The Wooden Solitaire Board

My great-uncle Fergus was a man of few words and many habits. He lived alone in a crooked timber house at the edge of the Ponderosa Pine forest, where the wind always smelled of sap and old dust. He was a retired lumberjack, a quiet man who found comfort in routine: coffee at 4 AM, a single cigarette at noon, and a game of solitaire every night at exactly nine, using a worn wooden board with glass beads that clicked like teeth. When the cancer took him in March of 2007, the family gathered at his house to sort through his belongings. I volunteered to stay the night, as the house was small and the relatives were many.

I chose the living room, which was dominated by his recliner and a side table that held his solitaire board. The room smelled of stale tobacco and menthol rub. My cousin Vera, who snored like a chainsaw, insisted on sharing the space with me, saying she didn’t want to be alone under that roof. I agreed, though I regretted it when her first snore rattled the windows. I lay on the pull-out couch, staring at the ceiling where a single bulb hung on a frayed cord, and tried to ignore the creaks of the house settling. At 1:09 AM, by the green glow of my travel clock, I heard a precise, rhythmic click-clack from the corner. It was the sound of glass beads being moved on wood.

I froze. The sound was unmistakable: the deliberate placement of a bead into a groove, then a pause, then another. It came from the direction of the solitaire board. I held my breath and listened. The clicks were steady, as if someone were playing a game, but the board was on the side table, and no one was there. I thought I was imagining it, or that a draft had shifted the beads, but the rhythm was too measured. I turned on the lamp, and the board sat still, beads arranged in a perfect cross pattern—the starting position for a game. I checked the room: no one. Vera snored on, oblivious. I switched off the lamp, and the clicking resumed, slower this time, as if the invisible player was considering each move.

I did not sleep that night. I lay rigid, listening to the game continue until the first light of dawn filtered through the dusty blinds. When I finally got up, I saw that the board had been reset to the starting position, exactly as it was meant to be before a game. I told my aunt, and she said, ‘Fergus always played a final game before bed. He said it helped him think. He never finished one, though. He said the last move was always the hardest.’

I shrugged it off as grief playing tricks. But the next night, I had to stay again, as the estate lawyer was coming in the morning, and I was the only one who could open the safe. I slept in the same living room, alone this time, because Vera had left. At exactly 1:09 AM, the clicking began again. This time, I got up and walked to the side table. The board was mid-game, with beads scattered across the grooves. I watched, mesmerized, as one bead moved on its own—a small, ceramic bead sliding from one hole to another with a soft clink. I reached out to touch it, and the moment my fingers grazed the wood, the bead shot back to its starting position, as if shocked.

I jumped back. The room was cold, the kind of cold that settles in bones. I backed away, but the clicking intensified, faster and faster, until it was a frantic clatter. Then, just as suddenly, it stopped. A single bead rolled off the board and fell to the carpet, rolling until it bumped my foot. I picked it up; it was warm, almost hot, despite the cold air. I looked at the board: the beads had rearranged themselves into a word—not a word, but a date: 03/14/2007. I knew that date. It was the day Fergus had been diagnosed.

I dropped the bead and fled the room. For the rest of the night, I sat in the kitchen with the lights blazing, too afraid to go back. In the morning, I told the executor, a pragmatic man named Bill, about the incidents. He laughed and said, ‘Old Fergus was quirky, but he’s dead. Probably the house settling.’ He went into the living room to retrieve some documents. A moment later, he came out pale, holding the solitaire board. ‘The beads,’ he whispered. ‘They’re all in a straight line, but there’s one missing.’

I checked my pocket, and I still had the warm bead. I showed it to Bill. He shook his head and said, ‘That’s not the missing one. The missing one is the last move. He never finished his game.’ He set the board down and left the house, suddenly eager to be gone.

I stayed one more night, against my better judgment, because I needed to clear the house for sale. This time, I did not sleep in the living room; I camped out in the hallway, near the front door, with a suitcase packed. At 1:09 AM, I heard the clicking again, but now it was accompanied by a low humming, a tuneless melody Fergus used to hum while whittling. I covered my ears, but the sound seemed to come from inside my head. I stumbled to the living room door, which was slightly ajar, and peeked inside. The room was bathed in moonlight, and the solitaire board was on the floor, not the table, as if it had been thrown. The beads were scattered everywhere, rolling and spinning in circles, as if chasing each other. And in the center of the room, a faint, gray shape sat in the recliner, leaning forward, one hand extended toward the board.

It didn’t have a face, but I felt its attention on me. I slammed the door and ran out of the house, not stopping until I reached my car. I drove to a motel and called my aunt, sobbing. She listened, then said, ‘He always wanted to finish that last game, but he never could. He died before he made the final move. Maybe he’s stuck.’

I didn’t go back. The house was sold the following month to a young couple who knew nothing of Fergus. I kept the wooden board, though I buried it in the backyard of my own house, deep under a patch of weeds. I thought that would end it. But last night, at 1:09 AM, I heard the clicking from the garden, and when I looked out the window, I saw the board propped against a tree, beads gleaming in the moonlight. One bead was missing. And in the dirt, something had scratched a line: ‘FINISH THE GAME.’ I haven’t slept since. I don’t know if I ever will.