Page 161 of The Best Shot

“Somewhere far?”

“Far enough.”

“You love her?”

“Yes.”

“Sure about that?” He shook his head slowly. The fondness came into his voice unguarded. “My wife. There’s nowhere I wouldn’t go to be with her.”

I smiled. “Yeah?”

“Yeah. She’s been gone about eight years. Just me and my boy now.”

My fingers tightened around the knight.

“You remind me of him.”

I kept my eyes on the board and moved the piece. “Do I?”

He nodded, his own piece still in his hand.

“You’re almost as dumb about women as he is, but he’s fifteen. He’ll grow out of it. I hope.”

My mouth twitched. “Fingers crossed.”

“Mm.” He glanced down, registered the bishop, dismissed it, and moved a pawn. “Whip smart, that kid. Off at school now.”

I’d been fifteen when he started the story. Somewhere between one move and the next, I’d gone away to college. Time moved differently for Harry.

A faint smile crossed his face. “Going to change the world someday. Won the regional science award last spring. His teacher called me. Said she’d never seen a more gifted student. But I already knew that. Been watching him think since he was old enough to sit at a board. It’s good that other people see it, though.”

In my mind, I saw the plaque. Regional Science Award. I knew exactly where it was—third shelf in the study, under semesters of engineering textbooks. The ribbon was still on it.

Harry studied the position. “Good,” he said.

The same word in the same register that had followed my good moves since I was a kid. It was now given to a stranger across a concrete table.

I breathed in slowly and made my next move. The game had slowed into an endgame, neither of us rushing.

“I worry about him sometimes,” he said after a while.

“Your son?”

“Hm. He’s a sensitive boy, and the world is big. But he’ll figure it out.” He was looking at the board, but his mind had drifted. “That kid is going to change the world. Just need to stay alive long enough to see it.”

My father sat across from me, in a park had gone quiet except for a dog somewhere on the far path and traffic humming beyond the trees, proud of a boy who was supposed to go somewhere.

The boy had come home instead.

His hands shook slightly when he reached for the rook. Those hands had taught me where the pieces went. Had tapped the board when he said, Watch now. Watch how this works.

They were slower now, less certain than they used to be, but still his.

We played a second game.

He talked about my mother. The same stories, rearranged. I listened like I always did, collecting them like they were new.

Eventually, his aide came for him.