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Grandpa Jiminez is an old, gnarled thing. He pushes his black knight
across the board, looks up at me, smug, as sure of himself as any punch
he's ever given or taken. His eyes look huge behind those rosy round
spectacles.
"You get me beer why you thinking?" he says, in his rat-a-tat pidgin
English.
"I think not." Mother would kill me if I did. Last time was enough.
Grandpa scowls, pulls his whole face down, deep creased and brown. "Why
not?" he says. "You go if I say 'please?'"
Please is nothing more than the means to the end. Means nothing to him.
I mean nothing to him. I'm an errand boy, not his only living grandson.
He's an old boxer. A referee, after the boxing career. And finally, a
raving God-fearing alcoholic. My parents took him in when errant punches
and the sauce dropped him in a few alleys too many.
I roll my eyes, move my piece. White bishop takes black knight. Check.
He's not used to people crossing him. Serial thinker, Grandpa is — one
thing at a time. Beer steps out of the picture for a second, and those
pink glasses are focused on the board. There are live cells still left
in that gray matter of his. Two or three tops, and all chess. The man is
a former Grandmaster. The almighty's sense of humor: a boxing
beer-addled chessman.
We've got a picture somewhere, an old black and white photo. In it,
Gramps is a young Salavador Sanchez, perched atop a burro, wearing a
sombrero half his size, boxing gloves posed in a mock punch at the
donkey's head. The burro looks bitter. Grandpa looks drunk. He probably
was. A drunken prince, his flashy grin a white half moon in the shadow
of that enormous hat.
He thrusts a fat, puffy hand at me, drops an oily couple bucks on the
table. Crisco, most likely, the goop he still uses in his hair. He's
made his move. He wants his poison.
I ignore the board, pick up the money, shake my head. "I'm not doing
this."
"Thank you, honey," he says.
"No." I say, but he's nodding that thick head of his and smiling. Deaf,
too.
I look down at the board. Queen takes bishop left dangling in the wind
by idiot grandson. Checkmate.
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