The Slut's Guide to Chess

chapter 14

I knew that it was no use sneaking Arwyn inside my dorm, the cameras were probably already tracking my every move along the corridors and so we decided to walk straight through. We pushed our shoes off by the door, I threw my hat onto my bed and then ran to the only radiator within the small room. I pressed myself to the faint heat in hopes that my skirt and shirt would dry quickly.

I watched as Arwyn took stiff steps towards my bed and sat at the very end with a soft sigh. He folded his hands together and looked as though he was trying to make himself smaller under my gaze.

"We've had two lessons and you still haven't even shown me a chessboard. It's only just hit me that you're a terrible teacher," I teased.

His eyes flickered to mine whilst he surveyed my expression.

"Well, actually that's why I'm here," he murmured. "I didn't expect our lessons to be cut short so many times. I had a PowerPoint presentation set up and everything."

"A PowerPoint?" I questioned. "I mean, I don't need a presentation just-"

"Zora," he interrupted. Arwyn took a deep breath that reverberated through the room. His eyebrows had furrowed deeply causing harsh lines in his normally softly brushed face. "We've done nothing. How do you expect to become better at chess if every time we have our lessons, you run away?"

"I don't mean to."

"Well-... well, it doesn't matter what you meant to do. You know that I'm putting my ass on the line for you here, and you-"

"How?"

He lifted his eyes to meet mine, his spark of anger simmered to confusion.

"How have you put yourself on the line for me?"

"The cameras, Zora," he huffed. "They're such a pain in the arse but this whole damn school is full of it. I want to go to university and get a good job and not be reminded about that one time when I was sixteen and did something stupid. It stays with you. I don't want to be applying for a job when I'm an adult and having them say no because of something I did on this goddamn stupid reality show. I can't even move school because a Blackwell education is what I promised my dad."

Feeling the burn of the radiator on my skin, I stepped up and dragged my feet along the carpeted floor to my set of drawers on the left side of the room. While Arwyn continued to babble along behind me, I let him. His voice raced shakily while his eyes widened drastically behind the wire-framed glasses, I could practically feel his nerves as it glowed from him, bouncing around my room.

"If I go into these sorts of situations, I'm practically begging for the cameras to follow me. And I'm not saying that I don't want to help you, because I do. It's just, we've got to be careful. I want to be known as the chess club captain, not the one who marched after the twelve-year-old boys to tell them off-"

"You told them off?" I interrupted, my voice high with surprise.

"Well...yeah," he answered softly as though only now it had hit him to question why he would do that. He looked up to the ceiling and wrung his fingers together with a deep breath.

I peaked out the windows and watched the large droplets of rain as they pounded against the poor glass, the storm raging dangerously.

"Let's practise right now while we have time," Arwyn called.

"Practise what?" I questioned, only half paying attention while my eyes fluttered to the poor birds who fought against the wind outside.

"Umm, chess?"

I spun around quickly with an expression I hoped was encouraging. "Okay, let's do it. Wait a second, I'll grab the board."

A deep red flooded from his neck up at my statement. "So, well... Actually, I was thinking." He zipped open his bag that sat at his feet and brought out a slick black case, battered with age. He opened up the case and in his hand was an old black Nintendo DS, the same sort that my friends and I all played Mario on as children.