Just a quick one - both the writing and the story. This is an entry in
yay-team-sex-and-sports-story-challenge-2025-coming-soon
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I'm not your sporty girl. Always last to be picked for teams at school, no idea which pro teams are top of their leagues, you get the idea.
Like everybody else, I'd had to endure school PE lessons. At one point, the staff desperately trying to get fewer of us to skive off, we got to do various activities down the leisure centre instead. Trampolining was fun - not that I ever managed to get up again after bouncing on my arse! Short Tennis was mildly less frustrating than the normal version, constantly chasing after balls in between failing to hit them. Ice skating. I can lurch around a rink, now. That might be useful, one day? Then, one week, we were made to try playing squash.
It didn't go well, trying to manipulate a racket of a longer length than the tennis and badminton ones I was already bad with. Only one in ten serves connected, if that. But at least the ball always bounced back towards me, thanks to the four walls around us. Predicting where the small rubber ball would return to was quite mesmerising. It meant I at least got my racket to touch it, if not do anything useful.
At the end of the session, the centre worker called me over. "Hey, love! You're good at predicting the ball off the walls." I supposed a childhood playing Pong hadn't been totally wasted. "Why don't you stay for an hour or so, mastering serving? Then hitting it back?"
This was when I realised the huge superiority of squash over tennis: you don't need a partner to practice. Yeah, I know, there's tennis walls - I spent many a summer's lesson being told just to serve balls against them for hours - but they only bounce back in the obvious direction. And a good serve will rocket behind you, too far to hit back.
The guy gave me the half-dozen balls we'd been using. I didn't have anything better to do for the next hour, so I gave it a bash.
Half an hour later, three in four balls I served worked. After an hour, I was puffing, scarlet in the face and arms, but making a decent stab at returning balls - and at least half of them went where I wanted. Result!
So I played squash a bit with friends until I left school, and then at college. For some reason, tennis is a socially-desirable sport to enjoy. Tennis clubs are generally very upmarket, darling. Meanwhile, squash has a total lack both of posh people and Pimm's; the only stereotype being of City workers proving themselves and having heart attacks. But a couple of the college guys - similarly self-conscious about playing sports badly in public - were intrigued, mostly once they found out our college owned a dilapidated squash court close nearby.
Of course, once they got the hang of it, they beat me hollow, with their long arms and male power. I'm tall with a solid build, but my muscles still couldn't compete with men. We adjusted to decide that if I got seven points - before they got the usual eleven - I won.
Which made things closer, but I still never won. I didn't mind. It was good exercise, fun working to place the ball so it ricocheted in cool ways, and getting to see Ben or Nathan in short shorts, sweaty and showing off their legs, was quite the bonus! The hot day when Nathan ripped his top off, showing gleaming bright pink skin round his hairy chest, was even better. I was starting to rather appreciate Nathan's looks.
Ideally, the building would have had showers, so we could rinse and get clean after. It did have plumbing for them, but we were assured no water had come through in at least thirty years.
It was a real shame. Given the rarity of anyone else being in the building, I might have persuaded Nathan we could have had a long leisurely shower together, under the four shower heads in a row...
Sometimes other people were there. There was only the one squash court, but there was also a 'Real Tennis court', next to it. Ever wondered why normal tennis is called 'lawn tennis', even when indoors or on clay? It's because 'real tennis' still exists. It's kinda like squash, only with extra shelves and sticking-out buttresses. And played pretty much only by guys who had a court at their fancy boarding schools. I think there's one at Eton.
Obviously Nathan and I had to give it a go, probably lowering the class of the niche sport significantly all by ourselves. It's fun, actually, but the extra ledges and angled sections just add unpredictability. And some of the floor was loose, which was just a hazard. We stuck to the squash court, which might be a peeling grey rather than white, with the odd missing chunk of plaster, but it was functional.
The next year, Nathan bet me his body if I could beat him. "Just seven points, Nessa!" Sort of joking, sort of not.
By the end of the year, I was super fit. That would have shocked all the school PE teachers who'd always accused me of laziness: 'You're just not trying, Vanessa!' Of course, after a few years of that, my only effort had been in making excuses to escape classes, so it was a self-fulfilling prophecy. I wasn't just playing squash; I went running by the river to reach my lectures, and living on the fourth floor with no lift was a genius measure for enforcing a stairs-based fitness regime upon me. But Nathan and I played squash a couple times every week. We were getting closer, and our scores were getting closer...
"Ha! Seven!"
"Fuck," Nathan panted. "I wasn't going to let you win for another two points!"
