Warning: Use of language
The package the USCF sent over was long, too long, and weighed a small tonne. It hit the table in his New York apartment with a firm slap as Benny chucked it, discarding the envelope. What a waste of trees. It was mainly just a bunch of non-disclosure agreement for him to sign, as well as some attached documents, prepared answers for the press on their 'relationship' and a list of 'possible' events that the two could attend.
It made him want to laugh. It did, on several occasions. If he was another kind of guy, he might have circled his particularly amusing favourites and told them to kiss his ass. But Benny couldn't.
For there was something Beth didn't know, something he hadn't told her, a reason why he had agreed to such a bullshit charade. And it wasn't to do with Beth's fund.
They'd told him they'd ban him from playing if he didn't agree. It had been in the letter they sent, just over two weeks ago, the words carefully crafted to appear at first glance non-threatening, but Benny saw it for what it was: bargaining. He wasn't the best anymore, had been beaten by a nobody girl from Kentucky. He was Benny Watts, and his appeal was beginning to wane, like a lightbulb in need of replacing but it's still trying to hold on, doesn't want to go out just yet.
Neither did Benny. But at the same time, he still believed in right and wrong, still had some sort of moral code, no matter what people believed about his cowboy bohemian lifestyle. If Beth had said no, he wouldn't have forced her to. And it wasn't just because they were friends, or that they'd slept together, or the fact he'd kept one of her hair-ties in his top drawer, left and forgotten under his bed until he'd found it after she won, when he'd disassembled his rag-tag team to support her and he'd been cleaning up, or the framed picture of them fist-bumping at the match in Ohio, pressed between the pages of his book.
It was because he respected her, as a woman and as a player. Because Beth had lost too much, sacrificed too much, and her life was examined under a microscope enough as it was. He'd read her interview with Life, all those years ago, before he'd known the real her, about trying to make it in this world so dominated by men. He hadn't thought much of it at the time, but now, now he understood, how easy his chess career had been, how, compared to her, he'd had no door closed in his face, no player sneer at him due to his gender.
At least she'd shown them, every single one of those smug sons of bitches, how she was so much better than them. That just because she was a women, didn't mean that she went easy. Oh, no, that wasn't Beth Harmon; if anything, it was the opposite. She'd never gone easy on anybody, not even him, not even after the night they'd spent together. And he wouldn't have wanted her to. Benny was a man of little emotion, he'd hardened himself to the rest of the world, had practically raised himself into the man he was today, had seen some terrible things and carried a knife around because of them, and had expected to live in such a fashion for the rest of his life. But Beth... she softened him, somehow, sanding down his ruff edges, making him laugh more, made him feel less restless and listless, more at peace. She helped him see the wonder of chess, and the wonder of sharing that with somebody, somebody who understood every part of him, even the parts he tried to hide.
Benny's phone rang, the sound echoing off the bare concrete walls. Maybe it was time to redecorate: house plants were a major craze at the moment. Benny picked up the receiver, manouvering it under his chin as he sat down, stretching his legs out under the table. Perhaps no to the plant, but maybe it wouldn't kill him to get some comfier chairs that a) weren't plastic and b) didn't kill your spine if you sat in them for over five minutes.
"Hello, he said, you have reached the great Benny Watts. How may I be of service to you on this fine day?" he drawled.
Beth chuckled. In his head, he could see her rolling her eyes, as clear as if she was sitting across from him.
"Is that your perfunctory greeting now?" Beth questioned, mockery severely apparent in her tone. "Would you really answer the phone like that to your landlord? Or the Mayor of New York?"
"Why would the Mayor be calling me?" Benny asked, happy to play along in her teasing.
"To give you a key to the city for your contributions to the world of chess. Or to thank you for picking the crappiest apartment in the whole city so that no one else has to live in concrete squalor," said Beth.
"What can I say? I'm happy to provide more stable, less mouldy lodgings for the rest of America" Benny joked.
"How noble. Banter aside, I assume you know why I'm calling?"
"To hear the sound of my beautiful, charming voice?" he purred.
"If I wanted to listen to something beautiful, I'd listen to the sound of putting the phone down on your arrogant ass. No, Benny, I'm talking about-"
"I know, I know," he cut her off, waving his hand although she obviously couldn't see the motion. "I guess the New York and Kentucky postal department work on similar clocks. Yours about the weight of a small elephant?"
