Sore Loser

Author's Note:

Jaynie thinks Hunter is the perfect boyfriend: sweet, funny, kind to animals, and it doesn't hurt that he's super freaking hot. But when he gets onto the soccer field and turns into an entirely different person, she discovers something about herself that she didn't know before.

Sore Loser is posted in its entirety and features somewhat rough sex. Worse, however, this story contains a complete bastardization of the sport of soccer due to a character's misunderstanding of the rules. I apologize in advance for any offense this may cause. But not really.

***

"Mother shitter!"

My eyes nearly fell out of my face.

I may not have known much about soccer, but I knew what my boyfriend sounded like when he was frustrated. Given that Hunter was at the point where he was making up curse words, it seemed like he was very, very frustrated.

"Keep your fucking eyes on the fucking ball, Anderson!" hollered Tyler, the guy who had kicked the ball at the beginning of the game. He did other things, too, probably. But for sure, he was the guy who had kicked the ball right at the start.

I licked my lips as Hunter flipped off Tyler, hustling after the ball without so much as a grunted apology for not keeping his fucking eyes on the fucking ball, which I'd learned was a bad thing. Sweat clung to the collar of his soccer shirt and his muscled legs pumped hard as he chased the guy who had taken the ball from him while Hunter was trying to go in the other direction.

Which is what had triggered the aforementioned "mother shitter," so that was obviously also a bad thing.

I was starting to understand why Hunter hadn't wanted me to come to one of his games. When we first started dating a few months earlier, he'd laughed and kissed me on the side of the head when I asked if I could come watch him play.

"It's okay, Jaynie," he said. "I know sports aren't your thing. And the outdoor season is just about over anyway."

"But you're my thing," I replied.

He raised his eyebrows at me. "I'm a thing now? Not a person?"

It was still early enough in our relationship that I hadn't realized he only commented on those awkward little slip-ups I always seemed to make because he loved the way I reacted. He'd only admitted it a few weeks later when I started crying because I felt so bad for always picking the wrong thing to say.

"It's not the wrong thing, baby girl," he said, pulling me into his lap and wrapping his arms around me as I instinctively buried my face into his shoulder. "I'm sorry I made you think that. I only do it because I love how you look after you realize."

Sniffling, I frowned into his shirt before lifting my head to look at him. "What?"

There was a slight look of guilt in his eyes as he unwrapped one arm from around me and brought a hand up to my shoulder.

"I love the way you blush," he said in a low, rumbling voice. "The way you start turning pink right here--" He traced a finger along my collarbone and I swallowed instinctively, suddenly captivated. "--and how it rises and rises..." Fingertips walked up my neck and to my chin, then stroked my cheek before moving his thumb to my lower lip. "Then you bite this plump little lip right here and those gorgeous eyes of yours go big and round."

"They do?" I whispered breathlessly.

He groaned softly. "Yeah, they do. You're doing it right now, actually."

I didn't know what he was talking about, nor had I realized that I was doing it. He kept moving his thumb, gentle and hypnotizing, and his voice grew softer but more intense.

"Then you stutter a bit and backtrack," he continued. "You get a little flustered and you press your hands to your skirt, like flattening it down is gonna do something other than make me immediately picture lifting it up and kissing you through your panties. And I can never figure out how you manage to look so hilariously cute and so fucking seductive at the same goddamn time, but it drives me wild, baby girl."

His thumb moved away from my lip and he replaced it with his mouth, kissing me in that sweet, dizzying way that made my mind spin and my heart race.

"But I didn't know it bothered you so much," he murmured. "I'll stop doing it."

My breath hitched as he pulled back and I bit my lip without thinking, drawing another soft groan from him.

"You don't have to stop," I said. "I just... didn't want you to be mad or think I was saying things to make you feel bad."

He laughed. "You, Jaynie? No way I could think you would purposely try to make someone feel bad."

Then he'd kissed me again, and again, and by the time he'd kissed every inch of me and made me come all over his mouth, then his fingers, then his cock, I was feeling a lot better.

