"Okay, so then this piece goes here?" Margot questioned as her hand moved toward one of the white knights on the chessboard.
"No." Irv smacked her hand away.
"Okay, first of all, ow." Margot laughed as she rubbed her hand dramatically with her other one. "Second of all, why not? Why can't I do that?"
Irv just shook his head as he demonstrated why the proposed move would be bad. "Because it's just plain stupid," he explained as he showed Margot how easy it would be for him to beat her if she had moved her knight that way. "You have to use your head. Always be thinking two or three moves into the future. You can't just live in the here and now."
"I don't know if that's just chess advice or also life advice."
"Take it as you will." Irv only shrugged as he moved Margot's piece for her before moving his own. "I just can't believe you've never played chess before."
"Just never got around to it," Margot replied matter-of-factly. "But hey, maybe that's a good thing. If I knew how to play chess, you wouldn't have to teach me, which means we wouldn't be getting to have these lovely morning conversations where you begrudgingly attempt to teach me a game that I am clearly horrible at."
Irv scoffed as he motioned for Margot to take her next turn. "No, if you knew how to play chess, we would be playing chess instead of me playing chess and you asking too many questions."
"You really don't know how to look on the bright side, do you?" Margot laughed as she checked her watch, slightly taken aback at how late in the morning it was. "Wow, time sure does fly when you're having fun."
As Margot stood to leave, Irv put his hand out and stopped her. "You never leave in the middle of a game," he told her. "It's bad luck."
Margot rolled her eyes playfully as she sat back down in her chair on Irv's front porch. "Says who?"
"Says me. Just, sit there for two seconds more while I kick your ass and then you can go."
"Oh, please, be my guest." Margot sat back and watched as Irv quickly and effortlessly defeated her in chess for about the hundredth time.
As Irv made his final move, he smiled up at Margot cheekily. "Checkmate."
"I'm gonna get you next time, just you wait and see." Margot knew she didn't have a chance in hell of ever beating Irv, but she liked to at least pretend that she was getting better with every lesson she had. "You have yourself a wonderful day, Irv. I'll see you tomorrow."
"Say hello to Joe for me." Irv began to pack up the chessboard and pieces as Margot stood up and began to head next door back to Joe's house.
"Will do." Margot gave a wave as she tightened her sweater around herself some more to counteract the cool, morning breeze.
Stepping through the threshold of the house, Margot wasn't the least bit surprised to see that the kitchen and living room were both empty. It had been about a week or so since Margot had arrived at Joe's house and one thing she had learned—besides the fact that she was horrible at chess—was that Joe lived a pretty quiet, solitary life. He rarely left the house, let alone his bed, and it was clear that he was struggling with many of the same post-war side effects as she and Annie were.
The only difference was that while Margot and Annie actively tried to fight against their struggles, Joe was letting them consume him.
Shuffling down the hallway, Margot pushed open the door to Joe's bedroom and leaned against the doorway, her arms folded over her chest. Joe's eyes were closed, but she could tell he wasn't asleep; despite the many hours he spent in bed, he didn't sleep a whole lot.
"Irv says hello." Margot broke the silence. Joe only let out a small groan in response. "He wiped the board with me again. I'm really bad at chess."
This time Joe snickered a little, but still no words. Sighing, Margot entered the room and knelt beside the bed, her elbows resting on the mattress and her face inches away from Joe's. "I'm serious, this is a real problem," she whispered. "It's almost impressive how bad I am. I don't think anyone could suck this bad even if they tried."
"I'm very sorry to hear that," Joe finally spoke but kept his eyes shut.
"Do you know how to play chess?" Margot asked.
Cracking open one eye ever-so-slightly, Joe looked back at Margot and exhaled. "Yes."
"You should come play me then," she suggested, hoping maybe it would get Joe out of bed, even if just for an hour or so. "I guarantee you will win."
"Well, where's the fun in playing if I know I'm going to win?"
"Okay, I lied." Margot looked around jokingly to make sure no one was listening. "I'm actually fantastic at chess and I just pretend to be bad to make Irv feel good. Now you have to play me to see if I'm telling the truth or not."
Joe closed his eyes again and let out a grumble, the sound muffled as he buried his face into the pillow. "I don't want to play chess, Margot."
"Well, then what do you want to do?" Margot was willing to do almost anything at that point. "You have to get out of bed eventually. It's ten in the morning."
