Check & Mate

I am surrounded. Under siege. Relentlessly attacked from all sides.

Honda Civic leaking coolant? On top of me.

Mortgage letter from the credit union? In my backpack. Sabrina’s text reminding me that her derby fees are due on Friday and if I don’t pay them, her life will be in shambles? On my phone.

Bob’s supervillain presence, raging because I refused to push an early brake job on a high school junior? Hovering all over the garage.

Easton, whining at me nonstop like I’m her local congressman? Somewhere next to the Civic.

I successfully avoided her for three days. Now it’s Wednesday, she’s shown up to the garage, and I have nowhere to retreat. Except under a steady stream of coolant.

“You’re acting like a total weirdo,” she says for the twentieth time. “Winning against Sawyer and then running away? Refusing money to play chess?”

“Listen,” I say, and then stop. Partly because the leaking has intensified. Partly because I exhausted my explanations ten minutes ago. “I need a stable, long-term job that allows me to pick up extra shifts when money gets tight. I need it to be here in Paterson in case something happens to Mom and my sisters need me. I have no interest in getting sucked back into chess.” There’s a limited number of ways I can paraphrase these three simple concepts. “You’re leaving next Wednesday, right?”

She ignores me. “People are talking about your game. They’re analyzing it on ChessWorld.com. They’re using words like masterpiece, Mal. Zach keeps sending me links!”

I patch the radiator and roll from under the Civic, take in Easton’s University of Colorado crop top, and scrunch my nose. Seems a bit premature. “Did Zach ever end up playing against Lal?”

“Now you’re interested in the tournament?” She rolls her eyes. “No. But that’s probably for the best, since he lost every single game.” I smile my schadenfreude, but she wags her finger at me. “Hey— at least Zach didn’t leave me without a player because he freaked out when Nolan Sawyer winked at him.”

I huff. “First of all, I seriously doubt Nolan Sawyer has ever winked, will ever wink, or even knows the meaning of the word wink.” I stand, wiping my hands on the butt of my coveralls. Sawyer’s serious, intense expression is not something I’ve been letting myself think about. Okay, maybe I dreamed of him staring at me from across a chessboard that spontaneously burst into flames. Of him pushing the chess clock at me, smiling faintly, and saying with his deep voice, “Did you know that I’m a Gen Z sex symbol?” Of him tipping me over like people do with their kings when they resign, and then stubbornly holding out a hand for me, eager to help me up. Okay, maybe in the past week I’ve had three separate Nolan Sawyer dreams. So what? Sue me. Send the sleep police. “Secondly, I had an emergency.”

“Forgot to turn on the Crock-Pot, did you?”

“Something like that. Hey, I want to come to the airport when you— ” Bob’s voice rises in the main garage, and I frown. “Wait here a sec,” I say, running to check on the too-familiar noise.

My uncle used to co-own the garage with Bob, and I was working here during summers since well before he should have agreed to have me underfoot. I’ve always been intuitive about fixing stuff— figuring out how the different pieces are connected in a larger system, visualizing how they work together as building blocks of a whole, calculating how changing one could affect the others. So much like chess, Dad used to say, and I don’t know if he was right, but Uncle Jack was happy to have me around. Until he wasn’t around anymore: the week after I graduated and began working for him full- time, he made the unfortunate decision to sell his share to Bob and move to the Pacific Northwest “for the Dungeness crab.” As a consequence, I now have the pleasure of answering only to Bob.

Lucky me.

I find him standing in front of a woman I don’t recognize, flanked by his other two mechanics, hands on his hips. They all look angry.

Pissed, even.

“— for an oil change, and I was told that it would cost around fifty bucks, not two hundred— ”

“That’s because of the engine flush.”

“What’s an engine flush?”

“Something cars need, lady. Maybe we forgot to tell you when you brought yours over. Who did you talk to?”

“A girl. Blond, a little taller than me— ”

“I did the intake.” I smile at the client and step inside, ignoring Bob’s glare. “Is there a problem?”

She scowls. “You didn’t mention that my car would need an engine . . . whatever. I-I can’t afford this.”

I glance at the cars around the shop, trying to place her. “It’s a 2019 Jetta sedan, right?”

“Yeah.”

“You won’t need an engine flush.” I smile reassuringly. She looks distraught and rattled over money— something I can relate to. “The car’s well under fifty thousand miles.”

“So the engine flush was not necessary.”

“Not at all. I’m sure it’s a mistake, and . . .” I trail off as I realize what she said. Was. “Excuse me, do you mean that the engine flush has already been done?”

She turns to Bob, steely. “I’m not paying for a job that even your own mechanic says wasn’t needed. And I won’t be using this garage again. But nice try.”

It takes her less than a minute to settle the fifty- dollar bill. The tension in the garage is thick and ugly, and I stand by the counter, feeling painfully awkward, until the Jetta has driven off. Then I turn to Bob.

Surprise surprise, he’s fuming.

“I’m sorry,” I say, a mix of contrite, defensive, and gloating. Working with Bob clearly arouses complex, multilayered emotions within me. “I didn’t know you’d already done the flush or I wouldn’t have told her it wasn’t necessary. She seemed like she didn’t have the money for— ”

“You’re fired,” he says without looking at me, still fiddling with the credit card transaction.