There were a lot of people who were surprised that Hunter and I were dating. Some of them were surprised enough that they commented on it, which was especially aggravating when they pointed out how strong he was and that he was over a foot taller than me. When I was with Hunter, I barely noticed his height, and toned as he was, it wasn't like he was a bodybuilder who looked like he could snap me in half. He was the epitome of the gentle giant, sweet and kind and careful, even though I'd told him he didn't need to treat me like some kind of delicate bird.

"I'm not," he'd insisted as he held himself over me, hands traced the curve of my waist. "I just like taking my time with you."

"But you don't need to be so gentle," I said, though I couldn't help squirming as his fingers tickled a path towards my belly button.

"And what if I want to?" he whispered, his voice a low rumble. "What if I want to indulge in this sweet little body and savour every inch instead of taking it all at once and finishing before I want to?"

"Oh," I had said, and then he proceeded to spoil the hell out of me with his tongue.

As much as it annoyed me, I couldn't blame the people who were surprised that we were together, since there were still days that I was surprised Hunter and I were together.

I mean, really. Who could blame me for being shocked that the classically good-looking white man with tanned skin, dirty blond hair, strong jaw dotted with scruff, and toned body, was interested in the pudgy and bookish girly-girl with pale white skin that most people assumed was either too prudish for sex or too wholesomely innocent to be attracted to? I wasn't prudish, and it wasn't my fault that I was short and had big eyes and a high-pitched voice.

It was a little bit my fault that when I wasn't in scrubs that were covered in animal hair, I liked to wear frilly skirts and dresses in bright colours. But only a little. I was a grown-ass woman who had every right to wear whatever I wanted and to say words like "ass" even if I didn't say them very often. And I liked that I was pudgy and curvy and soft; I liked the way my body looked, that the apparent tradeoff for having plump breasts and a round butt was to have a bit of a belly. I didn't like being called cute, but I couldn't deny that it was the perfect word to describe my stomach.

And Hunter agreed.

The surprise didn't come from the fact that Hunter found me attractive. It was that Hunter found me attractive. I knew it was judgemental of me, but when I'd first met him, I hadn't looked at him twice.

Well, I mean, I had. He was good looking, and I was only human. But I didn't look at him and think that he would ever be interested in me. Guys like that always said they wanted thick girls, but they meant they wanted girls who were thick in the right way. They didn't want bellies and cellulite; they wanted firm hips and big tits. They only wanted certain parts of a woman's body to jiggle: asses could jiggle, especially when they were taking someone from behind, but thighs? Upper arms? Not a chance.

They wanted women who looked exactly like the typical standard of beauty, only if someone had gone into Photoshop and distorted the image by stretching it side to side. And that wasn't what I looked like.

And yes, that was judgemental. Yes, it wasn't fair for me to put all the toned, athletic guys like Hunter into one box and assume they were all the same. But that's what a lifetime of being told your body isn't good enough will do, even once you've decided you've had enough of the shame and you're going to love what you have and that no one can tell you that you can't like dressing in girly dresses and getting your hands dirty at work and going out to get laid when you weren't in a dedicated relationship, which had been a point of contention for a lot of people before I'd met Hunter.

I liked sex--a lot--and I liked things that were pink and pastel and I liked drinking beer, and I should have been allowed to like all of those things at once without having to put up with another exhausting conversation about what a surprise it was that a girl like me liked such-and-such a thing.

I was tired of being treated like I was pretending to be one of the grown-ups instead of the twenty-three year old woman that I was. It was hard enough to handle that on a normal day, but it was particularly unhelpful when I was at work and had to deal with people who thought they knew more about helping injured animals than me, which they rarely did. More often than not, they would listen the same way they might humour a Girl Scout before contradicting everything I'd said as if they were the ones who had gone to school to be a veterinary technician.

Hunter hadn't, though.

Hunter had listened attentively to every word that came out of my mouth when he'd rushed into the wildlife rescue where I worked with a fox he'd found injured on the side of the road near his house, even when I scolded him for picking up the fox and bringing it in himself instead of calling one of our technicians to handle it.

