I spent a couple weeks at the house after the big move-in, helping my dad stain a new deck that Nicolas had built in the back and counting down the days until I could leave for my summer job as a counselor at Camp Timbuktu in the Catskills. I’d gone there every summer as a little kid and had adored every second of it. It was kind of a nerdy version of camp, lots of learning in addition to the usual swimming and capture the flag games. I’d already missed the first six-week session because of the renovation and move, but my parents had promised me that I could work the second one.
“You should come with me,” I told Hull on a rare occasion when I wheedled my way into his room. “You know they hire any former camper who applies. Especially one with grades like yours. You could teach debate tactics or run a political science seminar or something.”
“Can’t,” Hull said. We were sitting in the mess on his floor: unpacked boxes and strewn clothes. His mattress was still on the floor because he hadn’t bothered to put the bed frame together and had ignored my parents’ offers to do it for him. Even his hair looked longer and messier than usual.
“Why not?”
“I’ll be too busy convincing Mom and Dad to sell this dump and move back to Manhattan,” he said, but then he gave me a small smile that reassured me that he was not completely out of his gourd.
“You know it’s not a bad view, if you would ever open your window blinds. Mom and Dad are almost finished with the back garden.”
“Oh, Izzy,” he said. “I love that you think the view could really fix what’s wrong with this place.”
If I had known how much more would be wrong by the time I got back from camp, I might have responded with more than an eye roll. I might have begged Hull to be more open-minded when it came to approaching a borough as vast as Brooklyn. I might have warned him that some actions have consequences that go on and on and on. Instead, I said, “Bork,” which was the tiniest scrap of our infantile twin-speak that we had left and which we used to mean whatever needed to be said at any given moment. This time it meant “Everything will be okay. You’ll see.”
“Bork,” he said, but I couldn’t read the tone in his voice, and it made me nervous.
THE KNIGHT
THE ENTIRE TIME I’M TUTORING ON SATURDAY, TRYING to get poor Tomaso to finally, finally understand the difference between sine and cosine, I have a weird jitter in my stomach, and sure enough, when I get back to the neighborhood for the block party, things are beginning to come off the rails. In spite of the crepe paper and brightly colored signs and the puffs of smoke from the charcoal grills that have been wheeled onto the sidewalk, everything feels wound tight. There are dark clouds speeding in, and it’s airlessly hot, a final throwback to stormy summer. It’s that point in the afternoon when adults have had too much beer and are feeling lackadaisical and sleepy. The kids have been riding their bikes up and down the blocked-off stretch of street since early in the morning, and they’re sweaty and cranky, and everybody’s beginning to grate on each other’s nerves. But that isn’t even the main problem, at least from where I’m standing. The main problem is that Marcus and his lackeys are sitting on his stoop, gathered like a pack of wolves, and like any good pack, they have their eyes trained on easy prey. Some white kid, dressed real nerdy, has set up a table across the street from them with a sign that says LESSONS IN CHESS AND POLITICAL STRATEGY—$10. A groan vibrates in my chest, knowing already that I’m going to get dragged into something here, but I try to pretend that I don’t notice anything—the kid, the sign, Marcus’s evil eye, nothing.
“What’s up?” I say to Marcus, hoping it will be taken as a mere greeting, not as a question that needs to be answered. All of them smell of the malt liquor that Marcus has gotten somewhere and barely bothers to conceal behind him on the step. K-Dawg looks stoned beyond speech, but the others are whispering to each other and laughing.
Marcus looks up and gives me a nod. “T, the man of the hour. We’ve been waiting for you to show up so this dog could give you a chess lesson.” He says this last part loud enough for the white kid to hear. He’s doing his best to not glance in Marcus’s direction; the antelope has smelled the predator but knows it is suicide to look him in the eye. “Big man on the block over there, he’s gonna teach us a thing or two.”
Frodo smirks. “Even his ma tried to get him to take it down.” He gives a quick chin jerk toward a woman standing at a folding table a little way down the street. She’s playing with her frizzy hair nervously. The kids near her are shooting each other with Super Soaker water guns, ignoring both her and her sand art.
