A Good Death by Gil Courtemanche

mockingly and tempts me with high lobs that look easy, and which I smash one by one into the net. He plays methodically and defensively, the way I play chess. I continue playing an attacking game, slicing the ball or putting backspin on it or hitting it as hard and, I hope, as decisively as possible. I put my faith in aggressiveness and instinct, on my reflexes, as William does when he plays chess. The chess master who is giving him lessons says that when logic settles into his imagination he’ll be a genius. I fall behind, Sam laughs more and more. I miss another slam, an easy one. Sam stops laughing even though he’s never been a humble winner. He needs one more point to beat me once and for all. Ever since we began pummelling each other every Christmas over this wobbly table in this narrow basement, banging our heads on the water pipes that thread through the rafters, ever since Christmas has existed and Sam has been old enough to hold a racquet, he has been waiting for this moment. His first victory. He sets his racquet on the table.
    “I don’t want to play anymore,” he says.
    “You only need one more point to beat me.”
    “You’re not playing seriously. It doesn’t count. It’s like you’re letting me win.”
    “Come on, finish the game!”
    I want him to have this first win. A Christmas present he’ll always remember.
    “Do you love Grandpa?”
    Most of all I don’t want to answer that question. “Come on, it’s your serve.”
    “Tell me. Do you love Grandpa?”
    “Do you?”
    “Yes.”
    He says it without hesitation. His answer thunders across the table at me like an unreturnable slam. He’s defying me now.
    “Serve the ball!”
    He serves me a soft, easy one, and I flick it back to his corner. Twenty-twenty. I win a point on my spinning serve. He misses his own. I’ve won.
    “Okay, you win, but you haven’t answered my question.”
    No, my boy, I haven’t answered the question, because… I offer him another chance to beat me. He declines. He has chosen his field, his sport: truth, a curious game that rarely produces winners. Still, I try to beat him at it.
    “So, why do you love him?”
    I’m hoping for a surprise attack. My opponent was waiting for a backspin, but what I’ve sent is an overhand topspin that hits the table and takes off like a rocket on a downward curve. He returns with a strong, hard backhand that catches me off balance.
    “Because he listens to me and doesn’t judge me.”
    Okay, his point. But now it’s my turn. I’m not about to let myself be beaten when the subject is my own father.
    “Well, Sam, it’s easy to listen when you can’t talk.”
    “He can talk, you just don’t understand him. And you still haven’t answered my question.”
    Two-love for him. An upset in the making. In any match there’s a point at which you can recover from a strategic error by stepping back and allowing yourself to lose another point in order to improve your position on the field, or you can stay on the attack, throwing caution and restraint to the wind.
    “No, I don’t love him.”
    “I understand what you mean.”
    Now it’s three-love Sam. Choosing his words carefully, he explains to me that he doesn’t love his mother, either. He likes her well enough, but more as you would like someone you knew well, someone with whom you had something in common, to whom you owed something or someone you could count on. He doesn’t for a moment want me to think he’s passing judgement on his mother, on her quality as a mother.
    “I’d rather have parents who were older, who had no other life left than that of their children.”
    “Why, so you can be free to do whatever idiotic thing comes into your head?”
    “No. Christ, you can be a jerk sometimes. How can I explain it? So that I don’t have to be told that you can’t make a living playing chess because chess players don’t have time to learn things like grammar and trigonometry. Do you know who Bobby Fischer is? Well,