Chess: The Deathmatch

There was my opponent in front of me, towering over the maple and mahogany battlefield covered with bishops, kings, knights, queens, and rooks. Fallen players were discarded and strewn across both sides of the tabletop in the midst of the intense battle. Looking me straight in the eye was the most experienced strategist I’ve ever met in all of my fourteen years: Joe, a school friend who had a knack for chess ever since he was born — ironically, he told me one day that he used to frequently suck on chess pieces as a toddler. Having extensive experience, he went to chess club meetings at our school and played on the Chess app on his family tablet whenever he had free time. Although I had significantly less experience than him, I proposed a challenge for the chance to embarrass him — “our renowned chess champion” as he was called by us — in front of the school and our classmates.

There’s no chance I’m winning today, I thought as I tried to figure out my next move. I glanced at the board again and again and tried to predict his strategy, searching for an escape from whatever he was scheming in his head.

“Hurry up, and make your move! You’ll lose anyway!” Joe hissed.

As I studied the board carefully, I decided to set up a double attack against him, with my knight and my queen targeted on his queen. I figured the game would be as good as mine if I eliminated his queen.

To my dismay, he instantly predicted my strategy in the next move and moved his pawns to defend his queen. Again, it was my turn.

One second. Two seconds. Three seconds.

As three whole minutes passed, I stared blankly at the board — and occasionally at Joe’s intimidating cold and frustrated stare — and was still unable to think of a plan. I tried picturing how some of the strategies I read online would play out, but all of them didn’t seem suitable in my situation. I tried to recall some ingenious moves that Magnus Carlsen did in these kinds of fixes, until out of nowhere…

Eureka! I realized that the solution was simple and didn’t require any difficult technique — castling! As I moved my king and rook, I realized the game was as good as mine. As Joe had no difficulty in predicting my move again, I tried increasing my defenses to delay his plan.

My turn. Joe’s turn. My turn. Joe’s turn.

It was an intense battle of us going back and forth; we were hanging over the edge of our seats as more pieces were discarded, and the board settled to three white pieces [mine] and four black pieces [Joe’s].

Being stupid, I lowered my guard by not thinking a few moves ahead and realized Joe’s eventful win.

“Checkmate!” Joe trumpeted.

With the conclusion of the match, he stared sincerely into my eyes. “I hope you can leave knowing that you’re walking away from this match with a better prize than anyone could give you, Anubhav. Because of your minor slip-up, I hope you will learn from this and be more clever and careful next time — and, more importantly, learn not to challenge me next time.”

In truth, life is like a game of chess, for once the King stands, you continue on playing and persevering through the challenge.