swig of beer, "God I hate love."

We all broke out into laughter, thinking his statement hilariously paradoxical.

"It's a terrible time of year to hate love" I told him, "it's Christmas!"

In the back of my mind, however, I partially agreed with him.  I already knew that the game of love was exactly like a game of chess, exactly like being amidst a battlefield.  There were two sides, rules to follow, passion and pain to be had.  I had heard this description many times, and thus it did not surprise or unsettle me.  What did unsettle me, though, was that there were not two sides for me.  There were three.  Therefore, in my case, the game of love was like neither chess nor a battlefield.  As with any game of three, there was one too many for head-to-head contact, and one too few for good negotiation.  Someone was always the odd man out, and if war was to occur between all three corners, stalemate would have been the only solution.  This is precisely the reason why I agreed with Colin that love was a bit despicable.  Why I had chastised him for bashing it, I really did not know.

"Bah" he replied again to my protest.

"Bah Humbug, you mean, Colin Scrooge?" Iain asked cheesily, and we all began laughing again.

Colin feigned a yawn as he stretched and pretended to be bored with our conversation.  He looked at his watch as he stretched, "Och will ye look at tha'," he began, "it's already the buttcrack of midnight.  Party should be over soon.  And do ye know wha' I'm going to do tonight when I get home?"

"Whatever it is, doona share it with us" Kane warned.  

"I'm going to enjoy all the benefits of bachelorhood, and enjoy becomming a wild spawn of Satan." He said with a silly grin on his face, and then he rose from his chair and reached to grab his beer, which Kane grabbed before he could.  

"Someday" Kane shook his head as he got up from his own chair, muttering to us, "he'll fall.  And when he falls, he'll fall hard."

"Ah, then he'll be just like 'is older brother," Iain said on impulse, and Kane stopped for a moment to give Iain a look that spoke, be careful bastard before i fucking draw my pocket knife on your throat.  Then he put his undisclosed cards under the deck, drained his whiskey, and put on his jacket. 

"Good night, Ellen" he said to me softly, and he lingered for a few moments as he looked into my eyes.  Then he turned to steal the car keys away from his younger brother, who was at that moment flirting aimlessly with a red-headed girl with sizeable breasts.  Kane grabbed Colin by the jacket, ruffled his hair a bit with his hand, and together they walked to the exit.

Once they were gone, Iain laid his cards down on the table face up.  It was also a 50 point hand.  I sat with an open mouth, watching him as he grabbed the score card, put his final score down, and then circled both his and Colin's names.

"Why did you do that?" I asked him, straining my neck to see the card, knowing that Colin had been the revealed winner.  I wondered what on earth Iain was trying to prove now.  

"Tie game" he said casually, "he may 'ave won by a point over me, but I get to take the ledy home."  He gave me a devastatingly flattering smile, and then held out his arm.

I smiled back at him, charmed despite myself.  "You devil" I told him, and took his arm.

I couldn't help but wonder, however, as I left the table, what Kane's undisclosed cards had been.  He had been winning before the last hand.  If his hand was just as profitable, he would have won.  Had he chosen to keep his cards concealed because, like his feelings for me, he felt he should let someone better suited take the reins?