Chess

I started playing chess in grade 2, and shortly after joining the club, swiftly beat a grade 7 pupil. The moment of elation from overcoming him was swiftly overtaken by his tantrum, he refused to believe I had beaten him, arguing vehemently about the last move, trying to rewind the board so that he could undo his mistake. That fleeting moment of victory was swamped by this, I felt guilty for humiliating him. These thoughts crowded my mind as my teachers applauded me, saying I was gifted and such a smart boy. I just didn’t want him to feel so bad about it. It was just a game. I was conflicted about the win, I began to play more defensively, cautiously waiting for my opponents to make the first move, take the first piece because, after all, if they started it I would only be retaliating, right? I still enjoyed the game, I carried on playing and many of my close friends joined the club. We were little kings who ran armies against each other, pitting our tactical acumen. Eventually I was surpassed, a close friend of mine who started at the bottom quickly climbed the ranks, I hesitated to play him. Would he undermine my ability? The fear of losing quickly stole the joy of the game from me, like a raincloud that overcasts the sun whilst we played outside in the green, sultry grass. I was still an adept player in our team, we attended tournaments at various schools and waged war against other students. This was more to my liking, with my friends and fellow schoolmates with me, we stood against the minds of other schools, the enemy.

Sifundzani Primary School had an amazing group of chess players, we challenged all the others for the position of champion, of chess overlord. Our foes were Enjabulweni, Sisekelo and most fearsome and hated of all, Usuthu Primary School, in their mustard yellow and brown uniforms. Usuthu was the richest primary school in the country, in our eyes, in the world, attended by children whose parents drove Mercedes and BMWs to pick them up and drop them off at school every day. They swaggered into every tournament and looked down on us, Sifundzani, the school whose students had to carpool to the tournament in a teacher’s car. They bought food from the tuck shop on a whim, and discarded half eaten packets of chips that we would have dipped our fingers in to lick the last crumbs out of. We had packed lunches, a peanut butter sandwich and a strawberry jam sandwich, with a bottle juice filled with water. My parents did not agree with cold drinks, neither did they think that children should have pocket money for junk food. What a foreign concept to a Taiwanese family in Swaziland. No, we would eat what we were given, and be happy that we were not hungry. But we had our pride, and they would have to roll over our toppled kings to take that from us.

In grade 4 there was a chess tournament hosted at Usuthu Primary School, the first one my friends and I attended at the bastion of our hated enemies. That afternoon, we clambered aboard our teacher’s van and departed to Usuthu Forest Primary. In sharp contrast to Sifundzani, which is located within 10 minutes’ walk from the town centre of Mbabane, Usuthu Forest was tucked away in the glades in the north, we travelled down winding roads hemmed in by pine trees that would be logged for paper by Usuthu Paper Mills. As we neared the school the pines walling in our view receded and we passed quiet houses with huge yards and pristine lawns. Lazy dust motes filled the air and the sunshine streamed through the thick canopies in dappled streaks, each house looked like a fairy-tale, a scene from those American comic books where everyone smiled and went to the movies. As we piled out of the car with trepidation I noticed how soft the ground was carpeted in pine needles, how cool the air. How unfair it was that my school was dusty, the hard concrete and gravel a painful place to scrape your knees. We milled around uncertainly until Mrs Miri, our teacher shepherded us towards a long brick building. The days sortees were about to begin. As the grown-ups sorted out our registration, we huddled together and assessed the competition, took stock of our surroundings. Immediately I identified Travis from the rest, a few years older than us with curly black hair, he reeked of self-esteem. He was Usuthu’s greatest champion and given to singing Justin Timberlake songs during matches. Oh how it irked us all to no end, not to mention he was already formidable enough without his irritating customs. As the lines were drawn and matches determined, we all realised that after the first match, we all had some downtime as the other schools competed, our matches would overlap later. My first game was against a surly bloke from, not surprisingly, Usuthu. A prefect I judged from his sash and much bigger than I was. I clambered into my seat and shook his hand. He looked me down once over and settled into a hunch that showed what he thought of being matched against a fourth grader. As the game unfolded, he quickly realised I was not to be underestimated, but by then I was capitalising on his mistakes, deleting his pieces without necessitating a trade and forcing his king into a corner while I steamrolled his unprotected sides. The game concluded without a hitch, I shook his hand, we lined up to deliver the results to the judges and I bounced out of that dark room into the lawn to find my friends.

I found them all on that soft, perfectly manicured grass and as our band regrouped from the starting matches we quickly improvised a game of stick in the mud and got down to some serious playing. We were soon out of breath shouting to be saved or chasing each other to claim captors that were “stuck in the mud”. Before I knew it, I was being called in for my next match. I ran up the gentle slopes back to the long house and went to look for my allotted table. As I walked breathlessly towards it I realised with a shudder that my opponent was none other than Travis. He sat cross legged across the table with a lollipop in his mouth. He was talking loudly with two others from Usuthu, one of which was the player I had just bested.