Reaching one arm out from under the covers and grabbing onto Margot's hand with his own, Joe kept his face planted firmly in the pillow as he spoke, his words only just audible. "Why can't we just do what we did yesterday? I liked having you read to me from that book you're reading."
"Because we can't do the same thing every day and I think it's time you left the house," Margot stated. "I know you don't want to, and I know it's hard, but we have to start somewhere. Why don't we just go sit outside for a little while? The sun won't kill you, I promise."
"I know the sun won't kill me."
"Well, you act like it sometimes." Margot squeezed Joe's hand and stood up. "Nothing is going to happen if we go sit in the backyard. It'll just be me and you. No one will be there to see you stumble."
Joe slowly lifted his head from the pillow and looked up at Margot, his expression still hazy from being in bed for so long. "Just you and me?"
"Unless you want me to invite Irv over."
"God, no."
"Then, yes, just me and you."
"Okay, fine." Joe rolled onto his back and pushed himself up so he was sitting up. "I'll meet you out there."
Margot looked at the prosthetic leg and crutches that were propped up against Joe's bedside table. "Do you want any help?" she offered even though she knew the answer already.
"No."
"Okay." Margot knew better than to push the subject, especially since she had just pushed harder than she normally would to get him out of bed. So, in the meantime, she decided to be productive and grab a blanket to set up outside under the large tree that sat in the corner of Joe's small backyard.
With her book in her hands and her back against the trunk of the tree, Margot read a few pages of the book she had picked up from this little, used bookshop in town that Irv had told her about. It was a fantastic read so far, and even though Margot wasn't sure she would enjoy a story about a man at sea, she surprisingly found the tale rather thrilling.
What was even more shocking, however, was that Joe seemed to like it as well. One evening, as Margot had been sitting on the couch reading, Joe had asked her what the book was about and she read him the short blurb on the back cover. Intrigued, Joe sat down beside the woman and began to read over her shoulder; however, that got annoying quite quickly, so Margot opted to just read out loud. Ever since then, Joe had asked Margot to read to him at least once a day, and the day before, when Margot had failed at getting Joe out of bed, she sat down beside him and read to him for hours on end.
Hearing the back door open, Margot looked up from her book to see Joe coming her way, the look on his face displaying unwillingness and discontent. "Hey, you're reading without me," he commented when he saw Margot sitting up against the tree with the book in her hands.
"I'll go back for you," she said as she watched him slowly make his way through the grass, his steps still uncertain and his eyes glued to his feet. "You're doing well," she told him as he made it to the blanket. "There's a definite improvement, even if it has only been a week."
"If you say so." Joe huffed as he glared at the ground next to where Margot was sitting. "Now how in the hell am I supposed to get down there?"
Putting her book down, Margot stood up and took Joe's crutches from him, promptly leaning them against the tree before taking hold of his arms. "Trust me." She could already tell he was uncomfortable by how his muscles tensed when she touched him. "I'm not going to let you fall."
"I'm not worried about you letting me fall." Joe, despite his reservations, allowed Margot to help him down onto the ground. "I'm worried about how much of a beating my ego is taking from this."
As soon as Joe was safely on the ground, Margot let go of him and planted her hands onto her hips. "Your ego?" She looked down at him with an amused smile. "News flash, Joe, but I've never cared about your ego before and I'm not about to start anytime soon."
"And there's the snarky remark I was waiting for." Joe squinted his eyes as he looked up at the sun, the shade of the tree still covering most of his body, however. "Are you happy now? I'm outside."
"I am very happy, thank you." Margot beamed. "Doesn't it feel better to get some fresh air?"
"Well, it doesn't feel worse, I'll give you that."
"I'll take it."
Leaning back against the tree as well, Joe pointed to the book sitting beside Margot. "How much farther did you get without me?"
"I only read a few pages," Margot assured him. "Do you want me to go back to where we left off yesterday?"
"Yes."
"Okay." Margot picked up the paperback again and flipped through to where she had left her bookmark before beginning to read out loud. "Chapter sixty-five. That mortal man should feed upon the creature that feeds his lamp, and, like Stubb, eat him by his own light, as you may say; this seems so outlandish a thing that one must needs go a little into the history and philosophy of it."
For hours, Margot and Joe sat underneath the shade of the tree and took turns reading. Neither one of them wanted to go back inside but Margot's throat was starting to get dry and sore. Before they knew it, it was mid-afternoon, they had gone through a sizable chunk of what remained of the book, and they were both starving.
