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Hikaru decides in the middle of the press conference.
He sits there in front of the cameras and spectators and disappointed-looking interviewers, feeling restless and stupid and desperately wishing he was literally anywhere else.
What do they want to hear him say? Do they want him to act like everything’s fine, like he’s fine, despite the fact that he’s lost what’s likely the last Candidates tournament he’ll ever play?
And yes, he knows that he and every other player always has to go through this whether they win or lose in every tournament they play, but that doesn’t mean he can’t be a bit of a bitch about it right now. Especially now.
Words are spilling out of his mouth, the usual line analyses and formal, stiff interview responses, the occasional tangent, but he’s not really listening to himself or thinking about what he’s saying as he drones on and on. Instead, he makes a decision.
I’m going to kill myself tonight.
On the walk he takes outside in an effort to clear his mind, he ponders the dilemma of how he’s going to do it. A few people approach him and ask for a photo or autograph, all of which he smiles mechanically at and complies, but he thinks people kind of pick up on his state of mind, because soon they stop bothering him, leaving him alone with his thoughts in the spring night.
Ironically, despite the fact that he’s American and patriotic as fuck, he doesn’t own a gun or a gun license. Not that they allow guns in Cyprus anyways, he’s pretty sure. Which is a shame, as if he did have one on him it would definitely be his preferred method.
So, what are the other feasible options?
Hanging? Hmm, maybe, but possibly too easy to fuck up. Slitting his wrists? What is he, a depressed teenage girl? Running into oncoming traffic? Humiliating, and not guaranteed to work. Jumping off the hotel roof?
Hmm, that one could actually work.
He’d feel slightly bad about the passerby who would find him splattered on the concrete, but then again, he’s a selfish man. More selfish than he’d like to admit.
It’s already the evening, and his stomach twinges painfully — he’d been too nauseous to eat lunch, high strung from nervousness and dread and last minute game preparation — but he ignores it. Hunger is something he’s long since become used to.
Instead, he buys a pack of cigarettes and a lighter from the corner store next to the hotel, which he’s already looped back to. He doesn’t know why; he doesn’t smoke. Well, he used to occasionally, but it’d never really developed into a regular habit. For some reason, though, he feels like a cigarette tonight.
To help him relax. He wants to relax.
He ends up with a pack of Marlboro Reds — he’d really just intended to purchase a random brand, but he suddenly remembers them being his old friend’s favorite, and he’s feeling nostalgic — and a cheap lighter in his pocket. When he returns to his hotel room, he stops for a moment for the first time to think about what he’s doing.
Is he really going to go through with this? Is this really it?
Yes, he decides, it is.
And that’s that.
His eyes survey the hotel room, scanning over his things. There’s not much to look at.
His battered suitcase that’s been with him through every tournament over the years and is practically falling apart by now, with a few clothes haphazardly thrown in it. Filming equipment, but there’s no way he’s doing a recap tonight. He never brings much with him when he travels.
He eyes the hotel notepad and pen sitting on the nightstand, debating on writing a note, but he can’t bring himself to bother. He doesn’t know what he’d write, anyways.
He doesn’t bother to change out of his tournament attire, which is just a pale purple dress shirt with some kind of swirly design on it, and his suit jacket and nice pants. He’s always hated how formal tournament dress codes are, but he figures that it’s fitting to die in the clothes he’s spent the most important moments of his life in.
His feet carry him to the hotel staircase. It’s typically used in case of fires — there’s even a sign on the door stating that it should only be used for emergencies, which he ignores — but today something compels him to choose it over the elevator. So he opens the heavy metal door and begins to trudge up countless flights of stairs, losing count after the first one.
The stairwell is a concrete tower that seems to stretch on endlessly, the barren walls a stark contrast from the excessively fancily decorated rest of the hotel.
Finally, just when he begins to suspect that the hotel is infinitely tall and he’ll never reach the top, he arrives at a door at the very top. It appears to be locked at first, but he discovers that it’s locked from the inside, and when he undoes the lock and pushes it with a bit of force it swings open to reveal a breathtaking view of the ocean.
The remnants of sunlight paint the sky with faint streaks of orange and pink on a canvas of deep blue fading into black. The sea mirrors the same vibrant scene, but rippled and reflected. Waves lap lazily at the shore, brushing over the sand and soaking into it, reaching out to tap the rocks before before receding, a rhythmic push and pull.