I’m about to say that I’m supposed to be helping her, but before I can, Marcus takes my arm and says, “Hey, T, let’s go talk to this cat. Welcome him to the neighborhood.” There is nothing that I would like to do less than go over and confront this kid who’s asking, with that smug expression alone, to get his ass beat, but there’s iron in Marcus’s grip, and so I let myself get pulled alongside him. I fold my arms and look down at the table and hope that this will be over swiftly.
“Hello,” White Boy says. “How may I help you?”
“What’s your name, son?” Marcus asks, smiling that killer smile.
“I’m not your son,” White Boy says, with his own wide politician’s grin. “But if you’re interested, I might be able to provide you with some useful advice.” He nods at his sign.
“Ohhh,” Marcus says, pointing at the sign as if he’s reading it for the first time and then putting his hand to his mouth as if in wonder. “I see. A chess master, right here on our block.”
White Boy doesn’t say anything, but he doesn’t drop his eye contact, even when Marcus leans in closer.
“Turns out, though,” Marcus says, “that my boy T here is actually pretty good at chess already.”
“Mmmm,” White Boy says, and his eyes relax a little. Do I know him? He looks like a lot of people I’ve played at school tournaments.
“’Cause, see, I think you have the wrong idea about your new neighborhood. We could probably offer you some lessons about that. Right, T?”
I clear my throat and try a different angle. “Man, it’s really not cool to sell stuff at the block party. It’s kind of a situation where everyone shares what they can. You know?”
White Boy smirks, and I recognize that feeling sorry for someone and liking him are two different things.
“So maybe you two should have a friendly chess matchup at the park tomorrow. You know, to welcome you to the hood,” Marcus says. Then switching to a goofy British accent: “Wouldn’t that be a sporting way to pass an afternoon, Mr. Strategy? As long as we have a little wager going, that is.” The uneasy jitter that’s been there in my stomach all day is now scratching and biting, a squirrel in a bag. I’m pretty sure I can beat this kid, but there’s always the fear.
“And what are we wagering?”
“I expect you could pay me a C-note when T beats you, and we’ll call it even. For now.”
“And if I win? You’ll pay me a hundred dollars?”
Marcus leans across the table slowly, and for a sickening moment I half think that he’s going to kiss this kid and make him shit himself right there on the pavement, but instead he says softly into his ear, “You win and I won’t make you regret the day you were born.” Then he pats White Boy on the shoulder so hard that the kid almost topples over sideways, and bursts into laughter. “I’m just joking with you! You should see your face!” White Boy manages a weak smile. Marcus sticks out his palm for a handshake. “We got a deal, son?”
“It’s Hull,” White Boy says, and puts his hand in Marcus’s. Something clicks in my brain at the name.
“Marcus,” Marcus says, and I can tell by the twitch of pain in Hull’s cheek that Marcus is squeezing his hand harder and harder. “Two o’clock in McNair on Eastern Parkway. It’s not hard to find, Mr. Strategy. Don’t be late.”
The first rolls of thunder break as he’s saying this, a cartoonish premonition, and you can hear little squawks
of alarm go up and down the block as big, fat raindrops begin to fall. The women hustle to cover up the trays of jerk chicken and rice. The children run in crazed circles, letting the rain soak their T-shirts.
“Two o’clock,” Hull says. He picks up his table without bothering to fold it and walks toward the newly renovated house on the corner.
I start to jog to get out of the rain, but it’s clear that Marcus isn’t about to hurry, so I slow my pace and we walk toward Aunt Patrice’s building. At the door, she loads our arms with food to take inside and put in the refrigerator. “And take your shoes off!” she yells as she runs back to the picnic table to collect more items.
Inside, I get two towels for us and throw our T-shirts in the dryer. Then I stand in the kitchen with Marcus, who is dripping water onto Patrice’s floor and brooding, forearms leaning on the counter, popping his knuckles one by one.