Beth laughed, an amused puff the down. "Most certainly," she said. She paused, as if she was contemplating her next move, hand hovering over a piece, just perfecting her strategy. "Look, Benny, are you sure about this? Because I'll still get my Fund, no matter what I have to do."
He believed her. "I know you will, and while I'm not exactly thrilled by the idea, it could be a lot worse."
"Oh, really? How so?"
Benny leant back in his chair, twisting his ring around his finger. "Well, you get to stare at this handsome face, rather than some Tweed-wearing, spectacle-cleaning chess dweeb who thinks he's so cool because he an play two openings. And you're not too bad yourself," he said smoothly.
Beth groaned. "I knew my drunken honesty about appreciating your hair would come back and bite me in the ass at some point with you," she lamented.
"It's not your fault," he consoled her, "my hair has made many a woman swoon in overcome passion at the sight of such unruly locks. It was bound to happen eventually."
"You do love to hear yourself talk, don't you? You phone bill must be solely comprised of one-sided monologues on your stellar qualities," Beth quipped, a smile threading through her voice.
"That, and take-out orders, it's true." Benny tilted the file in his hand, scanning the list of events. "Do you want to go over this?" he asked, trying to be gentle.
"We can't avoid it forever, and I suppose it couldn't hurt to familiarize ourselves with the protocol."
"Protocol?" he echoed. "What fucking protocol?"
Beth sighed wearily. "How far in are you?"
"Page nine."
"Skip to seventeen."
"There's seventeen!" he asked, incredulous.
"No, Benny, there's twenty four. What did you think was at the back?"
"Blank pages for doodling, like on science tests," he drawled sarcastically.
"Honestly," she said, in the weary and long-suffering way of a parent telling their child not to go near the plug socket and having them doing it anyway.
"Fine, fine," he muttered, pages flicking by under his impatient fingers. He scanned the list, helpfully typed out in red. They'd really gone all out, hadn't they?
"Jesus," Benny breathed, turning it over in distaste. "I bet the CIA don't get briefings as thorough as this."
"If only, Watts. You should have seen the ones I had to sign, before and after Russia. My hand was close to cramping, and I almost got a paper-cut."
"Poor Beth Harmon, government cardstock not up to scratch of her high standards," Benny said, smile curving across his face involuntarily.
"As if, I was wearing gloves. What do you think of section seven?"
He looked at the section in question. "'Penalties for not adhering to all prior rules will result in immediate expulsion from the USCF and a prohibiting ban on any and all chess tournaments taking place in the US for the next four years,'" he read out. "Penalties! What, so if, according to section two, we tell anyone we aren't dating, that we are basically being blackmailed, or don't show sufficient support of the USCF, they'll ban us?"
"Apparently," Beth replied. He could hear her, wrapping the extension cord around her finger, plastic crinkling.
"This is so fucked up."
"You don't have to tell me twice," she said hotly. "I can't believe that a bunch of ass-hats in too-tight pinstriped shirts and gaudy suspenders think they can control our lives like this. Chess shouldn't be about politics," Beth cried passionately. Benny let her rant, knowing it wouldn't do any good to stop her. Like him and his recitals of chess history, once Beth Harmon got going on something she cared about, little to nothing could dissuade her. "This age that we live in, this control that governments and people in power exert for their own ends. And, what? To look good? So that they can go home and kiss their wives and tuck in their kids and feel like they've accomplished something? As if they even care about how things effect others, so long as it doesn't effect them!"
"You should run for Senate," he told her.
"As if. They'd never let me get away with these shoes. It's just not right, Benny. Chess is sacred, it's above such petty human squabbles and insecurities and concerns. It's pure, and they're trying to taint it with paparazzi and propaganda."
"Do you think I should get a plant?" he asked her. "Maybe one of those spider plants, or those fly trap things, you know, the one named after that planet?"
He knew, and he knew Beth knew, and that she wouldn't be able to resist correcting him, even in the middle of a rant.
"It's Venus fly trap, Benny, and no, I don't. You'd forget to water it."
"I would not!" he protested.
"Benny, dear, you would. I once saw you go to leave the apartment without a shirt on," Beth said, solidifying her point.
"At least it would have given people something dazzling to look at," he said, but his mind was only half on the conversation.
Beth had called him dear. And she hadn't even noticed, as if it was perfectly natural, like a bickering old married couple, and in fact they weren't grousing about the dishes but instead saying, 'I love you and I treasure every day with you.'
