jannik sinner. liverpool f.c. the pitt. the thick of it. doctor who. game of thrones. interview with the vampire. one piece. jujutsu kaisen. hozier. hades/ii. lord of the rings. e.r. all for the game/the golden raven. dragon age.
🎵 Real Gone Kid
→ Jannik Sinner x Female! Reader
→ Popstar x Athlete, established relationship, light angst.
🩷 About You
→ Jannik Sinner x Female! Reader
→ First love, bittersweet, memories.
🩷 All I Need To Hear
→ Jannik Sinner x Female! Reader
→ First love, domestic, happy ending
→ Sequel
🛷 Head First
→ Jannik Sinner x Female! Reader
→ Summer x Winter Athlete, meet cute, fluffy.
📷 Local Boy in the Photograph
→ Jannik Sinner x Female! Reader
→ Sports photographer x Athlete, fluffy, yearning.
🛼 You Outshine the Morning Sun
→ Single Dad! Jannik Sinner x Single Mum! Reader
→ Girl dad, yearning, matchmaker kids
Carlos Alcaraz
One Shot
📚 August and Everything After
→ Carlos Alcaraz x Female! Reader
→ Friend’s sister, flirty fluff, obvious pining
Jack Draper
One Shot
🏆 Demolish Me
→ Jack Draper x Female! Reader
→ Angst, tennis injury, friends to lovers to exes.
Malcolm Tucker
One Shot
📎 The Sweetest Taboo
→ Malcolm Tucker x Female! Reader
→ Secret workplace romance, jealousy, smut
→ Continued on AO3 (here)
→ Pairing: Single Girl Dad! Jannik Sinner x Single Boy Mum! Reader
→ Summary: Jannik Sinner is a single dad, a kids' tennis coach, and thinks you're the most beautiful woman he's seen in a very long time. Neither of you is exactly subtle about your sudden attraction to the other, so your kids decide to take things into their own hands.
→ Word Count: 5.3k
→ One Shot
→ A/N: It's been forever, but I have way too much that I'm working on, so it'd hard to find the motivation sometimes, but I really love girl dad Jannik and just had to write something about it. Hope it's what you were looking for :)
The ball hit the net… again.
As a kid’s tennis coach, the ball hit the net a lot, and Jannik Sinner had gotten used to the dull thud of the ball falling to the ground. He’d had the job for almost a year now, and he’d gotten used to the routine, to seeing the kids grow, to watching his own daughter get better and start taking after him.
When Vittoria died, Jannik had to give up tennis.
Andrea was only two, with a shocking tuft of ginger curls that copied his, and now, his sole responsibility. He gnawed on the problem for a while, continued to play the season out while his mother looked after his daughter, but he could never concentrate if she wasn’t in sight. Vittoria used to bring her to matches, and he loved seeing her little chubby face in the stands, cheering him on. So, he left tennis, moved back to the snowy mountains, and lived off all that money one got from being World Number One for so long. He did the rare photoshoot for Gucci, the rarer appearance for the ATP, and tried to enjoy finally getting some peace and quiet with his daughter.
He got used to the easy life with her, and then she started school, and Jannik didn’t quite know what to do with himself. He’d gotten so used to spending all his time with her, and now he was bored. He’d walk the village, help his dad in the restaurant, and try to figure out what to do now he was in his early thirties and couldn’t play tennis. Not with Andrea needing him. Not when she deserved a better life than flitting around after him.
An old friend he used to play football with after school, now a teacher at the primary school, called him after a month of listening to him complain. Something about the local tennis coach deciding to move somewhere busier, and leaving the kids without their tennis lessons. Who better to take his place than the town’s very own tennis superstar?
Which is how Jannik Sinner found himself a job.
And you.
Your son was one of his students, and yet he hadn’t met you once over the year. You lived in the next town over, and you were a nurse, and that’s all Jannik learned about you from Florian. Usually, your parents would pick him up after the lessons on a Tuesday, kind but stern in the same way his own parents were, the type of people who would do anything for their grandchild and still complain about the amount of greens they weren’t eating enough of.
But one week, Florian’s shrill scream rang through the hall. “Mama!”
All heads turned to see who Florian was frantically waving at, jumping around on his toes. Jannik froze, halfway through teaching tiny Michelle how to serve, one hand on Cindy’s head to stop her from getting whacked in the face. You stood just beyond the doorway, hair up and out of the way, wearing dark pink scrubs. When you waved shyly, he liked the way you smiled. It’d been a while since Jannik had dated, and even longer since he’d dated anyone but models, and yet one sight of you had his heart flying out of his chest.
“Sorry,” you said, hurrying closer. Your trainers squeaked against the gym floor. “Am I too early for pickup?”
“You can watch, Mama! Can’t she, Janni?”
All the kids had picked up on calling him Janni, and he had to admit, he liked it. It reminded him of being back on tour, of all the little nicknames they would give each other. Andrea, fortunately, still just called him papa.
