Scrabble Memories - The Final Chapter

I left the glistening white tile floors, cool marble walls, ice-filled urinals, free cologne and solitude of the men’s restroom and walked back out into the faux English country manor that was the fourth floor of the Chicago Athletic Club, the heavy scent of Clubman Citrus Musk trailing behind me. It was time.

I heard my name of the public address system: “Mike O’Mary…report to the registration table for the Champion Challenge!”

I strolled confidently to the table. The National Scrabble Champion was standing next to the event organizers.

“I’m Mike O’Mary,” I said to one of the organizers. She introduced me to the Champion. We shook hands.

“Thank you for supporting this event,” he said.

“Let’s play,” I said.

There were about 100 people at the tournament that night, and every single one of them gathered around as the organizers led the Champ and me to a table that had been set up for the Champion Challenge. The Champ and I sat face-to-face across the small square table. One of the organizers explained the rules: The Champ and I would each get the same seven letters. We would have 60 seconds to come up with our best word. Whoever came up with the word worth the most points would be declared the winner.

While the organizer was explaining the rules, the crowd gathered tight around our little table. Some of them pressed in a little too close.

“Mmmm…someone smells good,” said a female voice behind me. I looked over my shoulder. It was an attractive black woman.

“Clubman Citrus Musk,” I said. She smiled at me. Her date, a very suave looking Billy Dee Williams type, smiled too and gave me a thumbs up.

“Could we have a little breathing room?” said the Champ. His tone conveyed that this was more than a request. Volunteers stepped in with their arms out to push the crowd back. We were ready to begin.

The organizer stepped up to the table and placed seven tiles face down in front of the Champ and me. I looked up at the Champ. He looked as cool and calm as ever…imagine James Bond at a Monte Carlo baccarat table, sipping a very dry martini – but with a little too much bristly hair going down the back of his neck.

“Are you ready?” asked the organizer.

“Ready,” said the Champ.

“Ready,” said I.

“Begin!” said the organizer.

The Champ and I picked up our tiles, placed them on the rack and studied them. Neither of us moved any tiles around at first, and it occurred to me that perhaps the Champ didn’t need to rearrange tiles. Perhaps he could just see things in his head. Maybe that’s why he was the Champ. Or maybe he was just messing with my head. Maybe he was trying to intimidate me by not touching his tiles, which would make me feel selfconscious about the idea of touching my tiles, which meant I wouldn’t be able to rearrange my tiles, which would put me at a disadvantage since I normally like to move my tiles around.

“Fifty seconds,” said the organizer.

Damn! I thought to myself. I just wasted 10 seconds trying to outthink the Champ. He was good, no doubt about it. Without even trying, he had gotten into my head and thrown me off my game. But I wasn’t going to let myself get caught up in his head games…not in a 60-second dash to Scrabble immortality. I decided right then and there that win or lose, I was going to play my way.

“Forty seconds,” said the organizer. I started rearranging my tiles.

The Champ and I were each dealt the following letters: EFIOMT. Yes, I know…that’s only six letters. There was a seventh letter, but I can’t remember what it was. It doesn’t matter anyway. Neither the Champ nor I were able to use that seventh letter, so I can pretty much guarantee that it was unusable. The Champ and I each played our hand using those six letters: EFIOMT.

I was rearranging my letters and coming up with some different options…FIT…MET…OFT…but nothing good. Meanwhile, the Champ still hadn’t lifted a finger. He just sat there studying his tiles, still trying to get into my head. But I was playing my own game…staying within myself…I kept rearranging my tiles: TOME…TIME…EMIT…MITE…OMIT…

“Thirty seconds.”

Finally, the Champ started rearranging his tiles. And oddly enough, the fact that he was following my lead bolstered my confidence. But that little boost in confidence was accompanied by a shot of adrenalin, which in turn made it more difficult to concentrate, and suddenly, I couldn’t think straight. I was losing it. I continued to rearrange my letters, but it was all nonsense: MIFO…FIMO…TIMO…TEFI…FIOT…nothing!

“Twenty seconds!”

I realized this was probably just as the Champ had planned. He was playing it cool, and I had played right into his hands. But I refused to give up. Focus, I said to myself. Concentrate. That’s when I heard the little voice in my head.

“See the word.”