And the stars. God, the stars.
Hikaru travels a lot — it’s part of his job description, after all — and he’s been a lot of places, seen a lot of night skies. But even though it’s not quite nighttime yet, the stars here shine more brightly than anywhere else he can remember, twinkling brilliantly, dotting the sky with tiny lights.
Must be nice not to have so much light pollution here unlike in every city I’ve ever lived, he thinks to himself amusedly as he goes to lean against the railing.
The cool spring breeze blows over him gently, flicking loose strands of hair over his face as he pulls the pack of cigarettes out of his pocket, unwrapping it, remembering to awkwardly hit the top against his palm a few times to pack the tobacco before sliding a cigarette out of the carton and placing the filter side in between his lips, returning the pack to his pocket.
He fumbles with the plastic lighter a few times before a flame flicks into appearance with a shhk, and he holds it to the end of the cigarette as he inhales, seeing orange embers spark into reality, glowing dimly.
The inhale is far too deep, though, and the burn that fills the base of his throat bursts him into a coughing fit, smoke escaping through his mouth in puffs, stinging his eyes. It’s been too long since he’s done anything like this.
When he recovers, he takes a proper long drag, inhales clean air, and blows the smoke out slowly. He pockets the lighter.
Despite the bitter taste and smell of the smoke, the nicotine instantly soothes him, a wave of calm washing over him, making him lightheaded. He can see how people get addicted to this.
And now, as he looks out at the Mediterranean Sea, cigarette in hand, he finally stops to think.
Why am I doing this?
Perhaps the better question is, why shouldn’t he? Throughout his life, he’s only ever had one goal: to become world champion. And this year, this year should have been his chance. His last and final chance. He’s thirty-eight, after all, double the age of the current world champion. How pathetic.
And, of course, as always, he blew it. He was so close. So goddamn close. Somehow gloriously and miraculously tied for first going into the last round. He’d foolishly gotten his hopes up. And then he’d lost. Pushed too hard, blinded by his own desperation. Or something like that. He’d been too distracted to think about it afterwards.
He’s such an idiot, honestly, for thinking, letting himself hope, that maybe he could finally accomplish something in his life.
All his life, he’s only ever been competing for second place. It’s still the same. Nothing’s changed, even without Magnus. He’s still the same failure he’s always been.
So what’s the point of it all?
When he was younger, his self worth was directly tied to his chess performance. He’d thought he’d improved, thought he’d gotten better, learned to love himself a bit more, but it seems that he’d only been pretending.
He sees no point in living if he can’t even be half decent at the only thing he’s ever been somewhat good at.
As much as he’d never admit it to anyone else, he’s fully and completely aware of his own flaws. Too aware, almost.
He’s annoying. Narcissistic, unlikeable. Pathetically insecure. Incompetent at chess even though it’s what he does for a career and he’s pushing forty. He’s a terrible person.
He’s tried over and over again to pretend that he doesn’t care how good at chess he is, that he has other things he likes or loves or lives for, that his family and streaming and nature mean more to him than any stupid title ever will. But right now, he can’t think of a single thing that he’d rather have more than that wreath sitting on his shoulders.
The only thing he’s ever had going for him was chess, and he’s gone and fucked that over now too. He’s useless as a human being; he’s more like a 200 elo chess engine. Useless that way, too.
So fucking useless that he couldn’t even win the candidates, much less the world championship.
He’s already overstayed his time alive.
He’s thought about doing it before. Who hasn’t?
Fleeting visions of incoming trains and blood-stained floors. Morbid curiosities: “What if I jump? What’s stopping me?” Half-baked notions of plans that he’d been too scared to follow through with.
But he’s not scared anymore. He’s not anything anymore.
Inhale, exhale. Flicks the long stack of ash that’s built up off the end of his cigarette.
He looks down. Looks at the concrete below him surrounding the pool, the pool that he’d been too busy futilely doing preparation for the tournament to enjoy. Umbrellas shielding empty beach chairs.
It’s a nice hotel. A nice pool. He wishes he’d visited it.
Imagines himself splattered on the concrete below him. A gruesomely pretty sight, he thinks.