“Yeah, you can stay.” You finally met on the edge of the court, Florian buzzing around you both like an overactive bee at your side. When Jannik had taken over the class, he got a list describing all the children he’d be teaching. Florian had ADHD and took his medication with meals, which meant they usually started wearing off during tennis lessons. “Glad to meet you.”
You shuffled on your feet. “Well, usually I work until six, so Flo and I get home at the same time. My parents are on holiday, though, so I’ve had to change some shifts around.” You blushed, bright and sweet. He liked the way your gaze flitted around his face instead of meeting his eyes. “Sorry, you didn’t ask. Should I just sit here?” You motioned to the bench against the wall where, during the first few weeks of lessons, the guardians had jammed together to watch their kids’ every move, before they finally got bored of sitting through the hour-long lessons. Now, they trusted Jannik enough to leave their kids and run their errands.
“Yes, do. Enjoy.”
He wanted to tell you he’d love to listen to you ramble on about the domesticities of your life. But he didn’t; he just went back to coaching, making sure the kids didn’t accidentally hit each other with tennis rackets while he tried to teach them how to be good tennis players for their age. He noticed that every time Florian did anything – even so much as return a serve without hitting the net – he spun around to make sure you were watching, grinning like it was his first time playing tennis. And you were always ready with a clap to make him smile even wider. You had the same smile. It was sweet.
“It wasn’t that good,” Andrea complained to Jannik, watching the slightly younger boy with a frown.
“Let him be excited, häslein (little hare).”
“They can’t all be as good as me.” Jannik laughed softly, chided her, and sent her back to training with the other children, where she slid into the group far more easily than he ever felt he could as a child. She had all her mother’s charisma and all his ambition to be the best.
Jannik was very hands-on with his coaching, which usually meant racing this way and that way to corral them into doing what they were told. Your laughter trickled through the gym, and he liked having it as background noise, something to keep returning to.
At the end of the lesson, when all the kids trickled out with whichever guardian picked them up that day, you stayed behind. Apparently, you were just making sure Florian’s jacket was zipped up, and his shoes were tied, and his racket was perfectly placed in his tennis bag.
Or, really, it seemed you were wasting time.
You eventually caught Jannik when everyone else was gone. “I just wanted to thank you.” Andrea and Florian were racing each other from one side of the hall to the other, but he couldn’t tell who was winning. “Flo loves tennis, so when we heard Stefan was leaving, he was devastated. We never imagined his new coach would be you.”
“I’m happy to hear that. Also happy to have been able to take over. I love having tennis in my life.”
“Probably doesn’t pay as well as Gucci photoshoots.”
“Yeah, but this is actually fun.”
You both laughed – a little awkward, a little red in the cheeks. You sent him one last grateful smile and hiked your bag up your shoulder, halfway through turning to leave. Jannik caught you around the wrist before he could think to stop himself.
You blinked pretty eyes up at him, and he knew he was fucked.
“Florian talks about you… uh, your family a lot, but he never mentions his dad. I didn’t want to ask but…” God, what was wrong with him?
“Oh.” Slowly, you eased your hand out of his grip. His heart plummeted. He’d tripped at the first hurdle. “Tomasz left about six months after Flo was born.” You must have noticed the shift in his expression and hastened to keep speaking to make it less awkward. “Oh, don’t worry, I live near my parents, and they’ve been a massive help with everything. They look after Florian when I’m working, or else I’d never have managed.”
“Parents are good that way.” Jannik shuffled on his feet. So, there was a good chance you were single. “After Vittoria died, my parents really helped with Andrea.”
Your face softened just a little. Just enough to be noticeable, the way people always looked at him when he mentioned Vittoria. That little bit of shock and grief. But there was something else in your eyes, too. Something he recognised feeling. Hope.
“My condolences. You really lost a lot.”
Jannik’s heart shouldn’t have fluttered.
“I gained a lot, too.”
And you both stood shoulder-to-shoulder for a long, quiet moment, watching your children laugh themselves breathless as they raced.
ᡣ𐭩 ᡣ𐭩 ᡣ𐭩 ᡣ𐭩 ᡣ𐭩
Over the next few weeks, you’d stay behind for ten minutes to talk to Jannik.
You claimed you were using the time to tire out Florian before taking him home, but you both knew better. It had been a long time since either of you had the chance to talk to someone like this – all shy and giggly and trying not to stutter.
When your parents got back from their holiday, he only saw you every so often. He’d keep his eye out for you in town, but he knew it was silly. You didn’t even live here. You had your own shops, cafes, pharmacies. You only came to his town for Florian’s lessons. He even had to take Andrea to hospital one day – nothing too serious, just an allergic reaction that he freaked out over – but, of course, you weren’t working that evening, so he spent the whole drive over there coming up with a great opening line for nothing.
It was, surprisingly, the summer festival that brought you together.
Every year, all the surrounding towns held their summer festivals on different weekends, to give everyone a fair chance of visiting instead of just having to work them all. You both just happened to be visiting the same festival on the same day in Sexten.