Unable to analyze it with her on the other end of the line, Benny put the thought away for later scrutiny.
"True," Beth laughed, and damn, if it didn't warm something in his chest, to hear her laugh like that and know he was the cause behind it.
"So," he said, "what's the first shindig on the list?"
"Dinner," she informed him. "At the Four Seasons. Something casual, but enough to get us ingratiated into the public consciousness in a possibly romantic school of thought."
"You and your fancy words," he groused. "Every time we talk, you give me the urge to go and pick up a thesaurus. You're like my third grade teacher."
"Was she pretty?" Beth inquired.
"She was, so long as you didn't look at her floral dresses that were akin to old curtains and the cloud of cat hair that seemed to permanently float around her like a Tabby cloud."
"I bet she adored you," she teased.
Benny laughed. "Yeah, until she caught me playing chess, and she said she wouldn't give me a talking to if she won."
"I'm guessing she was in for a shock when you beat her. How many?" she asked.
He knew what she meant. "Seven moves."
"That's sad."
"Yeah, for her poor cat who probably had to hear about it. Listen, when do you want to do this? Don't you have a tournament coming up soon?"
"Why, Benny Watts, are you stalking my chess schedule?" she purred but told him, "Yes. Pennsylvania. Week after next."
"You could stay here," he offered. "Camp out here, then we go and celebrate under the watchful eyes of the media masses."
Benny held his breath. Three... two... one...
"I'd love to, but I'm getting the heating fixed next week. It seems I can beat Grandmasters at chess, but fixing a radiator? I'm completely lost. But I will come and see you. I promise."
Benny nodded, the rebuke the same as always. "Sure. Of course. I'll keep you air mattress warm for you."
"Wow, you're hilarious. It's my go," Beth told him.
He glanced down at the board, the game they'd started playing, adding a move with every phonecall. "The floor's yours Harmon."
"Pawn to D4."
"Pawn takes Pawn."
"Damn," Beth cursed. "Oh and Benny? For the love of God, get new chairs. I can hear yours squeaking like a dying mouse all the way in Kentucky."
"Would you come more of I did?" he asked, genuinely wanting to know.
"Perhaps, if you put my name on it," she said and hung up.
They never said goodbye. 'Goodbye' felt too mundane, but also too permanent, as if once they put the phone down, that was it. So they always left their calls open, like a chess match that's been adjourned, waiting for the players to come back and pick up the pieces once again.
Everything related to chess with them, and neither would have it any other way. While both often had difficulty saying what they wanted to at the time, they could always talk through chess, this brutal and beautiful language of theirs. Sometimes actions really did speak louder than words, especially with them.
But he did, sometimes, have the urge to just tell her how he felt, to get it all out in the open, off his chest and all that. This fake dating thing was going to be torture. Well, at least he wouldn't have to try too hard to look like he hung off her every word, that the sun set on the great Beth Harmon, one of the finest chess players to ever grace the earth. No, it wouldn't be too hard at all.
Benny stood from his chair, eyes fixed on the board. It was one of his best, and he now thought of it as their board, since after she'd beat him at speed chess with it, he now only used it for games with her. Perhaps he was being too sentimental, perhaps it was just because, in some far-flung desert in his mind, he wished that it was real, this relationship between them. That he was actually going to take her to dinner like a normal guy, rather than the all-night diners and coffee shops they'd usually frequented when she visited. And no, that one dinner didn't count, since Beth and been invited for it's opening and hadn't wanted to get hounded if she went alone.
However, he knew that something like that could never be, not between them. They may have been a reasonable match on paper, and the USCF may have believed that they could be convincing, but Benny knew in his heart if hearts that Beth didn't see him that way, and never would. And that was okay. She'd been hurt too much in the past, wouldn't let herself open up only to have things not work out. So he'd go to the dinners and the parties, and do what Benny Watts did best: be there for her when she really needed him.
And eat lots of free food.
Author's Note: Hello, dear readers! I present, another chapter! This was a great one to write; I always have so much fun being in Benny's head, rootling through his feelings like a chef looking for the can opener. Want did you think? Please, let me know! And yes, the next will be dinner at The Four Seasons! Yay! Also, completely unrelated: I just started watching Gilmore Girls. Are any of you fans?
Until next time!
All my love, Temperance Cain