Takes a last drag of the cigarette before dropping the butt on the ground and stepping on it, extinguishing the embers.
Exhale. Breathe in fresh air.
He steps over the railing awkwardly — and winces as his formal pants stretch from the movement — swaying slightly at the wave of dizziness that hits him; he’s lucky — or maybe not — that he doesn’t topple over and fall to his death right then and there.
Looks up out at the ocean again. It really is pretty.
This is it, then.
Hesitates. Shakes his head. Closes his eyes.
The fist that’s clenched around the railing begins to release itself—
“—Hikaru?”
“Ahh!” Hikaru yelps — almost falls forwards but narrowly avoids it — and whips his head around towards the source of the voice, both hands reaching back to grip onto the railing for dear life.
Shit.
Fabiano Caruana is standing there, holding the door to the rooftop open, looking the most surprised Hikaru’s ever seen him. He’s still in his formal clothes from earlier today, but he looks significantly more worse for wear.
Both of them stare at each other for a second, lost for words.
“Come down,” Fabiano says. His expression is undecipherable.
For whatever reason, Hikaru complies, climbing back over the railing.
“Uhh…” His brain short-circuits as his mouth moves on its own, attempting damage control. “I… I was just… I wasn’t…”
Fabiano looks at him, eyes still wide. He closes the door behind him and walks forwards, silently, lightly, to lean against the railing, face carefully schooling itself into a neutral expression.
Hikaru blinks, confused. He thinks about leaving, or maybe even just jumping off, but decides that the time for both has already passed, and so he sees no other option than to take his spot beside Fabiano.
He pulls out the pack of cigarettes once again, pulling one out and holding the carton out towards Fabiano, who both surprisingly and unsurprisingly accepts.
“I thought you didn’t smoke,” Fabiano mutters through the cigarette between his teeth as he lights both their cigarettes with Hikaru’s lighter, the latter leaning in so that both of their faces are uncomfortably close to each other.
“I don’t.”
And that’s that.
“Why are you here?” Hikaru asks as both of them stare out at the ocean, twin tendrils of smoke curling up, polluting the clear sky.
“I could ask you the same thing,” comes the reply.
“Touché.”
An awkward silence stretches over them.
Hikaru and Fabiano are opposites.
Hikaru, with his wild thoughts and actions and loud, abrasive words. Unrestrained. Uncontrolled. Free. The barrier in between him and the world built with barbs and spikes and insults, hot and fiery and explosive.
Fabiano, with his cool, icy composure. Each and every word carefully constructed before leaving his lips, expression and actions always carefully poised, never speaking too much, doing too much, being too much. A distance always kept between him and anyone else, to prevent them from getting too close.
Yet right now, they both have two things in common.
The first, much more simple: neither of them want to address the circumstances that have led to this situation. Fabiano had also lost the final round of the Candidates, and thus the entire tournament. Their losses seem like some kind of symbol that the new generation is taking over, washing them out like waves knocking over the remnants of sandcastles that once stood tall and triumphant.
The second, a much heavier truth that has always weighed down on them like a storm cloud for the entirety of their chess careers.
“I guess we’ll always only ever be competing for second, huh?” Hikaru says with a laugh, pretending that that sentence doesn’t crush both of their souls into pulp.
He feels slightly nauseated, probably from the nicotine — he’s not used to smoking, though two cigarettes is a pretty pathetic limit to have — but he ignores it.
Fabiano lets out a snort, a breath of smoke. “Yeah, well…” A shrug. But the way the corners of his mouth are strung tight betray him, something he seems to be all too aware of.
“Last chance to become world champion, and we both blew it. It’s really over, isn’t it? Fuck Magnus. I hate him. Fuck everyone. I should have just jumped.”
“Chess isn’t the only thing you have to live for. It’s not the end of the world.”
“That’s rich, coming from you. And yes, it is.”
“Really, it isn’t. I have other things to live for, and you do, too.” It’s a lie, and both of them know it, but uncharacteristically, Hikaru doesn’t press him. Who knows; maybe he’s feeling kind, maybe it’s the nicotine, or maybe he’s just too tired to deal with this. To deal with everything.