Andrea always wanted to race ahead of Jannik to see all the stalls, claiming he was walking too slowly. But he liked slowing down, with the warm sun on his skin and the scent of summer flowers and barbequed meat filling the air. He wanted the chance to take it all in and teach his daughter that sometimes you just needed to slow down so you wouldn’t miss anything. She never did, but he’d perfected the art of keeping a tight grip on her hand.
“Janni!”
He spun around in the line for the ball toss. It was his favourite of the game stalls, just having to throw tennis balls into old milk jugs, and it was the easiest way to win Andrea one of the massive teddies she loved. She had half a dozen already piled on the end of her bed.
“Florian?” Jannik glanced around, but saw no sight of you or your parents. “Are you alone?”
“No. I’m just too fast for Mama.”
“You shouldn’t run away from her,” Andrea scolded him, and Jannik bit back a scoff. Yeah right. She’d be off in a flash if he gave her half a chance.
“Do you want to stay with us until we find–”
“Flo!”
If Jannik was in the middle of his toss, he’d have missed the shot entirely when he looked up and saw you. He’d only ever seen you in those raspberry-coloured scrubs before, and nothing could have prepared him for the sight of you in something as simple as a floral dress and denim jacket, with the sunlight washing you in shimmering shades of gold. His mouth dried up entirely.
“I told you not to run off,” you chided your son, who hadn’t strayed from Jannik’s side in a smart attempt to keep your groups together. “I told him not to run off,” you said now to Jannik, voice tinged with desperation. He knew how that felt, how the fear just shot through you entirely when you lost your child in such a large crowd. “I only let go of him to buy some water. I looked away for five seconds.”
“But I found a trusted adult,” Florian whined, and the way he smiled at the two of you made it clear this was his plan all along. “And now we can hang out with Janni and Andrea.”
You knelt by your son, handing him the cup of water to take a sip of. You gently fussed over him, smoothing the sweat from his hair that was the exact same shade as yours. “You have to ask people first before you can decide that.”
Florian pouted, and turned the biggest, brownest puppy eyes up at Jannik. He’d never be able to say no even if he wanted to.
“Of course, you can spend the day with us.” If he wasn’t watching you so closely, he would have missed the pretty way you blushed. If you were looking at him more closely, you would have noticed his equally bright blush staining his skin.
So, you spent the day together.
Jannik won both Andrea and Florian teddies from the ball toss, one purple, one yellow, that they argued over until you managed to swap the yellow one for another purple one. You bought everyone marillenknödel to split, and by the time you’d eaten them, you were all covered in dusting sugar that made you all laugh. You let the kids try hook-a-duck, and drink apple juice while you and Jannik had cider, and race around as long as they were with each other and stayed within sight.
It gave you and Jannik ample opportunity to chat. To share a bag of peanuts as you flitted from stall to stall, commenting on the handmade jewellery, or fridge magnets, even the felt hats somebody had started making. He learned more about your family, about your nursing career, about life as a single mother to a very unruly son. He talked about tennis, and everything he had seen around the world, and Andrea.
When you laughed, Jannik froze. It’d been a long time since a sound could make his entire body react. Like a shiver rolling down his spine.
“Did you notice we talk about our kids too much?”
Jannik chuckled too, scratching away the shiver that clung to the back of his neck. “I don’t have anything else to talk about.”
“We’ll just need to get a hobby,” you joked, elbow touching his, and there was no way he could hide his blush anymore. Just bright red and pulsing across his face, a shining beacon of his rather sudden attraction.
“I do need a new hobby.”
That was how you and Jannik found yourselves joining the roller-skating club.
ᡣ𐭩 ᡣ𐭩 ᡣ𐭩 ᡣ𐭩 ᡣ𐭩
Jannik didn’t know why he signed up to this.
Grass, clay, hard courts, he had mastered them all. Rollerskates, he was never going to be able to get the hang of. It had been a month and a half of lessons every Sunday, and yet he didn’t feel any steadier on his skates. Every time he was sure he got the hang of balancing, he’d fall right back down again, and he was pretty sure everyone was laughing at him. You, on the other hand, were a fast learner.
He clung to the edge of the rink while you skated beside him, twisting and twirling and dancing along to the music. Jannik was just glad he was still standing. In his first lesson, he spent half the time on his arse with your giggles filling his ears.
“Come on, Nik,” you whined. It was a nickname you’d adopted fairly quickly once you realised you’d be seeing each other every week. He couldn’t tell you just how much it made his heart jump. “Just let go.”
“I’ll fall.”
“Best way to learn.”
Jannik frowned, but he knew you were right. He’d never be able to roller-skate like this. It was the same thing Darren and Simone used to tell him – if he never put the work in, he’d never see the results. Jannik hated stagnation. So, he slowly peeled his hand off the rink railing, feeling the tell-tale wobble in his legs without anything to keep him up, and stretched his arms as wide as he could to keep his balance. Around him, the roller rink kept moving. The disco music that they always played and that you loved dancing along to, the sounds of everyone else laughing as they managed to balance with no issues, and above it all, your giggles as you watched him flail. It was a sound he should have gotten used to over the past few weeks, but still, it made his heart flip in every direction.
