The pattern "a___e" suggests several possible 5-letter words like "alive", "alone", "abuse", etc. The letter 'l' appears in multiple common words matching this pattern (like "alive" and "alone") and is a frequently used consonant in English. Since vowels 'a' and 'e' are already revealed, guessing a common consonant like 'l' that appears in several potential matches gives me a good chance of progress.