Scrabble

"No, it isn't."

"Yes, it is. Check the dictionary."

"I don't have to. That isn't legal."

"It most certainly is. Just because you don't like the definition I gave-."

"I'm doubting most of your definitions. What are you going to try and 'un' next, hmm?"

"Fine, I won't use that word. But that one-."

"Is no more legal than the last one!"

"You're just sore because you're losing."

"No. You're bending rules to create a pretzel."

"As if you don't do that-."

"I do it when it counts!"

"And this doesn't?"

"Fine. Let's just start all over, play this out properly. What do you say?"

"I say you're mad because you're losing."

Arthur Branch leaned back in his chair, rubbing his temples. While the bickering continued, he helped himself to some aspirin from one of his people's desk. Why they decided on a 'game-time lunch' was beyond him. He stopped playing long ago; letting the verbal tennis match continue, at first for comedy's sake, then for stress release.

Now he was counting out two pills, watching the exaggerated gestures out of the corner of his eye. This was what he got for encouraging them to eat in today. He counted out four more pills, put two in each cupped hand and slid them on opposite sides of the table. Absentmindedly, Jack picked up and swallowed the proffered pills. Alex picked hers up and held them like dice, even shaking them a couple of times. Arthur expected them to fall to the table and someone calling out 'yahtzee' or something.

For good measure, Arthur took a third pill, dry-swallowed it and shook his head in utter disbelief, asking himself the same question he already had an answer to.

Whose bright idea was it to turn the Scrabble board into a Boggle game?