“God, you’re really terrible at this.”
And then, as if he wasn’t wobbly enough, you reached out to grab his hands. The heat spiked through his body at your touch, and it was like you didn’t even notice, just kept giggling as you led him away from the edge of the rink.
No way he’d be able to skate with how much his body was shaking.
“Don’t look at your feet,” you warned when his gaze fell to his rollerblades. “Look ahead. Look at me.” So he did. He took that time to really look at you. He liked the way the flashing disco lights made you pink, then blue, then purple. Like a dream. He liked the way the helmet squashed your hair that you always complained about at the end of your session. He liked your unwavering smile, and the colour of your eyes, and the very faint freckles on the tip of your nose. If he had to go to the hospital, there was no other nurse he’d ask for.
“You’re beautiful.”
Your hands slid out of his, and he went crashing down with you, a tangle of limbs and pain and too-fast hearts.
ᡣ𐭩 ᡣ𐭩 ᡣ𐭩 ᡣ𐭩 ᡣ𐭩
Andrea crawled into Jannik’s bed at seven in the morning the next Saturday.
He couldn’t yet will his eyes to open as she burrowed under his blankets to curl against his side, head fitting easily under his chin. It had been a while since she’d snuck into his bed for a cuddle in the early hours of the morning. He certainly wasn’t going to complain, not when she always wanted fewer cuddles the older she got. He just pulled her closer and pressed a sloppy kiss to the top of her head to make her giggle. He loved that sound.
Just as Jannik was about to slip back into sleep, he heard her thin voice peek through the early morning quiet.
“Papa?” He hummed in return, not quite ready to open his eyes. Jannik had never been a morning person, and nobody would ever be able to change that. Most of the time, neither was Andrea. “What do you think of Florian’s mama?”
That she was beautiful – and that he’d ruined everything by telling you so.
“Well, what do you think of her?”
“I like her.” Jannik slowly inched one eye open to find his daughter twisted around to blink big blue eyes at him. She had Vittoria’s eyes and Jannik’s unruly ginger curls. “I like when she helps do my hair, and the clothes she wears, and sometimes she sings to help Florian with his homework. She’s really good at making tea, and I like her macaroni. And her house is nice.”
Over the past couple of months of growing closer, you’d both taken turns babysitting whenever it was needed, and soon it had turned into you both just hanging out. A lot. One of you would make dinner while the other helped the kids with their homework, or have movie nights with too much popcorn, or try to hike and get about a quarter of the way there before everyone started complaining. Jannik had barely noticed how domesticated his life was becoming with you, how easy it was to fall into a pattern of seeing you most of the time, of Andrea and Florian starting to act more like siblings than two children who shared tennis lessons.
He hadn’t seen you since Sunday. Since he called you beautiful, you fell and had to run off. You told him you were swamped at work, and he had no choice but to believe you, but he still wished he could just see you again. Just to apologise. Just to say he didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable. He had gotten used to the domesticity, and clearly, so had Andrea.
“I like all those things too.”
“Do you think she’s pretty?”
“I do.”
“Me too.” Andrea snuggled closer again. “I was just checking, papa. Go back to sleep.”
So he tried to, but his mind kept returning to you. To you, roller-skating in a pair of low-waist jeans that he tried really hard not to stare at every time you turned away. To you, gulping down water on a hike with the sun shining over you and the droplets beading against your lips. To you, sending him a soft smile as you braided Andrea’s hair just like Princess Anna, even including a fake white streak to make her feel more involved in the movie. It was odd how, in so little time, he had grown accustomed to you just being there.
It’d been less than a week and he missed you.
Midway through the afternoon, when Jannik was working on his answers for some magazine interview, the doorbell rang. Even though he wasn’t expecting any visitors, he was happy enough for the distraction from the boring slog of answering the same questions over and over again in slightly different ways, and he pushed away from the desk. His back creaked as he stood, and he groaned slightly, stretching, not used to his body feeling so old all of a sudden. It was easier when he was playing tennis all the time. Constantly training made his body feel younger. Putting most of that aside to raise a daughter meant less gym time and a little bit more of a stomach to contend with.
He would recognise your shadow through the glass window of the door anywhere.
“Hi,” was all he managed to say.
Almost a week, and he was immediately floored by the first sight of you. Pretty in the simple way you always were, the jeans he knew were your favourite just to throw on on a lazy Saturday, the old t-shirts you’d built up a collection of over the years, the thick cardigans to keep out the mountain-range chill. And yet, there was a new tiredness in your eyes, a slightly tighter pull to your smile. Florian stood behind your legs, but as soon as he saw Andrea, he went shoving past to meet her in the sprawling living room, already loud and bouncing and full of energy. Jannik had been just like that as a child.
