Grandpa's old hand ran softly along the polished wood surface, clearing a streak of dust in its wake. It had been years since he'd last seen it, but it was still as beautiful as the day he'd won it for his new bride in a tourist trap in Hawaii. It had been stashed away in an old box in the attic, one of many, for years. Smiling softly, he sat on a random box, hoping it didn't contain any breakable treasures from his past, and began polishing and tuning it, surrounded by silence and piles of the miles, real and metaphorical, he had gathered in his long life. The old thing needed to go for a spin; he could feel it in his fingers as they danced with practiced delicacy over the strings and wood. He wondered with a growing grin just how much he remembered.

Yyyyy

Yugi frowned and narrowed his eyes at his opponent. Joey had improved greatly and was now in the process of backing Yugi into the corner. The duel field was the coffee table, and Joey was seated on the floor while Yugi was on the couch, elbows firmly planted on his knees, lip firmly trapped between his teeth.

"…And then I place a card face down, just in case you get any ideas of attacking me." Joey grinned lopsidedly. Confidence was as strong in him as ever, but nowadays he was much more able to back it up.

Yugi looked at his cards for another moment; even though he already knew by heart exactly which ones were in his hand. He was trailing his friend by eighteen hundred points. That wasn't to say he was losing, though. So long as he didn't smile and let Joey know he was up to something, this win would be another tally on his side of the board.

"I'll summon out-," he broke off as the iconic twang, signaling an old west standoff, rang out through the living room. Grandpa's phone was seated just inside the doorway, playing the tune. A moment later, the elder stepped around the corner, plucking the strings of an old ukulele alongside the music.

"Keep playing, boys. I'll just handle the background music."

"Grandpa, what exactly are you doing?" Yugi lowered his hand, tilting it slightly towards himself so that Joey couldn't see what he was holding.

"I saw my neighbor do something like this before. His nephew called it 'being off his meds'." Joey made air quotes with his fingers and shot Grandpa a teasing look, still feeling giddy about having the King of Games on the ropes.

Grandpa lowered the ukulele and his eyebrows, glaring at the Wheeler boy. The phone continued its solo awkwardly. "Hmph. Some people know how to respect their elders."

Yyyyy

"Really? I thought he was adjusting well to life over here." Yami flipped over a spell card and held it up to the camera so Casey could see what he had activated. "This means your monster can't attack and loses five hundred attack points."

"Shoot." Casey furrowed her brow and focused on her deck. "I draw!"

The video chat had started out as just a conversation. Just catching up on things that had been happening over the past week. Then Casey had noticed her Japanese-Egyptian friend absently shuffling his deck and the topic had switched to her lack of knowledge of game play, despite owning a deck herself. Thus, a friendly practice game to test her skill level and gauge where improvement was needed.

"And I think Mitch is just a little homesick, you know? I place Atlantean Pikeman on the field and activate…" She quickly peeked under each facedown card to see what she had put down. "Never mind. Wrong time. I end my turn."

"And now I have an idea of what is on your field. Be careful about that." Yami drew and played an easy trap for her. She had to learn to anticipate what might be hiding under opponents' traps and spells. "Maybe you should come visit him sometime. Just a surprise drop-in. I know when I first moved to Japan, all I wanted was to see someone from back home again." He was careful to leave out the fact that 'back home' meant more than just Egypt.

"But you have family with you now. Mitch is living alone." She pointed out, drawing a card. "You do have a point, though. I'll give you that."

"And while you're here, you can come get your stuffed tiger. Joey found it the other day and won't stop laughing at me." Yami waited for her to call an attack so he could activate his trap, but she instead hesitated, reached for a card on her field, and flipped it up. His trap was destroyed and the attack lost him his first two hundred points of the game. She grinned widely and pumped her fist in the air in victory.

"Yes! And it's Tora, by the way. I named her Tora."

"Tora, stuffed tiger, what difference does it make?" He teased. "It's here with me. I can call it whatever I want."

That was when a romantic melody drifted through the door, across the room, and into the speakers broadcasting to a computer in America. Grandpa was leaning against Yugi's door across the hall, strumming the strings of a small instrument he hadn't seen before. It appeared to be a slow dance melody.

Yami stood, crossed the room, and shut the door, muffling the song. "It's a bit of a redundant name, though. You at least have to admit that."

Yyyyy

Rule 46: We do not need ukulele background music in our lives.

Yyyyy

Sooooo. Been a while, huh? Again, sorry this took so long to update, but several things happened and life has been insane. Like, even more than usual. But there is a very special chapter fifty coming up and I want to get there before the year is out!

Thank you for reading and don't forget to review! :3