The time between races was long, filled with eating, sleeping, or practicing. The painful part, the one Elsa hated was the time between suiting up and lining up to race; now, because of the virus, everything was spaced apart and even the swimmer's individual entrances took forever.
Most of the women chatted amongst their teammates or spoke to international friends to pass the time. And a few others like her remained seated, hood pulled up and headphones on to block the noise and distraction.
"What's in your ears?"
Elsa looked up. Anna was staring at her, sitting backwards on a chair she had pulled over, chin resting on her folded arms. Only her eyes were visible between her mask and swim cap; Elsa didn't like being the focus of that piercing gaze..
"Oy, blondie, did ya hear me?" Anna asked again tilting her head slightly.
Elsa let out a heavy sigh and took one earbud out. "Can I help you?"
Anna leaned back and held both hands up. "Whoa mate, I'm just tryin' for some small talk. You can put down the eye daggers."
"I'm trying to focus."
"Ah, I'll leave you be then. Not worth beating you if I win cause you're distracted." Standing up, she spun the chair around and sat down facing away from Elsa.
"You and your stupid yellow cap aren't going to beat me," Elsa mumbled under her breath as she put her earbud back in.
"Australia takes the gold! A disappointing loss for Team USA's Anderson!"
Elsa huffed as she stared at the scoreboard, refusing to believe what she was seeing. This was impossible. Not only had Anna beaten her— for the first time ever— she'd also set a new World Record.
"Did say I'd get ya in the next one," Anna said, beaming for the cameras and reaching her hand across to shake. Elsa took it begrudgingly.
Elsa exited the pool and auto-piloted to the media alley. She was stopped by the first news crews, stuffed into a tiny square, all of them wearing masks and face shields. Their eyes seemed to bore into Elsa as a microphone on a pole was shoved towards her face.
"How does it feel to break a world record and clinch the Gold Medal?" A reporter asked.
"It feels amazing! It was such a good race," Anna said. Elsa somehow hadn't noticed her presence before now. "I've been working on this for such a long time and to do it here on the Olympic stage is just incredible."
"And Elsa, how does it feel to just narrowly miss the gold and have your long-standing record shattered?"
Elsa shifted into her public face, swallowing down the astounding amount of cuss words that threatened to escape. "I'm thankful to be here to witness history. Harding is a great swimmer, I'm honored to be able to compete against her."
The next half an hour went on like this, short interviews with various media outlets from all over the world. Naturally, Anna's home country got a longer time slot. She stayed glued to Elsa's side, refusing all solo interviews. Elsa could feel her irritation rising; all she wanted to do was duck into the locker room and escape this painfully slow walk of shame that was being immortalized on film/broadcast to the world.
By the time she got back to her room she was in a horrible mood. That was only made worse by the mess her roommates had managed to spread all over the apartment. Towels, clothes, shoes, masks, they were thrown about on nearly every surface. The walls were covered with crudely made signs cheering on Team USA for nearly every event.
Elsa all but stomped to her room. She didn't have the time or energy to deal with the common area right now. Unfortunately, it turned out she couldn't escape it there either; half of the room was in absolute chaos thanks to her disorganized roommate. Said roommate— a young swimmer only there to compete in one of the breaststroke events— was sitting cross-legged on her bed with a pair of large headphones on. Elsa was almost certain her last name was Ellis but she didn't care to check. When the younger girl caught sight of Elsa she tossed the headphones aside and leapt up.
"Oh my god, Anderson! Or would you prefer Elsa? Everyone goes by last names here, so Anderson? I saw your race, that really sucks but you still, like, got a metal so that's cool right?"
"No one cares about silver or bronze," Elsa replied coldly.
"Oh, I don't know about that. One time a bronze medalist came to my school and everyone was, like, hella excited."
"How thrilling."
"Yeah and like, he took a bunch of selfies with us and, like, gave a speech. We got the whole afternoon off of classes." the child had drifted to Elsa's side of the room and well inside her personal space, bouncing excitedly on her heels.
"Uh-huh." Elsa said, edging away until the back of her knees hit the bed, trapping her.
"Anyways, do you want to take a selfie? Our first official photo as Olympic roomies! I mean it's been a few days but we never took one." She was looking at Elsa with such big pleading eyes. Eyes that probably worked on others, but not on Elsa.
"No, I need to go to the dining hall. I have practice later."
"Oh! I'll join you!" The younger girl twirled on one foot and lept over to her bed to grab her badge and credentials.
Why they had stuck her with the overexcitable sixteen year old, Elsa had no idea. Given how much the other athletes loved to party whenever they weren't in the pool, the coaches probably thought Elsa's rigid routine and hermit-like seclusion might rub off on the younger girl. For Elsa it was an intolerable disruption in the space she used to destress and refocus.
Why was she suddenly attracting so many relentlessly cheery and clingy people when the only vibe she gave off was: leave me the hell alone?
It was the last thing she needed after the race she'd just had.
The dining hall was a massive cafeteria fully stocked with cuisines from all corners of the globe and any nonalcoholic drink you could think of. It was also crowded. Athletes were herded around like cattle in the crowded room by officials in thick masks, face shields and gloves, trying to keep the various teams separated.
Sections of the floor were marked off with tape in a variety of colors, indicating where lines should form or teams should sit. Countries with fewer athletes were grouped together behind plexiglass— nations with larger teams, like Japan, got an entire corner of the room to themselves.
