Disclaimer:
This story is a hybrid between Sports/Drama/Romance and contains sexual acts between young males. If you do not enjoy this type of content, or if it is illegal in your country or place of residence, please stop reading immediately. This story is PURE FICTION and in no way depicts reality. Any relations to real people or acts that may appear are unintentional, I repeat IT IS FICTION.
The story is written for the enjoyment of anyone who had enough time on their hands to read it and should not be reproduced or reposted without the writers consent.
Author's Note: Any feedback is greatly appreciated because I would love to hear where I can improve on this story. I will try to update it as regularly as possible but can't commit to a schedule at this point in time. Please note that this story will build up slowly and will not depict anything explicit early on. Any questions or feedback can be sent to marlerff@yahoo.com . Enjoy!
"Jason... my man... you can't just hit the ball." He looked at me as he elegantly performed a one handed backhand in thin air on the other side of the court. "You have to feel the ball, be the ball." It was another one of his `hilariously funny jokes' after I performed a rather lacklustre attempt at mastering the art of the one handed backhand.
"Geez coach, maybe you should consider becoming a spiritual leader instead of a tennis trainer, don't see how it could possibly be any worse than what you are doing right now." I knew he absolutely hated the way American coaches presented themselves with a certain air of authority, so it was an easy way to bait a reaction out of him. We were also nearing the end of our session and after close to two hours of training most of our focus was long gone.
"And maybe you should stop calling me coach before I show you a different type of back hand. If you actually pay attention to the things I say. Who knows, you might learn something one day."
"I can't help but feel that is very, and I mean veeeeery unlikely". I tried to keep a straight face but as I dragged out the second very I could see a smile forming on his face and not long after we were both laughing at our terrible jokes.
As soon as we calmed down he returned his attention to the basket with tennis balls and with about 12 or so remaining we emptied it out in the next minute. More or less half of my strokes going according to plan and the other half turning out less than stellar. Afterwards we quickly gathered all the balls spread around the court and headed over to the benches next to the court to take a breather and wrap up our session.
"Happy with the results today?" He asked while grabbing his water bottle.
"It wasn't too bad. I still don't see what's wrong with my double handed backhand. Missing so many one handed ones is becoming rather frustrating."
"Nothing is wrong with it Jason, you know that. It's just that a one handed one greatly increases your reach and can be a nice addition to your arsenal to change things up every now and then."
"I know you are right, but still. Shits frustrating as hell..."
"Language my man... But don't worry. You'll get there."
I knew he was right, he almost always is. At least when it comes to tennis. Mark was amongst the best in the country when he was 19 but never really got the opportunity to fully commit to going pro. Now at 26 he is aiming to train and guide promising younger players to achieve the things he never could. Not to mention he is a great role model and I like him a lot as a person. The best part about it all is that his lessons would have been way too expensive for me or my family to afford, but the LTA (Lawn Tennis Association) compensates all of it as long as I perform.
It's not like we are poor but we live a very modest life. My dad works full time as a sales manager for an international organisation so he Is abroad quite often for a few days or a week at a time. My mom left him when I was two years old even though I still don't know why. This means I often spend time with our neighbours as they have no children of their own and have always been there for me when my dad is not around. They don't want any financial compensation but my dad sneaks in gifts and takes them out for dinner with us from time to time considering I eat there at least a few times every other week.
So who am I then? I am Jason Henderson, Jay to some. Currently 14 years old and pretty much your average teenager in almost every way. Fine, maybe I am not that average considering I recently joined the top of the country in my age group when it comes to tennis, but that's about it. Other than that I am average in height, I have light blue eyes and I have dark blonde hair that needs to be presentable without too much work. This means it is almost always cut pretty short and requires very little product and effort.
There is that one thing though that nobody really knows about. I am gay. Very, very gay. I mean let's be real, those things that women have down there, they are horrible. I swear someone might get eaten by one someday. I am also very much in the closet, but that's really no surprise. I find it easy to remain in the closet because I don't have "the voice", I don't do things that would be considered "gay" by people and when I see a rainbow I don't respond with "fabulooouuusss". So all in all I consider myself to a good straight impressionist and nobody has given me any indication that they know what's truly going on. Anyway, when it comes to being gay I guess you could call me socially awkward. Maybe even socially non-existent. I don't really want to risk anybody finding out so I simply don't interact with boys that I feel any type of attraction to. If they are cute or hot, AVOID THEM.
Mark and I are both leaning back enjoying the slight breeze and our drinks when we hear footsteps coming closer. We both turn around and Mark instantly gets up to greet the new arrivals.
"Hey, you must be Romeo, glad you could make it. Heard a lot about you on the phone." He extended his hand and a quick handshake followed while I just sat there with a surprised look on my face. Normally I am the last player he works with for the day, but apparently that's no longer the case. Victoria then extended her hand towards Mark as they shook hands as well. "It's good to finally meat you Mr. Brown. I am glad you were able to find the time to work with Romeo, he is really passionate about this."
