At the end of the game his opponent cursed him across the crowd, It was the first and last time in your life you will win.

People walked along the river. Workers were rebuilding the National Library and the Oriental Institute after four months of devastating bombs. They were once again raising the dome and painting two thousand square metres of arabesques on the walls. But the beautiful books were gone, the rare manuscripts and incunabula, all ash, all gone.

—

Kosmos brought us burek pastries and coffee in small porcelain cups. Edina set up her chessboard on a low table between the two chairs on the stage and turned the black side to me.

I sleep badly, she said. I wanted the trial to be over. Now I must go back. What will you do?

I am going home till it starts again.

She lit a cigarette with stained fingers. She said, I should go to Vienna. But I want to be alone. I stay in my apartment. Kosmos comes to me but we never meet like light-squared and dark-squared bishops. My family is destroyed. When one family is damaged, all are.

What could I do? Listen to her. Play chess. I had foreign money. I was sleeping in her apartment. I put enough money on the table for her to travel to Vienna.

She looked at me and I said, Just in case you want to go.

She played her opening move, e4, and I played e5.

We continued to play quickly until I got into trouble: Nf3 f6; Nxe5 fxe5; Qh5+ Ke7; Qxe5 Kf7; Bc4+ d5; Bxd5+ Kg6; h4 h5; Bxb7 Bxb7; Qf5+ Kh6; d4+.

She looked at the board and looked at me to see if I had seen the check from the bishop. I had. I resigned.

I have replayed that game in my mind. The ways it could have gone. I have often thought of the thousand moves we can make and how easy it is to make the wrong one.

We put the pieces away and I said, Sometimes at home I go to get my fortune read.

Why?

I don’t know. To change how I feel. To hope.

She considered this and said, I don’t hope.

I know.

She reached across the table, took my coffee cup, turned it over, then righted it to examine the patterns of the grounds on the white porcelain.

She tipped the cup so I could see the streaks and she said, Tears.

She tamped her thumb on the bottom of the cup. She showed me an imprint like a mandala. She licked her thumb and said, An evil eye.

I said, You don’t know how to read coffee grounds.

She set down the cup and laughed a true and open-throated laugh. She said, You’re drska.

What does that mean?

Like, bold.

She had left a burning cigarette on the ashtray while she pretended to read my cup and forgotten it, and now she took another from the package and lit it.