The Queen's Gambit by Walter Tevis

memorized.
    On the bus back to school she began playing them over in her head. Behind some of the moves—not the glamorous ones like the queen sacrifices but sometimes only in the one-square advance of a pawn—she could see subtleties that made the small hairs on the back of her neck tingle.
    She was five minutes late for the test, but no one seemed to care and she finished before everyone else anyway. In the twenty minutes until the end of the period she played “P. Keres—A. Tarnowski: Helsinki 1952.” It was the Ruy Lopez Opening where White brought the bishop out in a way that Beth could see meant an indirect attack on Black’s king pawn. On the thirty-fifth move White brought his rook down to the knight seven square in a shocking way that made Beth almost cry out in her seat.
    ***
    Fairfield Junior High had social clubs that met for an hour after school and sometimes during home-room period on Fridays. There was the Apple Pi Club and the Sub Debs and Girls Around Town. They were like sororities at a college, and you had to be pledged. The girls in Apple Pi were eighth and ninth graders; most of them wore bright cashmere sweaters and fashionably scuffed saddle oxfords with argyle socks. Some of them lived in the country and owned horses. Thoroughbreds. Girls like that never looked at you in the hallways; they were always smiling at someone else. Their sweaters were bright yellow and deep blue and pastel green. Their socks came up to just below the knees and were made of 100 percent virgin wool from England.
    Sometimes when Beth saw herself in the mirror of the girls’ room between classes, with her straight brown hair and narrow shoulders and round face with dull brown eyes and freckles across the bridge of her nose, she would taste the old taste of vinegar in her mouth. The girls who belonged to the clubs wore lipstick and eye shadow; Beth wore no make-up and her hair still fell over her forehead in bangs. It did not occur to her that she would be pledged to a club, nor did it to anyone else.
    ***
    “This week,” Mrs. MacArthur said, “we will begin to study the binomial theorem. Does anyone know what a binomial is?”
    From the back row Beth put up her hand. It was the first time she had done this.
    “Yes?” Mrs. MacArthur said.
    Beth stood, feeling suddenly awkward. “A binomial is a mathematical expression containing two terms.” They had studied this last year at Methuen. “X plus Y is a binomial.”
    “Very
good
,” Mrs. MacArthur said.
    The girl in front of Beth was named Margaret; she had glowing blond hair and wore a cashmere sweater of a pale, expensive lavender. As Beth sat down, the blond head turned slightly back toward her. “
Brain!
” Margaret hissed. “
Goddamn brain!
”
    ***
    Beth was always alone in the halls; it hardly occurred to her that there was any other way to be. Most girls walked in pairs or in threes, but she walked with no one.
    One afternoon when she was coming out of the library she was startled by the sound of distant laughter and looked down the hall to see, haloed by afternoon sunlight, the back of a tall black girl. Two shorter girls were standing near her, by the water fountain, looking up at her face as she laughed. None of their features was distinct, and the light from behind them made Beth squint. The taller girl turned slightly, and Beth’s heart almost stopped at the familiar tilt of her head. Beth took a quick dozen steps down the hallway toward them.
    But it wasn’t Jolene. Beth stopped suddenly and turned away. The three girls left the fountain and pushed noisily out the front door of the building. Beth stood staring after them for a long time.
    ***
    “Could you go to Bradley’s and get me some cigs?” Mrs. Wheatley said. “I think I have a cold.”
    “Yes, ma’am,” Beth said. It was Saturday afternoon and Beth was holding a novel in her lap, but she wasn’t reading it. She was playing over a game between P. Morphy and someone called simply