‘What happened then?’
Grandad got up from the couch and straightened a picture on the wall. He cocked his head to check the angle, then sat down again. Even that small movement left him slightly breathless.
‘What? After I saw your grandmother for the first time?’
‘Yes. Pop! You know what I’m talking about.’
‘Well, I picked up her groceries and helped her re-pack them. Then I believe I tipped my hat to her and wished her a good morning. She thanked me. At least I think she thanked me, but it was half a century ago so my memory could be playing tricks.’
Granddad got up again and opened a door in the cabinet that housed his television. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen the TV on, but he must watch it sometimes. Granddad knows more about what’s going on in the world than anyone I know. He reached into the cabinet and pulled out the chess set. ‘Fancy a game, Rob?’ he said.
‘Only if you let me win,’ I said. We’d now played many times and I’d never won a game. Not once. Not even close. This isn’t really surprising because I’m thirteen, Pop is older than God’s dog and therefore has a massive advantage. When he was growing up he probably only had chess to play. My generation has computers. I should challenge him to a first-person shooter game on my console. Then again, knowing Granddad’s competitive streak, he’d probably beat me.
‘You’re kidding, right?’ said Granddad.
‘No.’
‘You need to understand one thing,’ said Pop, returning to the settee and setting up the board. ‘I will never, ever let you beat me at chess. You could be dying of leukaemia, as bald as your father, with an hour left to live and I wouldn’t let you win. I’d crush you. And then I’d taunt you about it while you took your dying breath.’
‘Fine words, Grandad,’ I said. ‘You’re making me tear up.’
‘You wouldn’t want me to let you win,’ said Pop.
‘Yes, I would,’ I said. ‘I just told you that.’
‘And what would such a victory be worth? Tell me that, young Rob.’
‘It would mean I’d beaten you for once.’ I placed my white queen on the white space at the back of the board. ‘That’s important to me now. If I was about to take my last breath it would mean even more.’
‘Yes,’ I said.
The board was set up and I moved my king’s pawn a couple of spaces forward. Grandad mirrored my move.
‘You remember your soccer game?’ he said.
‘Sure.’
‘What if I told you every member of that opposition team deliberately didn’t try? That I had been in touch with them before the game and offered them fifty bucks each not to try.’
‘You didn’t, did you?’ You could never tell with Grandad.
He waved a hand.
‘Of course not. But answer my question.’
I didn’t want to because I knew where the conversation was going. Achievements aren’t worthy of the name unless they’re a genuine result of talent and commitment. Undeserved victory would taste like ashes in the mouth. I knew all this, even as I moved a knight forward and took another step towards inevitable defeat.
‘No,’ I said. ‘Answer my question. When did you see my grandmother next?’
Grandad saw Bella again in late 1967. He was walking through Darling Harbour with a couple of mates – the first time he’d been back in those intervening years, he said – when he saw a woman on the other side of the street. Maybe it was because she wasn’t moving and everything else was, but his eyes were drawn to her.
He stopped. His mates kept going. Pop gazed at Bella and the world went about its business without either of them. For a while, neither moved. Then he walked over; she stayed still. Even when he stood a matter of centimetres from her, she didn’t react.
‘Hello,’ he said.
She didn’t smile. She shifted her weight onto her right hip and cocked her head to one side. Grandad thought she cocked her head, but he couldn’t be one hundred per cent certain. But he remembered her next words exactly.
‘I’ve waited five years,’ she said. ‘Where have you been, you mongrel?’
‘Checkmate,’ said Pop.
‘Congratulations,’ I said. ‘You’ve crushed a thirteen-year-old and I hope you’re proud of yourself.’
‘I am,’ he said. ‘I beat you in twenty-five moves, which I think is my best result against you.’
‘If I was taking my last breath, your victory would be even sweeter,’ I said.
‘Oh, Rob,’ said Grandad. ‘Don’t be childish.’
‘I am a child,’ I said.
‘Doesn’t mean you have to behave like one.’
‘Okay,’ I said. I set up the pieces for a new game. I didn’t really care about losing because I was, despite Pop’s words, getting better. I was beginning to see the patterns, and how a move might have ripples across time.
Like Pop and Bella meeting in a street in Sydney in 1967.
‘Tell me your answer,’ I continued.
‘To what?’
‘To Grandma’s question. Where had you been in those five years, you mongrel?’