Two Girls, One Shower

The volleyball fell on the hardwood floor of the gym with a thunderous slam, echoing off of the bare walls as one side of the net erupted in cheers. Kristen was the first of the women to whoop, holding two fists up with a manic grin on her face, sweaty blonde hair sticking to her neck. She felt like she deserved a little celebration. It had been her point, after all.

As she quickly exchanged pats on the back with the other five players on her team, she rotated one position to the right, putting her right in front of the left side of the net. That brought her face to face with Marissa, who was loosely balancing the volleyball on her hip.

None of the ten girls on the Club Volleyball team were in uniform, since this was just a practice scrimmage, but Marissa had made an effort to match her outfit to the Green Valley school colors: emerald green for her shorts and a gold shirt, both of which hugged her athletic body. Sometimes she even wore a shirt with the Green Valley Moose mascot on it. As captain of the team, she tried to set a good example, even when it wasn't a real game.

Marissa was giving Kristen a look, her head tilted as she slowly rotated the ball against her hip. "Nice point," she said, casually tossing the volleyball without looking over the net, where one of the girls on Kristen's side caught it. It was their serve.

She nodded back and didn't say anything in response, still catching her breath. She felt a little shabby in her plain black shorts and an equally plain white t-shirt. Even though Marissa was the captain, Kristen had gradually started taking charge for one side of the squad whenever they scrimmaged like this, which could be as many as three times a week when they were in season.

Kristen felt a little intimidated by Marissa. Maybe it was because she was a senior, and Kristen was still a sophomore. Maybe it was because of how good she was on the court. Maybe it was because of how much attention she got. With her jet black hair and an ass carefully sculpted from years and years of squats and spikes, she always turned heads.

A whoosh of sound from the volleyball startled her, as her teammate served the ball soaring above her head. She squatted down automatically, holding in a breath as she waited for the return, seeing Marissa doing the same through the net. The ball came flying back and she looked behind her. Someone bumped it to her right, and she, in turn, set the ball flying high in the air. Show time.

The ball was sailing towards her as Kristen leapt into the air. She was just shy of six feet tall, unusually tall in most places. Back in her hometown, though, after a few generations of Norwegian immigrants kept marrying for strength and popping out a dozen kids to work the homestead, it was a common enough sight. Her sneakers squeaked against the hardwood as she rose higher, smacking the ball to the other side of the net with a thud and a stinging in her hand.

On the way down, she saw it was headed right towards Marissa, who got low, extended her arms, and blocked the ball from falling. She bumped it backwards for good measure. Marissa looked at Kristen with a smirk, distracting her just long enough to make her delay a fraction of a second too long on the return, her arms missing the ball by inches as the other side erupted in cheers.

Marissa looked at her again and winked. Kristen took a deep breath and nodded. Game on.

There wasn't a referee or an official scoreboard when they scrimmaged, but they had played often enough that it was easy to keep score. Someone would announce it whenever they were about to serve. The other team rotated and the girl in the back shouted out. "20-18!"

She played a little better without Marissa distracting her, and they volleyed back and forth for another five minutes, but it wasn't enough to win. Kristen's last spike attempt fell short, sending the net flapping wildly between the poles as the ball rolled back towards her. She couldn't hear the sound of it rolling on the floor when Marissa's side erupted in a celebration.

It was all meant to be fun, and the practice was good for the team as a whole, but they were all competitive. Competitive enough to join a barely-official volleyball team and pile into a sketchy school van every other weekend to play another group of girls from a nearby college who had the same idea. It wasn't like any of them were on a volleyball scholarship, and nobody really cared about how their season went besides them. It was just out of sheer love of the game.

That's why the defeat, as meaningless as it was, still stung. Kristen gathered with the five other girls in a quick circle approximating a group hug, arms over each other's shoulders as they pushed their heads together. Kristen spoke up, because somebody had to. "Good game, guys." The rest of the girls echoed the phrase, some more enthusiastically than others, before they broke up.

