She’s a cheater, and I just kept letting it go.

As featured online @ Daily Telegraph on 27 January 2016

I’m a bloke. So says my photo at the top and my name. And like most blokes, I’m not really in touch with my feelings.

But that has changed of late. Recently I’ve felt highly embarrassed, worthless and like a complete walkover.

Let me explain.

I’ve been seeing this girl for a couple of months, but to her it seems our relationship is just one big game.

She’s a cheater.

The pain, the anguish, the rising hurt and yet I just keep excusing such behaviour and pretending things are normal. Even though she’s likely to stomp all over my heart again in the futuron.

“Futuron. That’s four plus one plus one plus one plus one plus one plus one. That’s 14 and I’m on a triple word score so that 76 points to me,” she confidently tells me.

It all began with Scrabble, a game I feel I’m quite strong at.

But that mattered little when, just four words in when I experienced something I never had before.

“Futuron isn’t a word,” I said looking down at the Scrabble board, “And even it was, 14 multiplied by three equals 42, not 76.”

“Futuron is most certainly a word,” she replied, “And I’ve already added 76 to the leaderboard so I can’t take it back.”

My new-found love was a cheater — A board game cheater. And as the previous example showed, not just in a singular manner, but cheating twice within the one word.

I pressed my case referring to the official rules and even the Oxford Dictionary but there was no point. Like mum saying “no” to buying Ninja Turtles figurines in Kmart when I younger (Raphael was my favourite), my competitor wasn’t changing her mind.

“Bae, the shortened form of the word babe,” she said as she kept playing, “And before you get all sooky, onlineslang.com even says it’s a word. Forty more points to me.”

I let it go. Despite thoughts to the contrary.

You’re really starting to annoy me “bae”. It only got worse from there.

The following weekend saw Scrabble replaced with Guess Who.

It was a strategic move as no numbers could be conjured up, no dice deliberately dropped on a particular number or no battleships to be moved around the board to avoid being hit.

But still she found a way to get an advantage.

“You’re Herman!” she yelled, jumping up on the couch.

Herman I was, but I had one last opportunity to tie the opening game. “You’re Alfred,” I shot back.

“Yeah I am,” she answered. “But too bad, you lose and I win.”

I explained, as the rules of Guess Who state, that as she got the first question, I was entitled to the last. And thus as I guessed correctly, the scores were still at zero-zero.

But again rules meant nothing.

“No way, I got it right before you did so I win and it’s one-nil to me.”

I pressed my case, but like mum saying “no” to buying Ninja Turtles figurines... okay you get the rest.

Yet a second case of blatant cheating had left me feeling — as mentioned earlier — embarrassed, worthless and like a complete walkover.

After being so emotionally wounded I went on to lose the next five games.

I looked for an answer to my problems by presenting my case to family and friends.

The girls in my family were matter-of-fact: “It’s more fun if you let the girl win, plus you’re showing you can compromise, albeit in a lighthearted way”.

The lads in my group of friends were boneheaded, but also just mucking around: “Just let her win man, you’ll get more action that way”.

Of both bits of advice, I took neither. I was going to do this my way. I had lost the battle but hadn’t yet lost the war. One last board games night needed to be organised and all I needed was a couple of friends to play along, and a deck of cards.

Her confidence remained sky high.

“Ready to get your butt kicked again?”

Oh, I was ready.

“We’re going to play the card game Cheat,” I told her. “Which is also known to the swearing types as ‘Bullshit’.”

Yes, we were going to play a game where the best cheater wins, thus making it a level playing field.

Except that it wasn’t.

She, the greatest cheater of them all, crashed and burned spectacularly when facing the greatest test.

“This game sucks and you suck and I’m never talking to you again,” she comically vented as she stormed off into another room.

Grinning like a Cheshire cat, I had never been so in touch with my feelings, in fact, one in particular — superiority.

Speak to me again she eventually did, but more importantly, all games of Scrabble and Guess Who have been cheat free since.

And will continue to be long in to the “futuron”.