“Hi. You said you needed to talk?” Your head tilted as you spoke, the end of the sentence lilting up into a question.
“No. I don’t think so.”
You showed him the text he’d supposedly sent about an hour ago. Jannik’s brows furrowed. Had he sent that in some strange moment of blacking out? He checked his pockets, but he didn’t feel the familiar heaviness of his phone anywhere, and he remembered leaving it to charge in the kitchen so he wouldn’t be tempted to procrastinate the work he had to do. He checked the text again and noticed the oddness of Plz come. Need 2 talk. He never texted like that, and he was pretty sure you’d know that.
He glanced over his shoulder where Andrea and Florian were already playing with the new racing cars he’d gotten for her just because he could.
“Drey?” She looked up, smiling innocently, and he knew immediately what she’d done. She only ever looked the picture of perfection when she knew she’d done something wrong. “Did you use my phone to text Florian’s mama?”
“Maybe. I missed her. So did you.”
“We’ll talk about this later.” Her smile never wavered, and they all knew Jannik wouldn’t be too harsh on her. He was pretty bad at disciplining her, a fact his own mother never failed to bring up when he let her get away with everything. She claimed that if Andrea ever murdered someone, Jannik would just help hide the body. He shrugged it off. What else were fathers for?
Florian whispered something to Andrea, and she laughed so hard she almost choked.
Your face softened immediately.
“Don’t be mad at her. I could tell it wasn’t you.”
“But you came anyway?”
“Maybe I missed you both, too.”
He welcomed you in, fully aware that he could feel the dramatic pounding of his heart, and led you through to the kitchen. You sat at the dining table, in the seat you always chose, with your back to the window so you could watch everybody come and go around the house. Jannik made you both glasses of water and brought them to the table, sitting in his usual seat beside you. It was close enough that he could touch your knee with his if he wanted to, but he refrained. He had gotten good at that.
“I’m sorry for what I said on Sunday,” he finally said after gulping down half his water just to fill the growing silence. You tapped clean fingernails against your own glass, though you hadn’t even so much as taken a sip.
“No, I’m sorry for running off. It’s been so long since I’ve even been on a date that I’m still so rusty about all of this.”
Jannik felt the wind go out of him. “Is that what we’ve been doing?” Your eyes slowly lifted, and he recognised the emotion that flickered through your carefully picked-out expression. You hadn’t really meant to say that. “Or do you want us to start dating going forward? Do you want to call our roller-skating lessons ‘dates’? Or do you want to go on different dates? Proper dates with dinner and nice clothes and–”
“Stop, stop.” You were bright red and clearly flustered, one hand trying to cover your blush and the breathless way you spoke while the other flapped at him. He couldn’t help his laughter. He couldn’t help the sudden spike of adrenaline at the thought that you’d been thinking of dating him just as much as he’d thought about dating you. “I’m so embarrassed. It’s been so long even hearing the word ‘date’ is making me oddly giddy.”
He reached out to wrap his hand around your wrist and slowly lower it from your face. He liked the way you blushed. Liked the way it was never easy to hide.
“Do you really want to try dating?”
He couldn’t believe he’d woken up this morning thinking he’d never see you again, that he’d only ever hear about you in the small snippets he got from Florian at lessons, that you’d just be a crush he would fan until he heard you’d moved on with someone far better than he could hope to be.
“Yes. I… I was worried because I was–” You cleared your throat, clearly not used to being so forward with your emotions. “I was starting to like you, and I’ve not really been close to a man since Tomasz, and I’m clearly very bad at reading any signs, so I thought it was just me.” This time you chuckled. It was more like a scoff. More self-deprecating than anything Jannik had ever heard from you. His thumb traced the inside of your wrist. “And then you called me beautiful, and I just had no idea what to do. I was probably going to avoid you for way longer, but this morning, Flo asked me how I felt about you and told me all about how much he likes you. That you’re so patient with him, and you make amazing schnitzel, and you have really good stories about playing tennis. So when you – or Andrea – texted, I took that as a sign and threw away all my inhibitions.”
“I like the way you ramble,” he said, because he suddenly realised he’d never actually said it out loud before, even though he must have thought it a thousand and one times over the past few months. “I like listening to you.”
“I like the way you listen.”
Jannik didn’t kiss you, even though he wanted to. He shifted his hand so it was holding yours instead, fingers linked, and let the silence still for just a moment. A moment to catch your breath. A moment to just stare and take it all in. That these were real feelings and that neither of you was alone.
And realise that your kids had definitely planned this.
“Should we make tomorrow our first real date?”
You lifted your joint hands to your lips to press a kiss against his knuckles, and for a moment, he was completely breathless.
“Yes, please.”
ᡣ𐭩 ᡣ𐭩 ᡣ𐭩 ᡣ𐭩 ᡣ𐭩
Rollerskating was easier with you.
Everything, Jannik was happy to realise, was easier with you. Looking after the kids, looking after the house, looking after himself, it all felt so much easier now he could lean against you and feel your lips on the curve of his temple.