Officially, the gym they were practicing in was called the Robson Practice Facility, but everyone just called it the Old Gym. The New Gym, otherwise known as the Sparks Arena, was where the Green Valley basketball teams played. Well, the official ones, at least. The club teams played in the Old Gym, just like them. Kristen thought it wasn't that bad, really. It was just old. The floor was scuffed, the bleachers worn, and nothing was close to state-of-the-art, though they probably were twenty years ago.

The other half of their squad was already filtering towards one wall of bleachers, intermittently lined with backpacks, purses, and jackets. They followed suit, Kristen hanging towards the back. The loss really shouldn't have bothered her, but it did. Her playing was off tonight, and she was worried that it might affect the upcoming game this weekend.

Everyone was chatting in twos and threes as they packed up, waving goodbye to Kristen as they walked through the dark halls back to their cars or their dorms as she slowly changed her shoes, shrugging on a hooded sweatshirt as she dawdled on the bench.

The other voices faded away. It took her a minute to realize she wasn't alone when she saw Marissa sitting a few rows down, wiping the sweat from her face with a towel out of her gym bag. She looked up at Kristen and smiled, but more softly than she had during the game.

She looked as worn out as Kristen felt, and about as sweaty too. It wasn't quite enough to make her shirt translucent, but it was turning some of the gold a shade darker. Kristen glanced down at her chest, suddenly self-conscious of the sweat stains that threatened to form, but shook herself out of it. She exhaled and smiled back, nodding as she stepped down towards the floor.

"Hey, Kristen, you got a second?"

What she really wanted was to go back to her dorm and take a shower until the hot water ran out, but she forced that thought away. "Sure, what's up?"

Marissa sat back down on the bottom row of the bleachers and gestured for Kristen to join her. She felt the straps of her backpack digging into her sore shoulders as she settled next to the older girl, who held up her hand in an obvious request for a fist bump. She gave it to her and grinned. "You looked good out there today."

It might have been Kristen's imagination, but she could have sworn that Marissa had been checking her out after she said that. Her eyes had moved, she was certain of that, but she didn't know if it was to stare at her chest, her ass, or something on the floor. "Uh...thanks. I think I kind of botched it in the end there, to be honest."

The bleachers buckled as Marissa shifted closer to Kristen, a groaning noise that seemed to fill the entirety of the Old Gym. Their legs were almost touching, now, and Kristen was starting to feel strangely warm. "About that. I was sort of trying to get into your head, a little bit. When you're in the zone, you're phenomenal. I wanted to win, you know?" Marissa patted her on the leg, her fingers lingering just long enough that Kristen was about to shift out of the way, but she pulled it away herself.

"Oh, uh...don't worry about it? I mean, it worked. I felt like I couldn't take my eyes off of you." Kristen clenched her jaw and scrunched up her eyes, resisting the urge to bury her head in her hands or run away. "Shit, sorry, I mean..."

Nobody had ever accused Marissa of being a hard-ass. Not exactly. But she did have a resting bitch face, and her smiles only came out in the right situation. A volleyball game was one. After a couple of drinks was another. Laughter was something else, though. It wasn't that she was holding it in, or thought she was above it, but like the thought had simply never occurred to her.

When Marissa started to laugh, Kristen almost slid off the bleachers in shock. The sound of her captain laughing, a slow, rolling chortle coming out of her gut, immediately loosened the tension from her weird remark. Kristen didn't mean it the way it had sounded. At least, she didn't think she did.

After a few seconds, she nervously joined Marissa's laughter, and it turned real soon enough. Marissa held out a hand, begging for a second to recover. After coughing, she straightened up and wiped a tear from her eye. "I don't know why that was so funny to me, but damn."

"Heh, I misspoke a little, sorry about that."

She was merciful and didn't push it. "Anyway, Kristen, really, you've been doing good in charge of half of the team at scrimmages. Have you ever thought about stepping up to captain, for real?"

"What? Are you leaving the team?"

Marissa shrugged. "I mean, not until after this season. But it's my last year here, unless I manage to flunk organic chemistry, which isn't, like, out of the realm of possibility." She smiled again, and her dimples made her face seem to crinkle. "So, what do you think about taking over?"