I’m not sure I heard him right. “What?”

“You’re fired. I’ll pay you what I owe you, but I don’t want you back.”

I blink at him. “What are you— ”

“I am sick of you,” he yells, turning to me and coming forward. I take two steps back. Bob’s not tall and he’s not large, but he’s mean. “You always do this.”

I shake my head, glancing at the other mechanics, hoping they’ll intervene. They just look at us stone- faced, and I—

I can’t lose this job. I can’t. I have a letter in my purse and a text in my phone, and apparently guinea pigs get depressed if they’re not living in damn pairs. “Listen, I’m sorry. But I’ve been working here for over a year, and my uncle wouldn’t— ”

“Your uncle ain’t here anymore, and I’m done with you. Not only do you never upsell, but you also don’t let me do it? Get your stuff.”

“But that’s not my job! My job is to fix people’s cars, not sell them stuff they don’t need.”

“Ain’t your job anymore.”

“She’s right, you can’t fire her like that.” I turn around. Easton is standing behind me with her best I will now correct your grammar face. “There are regulations in place that protect employees from unjust termination— ”

“Luckily, Blondie here was never on the books to begin with.”

That shuts Easton up. And the realization that Bob can do anything he wants with me— that shuts me up, too.

“Get your stuff and leave,” he says one last time, rude and obnoxious and cruel as always. I can’t do anything about it. I’m completely, utterly powerless, and I have to clench my fists to stop myself from clawing his face. I have to force myself to walk away, or I’ll tear him apart.

“And Mallory?”

I stop, but don’t turn around.

“I’ll be deducting the cost of the engine flush from what I owe you.”

STRICTLY SPEAKING, I HAVE NEVER BEEN ENGULFED BY A MUD-slide and had my seizing body dragged down the jagged, rocky face of a mountain to be summarily deposited at its foothills and fed to the wild boars. However, I can imagine that if I were to find myself in a similar scenario, it would be no more painful than the week that comes after I get fired.

There are several reasons. For one, I don’t want to worry Mom or my sisters, which means not telling them that Bob fired me, which means finding a place to hide during the day while I search for another job. Not easy, considering that it’s still August in New Jersey, and that free places with AC and Wi-Fi are not common enough in the year of our Lord 2023. I find myself rediscovering the Paterson Public Library: it’s changed very little since I was seven, and welcomes me and my battered laptop to its underfunded bosom.

God bless libraries.

“Upon exhaustive investigation,” I tell Easton on the phone on Thursday night, after a day of less- than- fruitful research, “I discovered that you cannot pay bills with Candy Crush gold bars. A travesty. Also, to be hired as an auto mechanic by someone who’s not your crab- enthusiast uncle, you need fancy things like certifications and references.”

“And you don’t have them?”

“No. Though I do have that Mallory the Car Mechaness comic Darcy drew me when she was eight. Think that might count?”

She sighs. “You know you have another option, right?”

I ignore her, and spend the following day looking for something else— anything else. Paterson is the third- biggest city in New Jersey, dammit. There has got to be a job, any job for me, dammit. Though it also happens to have the third- highest density in the United States, meaning lots of competition. Dammit.

Also, dammit: the red numbers that blink at me later that night when I peek at the online bank account Mom gave me access to once Dad wasn’t in the picture anymore. My belly knots over.

“Hey,” I tell Sabrina when I find her alone in the living room. I shove my hands down into my pockets to avoid wringing them. “About those derby fees.”

She looks up from her phone, eyes scared wide open, and blurts out, “You’re going to pay them, right?”

My eyes are scratchy from staring at a screen all day, and for a moment— a horrible, terrifying, disorienting moment—I am angry with her. With my beautiful, intelligent, talented fourteenyear- old sister who doesn’t know, doesn’t understand how hard I’m trying. When I turned fourteen— on the very stupid day of my stupid birthday— everything changed, and I lost Dad, I lost chess, I lost the very me I’d been, and since then all I’ve done is try to—

“Mal, can you please not screw this one thing up for me?”

The “unlike everything else” is unsaid, and the swelling bubble of anger bursts into guilt. Guilt that Sabrina has to ask for what is due to her. If it hadn’t been for my stupid decisions, we’d have had no problem affording her fees.

I clear my throat. “There’s been a mix-up at the credit union. I’ll go check tomorrow, but could you ask for an extension? Just a couple of days.”

She gives me a level stare. “Mal.”

“I’m sorry. I’ll pay as soon as I can.”

“It’s okay.” She rolls her eyes. “Deadline’s next Wednesday.”

“What?”

“I just told you a few days earlier because I know you.”

“You little— ” I gasp, relieved, and flop on the couch to tickle her. In thirty seconds I have maneuvered her into a hug, and she laughs while saying yikes and gross and Seriously, Mal, you’re embarrassing yourself.

“Why do you smell like old books and apple juice?” she asks. “Do we have apple juice?” I nod silently and go to the kitchen to pour her a glass, choked in my throat because of how much I love my sisters, and how little I can give them.

