He smiled, but his eyes stayed troubled.
“You are the only person in this entire place who wants nothing from me. Do you realize that?”
I did not know what to say.
“I want to win a game before I die,” I teased.
“That,” he chuckled, “you will have to earn.”
His daughter Evelyn visited once during those weeks.
She lingered at the edge of the courtyard, watching us with a strange, conflicted expression.
Arthur beckoned to her, but she shook her head and left.
“That was Evelyn,” Arthur told me. “She is not like her brother. Not entirely. But she does what Gregory tells her. She always has.”
She shook her head and left.
“People can change,” I said.
“Some do,” he agreed. “Usually when it costs them something.”
We sat in silence as the record crackled to its end.
Arthur looked older suddenly, smaller against the grand backdrop of his gilded world.
“Whatever comes,” he said, “promise you will keep playing chess with me.”
“I promise,” I said, and I meant it completely.
“People can change,”
***
Arthur’s cough grew worse each morning.
By the third week of that bitter winter, he could barely lift a chess piece.
I sat beside his bed, holding a cup of the imported tea he loved, when the door burst open without a knock.
Gregory strode in first, tall and cold, trailed by his sister Evelyn and three men in expensive suits carrying leather folders.
The door burst open
“Father, we need to talk about your care,” Gregory announced. “This place is bleeding money you don’t have to spare.”
Arthur pushed himself up against the pillows, his eyes sharp despite his weakness.
“My money is mine to spend, Gregory. I don’t recall inviting you.”
One of the lawyers stepped forward with a document.
“Mr. Arthur, your family has concerns about your capacity to make medical decisions. We intend to petition the court to appoint your eldest son as your guardian and medical agent.”
“We intend to petition the court.”
“He’s perfectly capable of thinking for himself,” I said. “Anyone can see that.”
Gregory turned to me with a look of pure contempt.
“And who exactly are you? The charity case from the state wing? This is a family matter. You should leave.”
“She stays,” Arthur said quietly. “She’s the only one in this room who visits me because she wants to.”
“You should leave.”
Evelyn shifted near the wall, her arms crossed, her eyes fixed on the floor.
She had not said a single word.
“Father, be reasonable,” Gregory continued. “There’s a lovely facility upstate. Quieter. More appropriate for your condition. You’d be comfortable there.”
“Isolated, you mean,” Arthur replied. “Cheaper. Where no one would notice how quickly I decline.”
The room went silent.
“Isolated, you mean,”
Even the lawyers glanced at one another.
“You’ve never cared whether I lived or died,” Arthur went on. “You care about the accounts. About what’s left when I’m gone.”
Gregory’s jaw tightened.
“Sign a voluntary transfer of authority, and we can avoid a court hearing that will embarrass everyone.”
“You care about the accounts.”
They left with their threats hanging in the air.
Arthur reached for my hand the moment the door closed.
“They’ll be back with a judge,” he whispered. “They’ll declare me incompetent and put me somewhere I can’t fight them.”
“Then we fight them first,” I said. “Tell me what you need.”
He was quiet for a long moment.
“Then we fight them first,”
When he finally spoke, his words startled me.
“Marry me.”
“Arthur, people will say I’m after your money.”