She took a deep breath, held it for as long as she dared, and huffed it all out at once. "I'm flattered, Marissa, but I'm not sure I have what it takes. Camie's better at setting, Becca's taller, and Erica is way, way faster." Kristen shrugged. "I'm probably best where I am."

Marissa grabbed her by both shoulders, pushing her just enough that she was facing her directly. "Kristen, Kristen, come on." She squeezed each shoulder gently, and Kristen could feel each and every one of her fingers press into her skin. "It's not about being the best player. It's about being the best leader. Camie's good at setting it up, yeah, but she only has eyes on whoever's right next to her. If Becca's taller it's by like an inch, first of all, but second, she gets mad. It's good in a game, but not during practice. Erica's not bad, but she's still a freshman, and I don't think she's ready yet."

Kristen shivered as Marissa's hands moved to comfort her, rubbing from her shoulder almost to her elbow. "You're exactly who I'd want, trust me."

"Well, thanks, Marissa. I guess I don't really know what to say. I'd have to think about it, or talk to someone, or...something. I don't have to decide now, right?"

It happened again. Marissa's laugh was quicker this time, and lighter, like someone giggling after a prank. Her hands fell back to her sides, and Kristen found herself missing the way they felt on her arms. "No, no rush. Not until the end of the season, at least."

She reached into the pocket of her shorts, showing a little more of her smooth, taut legs as she did, and pulled out her phone, tapping it to life to check the time. "Listen, we got done a little early today. You want to get something to eat and talk about it a little more? My treat."

In the middle of raising her hand to wave Marissa off, and explaining she had a paper due at the end of the week, some of the synapses finally started firing in Kristen's brain. The first thing she remembered was that there was exactly one other occasion when Marissa laughed, and it was when she was flirting.

That set the rest of her thoughts in motion. The way Marissa was smiling and looking at her. The hand on her leg, her shoulders, pushing herself closer and closer to Kristen on the bench. The effusive praise. The invitation for dinner. Marissa was hitting on her. It was almost like she froze, but that wasn't quite right. She practically shut down. Her hand went from hanging still in the air to limp at her side, but her mind didn't stop. She remembered more.

The way that Marissa would pat everyone's back after a game instead of high fiving, a practice that the rest of the team had adopted without much thought. Her hands always drifted a little lower, though, sometimes all the way to the other girls' asses. That she always seemed to linger in the locker room after a game, taking her time to towel off and get dressed as half the team pranced around wet and naked. How she never seemed to have a steady boyfriend.

Those weren't the only things she was remembering, though. She was remembering memories half-repressed and nearly forgotten. The way she felt, uncomfortable and uneasy in the pew, when the pastor at church talked about the sin of women laying with women, and men laying with men. The weird jealousy she felt when her best friend in high school started dating someone for the first time. The way she had been looking at Marissa all day and, if she was being really honest with herself, all season.

Kristen stood abruptly, making Marissa jump back in surprise. She stood with her, steadying Kristen with a hand. "You good?" She said it with a smile, but Kristen could see the anxiety behind it now. She was really, really putting herself out there, and it had taken too long for Kristen to notice.

Her heart was pounding as she shook her head an inch to either side, a strained look etched on her face as she hiked her backpack onto her shoulders, gripping the straps so tightly her knuckles were starting to whiten. She didn't know what to say, or do, other than she had to get out of the gym, right now. The sweat starting to dry on her shirt gave her the answer, and she broke her gaze with Marissa long enough to see the entrance to the women's locker room on the other side of the Old Gym. "Sorry, I just...I need to take a shower. Like, right now."

Shuffling past Marissa and breaking into a quick walk, the tight feeling in her chest growing, she managed to make it all the way to the door before she couldn't take it anymore. As it swung shut behind her, Kristen dared to look back towards the bleachers through the slowly dwindling crack in the door. Marissa was looking back at her, but she wasn't smiling anymore.

The locker rooms attached to the Old Gym were just barely acceptable. They were clean enough, and the hot water in the showers worked most of the time, but the benches were worn and the lockers tended to jam. Kristen threw her backpack in the bottom of one and sat on the bench, forcing herself to breathe long and deep.