“I mean, what was it that we did so wrong?” Hikaru is still smiling like a madman, but desperation bleeds into the cracks of his voice, and he’s fully aware that he’s starting to unravel at the seams. “Be born in the same era as Magnus? Is that it? I mean, fuck, man… maybe in any other timeline it would be you and me playing in the 2018 championship.” Hikaru inhales smoke. “Maybe you would have won.”
“Maybe,” Fabiano hums non-commitally, taking a drag of his own cigarette.
“Ugh, can you actually say something? You’re too quiet. It’s pissing me off.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know. Anything. It doesn’t matter. You’re always so…”
Fabiano only stares at him with those large, unreadable eyes through his thick frames, and that only irritates Hikaru more.
“You always hold yourself back so much. I can tell. Everyone can, you know. It’s like you’re always on the verge of snapping but instead you, I don’t know, shell up and build a wall between yourself and the world, or something. And I know you have it in you to let loose — I’ve seen you do it before — so what’s stopping you?”
“And what’s the alternative? To act like you do?” Fabiano retorts calmly, blowing out a puff of smoke.
“And what’s that supposed to mean?” Hikaru bites out, and for somehow the first time since Fabiano’s arrival the air around them seems to darken from something light and fraught with tension to something dark and heavy.
“You know.”
And the worst part is that he does know. Knows exactly what Fabiano is talking about, what he means.
But still, he plays dumb. Doesn’t want to admit it. Maybe to Fabiano, maybe to himself.
“No, really, I don’t. Enlighten me.”
Fabiano sighs, as if it’s a strenuous act to have to explain himself when he doesn’t want to. “Surely you know what people think about you. Do you really have that little self awareness, to not be able to see the way you act?”
“The way I act?”
“Come on. You’re such a child, Hikaru.”
Hikaru bristles. “And who the fuck are you to say that?”
He knows he had purposefully been riling up Fabiano, but he thinks he’s just looking for any excuse to get angry.
Fabiano holds his hands up. “You’re the one who wanted me to say it. But I think you’re only doing it to yourself.”
“You’re such a bitch.”
Fabiano doesn’t reply, simply inhaling from his cigarette that’s slowly being reduced to a nub like a man that’s resigned from the world.
Hikaru abruptly stands, tossing his cigarette onto the ground carelessly before climbing over the railing, and Fabiano’s eyes widen in delayed momentary panic as he looks up at the other man helplessly, hands flying out but not quite touching him.
The two of them are suddenly more aware than ever of the fact that that they’re perched on a ten-story building, and that Hikaru is standing on the ledge of it with only the railing he’s clinging onto stopping him from plunging off it.
“I’ll jump. I’ll fucking do it. Watch me.”
Hikaru doesn’t know what he’s doing. Why he’s doing this, especially to Fabiano of all people. Fabiano’s never done anything to him, other than be better than him, which is unfortunately not a very high bar.
Maybe, he thinks, it’s jealousy. Isn’t it always just that?
But right now he’s going to kill himself, and he thinks he really means it, he’ll really do it, and suddenly warm tears are cascading down his face in streams, and he doesn’t know why.
“What the hell are you doing? Get down,” Fabiano hisses, cigarette slipping out from between his fingers. He stands like he’s going to grab Hikaru and pull him back over, his arms outstretched but not reaching out to grab the other man like he’s scared of accidentally pushing him, and right now all Hikaru wants is to see a reaction from him.
So he edges his foot back.
“Wait! Shit! Hikaru. Think about this, don’t do anything stupid.” Fabiano’s voice rises into panic. “Look, I didn’t mean what I said earlier, okay? I was just, I was just… I don’t know what I was doing. But I didn’t mean it.”
Hikaru feels a stupid sense of vindication seeing Fabiano this distraught for maybe the first time in the thirty years they’ve known each other. Tears are still rolling down his face, and he doesn’t know how to stop them.
Seeing Hikaru refuse to back down, Fabiano breathes out an ultimatum.
“Fuck. If you… If you jump, I’ll jump too.”
“Am I supposed to believe that? And am I supposed to care?”
“I mean, it’s what I came up here to do, isn’t it?” Fabiano looks physically pained admitting that. “And maybe you don’t care. I don’t know. But… hell, I’d like to think otherwise.”