That night, my Gmail snoozes an unanswered message from [email protected]. Received 5 days ago. Reply? I stare at it for a long time, but don’t open it.

On Saturday and Sunday I get a lucky break: a couple gigs— yard work for a neighbor I sometimes babysit for; dog walking— and it’s nice to have some cash, but it’s not sustainable, not long term and not with a mortgage.

“It just needs to be paid,” the credit union teller says on Monday morning, when I show her the reminder, urgent, you are behind and failing at taking care of your family, you useless member of society letter. “Preferably, all three overdue months.” She gives me an assessing look. “How old are you?” I don’t think I look younger than my age, but it doesn’t matter, because eighteen’s plenty young, even when it feels anything but. Maybe I’m just a child playing at grown-up. If that’s the case, I’m losing. “You should probably let your mom handle this,” the teller says, not unkindly. But Mom’s having a terrible week, one of the worst since the nightmare of her diagnosis started, and we probably need to change her meds again, but that’s expensive. I told her to rest, that I had everything under control, that I was picking up extra shifts.

You know, like a liar.

“You look tired,” Gianna tells me when I show up at her place later that night, in desperate need of a distraction from thinking about money. She and I used to take calculus together. We’d have study sessions in this very house that’s probably a McMansion, and would spend approximately one minute working on functions and two hours having lots of fun in her room. Her parents are out of town on a sailing trip, and she’s leaving for some small liberal arts college in less than a week. Hasan, my other good friend, the week after.

“Tired is my default state,” I tell her with a forced smile.

When I get home, not nearly as relaxed as I’d hoped, I find Easton’s text (Just take the fellowship, Mal) and force myself to look at the sample contract.

It’s good money. Good hours. The commute wouldn’t be ideal, but not impossible once my sisters’ school starts. Defne might allow for a flexible schedule, too.

Still, there’s lots to consider. My feelings about chess, for one, which I cannot disentangle from my feelings for Dad. They are twisted, knotted together. There’s pain. Regret. Nostalgia. Guilt. Hate. Above all, there’s anger. So much anger inside me. Mountains of it, entire blazing landscapes without a single furyless corner in them.

I’m angry with Dad, angry with chess, and therefore I cannot play it. Pretty straightforward.

And setting that aside, am I even good enough? I know I’m talented— I’ve been told too many times, and by too many people not to. But I haven’t trained in years, and I honestly believe that beating Nolan Sawyer (who in my latest dream broke off a piece of his queen and offered it to me like a KitKat) was nothing more than a stroke of luck.

On the twin bed next to mine, Darcy snores like a middleaged man with sleep apnea. Goliath is in his cage, wandering aimlessly. The fact is, competitive chess is a sport, and like other sports, there’s little room at the top. Everyone knows who Usain Bolt is, but no one gives a shiitake mushroom about the fifteenth- fastest person in the world— even though they’re still pretty damn fast.

The diner where I used to wait tables has a full roster, and the local grocery store might be looking for help, but starting positions are minimum wage. Not enough. I contemplate the news on Tuesday and whine about it on the phone.

“Listen, you stubborn bitch: just take the fellowship and fake your way through it,” Easton says, exasperated, affectionate, and suddenly I’m afraid again. That she’ll forget all about me, that I’ll never measure up to Colorado and the people she’ll meet there. I’m about to lose her, I know I am. It seems such an inevitable, predestined conclusion, I don’t even bother voicing my fears.

Instead I ask, “How do you mean?”

“You can take the money for a year and play your best, but also not care about chess. Don’t think about it after hours. It doesn’t have to be obsessive or consuming like it used to be before your dad . . . Just clock in, clock out. In the meantime, you can get those mechanic certifications.”

“Ha,” I say, impressed by her more-or-less devious plan. “Ha.”

“You’re welcome. Can you do that?”

“Do what?”

“Not be a total lunatic weirdo about something?”

I smile. “Unclear.”

She leaves on Wednesday, after stopping by my place to say goodbye. I just figured it’d be different. I expected a TSA farewell and to stare at her plane as it flew off, but it doesn’t make sense: we’re eighteen. She has parents— a non- bedridden, stilltogether set that takes care of her, and drives her to the airport, and pays for a nice dorm room with the 529 that did not need to be cashed out when the old water boiler sputtered to its timely but heart- wrenching demise.

“You have to come visit,” Easton says.

“Yeah,” I say, knowing that I won’t.

“When I’m back, we’re going to New York. Get that macaron you don’t deserve.”

“I can’t wait,” I say, knowing that we won’t.

She just sighs, like she knows exactly what I’m thinking, and hugs me, and orders me to text her every day and watch out for STDs. Darcy, who’s been hovering around us with heart- shaped eyes, asks her what that stands for.

I watch the street long after the car has disappeared. I take a deep breath and empty my mind of everything, allowing myself a rare, beautiful, luxurious moment of peace. I think about a deserted chessboard. Only the white king on it, standing on the home square. Alone, untethered, safe from threats.

Free to roam, at least.

Then I go back inside, open my laptop, and write the message I knew I’d write ever since this mudslide of a week started.

Hey Defne,

Is that fellowship still on the table?