GG Saab

Layla Saab works copper in the old quarter and learned on the worn boards between the benches. Her checker play is the product of a lifetime and her doubling is somebody else's business. She also insists on the old arrangement, one piece at a time, in the order she was taught, before a single throw. Where a set lays itself out she does it anyway, taking everything off and putting it all on again, and it has cost her two matches. She calls that a fair price and says so cheerfully. On the cube she has one rule of her own making: anything offered before halfway in the race is taken and anything later is passed. She has been told why that is wrong.