Final story!

The host is sitting down on a wooden chair, with a wooden table in front of him. The chessboard on the table is set up with its playing pieces, as he moves his black pawn forwards.

"Boards like these are being played these days like crazy. Of course, chess is known as the relaxing, care free, quiet game to play on lazy afternoons. That's if a fight doesn't break out determining whose turn it is. But its popularity has brought the quick-witted game into world wide championships and has made it into a classic activity."

"Jose the goomba invites his dear friend Wendell over to his house every Sunday afternoon to play chess, and after twenty years, they still don't know all of each other's moves. Many need the skill and knowledge to play this familiar game. But most of all, spirit is the key to having fun, no matter the results. However, according to Jose and his wife, spirit had gone to a new term for them."

Let's Play Chess

I love Sunday afternoons. I could have all the cooking time I needed. I would never actually cook anything classic or common, but I would be experimenting new tastes and recipes I could share with a few of my other friends.

But the best part was just having the usual company of Wendell and my husband Jose, playing on the outdoor balcony with a chess board in the middle of them.

"Wendell," Jose said, "I think my luck hasn't worn off from last week. Let's see if that's true."

"I'm afraid you might be disappointed," Wendell replied, as they both got up from the table and headed towards the balcony door.

"Have a good game, you two!" Mrs. Gimmons called out from the other room. "Oh, and I don't want to get distracted by your fighting this time."

"You can't play chess without having a fight," Jose told her, before they both headed out through the door. Mrs. Gimmons sighed as she went to the kitchen to finish her dishes.

I don't know how long it's been ago since Wendell had started coming to our house for chess with Jose. It was as if they could never be separated. They were both masters at it. And good quarrelers too. Wendell would drive down from his apartment five miles down the road and they would play for twenty to thirty minutes, playing at least a game or two very time. It's been so repetitive every Sunday, and never had any of the three of us become tired of it.

"Okay," said Wendell, "Now that we're ready, I choose---"

"I know, I know. 'Look at me! I'm Mr. Wendell perfect wanting to go first! I get white pieces!'" Jose mimicked. "Fine Wendell, take the white."

"It's pretty obvious then that you're unaware of the white goes first rule," Wendell said. "So thanks for the offer." Wendell made his first move with no hesitation: he moved the pawn in front of the king two spaces down, resulting in a look of annoyance from Jose.

"King pawn to king four," Jose said, shaking his head. "When will your move ever be different? I want to see just once, I want to see you make another different first move besides moving your king pawn up two. I know you win occasionally---"

"Well excuse my moves but---"

"You just don't---"

"You just don't want to remember," Wendell pointed out, straightening into his chair. "I have my wins because of that first move. Make me change it and two hundred coins are yours, José."

"Don't make that 'H' silent whenever you say my name!" Jose told him, and then sniffed the air twice as if he was trying to search for something. "Is that your cheap Shroom Purée cologne on you? Did you bathe in that nasty stuff again?"

"It ain't nasty, it keeps me from having a crazy mind," he argued. "Unlike you, of course."

"At least I don't still have that horrible body odor of yours," Jose argued back.

Wendell sighed heavily and looked at the board. "When in the Mushroom Kingdom will you stop sniffing at me, and, and make your next move before the millennium?"

"You know what, I think you're just distracting me," said Jose in a voice of realization. "You're distracting me from making my next move and also distracting me from thinking!"

"You don't need me to help you not think," Wendell said, and Jose proceeded to make his move on the chess board.

That sound of two arguing old goombas has replaced the sound of birds chirping in my life. Oh, how I loved those Sunday afternoons.

It wasn't until the next few hours when Jose picked up the ringing phone. I knew I should have been the one to do it. It was a business partner of Wendell's, who told him what had happened that afternoon Wendell was driving back home from the chess game. Wendell was involved in a fatal car crash and was killed instantly. That saddened look on my husband's face when he hanged up the phone almost broke my heart. I always thought that Jose and Wendell could never be separated, but I was wrong then. His beloved friend Wendell the goomba, was dead.

Days passed by. Weeks flew like the wind. A month passed by since that day he received the news. Jose was never the same, and neither was the Sunday afternoons I had always enjoyed. He barely got any sleep, even with the fact that he knew his doctor recommended at least eight hours of rest per night to sustain his healthy metabolism. Sometimes he would go into his bed at midnight and I'd see him at six o'clock in the morning, looking out the window. During the day, he would be sitting in a chair, on the balcony Wendell and he had always played their games. When I would bring him his favorite foods outside to him, I would always take the plate back and see only a few bites taken from his meal. The death of Wendell weighed so much on him, and for some strange reason, Jose blamed himself for his friend's death. I knew it was nonsense. He missed him so much. But on one day, I decided to stop the depressed feeling from taking over my husband as a human.

Mrs. Gimmons stepped outside to the balcony slowly and looked at her husband. He was sitting in the wooden chair he used to sit in every Sunday afternoon, with the plate of untouched food on his lap and the empty table and chair in front of him. She sighed and stepped towards him, as he didn't bother to look up from the floor.

