chapter 19

Kings and Queens

Wednesday, March 6

Cameron and I are three sessions into a new game using the Barnes Opening, pawn to F3, which most chess aficionados consider to be the absolute worst starting maneuver. Not only does it prevent the development of the pawn itself or open any lines for other pieces, the move hinders the development of the White king’s knight by denying it its most natural square. Worse yet, it weakens White’s kingside pawn structure, opens the E1–H4 diagonal against White’s uncastled king, and opens the G1–A7 diagonal against White’s potential kingside castling position.

In short, the move is suicide, and there’s a reason no one ever uses it.

No one, that is, except Cameron.

He’s especially quiet sitting across the picnic table from me today, and as I’m waiting for him to take his turn, his silence reminds me a bit of Zander who was known to shush me if I tried to carry on a conversation while he was thinking through a complex sequence of moves. He would often complain he couldn’t concentrate with my ‘blathering,’ so chatting about useless drivel became one of my techniques to use against him in the event I became desperate enough to win.

As much as I like Cameron and have become accustomed to and even fond of his quirks, it’s Zander I’d rather be playing with on this seasonably warm afternoon. With the blossoms budding on the redbud trees, it wasn’t hard to convince the entire chess team that our psyches and vitamin D levels could stand a move outside to the picnic tables for some sunshine.

A mother cardinal works diligently on her nest, gathering pine needles off the ground and delivering them to a narrow grouping of branches in the tree above. It makes me curious about my tree, my bur oak, and whether it, too, has begun to bud. I make a mental note to ask Zander about it the next time we talk, but inexplicably, the thought of our upcoming conversation hurts my heart. Our Sunday afternoon chats, undoubtedly the highlight of every week, are also the times I dread the most. They are the painful reminder of how far away we are, in both physical and emotional proximity.

*

The first time the two of us faced separation was during the summer before seventh grade. Along with a few other members of his 4-H program, Zander entered one of his father’s spring calves into the state fair two hours away in Des Moines. Unlike pies or crafts, those entering livestock are responsible for their animal’s care for the duration of the fair. With no one else to feed the calf or muck the stall, Zander was forced to stay.

And I couldn’t stand the thought of him leaving me behind.

“Why don’t you come with me?” he offered from the lowest branch of our tree as I bemoaned the utter tedium that would become my life once he headed to the fairgrounds the following week.

I turned my face from the waning sun, looking down at him from my perch above to check if he was serious. He was grinning, his eyes hopeful. Was he nervous about being at the fair alone?

“I can’t leave Dad,” I told him. “He needs my help.”

He scoffed. “Ashley can help for once. That girl hardly does anything.”

He was right. Ashley was rather lazy, not to mention so easily distracted from her chores it was less trouble to pick up her slack than nag her into submission. Her ineptitude was the whole reason Dad needed me around.

“I guess I could ask Mom and Dad,” I relented. “But don’t get your hopes up. There’s a good chance they’ll say no.”

But they hadn’t said no. They actually supported the idea, encouraging me, as long as I was going anyway, to enter one of our chickens as well.

That week at the fair, Zander and I tucked ourselves into sleeping bags each night on the straw-covered earth of the cattle barn, exhausted from the events of the day. As we lay together, side-by-side, amongst the pungent odors of the livestock and oppressive heat that was part and parcel to summer in Iowa, we’d promised one another we would return to the fair every year, no matter what. Even once we were old and gray with bad hips and wrinkles.

“We’ll pick something different to enter each summer,” Zander said, “and come together so neither one of us has to be alone.”

*

This August he’ll be entering the dairy goat his mom bought at the farmer’s market last summer for him to raise. And I know, for the first time ever, he’ll be going without me. I wonder if he’ll bring someone else along or if he’ll go it alone. I decide immediately he’ll fly solo. He is, after all, practically a grown man, and he certainly doesn’t need anyone’s help taking care of a stupid goat for a few days.

I’m imagining him sleeping alone on the floor of the livestock barn when Cameron, in an unprecedented show of boldness, begins to speak while contemplating his next move.

“Are you going with anyone to prom?”

He asks without emotion making it difficult to discern his motivations. And while it may be true he says everything without emotion, this particular question comes with a heap of potential consequences depending on how I chose to respond.

“I’m planning to go with Leonetta and Alice and Summer,” I tell him truthfully, gaze locked on the board, not wanting to give anything more away. Part of me is worried he’s about to ask me himself, and I’ll be forced to let him down. It’s not that I’d have any problem going with Cameron as a date, I just have no interest in going to prom with any guy.

At least no guys from Fayetteville.

“Oh,” he says simply, sliding his pawn out of my knight’s range.

I try to concentrate on my next move. On my next series of moves. Should I protect my bishop? Sacrifice my third pawn? But I’ve lost focus, unable to track more than a few moves in my head, and there’s no denying his interest in my prom plans has me flustered. He has a tender heart, and the last thing I want is to upset him, but now I can’t help wondering why he asked.

“What about you?” I blurt out before I can stop myself.

“Me what?” he says without looking up from the board.

“Prom? Have you asked anyone to prom?”

His face is inscrutable. “People like me don’t go to prom.”

There’s something about the way he says it, so matter-of-factly, as if it’s written somewhere in the Old Testament on a tablet sent by God.

“Why not?” I challenge him, straightening from my hunched chess position to assert a more commanding posture.

He shrugs.

“That’s not an answer, Cameron,” I say.

“It’s your turn,” he replies, ignoring my line of questioning altogether.

I cross my arms and cock my head. “I’ll take my turn as soon as you tell me why ‘people like you,’ whatever that’s supposed to mean, don’t go to prom.”

He lifts his eyes slowly from the chess board and in one giant, sweeping motion, throws out his arms, sending the board and all our pieces tumbling onto the ground.

Several beats pass as we both sit in stunned silence, waiting for the other to react. I’m getting used to his outbursts and overreactions, and although I no longer take them personally, it still takes a second to compose myself. The last thing I want is to enrage him further, and since it’s clear he has no intention of cleaning his mess, I dutifully slide off the end of the picnic table bench and begin collecting our scattered pieces. Cameron, for his part, doesn’t move.

“The way I see it, you don’t need to be on the shortlist for prom king or queen to deserve to go to the dance. Everyone deserves to go to prom. If you don’t want to, that’s on you. But if you want to and choose not to because you’re nervous or scared or feel like you don’t have anybody to go with, that’s another story.” I hesitate for an instant, wondering if what I’m about to say will be helpful or make everything worse. “If you want to go, you should come with me and my friends. We’d love to have you along.”

I finish gathering the last of the pieces—a black king and white queen—I have to crawl under the table to reach. After tossing them all into a box, I stand to face Cameron who remains stoically seated in exactly the same position.

“Well?” I say to him.

Before he can answer, Mr. Wilson calls to us from his room’s second-floor window directly above our heads.

“I just got a call from the NC Chess Association and you better do whatever it is you all do to prepare for battle because the delegation from M.A. Hopkins was accepted into the NC State Regional Tournament next month.”

Cameron’s face brightens almost imperceptibly.

“For real?” I call to Mr. Wilson.

“No joke,” he says.

I turn to Cameron. “I guess we’re gonna compete together.”

He shrugs. “Then we might as well go to prom, too.”