It started as a whisper, but it kept repeating and it grew louder and more drawn out with each repeat: “Seeeeee the wooooord.”

It kept running through my head over and over again – but then I realized the voice wasn’t coming from inside my head…it was coming from somewhere behind me. I turned around and watched as Billy Dee Williams did a stage whisper: “Seeeeeeeee the wooooooord.”

It was meant to be supportive, and I realized then that he and most of the rest of the people in the room were all pulling for me to knock off this Scrabble gunslinger of a champion who had blown into town intent on showing off his erudite ways and wooing all of our intelligent women, only to blow out of town the next day, leaving in his wake a trail of scattered Scrabble tiles, disillusioned lady literati, and humiliated but fragrant men. So I should have been flattered. But instead, I found the whispering very distracting, and the clock was counting down.

“Ten seconds,” said the organizer.

“Seeeeee the wooooooord,” said Billy Dee.

“Everything all right over there?” asked the Champ.

“Could we have quiet, please?” I yelled.

The room fell dead silent. My powers of concentration came back in a rush, and I could see not only the word, but the theme of my entire life. The structure, the design, the grand pattern…it was all perfectly clear now.

“Time,” said the organizer. “Put down your words.”

“After you,” said the Champ.

I smiled, calmly selected my tiles one-by-one, and laid down my word: MOTIF.

Billy Dee Williams and his date and the 98 other onlookers broke into a round of applause.

“Nicely done,” said the Champ.

“Thank you,” I said.

“Now for your word,” said the organizer to the Champ.

The Champ didn’t bother with putting down his tiles one-by-one. He picked them all up in one hand and laid them before us in an omnipotent motion, as if to say, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was…FOMITE.”

FOMITE?

“What the fuck is FOMITE?” I said, before I could stop myself.

There was a quiet gasp from the audience at my crude inquiry. The organizers and volunteers instinctively moved in, lest I pull a blade and try to cut the Champ.

“It’s an inanimate object that serves to transmit infectious organisms,” said the Champ.

“It’s in the dictionary,” said somebody in the audience, holding up a pocket electronic Scrabble Dictionary.

“FOMITE?” I said. But the world was already moving on.

“Good game,” said the Champ. He stood and held out his hand to me. I stood up and shook his hand, then one of the organizers yelled, “Next!” and I was ushered away.

I won’t bore you with details of the rest of the Scrabble tournament at the Chicago Athletic Club in 1998. Most of the details of the remainder of that evening are kind of fuzzy in my memory anyway. I know that we lost our third round game by a wide margin, and I recall that my coworkers observed a somber and respectful silence on the drive home later that night. But the thing that sticks with me most was my walk through the crowd after my loss to the Champ. The Tribune Company representatives gave me a pat on the back as I went by. The young copywriters from Leo Burnett shook my hand and said, “Better than we could have done.” The editors of Playboy magazine were genuinely bummed: “We thought you had him with ‘MOTIF,’ man!” And one of my coworkers came over and put an arm around me and asked, “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” I said. “I just need a minute.” So they all went off a left me alone by the fireplace with my thoughts. I wasn’t alone for long though. I soon sensed a presence behind me. I turned around and saw Billy Dee Williams and his girlfriend.

“FOMITE,” said Billy Dee. He was shaking his head in a motion that conveyed both disbelief and sympathy.

“Yeah, FOMITE,” I said.

Billy Dee shook his head again. “That’s rough,” he said.

“Yeah,” said his girlfriend.

“What are you going to do now?” asked Billy Dee.

“Nothing,” I said. “I’ll just keep playing.”

Billy Dee nodded. “That’s right, man. Just keep playing.” He gave me a fist bump.

“You, too,” I said. “See the word.”

Billy Dee nodded again. “That’s right,” he said. Then he turned to his girlfriend. “C’mom, Baby. We got a game to play.”

They turned to walk away, but his girlfriend looked back over her shoulder and smiled at me. “Bye, honey,” she said. Then she turned to Billy Dee Williams and whispered, “You should get you some of that Clubman stuff.”

Billy Dee turned to his girlfriend. “How many letters in ‘Clubman,’ Baby?” he asked.

“Seven,” she said.

“That’s right, Baby,” said Billy Dee. “Seven.” He smiled at her and she smiled back, and then the two of them walked back in to the Scrabble tournament and out of my life.