The 1 ball slowly but surely rolled towards the top-right pocket.
Almost there… almost…
Oh no! It almost arrived at the pocket, but the ball itself stopped after it had exhausted its kinetic energy.
Looks like I didn't strike it hard enough.
It was then Vic's turn.
Taking advantage of my goof-up, he finally sunk the 1 ball.
He then sunk pretty much the majority of the other balls with reckless abandon.
Until he arrived at the last ball standing, the 9 ball.
The yellow-striped ball rested in an ambiguous position – it was just a few millimeters away from the cue ball, which resided in the southeast direction, and both balls were situated roughly an inch near the lower-left pocket.
I thought to myself, "Unless he performed a trick shot, he would not nail the last ball down, and it would finally be my turn to steal his thunder."
The gentle giant just maintained his calm disposition as he ascertained the most efficient way to sink this last ball.
And then…
He positioned his cue stick in an odd way, like a conductor having too much fun with his conductor's baton.
Strike.
The cue ball hit the 9 ball as usual.
My jaw just dropped as the yellow-striped ball just made a curved turn as it rapidly spun towards the lower-left pocket…
...before it finally sunk.
He won, and I lost.
OK. I've really underestimated him.
Despite my years of vested interest in both darts and billiards, it seemed someone had an edge over me.
Nevertheless, I congratulated him with a pat on his shoulder.
I then asked him about the trick shot he used to win this game.
"Oh, that shot? I personally call it 'the intelligent roll'."
"An intelligent roll? Is that one of your secret tricks?"
"Well, not that secret. The key is to make the ball spin so that it moves in a direction other than straightforward."
"Alright… maybe I still have much to learn."
"Of course. As long as we live, we are afforded to learn."
***
"But even then, in the succeeding years, I still lost to him in both darts and billiards.
"Thankfully, my skills have vastly improved over those years, so all those losses I incurred in recent years were mostly close calls.
"I just couldn't whine about my losses, because that would be total lack of sportsmanship, right?"
Aurora just answers with a single nod before she concludes…
"Right. And when the opening day finally comes… this place will have much soul, because the competitive spirits will finally awaken in most of us!"
"Well said, girlie!"
For the next few days, we sally on as we anticipate with bated breath the formal opening of the recreational rooms.
And of course, in those down-times, we three decide to train ourselves at Kensington's, which was where Vic and Laurent first faced each other in those two sports six years ago.
Before one asks, we three are complete newcomers to these sports, so we just observe how other players are doing, complemented with what the bartender had narrated, to get us started.
A little bit of internet research beforehand doesn't hurt, either.
We start off with darts, of course.
Like them, we settle with the beginner-friendly count-up rule.
Since we three will be competing against one another, a simple coin toss or even a rock-paper-scissors won't do the trick.
Luckily, I have with me a 12-sided die, which is commonly used in fantasy tabletop games.
The die itself… is a keepsake from someone whom I eventually lost.
***
Her name was Conchita Primavera.
She was a classmate of mine back in middle school, and was a board game enthusiast.
Every weekend, she would invite me to her house and play both board games and fantasy tabletop role-playing games.
This way, I discovered the wonders of chess and checkers, and even more obscure board games such as backgammon and sungka.
It turned out that in terms of both skill and luck, we we both equally matched.
It was evidenced in the same win-loss counts we racked up, as well as the equal amount of draws (yes, she both kept tabs on it).
Her family was well off, and her parents readily approved of her hobby she came to love so much, that I came to her house every weekend to try out a new board game, or play the ones we grew fond of.
One day, Conchita invited me to a game of snakes and ladders.
Since there are many variations of that game alone, she racked up quite a good number of various boards so far.
Ten, if my memory serves me correctly.
At that time, she urged me to play the original Indian version, which was steeped in traditional Hindu philosophy, and even had imagery of Hindu mythology.
"This was where it came from. When it was imported to the United Kingdom, the rules were basically the same, but the Hindu philosophical principles were replaced by Victorian ones."
"Nice. So then… we'll roll the die to see who goes first. You do the honors, Fred."
Alright. I tossed the six-sided die enough, hoping to get a high-enough number.
It was a 4. Not bad.
When it was her turn, she rolled a 5.
Oh, well. It's just the beginning.
We exchanged turns; and thus far, we were evenly matched in terms of the current position.
But then, her player piece unknowingly landed on the 13th square.
As if that wasn't unlucky enough, that square also contained a snake's head, which meant she had to plummet down to the 7th square.
And yes, I've observed something.
This original Indian version contained more snakes than ladders, and the ladders were mostly situated on the upper squares.
And thus, we more often than not were at the mercy of the snakes that always tried to bring us down, and the stairways to heaven were hard to get a grip of.
In my mind, I've wanted to shout "I've had it with these monkey-fighting snakes on this Monday-to-Friday board game!"