✔️ Body and Mind

A night walk

Anya was finishing her homework at the library, behind the counter, while processing the book orders from students that came to her.

She absolutely loved this part-time job as she could have only late shifts and be in a quiet place where she had time to focus both on her school as well as preparing for her chess tournaments. And most of all, she was surrounded by the thing she loved the most. Books.

It was now late in the evening and she finished her physics assignment, her thoughts drifting again to the morning two days ago. She felt really sorry for Yuzuru, seeing that people are just abusing his fame for their personal gain. Be it the girl who tried to sell the photos or Rachel, trying to gain popularity. At least she knew that it won't last for long between those two.
The curiosity of a new, famous student at school was fading and with that Rachel's interest in Yuzuru will be soon gone as well.
She so badly wanted to tell Yuzuru what a piece of work Rachel actually is, but she knew he would have to find out for himself. If she would start dissing on Rachel now, it would be for him just her flatmate trying to stir drama. She could see he genuinely cared for her and would take Rachel's side.
And who knows what kind of lies Rachel already told him about her flatmate.

It took even Anya several weeks after moving into the free room and living with Rachel on daily basis to see what a shallow person she is. And since Anya prided herself on being really good at seeing through people, she had to admit Rachel knew how to fake a nice personality.
Only once she knew there is no point in pretending in front of Anya she really revealed her true face.
Even though Anya wasn't the fighting type and was OK with just both of them ignoring each other, she knew how to push Rachel's buttons and often took advantage of it to provoke her, to at least have some satisfaction.

Anya took out one of the 'New in Chess' magazines and started to go over the match of her biggest rival from the UK, Megan Byrne, who just won against a guy who was in the top 30 players. It was a massive deal in the chess world, mostly because she was a girl. For Anya, it was because the more she was going through the prints of the chessboard from the match, she couldn't figure out where it could go wrong for that guy.
Megan was her friend that she had great respect for but she also always won against her in tournaments. Now Anya was worried she might actually lose to her.

The guy did all the moves exactly as she would have done them herself. She was eagerly flipping through the pages, quickly scanning the records of the moves and disappearing into her own world. And then she finally saw it. The move got him into an impossible position with no chance of an escape. She stared at it with her mouth slightly open for a while, trying to see if there was a way out. There was not and Anya burst into laughter seeing that genius move. What an amazing play from Megan!!
She fished her phone out of the pocket to text her but when she raised her head, she saw there was a queue of three students waiting to get her attention.
Anya was quickly brought back to reality and processed their orders, slightly embarrassed for forgetting where she was but at this point in her life, she was kind of used to it. It was happening quite often.

As soon as she was free again, she went to text her friend.
They always texted each other slightly longer messages, knowing the other person will read it after several hours with the time zone difference. But even though they were messaging quite often, it was always just about chess, never anything personal. Just a respectful friendship between two players.

Anya
19:48
-Just finished your game against Davis. Absolutely awesome! Well done!! That last move made me laugh out loud, didn't see it coming! It's a shame that most of the article was dedicated to 'a woman beating a guy' and calling it a New Era in chess. Such a shame.
-And thank you for mentioning there is no rivalry between you and me, even though it seems it went over the reporter's head. He still wrote it as if we would hate each other.
-Good luck in your upcoming games!!