"Jose," she started, "Jose, I understand how painful this can be. But please, you've got to stop doing this to yourself. You've got to stop with this." Jose looked up at his wife with a face that showed all the sadness that had weighed on him the past four weeks. She sighed again, this time sadly.

"I know something that might…be an idea," she said. "How about you and I play chess together?"

"Gloria, I love you," he said in a cheerless voice. "I love you so much. But you know it won't be the same at all. I'll still have that empty feeling in me that can never be filled. It just won't be the same."

"I know it won't be the same," Gloria replied. "And I don't think it ever will. But we'll try it anyway." Her husband slowly nodded as she went to get the game equipment from the room.

We both emptied the bag full of chess pieces onto the chess board, and something seemed too coincidental. The black and white pieces separated by themselves when they emptied onto the board.

"Isn't that odd?" Gloria wondered, as they started to put their pieces up.

"Yeah, what were the chances?" said Jose. As they were both setting their pieces standing up in their correct positions, Jose suddenly stopped. He sniffed the air, and sniffed again and again. He looked around him before he smelled a familiar odor coming from somewhere around the table.

"Honey," said Jose. "Does it happen to be that you're wearing Shroom Purée?"

"Shroom Purée?" she questioned. "I never wear anything like that. All I put on this morning is my regular Floral Perfume. Isn't Shroom Purée what…?" She stopped talking and looked at Jose, who slowly tilted his head towards Gloria to indicate it was her turn to make her move.

"White goes first," he said.

What happened after when I made my first move was beyond what I expected.

Gloria sat down straight into her chair and picked up the pawn in front of the bishop, moving it up two spaces. But just as Jose was going to play his turn, he stopped. The pawn Gloria had just moved suddenly moved again, but this time without Gloria touching it. It slid back to its original position ever so slowly, as he and Gloria stared with faces of disbelief.

"What in the world?" Gloria said, her eyes getting wide as she looked down at the board in confusion. Jose stared at the board as well. As they watched in panic, the pawn in front of the king moved slowly, moving its way up two spaces as Jose and Gloria sat in their chairs, stunned. Gloria picked up the bag from the floor slowly.

"There's something definitely wrong here," she said, her voice baffled and bewildered at the same time, "I really think we should put the game away."

"Yes," Jose said slowly. "Yeah, put the game away." As his terrorized wife hurriedly tried to put the pieces back into the leather playing bag, Jose sniffed the air once again. He started to smile.

The next day, we hired a paranormal expert to come and visit our house. I just knew something unusual had happened the day before, and she performed a number of extensive tests as Jose and I stood besides her. She did radio tests, samples of the floor and tables, and was even holding a camera to search around the balcony.

"The paranormal," she explained, "Can usually be picked up by video than can't be seen by the naked eye." The expert searched further and further around the base of the table videotaping everywhere she could see. The old couple stood still in curiosity as she continued to search around the area of the balcony.

"My investigations are complete in every way I could possibly think off. I think it's safe to conclude that there is no parapsychic activity or anything like such going on in your place," she said. Gloria lowered her shoulders at ease.

"The only possibility I could think of is that perhaps there was…a slight earth tremor yesterday that shook the table and happened to cause the playing pieces to move around." As Jose looked pleased, Gloria still was unconvinced.

"But how was it that one went back, and another one went forward instead?" Gloria asked her. "There's hasn't been any earth tremors occurring in this town recently."

"Well," the lady said as she went to think of another possibility, "Maybe one of you happened to bump the table accidentally. Do any of you remember hitting the table somehow while you were playing the game?"

None of them said anything, when suddenly Jose changed his face into the look as if he had just realized something important.

"Oh yes," he said in a voice of awareness. "You are absolutely right Doc! I…I think that now that I look back to yesterday, I think I did accidentally bump the leg of the table on my wife's side."

"Oh?" asked the investigator, surprised at Mr. Gimmons sudden recognition.

"Yeah, this makes me feel a lot better," he said. She had nothing else to do but give him a warm smile.

"Well," she said. "If anything else seems to occur that seems somewhat unusual, just don't forget to give me a call and I'll be with you as soon as possible."

"Oh no, no," Jose said, as she got the lady and him facing away from Gloria, who was standing behind them and wondering what Jose was talking about.

"I don't think you'll have to come back here any more," he explained. "It's much useless, and no spirits or anything is around here at all. You know, it's my wife who's the superstitious one, and imagines some pretty weird stuff. But bah! Her imagination is an immense area."

"Well, I'm very glad I was of your assistance," she said, "Best wishes to you, Mr. and Mrs. Gimmons. She went to shake Jose's hand, and then turned around to shake Mrs. Gimmons hand. As she went to walk down the balcony steps, she suddenly turned around to face Jose again.

"You know," she said, smiling, "My brother used to wear Shroom Purée all the time. Is…is that what you have on?"

Gloria put her hand up to her mouth in realization and alarm, but Jose kept his usual attitude as he thought of what to say next.

"Yes, doc, that's right I have on right now." The lady smiled again and headed down the balcony stairs.