"Okay, let's stop for today," Margot suggested as Joe reached the end of the chapter they were on. Even though she was sure she could listen to his voice all day long, the rumble in her stomach was taking away from her enjoyment of the story. "I'm hungry."
"Me too." Joe agreed. "But I don't want to get up."
Margot chuckled. "See? I told you it wouldn't be so bad." She bumped his shoulder with her own. "I don't want to get up either. The mixture of warmth from the sun and the coolness from the shade has lulled my body into a state of utter relaxation."
"Do we even have any food in the house?" Joe cocked a single eyebrow.
"I have no idea." Margot pushed herself up onto her feet. "I'll go check. Be right back."
Wandering back into the house, Margot headed straight for the kitchen and began sorting through everything Joe had in the fridge and cabinets, trying her best to think of something she could possibly cook—once again wishing she possessed her mother's culinary skills.
Opening one of the higher cabinets, Margot began to feel around for anything useful. Reaching as far back as she could go, Margot thought she felt a box of some sort, but in the process of grabbing for it, she knocked a coffee tin onto the floor.
A hushed curse left the woman's lips as she looked down, expecting to see the floor covered in coffee grounds. What she ended up seeing instead, however, was something she had not been expecting. The lid of the tin had popped off in the tumble, but instead of being filled with coffee, the tin was filled with paper.
Curious, Margot reached down and picked one of the folded papers up. Upon unfolding it and taking a quick glance, Margot knew exactly what it was right away; it was one of the letters she had sent to Joe while she had still been in Europe. Margot picked up another paper and another. They were all letters she had written to Joe.
Neatly folded and in perfect condition, Joe had kept all of the letters she had ever sent safely in an old coffee tin.
"I heard a crash, is everything okay?" Joe suddenly appeared at the door, his crutches nowhere in sight, but Margot was much too caught up in the situation at hand to comment on that.
Looking from Joe to the letters in her hand, Margot felt very guilty for having snooped through his things, even if it was unintentional. "I'm sorry," she apologized. "I didn't mean to. They fell and the lid popped off and I went to pick them up and-"
"Margot, it's fine." Joe waved it off. "It's not like you don't know what's in the letters. You wrote them yourself, for crying out loud."
"Oh, right." Margot realized how silly she was acting and began to put the letters back into the tin.
"Hey, be careful with them." Joe walked over and took the letters from Margot's hands before placing them back into the tin gently. "They are important to me."
A smile played at the corners of Margot's mouth as she watched Joe put everything back into place and press the plastic lid back over the tin. "I kept them too," she finally said.
Joe looked up at her, a quizzical expression on his face. "What?"
"The letters you sent me," she elaborated. "I kept them too."
"You did?"
"Every single one." Margot nodded. "Even the one where you went on for about five paragraphs about how much Bill was getting on your nerves. I like that one, it makes me laugh. I read them when I can't sleep."
"I used to keep yours on my bedside table and read them every morning," Joe confessed. "Once you got here I stored them away for safekeeping."
Margot's smile was spanning her whole face by then, and even though she didn't want to admit it to herself, she felt tears beginning to gather in her eyes. "Okay, if we keep up with this sappy shit I'm going to start crying." Margot took a deep breath and wiped her eyes. "I'm still starving. Let's find something to eat."
As Margot spun around to return to her food hunt, Joe grabbed her by the arm and stopped her. "I really did miss you."
"I missed you too." Margot took the tin in her hands and placed it back onto the shelf that she had knocked it off of. "And you know what else I miss? Your crutches. Look, you didn't use them!"
Joe looked back out the door at where his crutches were still sitting against the tree. "Oh, yeah, look at that." He played it off very nonchalantly. "I just heard the crash and thought maybe you hurt yourself. I didn't even think about them."
"Progress." Margot smiled wide as she picked up a bag of bread from the counter. "Now, from what we have here, we can do sandwiches or sandwiches. Which one would you prefer?"
"Sandwiches." Joe made his way over to the counter. "What can I do to help?"
Grabbing a cutting board and sliding it over to him, Margot then handed over a knife and a tomato that had definitely seen better days but could still pass as edible. "Do some slicing"
"Okay."
As the two worked together at making the easiest and laziest dinner possible, the sun began to dip in the sky, bringing with it a cool breeze that matched the one that had been present that morning. "Hey, you know what we should do tomorrow?" Margot opened the fridge to search for condiments.
Joe's eyes never left the tomato. "What?"
"Go shopping."