‘What? No! Felix! You can’t! It’s bad enough being on my own when you play with your granddad, but not at school too.’

‘I’m sorry,’ I say. ‘But I want to.’

‘Brilliant.’ Rebecca almost squeals with excitement. ‘I’ll tell Chris.’ She runs off down the corridor, then turns around. ‘It’ll be great,’ she shouts. ‘Just make sure you practise with your granddad again tonight.’

Jake turns and looks at me.

‘Felix,’ he says. ‘You don’t know what you’re doing. He’ll embarrass you again.’

‘But I’ve got to try.’

‘But . . .’

Jake’s voice fades away as I stare at the board. A weird feeling grows inside me and I don’t know what it is. But I do know that I actually want to play. It’s something I want to do, and not because a teacher, Mum or Dad, or Jake are telling me to. It’s something I want to do on my own. I feel a smile creep across my face. I’m going to do it. I’m going to do it for Granddad, but also I’m going to do it for me.

The Mechanical Turk

‘One moment.’ Granddad holds up his hand.

The phone is ringing for the third time since we got home.

We look across the table at each other in silence, waiting for it to stop. It rings for ages, like someone wants to contact Granddad urgently. I think of telling him, but he’ll just wave me away. I don’t know why he just doesn’t get the telephone company to disconnect it. But that would mean he’d have to use the phone to ask them to do it. He would never do that, so as usual we sit and wait with the curtains closed.

‘So,’ says Granddad eventually. ‘A championship? You have a championship. I am so pleased.’

The phone has stopped, but my ears are still ringing.

‘Yes, Granddad, a championship. I can’t wait, but I’ve realized that chess is so complicated. You’ve shown me two moves, but this afternoon, in IT, me and Rebecca found loads of others – there are the Bird’s Opening, the King’s Indian Attack, the Queen’s Knight Defence, the Hedgehog Defence – so many attacks and defences.’

‘Tsk!’ Granddad waves his hand across the table. ‘I told you, don’t worry about the names. You will be fine.’

‘I hope so,’ I say. ‘Because all this information is turning my brain to spaghetti.’

‘But you are learning quickly.’ He takes a sip of tea. ‘And maybe you know more than you think, because much of what I have taught you is subliminal.’

‘What?’

‘Subliminal – it’s when you learn something without knowing.’

‘Well, I think I’ve had a lot of subliminal, because I’m still seeing chessboards on the classroom walls.’