Chapter 62

Sure enough, just as Peter had mentioned, Sophia and Ashley were waiting for them at the hard-court Peter usually trained Dan at. Along with them, a cart of balls, and Ben. Ben had been a normal appearance training all week, given his penalty from Peter, but today was different. Because Ben had been acting as ball boy essentially, he’d been leaving his racquet in the locker room. Today, he stood, chatting with Sophia and Ashley, holding his racquet. Was he playing today?

“Have no fear, Peter is here.” Peter announced as he and Dan stepped onto the courts. Of course, the trio of players had already noticed them arriving at the court, but Peter, was Peter.

“Bout time. Don’t you know it’s bad form to keep the ladies waiting.” Ashley commented almost immediately.

“True,” Peter responded, “if there were ladies waiting, you can bet I would have been more punctual.” Ashley’s face darkened for a moment, before she split into a grin. Beside her, the others chuckled as well.

“You walked into that one.” Sophia said to her friend, and Ashley nodded.

“Yeah yeah.” She grumbled, though Dan could tell everyone was having a good time. He didn’t realize they all got along. Hadn’t Ashley told Dan that Ben was an asshole? Had his personality changed so much following Peter’s example of him? And, more so, was it a natural change, or part of Dan’s powers? He couldn’t help but notice his interactions with people had begun to shift ever since his Charisma had climbed, even if he’d made sure to keep it from auto triggering romantic encounters.

“Any who,” Peter said as he led Dan towards the group. “I’m sure you’re all wondering why I called you here today?”

“Doubles, obviously.” Ashley commented, and Ben nodded in agreement.

“Maybe she isn’t a lost hope.” Peter said softly towards Dan, though loud enough everyone heard it. “And here I was, thinking she couldn’t learn.”

More snickering from the group. The way Ashley and Peter interacted with each other; Dan had a feeling there had to be some sort of history between the two. Though he wasn’t quite sure what it was.

“Real talk though,” Peter headed over to the cart of balls, grabbing them and feeling at em, looking for the best ones in the batch. “Dan here has been working his ass off improving, and I figured it was time to get him some actual doubles practice. I’ve been working with him one on one, but as you all know, experience is just as important as practice.”

Everyone nodded as Peter continued to pick at the balls. He’d already pocketed three or four.

“Furthermore, while I’ve got Ben hostage, I figured I could use him to help with Dan’s training. And since the two of you,” he pointed towards Ashley and Sophia, “are wanting to improve as a doubles pair, I figured this would be good practice for you two as well. Plus, ya know, Danny’s got a crush on one of you.”

Dan’s racquet nearly fell from his hands, his face heating up.

“Dude, what the-“

The girls laughed. Peter laughed. Ben laughed. Syn laughed. It’s not like you’re subtle.

“It’s pretty obvious Danny boy.” Peter said, shooting him a wink. “Might as well own up to it, rather than try and keep it hidden. Besides, this is high school, everyone has crushes on everyone.”

More laughter. Dan wanted to go die in a corner.

“Added bonus, that crush of yours.” Peter continued. “It should help us work on your mental game. After all, can’t have you accidently going soft on people just because you think they’re attractive. Especially if you plan to play mixed doubles. Or you know, regular doubles and singles, if you swing that way.” Peter laughed. “Nothing wrong with that either. I just want you to get used to playing to your fullest, no matter who your opponent is.”

Dan was focusing on Peter, while the trio seemed to be having a side conversation, only occasionally glancing at Dan. What they were discussing, he had no idea, but he had a feeling, it was pertaining to his whole crush situation. Freaking Peter. Though, to be fair, Ashley did know he was crushing on Sophia, and didn’t Peter already mention it once to her as well? He honestly couldn’t remember, his mind was a bit of a mess lately, especially with his dad’s situation.

“So,” Peter rose his voice, grabbing the attention of the trio. “Since you’ve all so kindly offered to help, well,” he looked at Ben, “the girls offered to help, Ben’s just stuck here with me. We are going to start with some warming up. Then, Ben and Dan versus Sophia and Ashley for our first round of doubles, and we will go from there.”

Sophia and Ashley grinned, glancing from Ben to Dan. Ben, looked at Peter, then Dan, and offered Dan a smile.

“Works for me.” Ben said, “I’ve no qualms beating up on these two.”

Peter laughed and tossed a ball towards Ben. “That’s the spirit.”

“As an added bonus,” Peter continued as he motioned for everyone start warming up. “I’ll even be offering advice to both sides. Free of charge. Consider it my thanks, for everyone’s help in training up my Danny boy here.”

At that, everyone seemed to perk up even more. It was one thing to just practice. And to be fair, both teams had qualified coaches who were pretty damn good at their jobs from what Dan had noticed. But, it was obvious Peter was the best Tennis Player, probably in the entire state, if not entire East Coast. And because of that, any extra advice from him, any personalized training from him, was extremely valuable.

And when you were playing at Ben and the girls levels, Dan knew that added, personalized advice from Peter, could really help them take their games to the next level. After all, from his understanding of the sport, the higher you climbed, the more personalized and focused your instruction became. It went away from just working on the basics, to in depth analyzing of movements, body functions, and assessing personal strengths and weaknesses. Nothing against the coaches, but they just couldn’t handle that level of instructing with how large the teams were. Meaning, this was an opportunity everyone would kill for. It was also, Dan understood, why there had been so much animosity towards him. Because in their eyes, he was stealing from the other players the chance of personalized instruction from Peter.

Of course, that just meant Dan had all the more reason to do his best to get as good as he could, as quickly as he could. To justify, and show the results, of Peter’s instruction, and prove Peter’s time and skills, hadn’t been wasted.