Vignette: Pieces

Playing chess frightened her. She knew Matt relished this fact as he cracked open the chessboard and started arranging the pieces.

She watched Matt carefully pick up each chess piece between thumb and forefinger and set it down carefully—maybe even reverently—on its designated square. She noticed that his right thumbnail is irregularly shaped owing to his habit of chewing on it while playing his favorite game. The rest of his fingernails badly needed a trim and she made a mental note to remind him about it. After the game, maybe. After he’s won.

He smiled a nicotine-stained smile as he paced around the table, crouching towards the board and squinting at the pieces every now and then, making sure they are looking straight across the board at the opposing army. He used a long, bony finger to gently nudge a white knight to the center of its square. He then made one last slow circuit around the table, a general reviewing his troops before the battle. Satisfied, he straightened up, positively beaming.

She was so absorbed watching him go about his ritual that she barely heard him address her.

“Hmm?” she asked.

“Black or white?” he said, gesturing with a lean arm towards the table. “White, black? Black, white? C’mon, Ma, we don’t have all night.”

It’s begun, she told herself. The chess game hasn’t started and he’s already playing me. She looked at the chess pieces, at the arrayed whites and the arrayed blacks. What to choose?

She shifted her gaze to her son. He was lighting a cigarette, his intense eyes focused on the lit tip. He took a deep drag, savored it in his deteriorating lungs and exhaled it through his nostrils. A series of wet racking coughs followed it, silenced by another drag of the cigarette.

He saw her watching him and his thin, discolored lips stretched into a grin. “Ma…,” he said.

She walked towards the table, studying the chessboard and its pieces.

“Dither, dither, dither,” said Matt.

She looked up. He was still grinning but she could see impatience starting to creep into his eyes, slowly supplanting the benign grin. He took another drag of his cigarette and slowly ran his fingers of one hand through his thinning hair.

“It’s just two colors, Ma. How hard can it be?”

Do not play his game, she told herself.

“For fuck’s sake, Ma!”

Matt strode towards the table, took a piece each from the whites and the blacks and went to her. She silently prays he won’t try and make her eat one of the pieces like he did a week before.

He stood before her holding up a white king in his left hand and a black rook in his right. She tried hard not to look up, staring straight on at his chest, watching it rise and fall steadily against his loosely hanging shirt.

Do not play his game.

“Ma!”

His raised voice made her look up. She studied her son’s slowly deteriorating face. The grin was gone, melted by impatience. His cigarette still hung from one corner of his lips. She saw ash break away from the stick and fall silently to the floor. Her eyes moved on straight into her son’s eyes, looking for something to appeal to. Her son’s glare met her eyes and quickly terminated the search. He held up the two pieces in front of her face.

“Choose. Now.”

Do not play his game.

She closed her eyes.

Do not play his game. It’s been her mantra for some years now.

“Black,” she heard herself say.