Hikaru exhales, closing his eyes. “Fuck you. Fuck everyone. Fuck everything.” He adds in a “fuck Magnus,” just because.
And then he lets go and steps off, and for a second he’s free—
He hears a panicked “Agh!”, and suddenly he’s not falling like he’d expected, and there’s a painful pressure around his right wrist.
He opens his eyes, and he’s looking up.
Hikaru is dangling from his right arm, and one of Fabiano’s hands is around his wrist, the other gripping the railing deathly tight to prevent both of them from plunging down to their graves. Hikaru honestly doesn’t know how he’s lifting him with just one arm.
“What are you doing?” Hikaru shouts, but makes no move to struggle out of the tight hold around him. The force of gravity dragging him down is at war with Fabiano desperately trying to prevent that, and at the centre of it all is Hikaru’s arm, which feels like it’s going to snap any second now.
“You idiot!” Fabiano yells back, and he’s losing his composure, face contorted, red with the effort of trying to pull Hikaru up.
Hikaru should just give up. He’d planned to die tonight, anyways. Why should that change just because Fabiano’s here? He wants to die. He needs to die.
But for some reason that he can’t quite pinpoint and doesn’t quite want to, his left hand comes up to scrabble at the wall, where his fingers catch on a shallow groove, and his foot finds a small ledge, and he pulls himself up as best as he can, which is just enough for Fabiano to pull him back over the ledge.
They both fall backwards, collapsed in heaps on the floor, chests heaving.
“Fuck, why are you so strong?” Hikaru groans, out of breath, rubbing his right arm.
“Doesn’t help that you’re, like, all of five feet,” Fabiano retorts, equally exhausted.
“Shut up. I’m not,” Hikaru shoots back, and they both lie there in silence for a moment, exhausted. Adrenaline is still coursing through his veins, heart pounding like he’s playing bullet chess.
Silently, Hikaru, still lying on the ground, pulls out the pack of cigarettes, offering one to Fabiano, who takes it. Both of them light up.
Finally, Hikaru breaks the tension.
He drags a hand over his face. “Fuck. I don’t want to go back.”
“...Me neither,” comes the quiet, hesitant reply.
“I mean,” Hikaru continues, “I came up here not expecting to go back down, I guess. I don’t want to… How can I keep living, just like that? I don’t know. I’m alive, but it feels like I shouldn’t be.”
A hmm is the only reply he receives, but Hikaru feels that Fabiano understands.
“Ugh, why am I even talking to you? Why did I let you… save me?” The word save feels strange in his mouth. “I mean, if I’d won my matches with you instead of drawing I probably could have won the whole tournament. Then I wouldn’t be here. So really, you’re kind of to blame for this.”
But even though Hikaru is complaining and pretending to be upset, his heart’s not in it. He hesitates, takes a drag of his cigarette for courage, then opens his mouth again.
“Can we… can we stay here for a bit? Just like this?” Hikaru’s voice shakes. Both of them pretend not to notice.
“I’d like that, I think.”
So they stay there, lying on the roof, chain smoking cigarettes until the carton runs out, looking up at the sky as if right now, the world is on hold for them.
Fabiano laughs at Hikaru when the other man gags a few times in between smokes, sick from the nicotine he has no tolerance for.
Hikaru doesn’t know why Fabiano saved him. He could have dragged both of them over, almost did. Fabiano should have just let go. He’d almost died. He knew he’d almost die.
Sure, Fabiano did come up here to do just that. But it’s not the same.
It doesn’t change the fact that Fabiano saved him.
They’ve never really been close. He’s never really been close with any of his colleagues. The two of them have been competitors over the years, sure, and united over their country as well as their universal failure.
But there’s something unique shared in between both of them them that can only be experienced through being second to one man their entire life, and even after that man retired, still not being good enough. Knowing what could have been in a different life, in a different universe.
Eventually, when the sky is dark, the moon barely a sliver in the sky, Fabiano stands, snubbing out the last of his final cigarette, the butt joining the graveyard of them already littered around them, and extends a hand. Illuminated by the silver moonlight that shines in his hair and casts shadows on his face, he almost looks like some kind of guardian angel. The thought makes Hikaru laugh.
“Shall we go?” Fabiano asks, voice soft.
Wordlessly, Hikaru takes his hand.