"She could have bitten you," I had said. "And you didn't know if moving her would make it worse or not. If this happens again, call us first."

"I didn't know if she'd make it that long," he said quietly, which was fair--the fox was injured enough that she had let him take her without a fight. "And... it's a she?"

Pressing my lips together, I nodded.

He glanced down at the fox and then up at me, his eyes wide. "Is she going to make it?"

I almost couldn't bring myself to answer, not when the tall, athletic man who had refused to leave until he knew if the fox was okay had wet, worried eyes beneath a pleading, furrowed brow. And thankfully, regardless of the answer I'd gently given him, the fox had survived, which I'd also gotten to tell him when he returned to the rescue center the next day to check on her.

Even though that was technically against the rules, I couldn't bring myself to turn him away. And when my boss found out, I argued that it had earned us a new volunteer, since Hunter had returned again the day after that asking if he could sign up to help.

She didn't quite buy it, especially not after Hunter and I started dating a few months later, but he was such a helpful volunteer that she couldn't quite bring herself to call me out on it. Not when he was hard-working and dedicated and was just as happy to clean up wild animal shit as he was to cuddle the baby deer with a broken leg that we'd been rehabilitating for months.

"Anything for the animals," he'd say when people apologized for giving him the less than glamourous tasks, putting on his gloves with a smile that could make even the coldest heart turn into a puddle.

That was why it was particularly jarring for me to see that same man playing soccer--that same man who had almost cried over an injured fox, who kissed me softly and sweetly, who had asked me to be his girlfriend by finding out what my favourite flowers were and bringing a bouquet of them to the rescue on a day that he wasn't volunteering--with his mouth in a snarl while he cursed and yelled when things didn't go his way.

In fairness to him, he had tried to warn me, but in fairness to me, that was after the third time I'd asked, which was also the time that he'd done the one thing I hated more than anything in the world and talked to me like I was a child.

"I like you," I had said. "And I want to support you."

"I know you support me, baby girl. You don't need to give up part of your weekend for me to see that."

Then he tilted his head and touched my cheek, his smile lopsided as he looked down at me.

"Besides, Jaynie," he continued. "Do you even know how to play indoor soccer?"

I don't know if I'd physically recoiled, but I felt those words enter my ears and force my stomach down in a sickening drop. The smirk on Hunter's face had disappeared almost immediately, but it was too late, and I'd pushed his hand away.

It was our first fight, and I did not like it one bit. He'd apologized, but it was the rock that shattered the wall I'd put up around my worries about why he didn't want me to go to his soccer game. Was he hiding something? Was he embarrassed of me? Was this some prolonged plan of his to have a secret second girlfriend that had started long before we began dating because even when he'd applied to be a volunteer at a rescue, he'd said that he wasn't available some days and given a copy of his soccer schedule to the administrator?

"It's because I don't want you to hate me," he'd finally said, his voice quiet as I struggled not to cry.

"Why would I hate you?" I asked.

"I'm a different person when I play sports," he said.

I folded my arms, looking at him cautiously. "Different how?"

"I dunno, like... competitive." A crease appeared between his eyebrows as he looked up at me from where he sat. "And what if you don't like what you see?"

As vulnerable as Hunter had just made himself, I couldn't picture him being the kind of competitive asshole that I would decide I didn't like. I studied him for a moment longer, then unfolded my arms and walked over to him. Hope filled his eyes as I climbed onto his lap, his arms going to their natural place around my waist.

"Hunter, I obviously expect you'd be competitive during a competition," I said. "I know how sports work."

Except that was kind of a lie.

Hunter hadn't been entirely off-base when he asked if I even knew how to play soccer, but I'd been so busy being upset about how he'd sounded when he asked it, I hadn't actually admitted that he was right. And I didn't admit it when he finally said that I could go with him to his game that weekend, even though he still looked apprehensive as he agreed to it.

I mean, I knew the basics. One team kicked the ball towards the other team's net and there was a guy there to try to stop the ball from going into the net. And I also knew that apparently, indoor soccer was slightly different from outdoor soccer and wasn't just played indoors because it was cold in the winter.