She wasn't lying when she said she needed a shower. That was always the best way she had to unwind, or relax, or think. The warm, dripping water enveloping her as the steam rose and filled the room did the trick nine times out of ten. She wasn't sure it would work this time, but it was better than nothing.

Kristen stripped unceremoniously, shoving everything on top of her backpack in the locker as she kicked off her shoes. Her sweaty shirt went first, then her drenched sports bra. It felt good to let her breasts breathe a little bit as her flesh started to relax. She loosened then dropped her shorts, leaving her in nothing but her worst thong, the one she usually wore to practice. She peeled them off quickly, leaving her naked and a little cold in the empty locker room.

Before shutting the locker, Kristen pulled out her towel and a travel-sized bottle of body wash, draping the former over her shoulder before heading to the showers. She hung the towel on a hook just next to the entrance, clutching the body wash in one hand as she padded forward. The showers in the New Gym were individual stalls, with curtains and everything, but these were just a few shower heads in a big tiled room. She knew from painful experience that the showerhead closest to the door never got hotter than lukewarm, so she moved to the next one and turned it on.

The water took a few seconds to sputter through the pipes, spraying out on the tiles with a spurt. She could wait for it to warm up. It wasn't like she was in a rush or anything. That's when she heard the door open, the telltale squeak on the old hinges reverberating all the way to the showers. It had to be Marissa.

Kristen stepped forward into the still-warming water and yelped at the cold, shivering slightly as she scrunched up her face. She really hated a cold shower, but at the moment, it was preferable to continuing her conversation with Marissa. Frankly, she could stand to cool down a little.

Her body had other ideas, particularly her nipples. They had immediately started to harden as the cold water cascaded over her body. Her breasts were small, but perky, fitting neatly on her lithe frame. She grit her teeth and forced herself to stay under the stream, sighing in relief when the hot water finally kicked in. She turned around, leaning her head back under the water as she let it flow through her sweaty hair and down her body, dripping into the drain in the center of the room.

It was working. The hot water was melting away everything else. Kristen was so absorbed in her shower that she didn't hear the locker open, and then shut, or the quiet, telltale signs of someone stripping out of her clothes. She thought Marissa must have slipped out when she wasn't listening, until she heard the squeaky twist of a knob of the shower next to her.

Her eyes shot open. Marissa's naked body was only a couple of feet away. She was testing the temperature of the water with her hand, facing away from Kristen, so she didn't notice when her gaze started to linger on her body. She had seen Marissa naked more times than she could count, but none of them were after she just asked her out.

Marissa's hair was down, now, just past her neck and framed around her tight shoulders and her toned arms. Her torso narrowed into a classic hourglass figure which looked even better from behind, her ass like a big heart pointing down to her slim legs. She was beautiful.

When her neck started to turn, Kristen shot away and stared towards the wall, fumbling for the body wash as she did. But she could still see Marissa out of the corner of her eye, and she could tell she was looking back.

Water pitter-pattered against tile and grout to fill the silence. Kristen's heart was pounding again, and she ignored it as she started soaping up her arms. She remembered how she had felt when Marissa was pressed against her and tried to swallow around a lump in her throat. She was still there, still looking.

The sound of Marissa clearing her throat finally made her turn to face her. Kristen didn't know where to look. Not her face, with her quiet, dark eyes. Certainly not her ample chest, with breasts already soapy and dripping. As Kristen's eyes darted downwards, trying to bounce off of Marissa's completely shaved mound and her powerful legs, she managed to lock eyes with Marissa again.

Her voice was thick when she spoke. "Hey. I'm sorry about that before. I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable, I just thought..."

Kristen cut her off. "I'm sorry for making things weird. It's, like, not a big deal, or anything. I'm just not, you know...into girls."

Marissa's eyes softened as she looked back at Kristen. "How do you know?"

"How do I know what?"

She took a half step closer, still shrouded in the shower stream. "How do you know that you're not into girls?"

There was a bit of foam on her arms and she hardly felt clean, but Kristen immediately twisted the shower off on instinct. Her eyes were wide as she started to storm out of the room, as quickly as she could manage on the slick floor. "Because I just know, okay?"