“That’s him” he gestured towards me.

“Hello” Travis smirked, “I hear you gave my friend here a beating”

“Uhm, not really…” I replied sheepishly, I glanced around the room but my friends were all still outside or involved in their own skirmishes. I felt so alone. So naked.

“Well, good luck.” Travis quips as he leans in and shakes my hand.

I do not remember much from that game, except that I was moving a bishop to threaten his king. As I placed the bishop down gingerly on the tile leaving my index on the hat as I surveyed the board for a potential backstab I had made myself vulnerable to, I realised that it was flawless. As I looked up at Travis I realised that the loser from the previous match, let us call him Simanga, had inched closer to me on his chair. As I waited for the next move, Simanga says from the corner of his hand, that was covering his mouth, “Move it back”.

What?

Move it back.

Thoughts raced through my head, was this move illegal? Had I exposed myself to check? But I had already gone through the hundred and one iterations and possibilities, it was imposs-

Ah, he wants me to move it back for breathing room. I stare at him, the rules and regulations of chess and the tournament support me, they are the resolute pillars that we all rest against, aren’t they? Then why is it so hard to say no. Realising the command for what it is, I resolve myself to say no, the word bubbles up out of my throat, and bursts as a squeaky, oleaginous “No”. My face turns red from embarrassment, my body quivers on the plastic chair as he gently encircles my neck with his two hands. Like a lover’s caress, a serpent’s coils sensuously feeling their way around my neck.

Take it back he says through gritted teeth as the coils, hands, give my neck a terse shake, my head bobs back and forth like a reed in a storm. I try to swallow but my spit gets caught in my throat, refuses to go down. I can do nothing but shake my head in defiance, face slowly turning red now, not from embarrassment, but from fear, from the icy grip of helplessness encircling my heart.

I look at his face now through my blurry vision, a tear slides down my left check, like a child down a slide, fleeing from this coward who can do nothing, but shake his head. He has stopped enjoining me, the caress has become imbued with his anger at my defiance, the rage that demands to be spent, to be used and recognised, he channels it slowly into my throat with gathering intensity. The No in my throat, or the spit, finally chokes itself back from where it came from, I am looking at Travis across the board. I see it in his eyes, his fear, not of my welfare, but of his own. He leans in to Simanga, “enough man, take it easy”.

This breaks the spell of silent confrontation between us, the coils slacken. I draw in a shuddering breath but before I can get it all down a sob wracks my body, quaking me to my core. I can’t cry, not here, not now, in the silence of a chess tournament my half-breaths, half-wails pierce the room. Travis lays his hand on my shoulder, that ‘this is my best attempt at comfort but I overcame my personal space for this so be grateful please?’ Gesture. I bury my face in the safety of my elbow, the closest hole I can dig myself into, cower in artificial safety, take a few more shuddering breaths, then wipe the tears from my face, really just streaking them across like liquid comets. My glasses have ridden up to my hairline, caught there between my nose which is squashed into my elbow and my jet-black hair, tear-stained, now with that salt in the wound.

Are you ok?

I nod my silent assent, Simanga has retreated to the periphery of the table, the match has lost its glamour, I do not care to win anymore, he pretends to focus all his attention on the board, we both know he has no way out. In the end, I pursue him doggedly like a lame horse finishing a race, the outcome does not matter to me anymore, I remove his pieces with careless abandon, soon I have him cornered but I just want the match to end, to leave this table and my shame with it, to get outside away from this GODDAMNED injustice. He picks up his king, moves him once, returns him, that’s check, another step, that’s check too, “Oh, he looks up at me with a grin, stalemate 😊”

“Yeah…”I agree sullenly, the death throes of the match have drawn the vultures, the officials to observe, where were you 5 minutes ago? Doesn’t matter, “Yup, that’s a stalemate!” she says cheerily, “Shake and go tell them your results please” Another smile. My hand reaches across the chasm towards him, oh the pathetic irony of it all.

Good game man.

I am standing in line, a head shorter than Travis, behind me stand his goons, Simanga still breathing down my neck,

Hey I’m sorry my friend got carried away hey? You’re alright though?

Nod my assent, eyes downcast. Is this how the enemy is resisted? Is this how evil is defied in the world? Standing irresolutely with the fingers of death encircling their neck. The shame eats away at me, I wipe away another tear threatening to abscond. Later I return to my friends sullen and teary-eyed.

I remember Mrs Miri coming up to me, accusing me of not telling her what happened, dragging me away to a tribunal in a classroom, I am being questioned by strange ladies fretting about the room, they offer me tea, the tears come, the slide has become a rain gutter, all the emotions are laid bare in front of them, sun-dried and cauterised, I pull the cup of tea towards my quivering lips, attempt to drown the sobs in a mouthful of tea. Why didn’t you tell me Ian? Because I ain’t no snitch Mrs Miri, because that’s not what the good guys do.