You lived separately for the first year, but still spent as much time as you could together. Still had movie nights, and helped with homework, and made dinner for the other. You sprinkled in dates, without the kids, to fancy restaurants in a different town, or to the golf range so he could show off while you spent too long setting up the shot, or at the roller rink where he stopped falling when you held his hand and even taught him how to dance to the music. Then, he and Andrea moved into your house. It was bigger, and had nicer views from the window, and felt like something new. Something that he needed in his life.
That’s when it all started falling into place.
That’s when the kids started going to the same school, when you could cut your hours at work. After all, you could rely on Jannik to help pay. When answering the interview questions didn’t seem so boring because you were there to help him come up with some new answers.
That’s when Andrea started calling you Mama, and Florian started calling him Papa. That’s when you got the dog, a Leonberger called Wendel that the kids named and that Jannik always walked because everybody else was too lazy to. That’s when you got the cats, two fluffy forest cats that the kids named Anna and Elsa because they were always watching Frozen, and that left ungodly amounts of hair everywhere. That’s when you had the wedding, something small, something just for you, with your families and friends in the back garden with the mountains sprawling behind you and the snow dusting the grass. That’s when you had the third child, Dorothea, who had Jannik’s gold-flecked green eyes and your hair, and that Drey was always fussing over while Flo tried to race his cars over her chubby legs.
That’s when everything started to feel just right.
Jannik crawled into bed, around two-thirty in the morning, after just managing to put Dot to sleep. She had been such a good sleeper at first, but teething made everything worse, and Jannik liked to be the one to get up so you didn’t exhaust yourself any more than you already had.
“Maybe Klaudia for the next one. Or Dominik if it’s a boy.”
“Please do not joke right now, amore,” Jannik mumbled into your neck, trying to lull himself back to sleep with the smell of you invading his senses, with your hair tickling his face, with your nails softly scratching the back of his head.
“Okay, baby, I’ll wait until the morning.”
And every Sunday, you still went roller-skating, with your hand in his, and your balance far better.
ᡣ𐭩 ᡣ𐭩 ᡣ𐭩 ᡣ𐭩 ᡣ𐭩
Hi everyone! Hope you enjoyed. Just wanted to write something fluffy, especially after RG, and what better than girl dad! Jannik?
VEE this reminded me of your fic 'local boy in the photograph' which is one of my favourites from you!!
Also, hope you're doing well and I hope life is going easy on you 🫂
I love that!! And I'm so glad you love that fic too! It was a lot of fun to write!
Thank you for checking in 🤍 I'm currently on a cruise and its been so good and done a little bit of writing for Jannik, so I'll try to get that published asap when I'm home.
Big news in my life!! I got accepted to start training to be a nurse so I'm going back to university and I'm very excited to try that 🤍🫶
Idk if anyone here is an ASOIAF or AKOTSK fan, but I finally published the first chapter of my Baelor Targaryen fic on AO3. Please go check it out, it would mean so much to me 🤍
In honour of jannik winning IW, I'm finally sending in a fic request hehe🤗
I'm thinking atp tour photographer!reader whom jannik eventually hires after seeing her at tournaments (just like he stole that one physio lol)
Like, her pics of him always end up becoming fan-favourites bc she knows what the people want as a fellow tennis fangirl + he also lowkey misses her whenever there are 2/3 tournaments at the same time but she's not at the one he's playing
Idk just smth cute and fluffy, so thanks in advance if you do write it<3
Local Boy in the Photograph
→ Pairing: Jannik Sinner x Photographer! Reader
→ Summary: You're one of the tour photographers, and Jannik couldn't help but notice you. Or, well, purposefully look out for you. You must have been the only person who ever really saw him. Who could capture the hunger that pounded in his veins.
→ Word Count: 2.2k
→ One Shot
→ A/N: Loved this request! It was such a buzzy idea. Also, so sorry I've been gone for so long. I've been working on a lot of other stuff, and just not really had the motivation to write my Jannik stuff. But I have a lot of cutesy requests so hopefully I can get through them.
Jannik Sinner was looking for a photographer.
And the photographer he was looking for, specifically, was you.
The whispers followed you throughout the day. The other photographers at Turin weren’t quiet in their gossip. They’d overheard Jannik telling his coach it’d be nice to have a photographer in their team, and every time they shared this little tidbit, their eyes would flick to you. Jannik didn’t have to say it, but it was clear he meant you. You were, after all, his favourite of the tour photographers.
You just clicked.
You’d joined the tour while he was stuck at home, and you’d already made a bit of a name for yourself by the time he got back. Though he took no notice. He had something to focus on. A title to win. A chance to show that he was better than he had been before, that the ban hadn’t taken all the best parts of him and twisted them into something worse – even if he often felt that way. It didn’t take long for him to notice you. You were the one to take the photograph of him in his new black kit, the clay shining red beneath his feet, his hand curled into a fist when a point went his way. And that hunger, shining clear as day in those green eyes of his.