"— and my coach says I need to pay more attention to my breathing and gliding. But that's, like, so boring you know? I wish we could listen to music during races, like in the water. How cool would that be?"
Despite her attempts to ditch the child, Elsa had found herself hostage to a nonstop monolog the entire walk to the dining hall, which still wasn't over. She could feel the beginnings of a headache throbbing behind her eyes.
"I missed prom to go to training. Becky was like, super mad at me because we had matching dresses. But now she's all like, "my best friend is an olympian". And she's hosting a watch party for my race. And the reporter said they would have the party be on national tv. It's so cool!"
Elsa nodded, only half-listening. She just wanted to finish a meal of steamed vegetables as quickly as possible so she could get to the pool and change for practice. The incessant talking droned on in her ears like a gnat she couldn't swat away. Couldn't this girl see there was no point in them becoming friends? This would probably be her first and only Olympics, and they'd never cross paths again. Elsa had seen her share of rising stars who fizzled out after their debut on the world stage, disappearing back into mundane, normal lives. Most of them lacked the discipline to keep competing, so easily distracted by friends and relationships.
"Anderson, Ellis!" A familiar voice called and Elsa wondered if it was possible to take her food to go.
"Oh my god! You… you're Harding? And you know my name?" The girl squeaked as Anna jogged over to them. Apparently, her roommate's last name was indeed Ellis. Figures that Harding knew that.
"Of course!" Anna smiled behind her mask, her eyes nearly closed and her head tilted slightly to the side. "100-meter breaststroke. Just nearly missed the mixed relay team this year. But you'll get 'em next time."
Ellis nearly fell over in excitement, she kept making weird squeaking sounds instead of talking.
"Harding." Elsa nodded. They were a good distance apart, separated by a rainbow of different color tape on the floor and she had no intention of getting any closer.
"Sorry, I just saw you and I thought I would come over and say hi. You left the locker room so fast after we were done with the press. You alright?" Anna's brows knitted together.
Why was her competition concerned with how she was feeling? She'd lost and that was that. You swallowed your pride, hopped back in the pool and practiced harder. And you definitely did not let the winner know how angry it made you to come second.
"I'm fine." She responded, maybe a little more cooly than she mean to.
"That's good, that's good." Anna didn't seem to notice the tone. She raised a hand and rubbed the back of her head. "I would offer to sit with you but, you know…" She gestured around and sighed audibly.
"You guys are friends? My roommate is friends with Harding!? Becky isn't going to believe this. This is amazing!" Ellis said, her voice finally returning.
Anna laughed but didn't have a chance to comment as an official came running over. "Separate! Separate!" he shouted and all three girls took large steps back. He remained standing between them, arms stretched out.
"I'll see you tomorrow, hope you sleep well tonight. Good luck, Elsa!" Anna shouted to her over the large gap.
Elsa pretended not to hear and turned to find a seat. She chewed on her lip, glad that her mask hid the telling reflex. She didn't understand Harding. Didn't understand why her attitude never changed no matter what place she came in, even if she didn't make the podium. Didn't understand why she felt comfortable enough to go around using Elsa's first name.
They weren't on a first name basis.
She busied herself with dinner, completely ignoring Ellis as she continued talking her ear off obliviously. The only thing she could hear was 'good luck, Elsa!' over and over again in her head. Had Anna been mocking her? Goading her? Who genuinely wished their competition 'good luck'?
Elsa had no idea what to make of it.
Elsa slammed into the wall hard, a turbulent wave following after her. The violent slap of the water matched how she felt as she glanced up at the scoreboard to find her name first, Anna's second. She nearly smiled. But it wasn't a true victory when she'd failed to beat the world record. It wasn't as good as Anna's last win.
Once again Anna was reaching across the rope between their lanes to shake her hand with a big smile spread wide across her face. Again, she stuck by Elsa's side the entire walk down media alley, ignoring her request to go solo. The media ate it up— two fierce rivals trading places between gold and silver. The perfect sports story.
The next two races ended with Elsa receiving a silver medal. Strangely, she found it hard to be mad at Anna for beating her both times. Over and over she'd watched as the Aussie took time to shake every swimmer's hand, to offer kindness and support, hugging her teammates when they did well and when they didn't.
It seemed Anna, like Elsa, was her country's star female swimmer. Just like Elsa, she couldn't even swim a heat without being stopped for interviews. Anna was a natural at fielding questions, charismatic and surprisingly diplomatic when she needed to be. The more interviews Elsa got roped into with her, the more she found herself relaxing around Anna, even engaging more with the media she normally could barely stand. It surprised her maybe even scared her.
As soon as they parted in the locker room and Elsa found herself alone in front of her locker, the anger and resentment started bubbling up again. All day she'd unconsciously found herself looking for Anna in the ready room before a race, a strange feeling washing over her when Anna caught her eye and gave her a smile and a little wave. She was forgetting herself. Lowering her guard. Anna was getting to her, and that was a distraction.
She absolutely could not have distractions.
She didn't know what to call the strange feeling– if it was the beginning of a friendship or something else. It didn't matter, because Elsa didn't have time for either. She stepped into the shower and ripped her swimming cap off, wincing as a few strands of hair were pulled with it. With a sigh she leaned her head against the wall and closed her eyes, letting the warm water wash away the chlorine and all her distracting, complex emotions.
"Fuck."