Chapter 4: The Hardest Part of the Workout

After Mason’s comments, I couldn’t jerk off.

If I didn’t come to dinner right away, he’d know what I’d done and that’d be even more embarrassing than what had already happened so I threaded myself together and headed to the dining hall.

Dinner was loud. I don’t remember what I ate. Something beige and grilled, probably. Something I picked at while pretending to listen, while trying not to stare.

Mason had waved me over the second I walked in. No hesitation. Just a lazy grin and a gesture to the open seat across from him, as if nothing about earlier had been strange.

Now he was at ease again, sprawled at the head of a long table of guys from the team, damp hair curling around his ears, shoulders shining faintly under the cafeteria lights. He cracked a joke that made someone choke on their drink. Reached across someone’s tray like it was his own. The boy wore confidence like it was stitched into his skin.

It was the kind of scene I’d seen from across the room a hundred times, and never felt invited to. Now that I was in it, everything felt louder, sharper, too warm. My clothes clung to my back in a way that made me want to peel them off and run.

At one point, Mason caught my eye mid-chew and gave me a look. A smirk, almost. Familiar, maybe.

I thought about returning it. But then he turned back to the conversation, and I was left sitting there with my tray and a chest full of static.

When I woke up, it was still dark enough that I couldn’t see the ceiling. I lay there for a while, listening to the hum of the mini-fridge and the distant clank of pipes in the walls, waiting to feel like myself again.

Instead, all I could think about was Casper’s hand.

The way he’d grabbed me at the end of drills — firm, like a handshake. Like he needed to rearrange something. He’d said something about my stance, about loosening my hips, and then his hand had been between my legs, flat against the fabric of my singlet, right between my ass cheeks. Just for a second. A deliriously long second.

It had been clinical, probably. I’d seen him correct other guys before. But not like that. At least I didn’t think so. Not with that kind of contact?

At the time, I’d just nodded. Like it hadn’t knocked the breath out of me.

Now, less than twenty-four hours later, I couldn’t stop thinking about it: how casually he’d touched me, how sure he’d been of my stillness. Like he knew I wouldn’t flinch. Or maybe that I would, and he wanted that.

By the time the sun started pushing pale light through the blinds, I was wide awake, still achy from yesterday’s practice and just unsettled enough to want out of my own skin. I got dressed without showering, pulled on my favourite light teal singlet, and headed back toward the gym before most of campus had even stirred.

I didn’t really have a plan. I wasn’t scheduled for anything, no classes until the afternoon, and nobody had asked me to be anywhere. But I couldn’t sit in my room. Every time I tried, I ended up just pacing or lying back down and staring at the ceiling again, like that would do something.

My phone was full of notifications, but I didn’t feel like checking it. I didn’t feel like talking to anyone, or scrolling, or pretending to be interested in whatever distraction might take the edge off. I just wanted to move.

The gym felt like the only place that made sense. At least there, I could tell myself I was being productive. That I was doing something useful. That soreness meant progress and sweat meant control.

I kept my head down as I walked across campus. A couple guys I recognized passed me going the other direction, laughing about something that probably happened at dinner last night. One of them bumped my shoulder by accident and gave me a quick nod, but didn’t stop. I didn’t stop either.

By the time I pushed open the side door to the training complex, the sun had just cleared the roofline of the science building. It sent this watery kind of light through the windows, made everything inside look prettier than it actually was. The mats hadn’t even been cleaned yet. The air still held the ghost of yesterday’s sweat.