It was the first time he had felt truly seen.
After that, he saw you everywhere. Or, well, he looked for you everywhere. At the side of the court, just before a match, with your camera around your neck and a cap shading your eyes from the sun. During practices, giggling with your friends, the sound echoing with the constant whack of tennis balls. In the media centre, halfway through taking a photograph with your tongue poking out just a little. Just enough to distract him. He never talked to you.
He was, at least for a little while, content to just watch you from afar.
Until he wasn’t.
It was one of those rainy days where practices had to be cut short, where nobody was allowed to play because the clay was ruined for the day. The sort of day when athletes weren’t quite sure what to do with themselves. Jannik would have been perfectly happy to sit and play video games all day, but Darren wanted him to at least pretend to care in the gym, so he listened to the rain hit the roof as he went through the motions of his usual workout. At least, he wasn’t the only one. Carlos was here too, and Jack, and Hubi. There was Elena and Coco, too. Everywhere he looked, another tennis player who didn’t get to spend this rare day off relaxing after all.
Jannik was supposed to meet his team for lunch immediately after showering, but on his way out of the locker room, his attention was caught by the shadow at the other end of the player tunnel. His feet took him towards you before he could stop himself. You stood just at the lip of the tunnel, protected from the rain, your camera lifted to catch the exact moment rainwater mixed with clay. Your Adidas Sambas were soaked, he noticed, a small puddle beginning to form where you stood, and water dripping from the edges of your hair down your spine.
“How do you do it?” he asked, before he could stop himself. He stood close enough that your shoulders brushed. You didn’t lower your camera. “How do you capture every thought I have ever had on court?”
Eventually, you looked up at him. He was struck. You’d been on the wrong side of the camera this entire time.
“You’re an easier read than you give yourself credit for.”
It kept happening like that. Little moments where you brushed together in this constantly moving world you both occupied. In the player lounge, ordering coffee at the same time, waiting for your orders and standing far too close for it not to be noticeable. At practice, when he’d gulp down water as the sun beat hard against his skin, and you’d step into the shade with him. At the hotel bar, your elbows touching, watching people come and go. Jannik would ask something, anything about you, and you’d answer cryptically, like you were afraid to show too much. Like you were afraid to be on the other end of the camera.
“What are you afraid of?” he asked at Wimbledon.
Or well, at practice at Wimbledon, the scent of strawberries and freshly mown grass hung in the air, the chatter of fans watching as tennis players rallied against one another louder than he realised when he stopped for a moment. He had been retaping his racket when you stepped behind his bench to get a photograph of his training partner from his side of the court. You were always trying something new with your photographs.
“Bees,” you said, off-handedly, flicking through your photos like you were already trying to decide which one you liked best. Jannik chuckled and kept watching you out of the corner of his eye. He liked watching you without anybody noticing. “What about you?”
“Dissapointing everyone. My family, my team, the fans.”
Your expression shifted, just a little. Just enough for him to tell you weren’t expecting anything quite so honest. But he had been himself with you from the very beginning – no walls, no shield, just the truth with every answer. He couldn’t hide if he wanted to. You saw it all. The fire that drove him to walk onto every court and want to win. The pain with every heartbreaking loss. You’d captured that photograph of him at Roland-Garros, tears in his eyes, gaze lifted to the sky like God could provide any answer, even if he didn’t want to hear it. You saw everything, even if you claimed it was your camera.
“I’m allergic to bees,” you told him, and you refused to look at him, like it was the most honest you’d ever allowed yourself to be. Always on the other side of the camera. Never allowing yourself to be seen. “Had a pretty rough experience as a kid where I thought I was going to die. A whole lot of bees, and one very allergic child.”
It was the last thing you said to him that day. But that night, when he was lying in his bed in his Airbnb, you messaged him on Instagram. It was the first time one of you had messaged the other. It was the first time you had done more than bump into each other. You sent him one of the pictures you’d taken today, of a bee buzzing around his head while he laughed at something Darren said. He couldn’t remember the joke, but he did remember the little buzz-buzz in his ear because it reminded him of you.
Two things I’m scared of, your message read, bees and cute boys.
He fell asleep smiling.
When he won Wimbledon, you took the photograph that became his lockscreen. Him, and the trophy, and the hundreds of lights flashing in his eyes as he made history. You weren’t at the after-party, even though he wanted to invite you, just to have an excuse to dance with you. At Cincinnati, you started opening up more, answering his questions without the deflection he had grown used to. He liked the way you ruminated on his words, swirling them around your head like you were trying to find the right answers without jumping into it. He liked that you thought everything through, that you knew just how much to give away of yourself. Whereas Jannik practically tripped over his tongue answering your questions. He’d crack open his own chest just so you could see the arteries of his heart if you asked for it.
At the US Open, you went to dinner with him, some mostly empty burger joint, and with his hood pulled up, luckily, nobody really noticed him. You laughed at a stupid joke he made, and let your elbows touch, and he liked it. Really liked it. Liked getting to see you away from the court, away from the camera, away from the ever-watching eyes.
