stop going easy on me. // also to art
@survivall / jordan riley. ★ meme.
STOP GOING EASY ON ME. the words coil themselves around his ankle and jerk, dragging him right back to stanford, back to hitting a tennis ball to tashi wearing a knee brace. what, you scared you're gonna hurt me? pussy. he thinks about how that was a defining moment for him, how he wanted so badly to keep from hurting tashi that he decided that he would do whatever she needed him to do. if going easy on her hurt her more than the physical pain of her knee injury did, he would stop going easy on her. that really might have been one of the last times tashi had to ask him for something like that, had to ask him to adjust his actions for her sake. from that point on he just did his best to pay attention to her needs and take care of them. it really had been detrimental to the both of them, he realizes, that decision to be anything tashi needed him to be. he lost himself and she was never given the chance to mourn her tennis career. she was as hard on him as she would have been on herself.
art snaps back to the present and he's pulling a tennis ball from the pocket of his shorts and twirling his racket in his right hand. his eyes meet jordan's and what he sees isn't the anger that he'd seen in tashi's face when she said the same thing to him fifteen years ago; he sees a smile. his own lips pull upward on one side and he replies, "okay, okay. if you think you can handle it, i'll stop going easy on you."
training her for this film has been fun. his last couple of matches had been fun, but he'd still retired, still didn't want to play tennis professionally. he had to admit though that he'd missed it. he missed all of it. the feeling of the racket in his hand, the sound it made when it hit the ball, everything. art bounces the ball a few times, catches it, and places it in the center of the racket. his eyes flick up to jordan's again, a quick check to see if she's ready, and then he serves.










