“Is it? Because as far as I know, I have twelve coming up.”
“The first one sets the tone, Mal.”
“I . . . Won’t it be rude to leave?”
“Maybe.” She pulls me up the stairs. “But your opponent didn’t even bother showing up. As long as his rudeness eclipses yours, you’re golden.”
That’s how I end up wearing my jammies at 8:53, tucked in, pillow punched underneath my head. Easton slides in on her side of the bed, Darcy curls right between us, and Sabrina settles at the foot of the mattress.
A veritable slumber party.
“According to my trainer, I should be asleep in five minutes,” I point out.
“Ah, yes.” Sabrina doesn’t look up from her phone. “Is Defne going to come burp you, too?”
“Come on, Sabrina,” Easton scolds her. “You know she first needs a diaper change.”
We argue for the longest time over what to watch on the 8K TV. Then we give up on finding a movie that won’t be vetoed by at least one other person, and settle for pulling up random You-Tube videos. After nine centuries of surprisingly violent roller derby footage that have me worried for the state of Sabrina’s brain, Easton blesses me with a Dragon Age playthrough. For a minute it feels like it used to be— the two of us, and Solas being an asshole on screen. When I turn to grin at her, I find that she’s already grinning at me. Then I remember something, and my smile slips.
“What?” she asks.
“Nothing. Just . . .” I shrug. “I watched one with Nolan once.”
“A playthrough? Is that gem of a boy into DA?”
“Not really.”
“Ah. I’ve seen your press conference, by the way. Nice job making it look like you totally despise him even when he said nothing but super-nice things about you.”
“I didn’t.”
“Yes, you did,” Darcy and Sabrina say in chorus, without tearing their eyes from the TV.
“Whatever.” I roll my eyes. Because they’re right. “He hasn’t really . . . Maybe he said mediumly nice things, but don’t be fooled. He hasn’t acknowledged my presence.”
“Mmm.” Easton nods. “Have you considered acknowledging his first? Maybe be like, ‘Hey, whadup, I didn’t really mean the many horrible things I said about you.’ ”
“Right.” I clear my throat. Look away. “No.”
“Did you call him a bitch, too?” Darcy asks.
I tilt my chin up and groan. “I refuse to engage on this topic with anyone who’s under eighteen, or with anyone who’s over eighteen but needs a twenty-five- minute pep talk to add a heart emoji to a text,” I declare. But ten minutes later, while a Texan lady nurses an injured bat back to health （Darcy’s selection）， I start composing a text. The most recent blue bubbles are dated January 9, middle of the night: the response to my Either Emil’s really good at sex or he’s gutting Tanu, was You mean, it’s not a foghorn that woke me up? I half smile and write:
can we talk?
Then I delete it. And type again:
you’re right about some things. maybe not all of them. but I overreac
Delete.
did you know in your 2016 game against Lal you missed a checkmate. nice queening, though.
Delete, delete, delete.
im sorry about
Delete.
hi.
I don’t hit Send. But I leave it there, in the typing box. And when I set my phone against my chest and go back to watching TV, it feels several pounds heavier than ever before.
After a match— usually during one of those press conferences that I always assume will have twelve viewers but instead are streamed by hundreds of thousands of nerds like me— people will ask me how, in a specific moment, at a specific turn of the game, I decided what to do. How did you know to sacrifice the pawn? Why that trade? Rook e6 was perfect— what made you think of that?
People ask me. And all I can say is: I just knew.
Instinct, maybe. Something innate within myself that helps chess come together like a fully formed shape. A rudimentary, gut understanding of how things could be if I let myself follow a path.
The pieces tell me a story. They draw pictures and ask me to color them in. Each one, with its hundreds of possible moves, billions of possible combinations, is like a beautiful skein of yarn. I can unspool it if I like, then weave it together with others to create a beautiful tapestry. A new tapestry.
Ideally, a winning tapestry.
If it hadn’t been for Dad, that instinct would have stayed coarse, unspun within me. If it hadn’t been for years of hard work, of practicing, studying, analyzing, thinking, reliving, obsessing, playing, playing, playing, my instinct would be worth very little. If it hadn’t been for Defne, after falling asleep for four years, it would have stayed dormant.
But I would still have it. If things had been different, my instinct would still be a raw ball of unknowns knotted inside me: waking me up at 3:05 a.m. on the most important day of my life, thrumming within me, pulling me out of bed.
I don’t even remember falling asleep. The TV is still on, Netflix pointedly asking if we’re still watching Riverdale, and I have no idea why my sisters decided to infiltrate my room instead of returning to their overpriced suite. Climbing out of bed takes Cirque du Soleil– grade coordination and a nearly sprained ankle. Once I’ve peed and drunk what’s left in my water bottle, I’m just not motivated enough to dive back in.
I try to keep quiet as I put on Easton’s CU Boulder hoodie. It stops just below my shorts, and I should probably grab a coat and some thick sweats, but I don’t bother turning on the light for something warmer, and instead let myself out of the room.
The hallways are silent and gelid. The sea, quiet. There are no ferries, no boats, no seagulls, because all of Venice is fast asleep. I make my way down the stairs, the shiny pinks and whites of the marble floors pure ice under my bare feet, hair bouncing over my shoulders.
I don’t know where I’m going, but I know in my stomach that it feels right. It’s good, this: being alone with the night sea breeze, exploring the deserted gardens, inhaling the smell of grass and salt. I spot some lights in the distance, from the little glass house where I’ll spend the next two weeks, immersed in chess and heartache. I follow the stone path, shivering, tracing the steps for the first of thirteen times. Wondering if come morning, the precious calm I feel right now will tangle into a pile of exposed nerves.
I stop in my tracks when I see him, but I’m not startled. Maybe I should be surprised to see him there— the time, the place, the coincidence don’t exactly make sense—but my gut tells me that this is fine.
This is why I’m here: for Nolan.
He gives me his back, standing tall in front of a familiar frame. Marcus Sawyer’s picture has been moved into the glass house, flanked by three others— all the world champions who have been crowned here in Venice. Tomorrow, when the first game starts, they will surround the players. Place them right within history.
I watch the relaxed line of Nolan’s shoulders and think about my next move.
Think about turning around.
Think about my cold limbs and the pile of sisters back in my room.
Think about his messy hair and a box of Froot Loops and his wide eyes as he said, Kasparov was there.