We'd known this moment was coming. Our flirting had grown and grown; Nathan had split from his ex. It was only a matter of time. Ben, our mutual friend, had told us to get a room already. "Or a squash court."
I reached to shake Nathan's hand. I must look a sight: my hair pulled back into a Croydon facelift and all moist with sweat, my face flushed red. I tried to forget about that, given he was shiny and scarlet-faced too. Another advantage of a shit sports building - no mirrors to make you self-conscious. He knocked back a swig of water and pulled me into a kiss.
His hot damp body pressed against my vest top. It was good. I liked his stubble against my cheek as he held me. The regular exercise had been good for him, too. No longer the slightly tubby shy lad he'd been at the start of first year - he'd blossomed in both looks and personality. I liked to think I had, as well. His strong thigh forced itself between my legs and I sagged onto it, enjoying that touch and pressure. I kissed back as enthusiastically as I could, loving the salty wetness of his face, but my arms, looped round his back, were slipping.
"Want to go somewhere more comfortable?" I asked.
"Your place or mine?"
"Yours has showers on the same floor."
"Let's go." We went, holding hands, fast as our exhausted legs could carry us.
Even standing in adjacent shower cubicles, peeping around the curtains as we passed each other shampoo, seemed romantic at the time. Wandering back to his room, wrapped in identical towels, I looked forward to what would happen next.
Lots of sex, a nice relationship, then getting separated by graduation, was what. I moved to one city, he to another. Could long distance, seeing each other on weekends, work?
In some ways, I missed the regular squash games as much - or more - than him. Challenging both my mind and body, squash had worked perfectly for me. I tried joining various 'all welcome' circuit classes and running groups, but they all made clear they meant 'all welcome who meet our minimum standards.'
And you don't.
I had stamina, after getting fit during college, just didn't have fast-moving muscles, nor coordination. A fun run when they dismantle the course before you finish isn't fun. I did the odd run-walk-run alone, instead.
I also filled my evenings by starting a language class at a college near my work. One night, in halting, half-remembered GCSE Spanish, I'd answered the classic "My hobbies are..." and managed to explain that I didn't play squash any more. The huge city centre sports centre had a court, but it cost a fortune, even if you could book a slot less than a week in advance, not to mention trekking there and back. Nathan and I did play a game there a few times. Either we'd separate for our showers, so he'd have to wait alone for me while I finished washing my hair and getting dressed, or we'd not be able to get clean for an hour until we got home. Neither option was pleasant.
"Did you know this college has a squash court?" a classmate asked. I did not. "It's at the back of the industrial estate. Ten minutes walk away. It's kinda basic, but it works. I think it was meant to be changing facilities for the rugby pitches next door, before they built their new pavilion."
I enquired at the college office. "Studying here? Sure, an evening language class counts. See this book? Write your name to book a slot. Oh, go on, have a couple hours. £50 deposit for the key. Bring it back before the next-but-one booking, or else. There's only the two keys." I reserved the second-to-last slot, at four in the afternoon. "So drop it off any time on Saturday night - we're here until midnight."
I told Nathan I'd booked the court for when he was down on Saturday. Plenty of time to play with my boyfriend, and then to go out for a meal.
"Shit, I need to get back into shape!" Nathan, getting used to the 9-5, and driving to work, wasn't as fit as he had been. I couldn't complain. I had the same problem. The lack of convenient stairs was affecting my muscles severely. I vowed to take the spiral staircase at Covent Garden a few times, all 193 steps to reach the surface from the platforms. It was gruelling, especially due to fighting the tide of tourists coming down, forcing me to the centre of the spiral. I'd have to work up to Hampstead station. There's 320 steps, there.
On the Friday night, before going to meet Nathan's train, I gave Hampstead a go. Given zero tourists, it wasn't too bad. I managed to plod up the whole way without resting.
I might be a bit flushed in the face still, when I met Nathan, but hey, he liked me out of breath. Ideally caused by him fucking me to screaming point, but a good squash game worked, too. We'd adjusted to me needing nine points to his eleven. He had the extra reach and strength, but I was sneakier with my shots, hitting down towards the metal, or to the side wall before the front, and managing to catch him out.
"Hey, gorgeous!" He ran a finger down my hot cheek. "Have you been cheating on me, playing squash with someone else?" It was a joke.
"No. I fought the stairs at Hampstead tube. Building up to playing with you tomorrow!" He whistled, impressed.
"Best take it easy tonight, then," he warned.
"Not too easy, I hope."
"Are you saying you're easy, sweetheart?" He pulled me to him with my ponytail.