"No problem Ms. Be..." She interrupted him right away. "Please just call me Victoria, I am not much of a fan when it comes to all these formalities, I feel plenty old without them."
"No problem Victoria, then you are more than welcome to call me Mark."
"Mark it is then." She says with a smile. She then turned her attention to me and extended her hand towards me. "And who do we have here, England's next hope at winning a grand slam perhaps?"
"I surely hope so ma'am, but I don't think I can claim that I am that close just yet." I replied a bit sheepishly.
"Well, it's good to know someone is working on it because this one certainly isn't going to be winning them anytime soon. And please, ma'am doesn't make me sound any younger either, it's Victoria hun."
"Wow mom, thanks for the vote of confidence, really appreciate it." He pretended to be hurt by the jab as he walked towards me and introduced himself. I am Romeo as you probably figured out by now and that incredibly supportive woman over there is my mother." I shook his hand and introduced myself. It really didn't take very long for me to realise that this guy was pretty cute so before I could do anything stupid I excused myself and went over to pack my stuff, getting ready to leave.
"Hey Jason, can I ask you a favour bud?"
"Sure what's up?"
"Listen, I really need to go to the toilet real quick so is there any chance you could play with Romeo for a bit to help him warm up while I'm gone?"
"Eeuhm... Yeah... Sure... No problem." I wasn't too tired so it wasn't a problem at all and as long as I don't say anything weird I am sure I will be ok. I picked up my racket again and moved to my side of the court as he unpacked his and got ready as well. The first few rallies were very casual and it was pretty obvious that he knew what he was doing. It wasn't mind blowing or anything but you could tell that his technique was solid and he appeared to be especially light on his feet.
Boys will be boys though and without saying a word our rallies started to become a little more intense. I mean, what can I say, I am competitive, and apparently he was as well. At some point in a rally that was going pretty evenly one of his strokes fell a little short and offered the perfect opportunity for me to hit a strong winner. Out of instinct I moved up to the ball to attack it at its highest point and hit my signature two handed backhand straight ahead in the top left corner of the court.
"Hey, hey, calm down there tiger, you were supposed to help him with his warming up, not make him lose the will to play." Mark walked back onto the court and saw the whole ordeal much to my embarrassment.
"I'm sorry Mark, I guess I got carried away a little bit."
"You shouldn't be apologising to me, you should be apologising to..." Before he could finish his sentence Romeo interrupted him.
"Are you kidding me? That was awesome! Is that a thing? I mean... That wasn't luck?" He was beaming with excitement and I had no idea how to deal with it.
"Well euhm... yeh... I spend a lot of time working on that." I scratched the back of my head not really sure if I should be happy about his compliment or embarrassed about the fact that I got carried away.
"Dude, I so badly wish I could do that, like for real." He then turned to Mark. "Can you teach me to hit a ball like that? I mean I've seen plenty of good cross strokes but a straight one like that with so much power is ridiculous."
"It's not completely impossible but to be honest, it's not something you should never try ."
"Why is that, I understand it's not going to be an easy thing to achieve but is it really that hard?" He looked somewhat puzzled at me and the focussed his attention back on Mark.
"Hitting a ball straight down the line when it came from a cross angle is a risk to begin with, it is much easier to hit a cross ball because the court is longer that way and you also have a much wider angle you can play. Apart from that you are also changing the direction of the ball and to attack it like he just did requires you to be in the perfect position relative to the ball, otherwise there Is no way you can put that much force behind it. All in all Jason has practised his two handed backhand rigorously for the past few years and even then without an innate talent for the sport it would not have been possible." The more he spoke the more Romeo seemed to be in awe of what just happened and the more it made me uncomfortable because I don't deal with praise very well.
"Well... that kinda sucks, but now I am really hyped up to train even harder." He then turned his attention to me. "You need to show me that again sometime, that was cool."
Once again I was completely useless because I was getting praise so I just nodded and got ready to leave. As I walked away I shouted my goodbyes to Mark and wished Romeo good luck with his training. He waved me off and I was on my way home.
The rest of the day was pretty uneventful, I finished some homework when I got home and when dinnertime rolled around dad decided to grill me about today's events. I mentioned the new kid at practise but casually forgot to mention that I thought he was cute. We then proceeded to talk about very uninteresting work topics and I ended up going to bed early.
The next few days were equally unimpressive as I had nothing planned and school barely provided me with homework so before I knew it Friday rolled around and it was time for another training session. As soon as school was over I gathered my stuff at home and started making my way to the court. Thinking about the things I wanted to go over with Mark I walked through the gates when I heard a familiar voice behind me.
"Hey Jason, hold up!
To Be Continued