The investigation of the paranormal expert still didn't ease me up. The strangest thing was how Jose's attitude started to lighten up after one month of complete grief, ever since that time we saw the chess piece mysteriously move. And what also struck me odd was how he wanted the paranormal lady to leave the house so quickly and reassuringly.

Then I would never forget the time I saw my husband the next week on Sunday. It was three o'clock, and I had just returned back from buying more food ingredients for making my dinner.

Mrs. Gimmons opened the door and walked her way over to the kitchen to put her food down. As she went to put the canned foods onto the shelf, she remembered how Jose had taken the olive oil that morning to use it for his scrambled eggs, and olive oil was what she needed for her new recipe.

"Jose?" she called out. "Jose, I need the olive oil you had this morning. Jose?" She exited the kitchen and went towards his bedroom, only to find it empty.

"Jose, where are you?" she asked, walking and searching each room she walked by. "Where are you?" As she made her way back to the kitchen, she noticed the open balcony door and had only one idea of where Jose had gone to.

"Jose, I'm been looking for you," she said, seeing him outside on the balcony table.

But I didn't expect to see him in a very familiar position, a position he had been always seen in every week. He had a smile on his face, the same one he had used to display on Sunday afternoons. On the table in front of him was the chess board I could assume he had set up. The pieces, to my surprise, were in various places. As I stared in confusion at my husband, my mind completely changed when I saw a white bishop move diagonally across the board as my husband watched contently. The only thing was that he wasn't the one who had moved it.

After that Sunday, everything seemed just the same as it was a month ago. Sunday afternoons were back to normal, or the same at least. I would always take away the sandwich plate from Jose as he went to the chess table. He looked so healthy and well lately.

"You ate everything!" said Gloria said in surprise. "I'm glad your eating habits are back to normal."

"You know I love you," Jose said, as they leaned in for a quick kiss. She turned around to head back, but then turned back to the table once again.

"Have a good game, you two," Gloria told them. "And keep your fighting down."

"We'll try, we'll try," said Jose. "Oh, and Wendell says your new recipe meal smells marvelous." Gloria smiled happily at across of Jose at the empty chair.

"Why, thank you Wendell!" said Mrs. Gimmons, flattered that her recent cooking experiment was a blossoming success. "But you still haven't seen anything yet."

"Okay, your move first," Jose said, looking from across from him.

I would always wait for the first move of the white piece before I left to test my new recipes. And every time, the pawn in front of the king would move up two spaces. Jose would shake his head and chuckle.

"You never change!" he would say as he proceeded to make his next move. Sometimes the game lasted for over thirty minutes, even an hour. And as I would be in the kitchen testing my blooming kitchen skills, I would keep the kitchen window open so I could keep my usual eye on them. Sometimes I would close it when the arguing between them distracted me too much, but at least from now on I could only hear the sound of one of those bickering old men. Of course, I didn't really think I actually believed in such things before. But with my real and only eyes, I could see how those white pieces were moving by themselves. I guess my husband and his best friend can never be separated after all.

Oh, how I love Sunday afternoons.

The host picks up his black knight from the playing board to checkmate the opposing king on the other side.

"Unfortunately, and fortunate in some way for Jose, the usual revival of the Sunday afternoons suddenly ended after another few weeks. How do you judge this story? Was Jose probably imagining the chess pieces playing by themselves in his deep desire for having his friend back? But then how did his more rational wife witness the later paranormal games Jose played? How do you explain the smell of his friend's cologne as well? Perhaps the only explanation is that Wendell's spirit returned back to where he had loved the most; in the company of his best friend and to relive the enjoyment of the game chess. Can this story have really taken place? Choose your decision, because it is your turn to make the move."

Peach: Oh dear, that story was confusing and really creepy.

Klepto: How could this story have happened? Or maybe it did?

Wario: So fake!!

Flurrie: Wait sweetums, can you consider just once the possibly of a story about a spirit coming back to play chess as true?

Luigi: I really think this story might have happened, with some personal experience.

Peach: These stories are based on the real world, you know

Luigi: I still believe this story had occurred somewhere and somehow. For my last and final prediction for tonight's story, I think this story is FACT

Wario: Nahaha! FICTION

Klepto: I'm stuck between my beliefs.

Flurrie: Gosh, me too. It's just all the stuff in the tale that seemed so weird and unreal. It has the possibilities of being fact.

Wario: Don't be stupid.

Flurrie: FACT

Klepto: I'll have to go with fake, cause it seems just a bit too much. FICTION

Peach: Ehhhh, I really don't know! Fiction it is! FICTION.

Host: I think I've got twenty five submissions for tonight with names and titles on them. I'll be back with the final results, and also with…

All: (gasps) The truth!

Flurrie: This is going to be interesting now…

When we return, all the stories of tonight will finally be revealed whether to be true or false, when we return to Beyond Belief: Fact or Fiction.

Thanks for reading! Also, I suggest you review and say your guesses for the stories on this show before they get revealed. Can you really seperate the line between fact or fiction and prove to be an untricked person, or are you leaning over to one side too much? The truths will be in the final chapter!