“I shoulda smacked that loser while I had the chance.”
“Oh, come on, Marcus.” I toss him the towel. “Why’s this kid getting to you? He’s nobody to you.” Marcus can get angry quickly. My guess is that it’s because he’s quick to get his feelings hurt, too, but that’s not a theory I’d ever share with him.
Marcus glowers. “It rubs me the wrong way, T. Him looking down on all of us.” Then something in his face breaks open, and he gives me a wry smile. “Doesn’t matter. You’ll show him what’s what tomorrow. I had a dream last night that you turned into a champion pit bull, that you tore apart the competition.”
I cover my head with the towel and rub my hair dry. I’m not interested in hearing Marcus’s dreams right now, especially if they involve me being a dog. “You know that kid’s not bad at chess, right? I recognized him. His name’s Hull, and his team finished, like, fifth at the citywides last year, mostly because of him.” I don’t like the way Marcus is looking at me when I pull the towel down around my shoulders.
“And how did you do at citywides, my man?”
“We won.”
“That’s what I thought. So tell me you’re going to beat this kid tomorrow.”
I shrug. “I’ll win.”
“That’s what I thought,” Marcus repeats, and he opens his mouth to say something else, but Patrice comes bustling in, arms full of wet tablecloth. I take it from her, glad to have an excuse to dodge Marcus’s gaze.
“What a mess!” she says in that voice that lets you know that she could plan the weather far better than whoever is currently in charge.
“Sorry your party got rained on, Auntie,” Marcus says, and leans down to kiss her on the cheek as I leave the room.
“It’s okay,” I can hear Patrice say. “You staying for dinner, Marcus?”
“Naw, I got some errands to run. I’m on my way out.”
“Marcus, you’re not wearing a shirt!”
Whatever Marcus says in response is muffled, but I hear Patrice laugh girlishly in response. “See you tomorrow, T!” he calls out, right before the door bangs shut behind him.
I dump the tablecloth in the big utility sink and lean against the washing machine. I don’t want to play tomorrow. I don’t know why it’s different than any other match that Marcus has set up for me, but it is. It feels more personal, and the little facts that I usually brush away are more pressing this time. Like the fact that Marcus has never offered to give me a set percentage of the winnings. Sure, most of the time I roll with it, chalk it up to honing my skills with a few side benefits. But right now, it feels more like licking up the scraps that Marcus deigns to throw my way.
I’ve been on a winning streak lately, picking up speed all summer. Last summer, when Marcus and I first started this racket, I played mostly old guys from around the neighborhood, guys who spend all day shooting the shit and playing chess. They were tough at first, but then I came to realize that they relied too much on a pretty small pack of tricks that they’d picked up over the years. Catch on to the tricks and you can take them down. That’s what I did, gradually. Now the old guys won’t even play me; they just wave Marcus off, say they’ll keep their cash, go back to drinking their afternoon beers. This summer I’ve been playing younger guys, recruited by Antoine or some other tough. These kids play a looser, more creative game than the old-timers, but they’re also green, lacking in methodology. I can sense the moment when they start to panic, can almost feel my reputation taking on weight as I lay them down gently. These past few weeks, winning has started to feel like an inevitability.
So I think I can beat Hull, but it’s not a sure thing. He’s good, and all streaks come to an end, even mine. I do have an advantage, though: I recognized Hull and I can look up his stats online tonight, maybe even find lists of moves from some of his matches. He could, theoretically, do the same for me, but I don’t think he recognized me. Probably because Marcus always calls me T instead of Tristan and because we didn’t go head-to-head at citywides last year. I already know, though, what Marcus would say if I mentioned this to him: “Asshole thinks we all look alike.” And I don’t know. Maybe Marcus would be right.