“Do you ever think–” he asked, as he stole one of your fries and you didn’t even bat his hand away. “–that you use your camera as a shield?”
“I don’t think that. I know it.” You stole a sip of his drink. Some grape soda thing he didn’t really like, but it was too late to give back. “I don’t really have a lot of friends. Just a lot of coworkers, all with cameras of their own that I don’t really want to be viewed through. I’m not used to opening up like this.”
“I can see that. You answer every question like you’re afraid of the answer.”
“I guess I’m just afraid of the response.”
It continued like that. Dinners and answers, coffees and questions. You kept messaging too, more than just pictures, it had expanded to an off-the-cuff thought you had that you wrote down before you could think too much about it. He sent jokes, and you laughed to yourself, but in response just sent him the tired face emoji. You sent secrets, and he kept them close to his heart, because he knew that’s exactly where you’d want them.
He didn’t even realise how much he relied on your company until he went to Beijing… and you went to Tokyo.
I miss you, he typed. Then deleted it. Then typed it again and let his thumb hover over the send button.
Eventually, he sent it. He couldn’t expect truth from you if he refused to be honest with himself. He did miss you. He missed finding your smile waiting for him across the court. He missed the specific click of your camera, which he knew by heart. He missed sitting beside you at breakfast in the hotel and commenting on the dark circles under your eyes just to make you blush and hit his arm.
It only took two minutes for you to respond.
I miss you, too. Strange that. I’ve never had a friend on tour to miss.
After that, he knew what he wanted. He didn’t bring it up at first, not to the team, not to his brother, not to anyone. He just kept ruminating on it. He wanted you at every match, at every meeting, at every practice with your camera, with your smile, with your secrets. He wanted to get on a plane and know you’d be there. He didn’t like the sudden sinking stomach he had when he realised he’d have to go through this entire tournament without you.
He managed to steal Alejandro from the ATP. He could easily do it again.
You weren’t in Dubai, obviously, but you were there in Vienna, in Paris, in Turin. You were the laughter thrumming in his veins, the flash of a camera, the eyes he always looked for. You were there, and that is exactly where he wanted you. So, when the whispers started in Turin, the other photographers side-eyeing you, you knew. You had to know.
Jannik Sinner wanted a photographer.
And that photographer was you.
“Join my team.” It wasn’t a question. Just a request. Out there on the balcony of your hotel room, with your feet up on the rungs. He was sitting close enough his knee could touch yours, and you didn't shove him off. You never did.
“What if I say no? Will you stop talking to me?” Your eyes roamed the dark night settling over the Italian city. The blanket you’d tugged over your shoulders started to slip, just a little, but Jannik was already there, thumb hooking through the fabric to pull it back into place. You liked the heat that just the simplest touch of his could inspire inside you.
“Are you? Saying no, I mean.”
“I’m not saying anything. I’m asking you.”
Jannik watched you watch the city, and he realised he didn’t just like it. He loved it. And it was a hard truth to contend with in that moment, letting it sit between you, a breath he was too afraid to exhale in case you didn’t want to share it.
“I wouldn’t stop talking to you even if the whole world tried to stop me. I’d miss you too much. So, join me. Please.”
“Do I get to live in Monte Carlo?”
“You could live with me.” And he meant it. It wasn’t supposed to slip out, but it did, sudden and true.
You, finally, tore your gaze away from the city, settling those eyes onto him that he’d gotten so used to seeing across the court. Those eyes that saw right into the very depths of him.
“I’d like that.”
He waited to kiss you until after he won.
When you showed up with his team at the exhibition match against Carlos in Korea, it wasn’t exactly a surprise. It was more surprising that you were the one initiating every kiss when he jogged across the court after a point.
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Hi everyone! I know it's been foreverrrr! I've been working on different fics (continuing my Malcolm Tucker fic on AO3, and a Baelor Targaryen fic) but got a sudden surge of inspiration for this ask. I hope you enjoyed!
Aw thank youu, I'm so sorry I've not posted anything in ages. I've been working a lot of a fic for the character Baelor Targaryen from A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms that I'm gonna post on AO3, so I've been so focused on that instead of for Jannik.
I've got a couple of really cute requests that I want to write but I want to make sure I do them justice, so just know if you have requested, I will get around to writing it. It might just take a wee while!
🤍 Jannik x Famous American GF with angst and pregnancy
🤍 Jannik x Photographer Reader thats all fluff
🤍 Jannik x Cincy Ball Kid around his bday (someone pointed out that it looks to them like its the same ball kids just getting older and the request is really cute!)
Aw thank youu, I'm so sorry I've not posted anything in ages. I've been working a lot of a fic for the character Baelor Targaryen from A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms that I'm gonna post on AO3, so I've been so focused on that instead of for Jannik.
I've got a couple of really cute requests that I want to write but I want to make sure I do them justice, so just know if you have requested, I will get around to writing it. It might just take a wee while!