Though, I only knew that because Hunter said he liked outdoor soccer better than indoor soccer while we were driving to the game.

But really, how much more did I need to know? Other than that after the game, I knew Hunter would look irresistible, the same way he did whenever he came over after his soccer practice. He'd be wearing those shorts that hugged his legs in just the right ways and teased the bulge hiding beneath it. I'd get to see him with his shirt clinging to his muscles as he mopped sweat off his forehead, his hair delightfully messy as he brushed it away while jogging. And then he'd take me back to his place after... or maybe he wouldn't.

Maybe he'd linger in the locker rooms until he was the only one left, and I'd get impatient. I would have to sneak in to find out what was going on, hoping that no one would see me creeping into the men's locker room. And maybe he'd still be in the shower, and he'd hear me walking up to him and turn, smiling that easy smile of his as the water poured down his chest and abs and... well.

But that was all just a fantasy.

For the first few minutes of the game, I watched with my mouth half-open and my cheeks red, eyes wide and barely recognizing the man on the soccer... field? Field didn't feel like the right word, since we were indoors. It was more of a court, really.

Regardless, I barely recognized him.

The man out there wasn't my boyfriend, not as I knew him. The usual glimmer of humour in his eyes had turned into the steely glint of his namesake, something primal and ferocious. He was ruthless, spitting brutal words at teammates and rivals alike. He was incredibly rude to the other players, elbowing and shoving them when the man with the whistle wasn't looking. More than once, I was sure someone was about to grab him by the shirt and punch him, or spit on him, or maybe try to choke him out of frustration.

My Hunter loved animals and was friendly to everyone he met. My Hunter had endeared himself to my friends, who had all squealed to me about how outrageously attractive and sweet he was as soon as he'd left, as if I didn't know. And even though he'd only met my family once, my mother had started having visions of church bells and my dad of roly-poly grandbabies who would grow up to be hockey or football superstars instead of ones who would watch Beauty and the Beast once and take on Belle's entire bookish personality for the rest of her life like I had.

The man on the soccer court's incredible smile had disappeared and he was glaring at... well, everyone. His team didn't look like they minded, probably because it seemed like he was especially good at kicking the ball, but the other team?

I'd never seen anyone look at my boyfriend like that.

And for some reason, I loved it.

It was horrible. I hated that I loved it. I mean, it was clear that he was good at soccer. He'd kicked the ball into the net and his teammates had rallied around him, indulging in the excessively masculine tradition of bumping their bodies together before smacking each other on the butt. And there was nothing wrong with me being proud of him for that.

But I didn't love that part of me was looking at all those men in front of me and feeling an instinctual thrill that mine was the strongest and fastest and most talented of them.

I liked Hunter because he didn't make me feel small, even though I was much shorter than him. I liked that he caressed my body with light touches and tickling kisses, that he always paused after sliding his cock inside of me to make sure I was okay, even though I'd never not been okay and just wanted him to start moving already. It showed he cared, and I couldn't exactly complain about that, even if I wanted... well, it didn't matter.

I liked that he wasn't the person I thought he was when I'd first seen him. That he had a kind heart. I even liked the sense of shame I felt about judging him when he was so much more than the two-dimensional man I'd assumed he was.

Unfortunately, it seemed that my pussy really liked that he was Big Strong Man With Fast Legs And Nice Ass.

I chewed on my bottom lip, my eyes glued to him and my heart skipping a beat each time he bested someone on the other team. My legs were getting that warm, light, tingling feeling, my thighs pleading to be parted while the junction between them craved friction, neither body part realizing that I could do absolutely fuck all about either thing at the moment.

"But when?" my thighs seemed to cry. "How long do we have to wait?"

They were not pleased when I looked at the big light board thing that had the clock and the score on it and mentally informed my entire body that we were only halfway through the game.

Swallowing nervously, I pressed my thighs closer together and shifted in my seat, hoping it would be enough to calm myself so I could get through the rest of the game. I promised the aching arousal in my core that I'd tell Hunter soft and sweet and gentle lovemaking was absolutely not going to cut it today.