I Hate You (Larry Stylinson) ✅

38. jealousy

August 1

Harry's POV

"Oh my god. I am going to bloody suck at this," I laugh as we head out onto the tennis court.

Aside from the occasional jog, I don't really work out, and I feel like an idiot in my shorts and athletic shirt.

"Same," Liam laughs as he takes a practice swing with his racket. "Niall, you have to teach us."

"Calm down mates," Niall says, jogging onto the court. "I'll show you. Someone throw the ball."

Lou heads to the net and starts to toss a ball at Niall, who hits the ball with two hands on his racket.

"That's back hand," Niall grunts. "Other side is forehand."

Louisbthrows another ball and he hits it, demonstrating. Then he jogs up to the net.

"Lou, throw it gently," Niall says. "This is volley."

"Not gonna remember that but okay," Liam chuckles.

"Whatever, you'll probably learn more by doing," Niall says, returning to the sidelines. "We only have an hour so let's go, mates. Me and Li versus Louis and Harry."

We nod and run off to our respective spots.

"Do you want the front court or back court?" Louis asks. He's wearing black adidas shorts and a red T-shirt that is absolutely gigantic on him. But he's never looked so adorable.

"Whichever," I reply, planting a kiss on his head. "I'm gonna suck so sorry in advance."

"You won't," Louis laughs. "Okay, you take front."

We assemble into our positions and then Niall starts with the serve.

Louis hits the ball back quickly, and Liam lunges for it, hitting it out of bands.

"Fuck," Liam shouts.

"Not bad though," Niall replies, patting his back. "Just get it in the lines next time."

We start again, this time with Louis serving. Niall immediately hits it back right at me, and I swing my racket, epically missing the ball. I didn't realize that Louis had run up behind me, and dove for the ball, nearly falling onto the concrete in the process.

He got it into the court and Liam hit it back, basically right in my face. Panicking, I raised my racket and smacked it back.

It landed in the corner of the court near Niall, but he just missed it.

"Nice!" Louis said, squeezing my shoulder. "1-0."

Things went on like this for a while, with Niall and Louis dominating and me and Liam trying to keep up. Liam was a decent player, he just had too much power and often hit it out of bounds. I was just generally bad - and clearly awful at serving, as I quickly learned after I managed to wedge the ball in the net on my first serve.

In the end, the score was 6-8, with Niall and Liam in the lead. There's apparently a special way to record the score for tennis, counting by fifteens instead of ones, but we were feeling too lazy, so we decided to just go point by point.

"Okay, we surrender," I say, putting my hands up.

"Hour is up anyways," Niall replies, tossing down his racket and going to pick up the balls. "Lou, you were bloody amazing!"

Louis smiles and shrugs his shoulders. "Never played before. Just treated it like footie. Go after the ball," he giggles.

"You really did go after it. You scored 5 of the 6," I laugh, looping my arm around him as he approaches the net next to me.