THE ROOK
SO I’M DRYING OFF THE OUTSIDE TABLES, OR MORE LIKE shoving the water off of them with an already soaked rag, when Marcus appears in front of the restaurant and, oh God, he’s not even wearing a shirt, and, as usual when he shows up, my heart refuses to beat for a full minute, maybe longer. I’m sweaty to an embarrassing degree because I’ve been working all afternoon in this humid weather, but I don’t think I smell bad and besides, Cosmo says all the time that men like women who are natural and earthy, so I put my hand on my hip in a way that I hope looks fun and flirtatious and say, “How’s it going, Marcus?”
Marcus smiles. He’s wearing spotless red basketball shoes, a pair of athletic shorts riding low on his muscular hips, and nothing on top but that thin rope of gold chain that I like, the one with a pendant shaped like a house dangling from it. My brain sends a signal to my body to walk over and lick his glistening bare chest, but I don’t.
“What’s going on, Caballito?” he says. That’s his nickname for me. Unfortunately, it’s not because I look like a beautiful prancing pony. It’s because my worthless older brother’s nickname is Caballo, and thus I became Little Horse. “Is your brother around?”
I try to think of something fascinating, something witty, something just the right degree of playful to say to him, but my brain has short-circuited on his perfection, so instead I say, “I think he’s inside.”
“You going to tell me my future sometime, like you promised?”
“I’d love to,” I squeak. I’d die to do a tarot reading for Marcus because it’s intimate, tapping into the unexplained with someone else. I’ve done his astrological chart a million times already (of course I know his birthday, he’s a Leo, he even has a lion tattoo on his right arm and I’m pretty sure that’s why), but I would never let him know that I’m a total stalker.
“Good. ’Cause you got the gift. Everyone says that’s the truth.” Then he smiles and disappears behind the namesake yellow door of La Puerta Amarilla, my parents’ café.
Be still, my heart.
What is it about Marcus? Honestly, that’s like asking What is it about oxygen? It’s been there always, and without it, you’d suffocate and die. For as long as I can remember, Marcus has had a role to play in my life: joke-cracking little boy, jumping around and doing spot-on impressions of the adults in the neighborhood; then athletic middle school kid, the first one in our circle to get muscles and a voice like hot chocolate; and then handsome and powerful heartthrob always one degree cooler than everyone else in the room. A portrait of my soul mate, no matter what age we happen to be. Before I go to sleep at night, sheets wrapped tightly around me, I think of what it will be like the first time we kiss, the surprise on his face when he finally understands, marveling that he didn’t know it all along, the way I have. It’s me who’s a step ahead on this one.
Anyway, I barely have time to silently thank the stars, the fates, the mysterious forces of the universe for
Marcus’s scrap of a compliment before he’s gone. Coming up short on a reason to follow him, I move toward the open window so I can at least eavesdrop.
“Evening, Mrs. Gutiérrez,” Marcus says. “Is Hector available?”
I can’t hear how my mom answers, but her voice is curt, so sharp that it makes me cringe. She doesn’t like Marcus. She thinks he’s “a bad element,” but that’s a laugh since, in fact, it’s my brother who supplies Marcus with weed, not the other way around. Anyway, it doesn’t matter what Mai says because Hector has come downstairs, I can hear his voice, and the two of them walk back out onto the patio, so I go back to looking busy.
“Scram,” Hector says to me.
“It’s cool,” Marcus says. “It’s just Brianna.” I’m not sure if I should be elated because of the “cool” or mad because of the “just.”
“You two need to come up to the park tomorrow afternoon. I got a little thing going, and this time I want people there to watch.” Instead of betting on horses or football like everybody else, Marcus bets on chess. He’s always different. One more reason to love him. He looks at me now and smiles and says, “You’ll be there, won’t you, Caballito?”
I’ve never been brave enough to ask him where he got that necklace, and when I’ve heard other people ask him about it, he only says it’s a good luck charm. But to me, it’s always been a symbol, a tiny gilded home for the future Marcus, the future Brianna. I nod. Of course I’ll be there.
That night, I consult the I Ching about how many of Marcus’s children I’m destined to bear, but the results are inconclusive.
Izzy + Tristan Page 3
