Acquaintances

Chapter 55: Marathon Training

“Get up!” Harry’s voice is the first thing I hear when I wake up the next morning. Which is surprising because he didn’t sleep here last night, but he did keep me out till 11pm eating ice cream.

“What are you doing here?” I groan, rolling over and burying my face in the pillow.

“You’ll see. Get up and put this on.” He demands, his voice more authoritative than usual.

“No!” I protest, snuggling deep into the covers.

“Come on.” His arms wrap around me and lift me up off the bed, kicking and screaming.

“What’s the time?!” I screech, pushing away from him as he plants my feet onto the ground.

“6am.”
“Ew. Are you insane?’
“Yes, put this on.” He hands me the pile of clothes, which is black gym tights, an orange sports bra and a black nike zip-up tracksuit jumper, all items he’s searched through my closet to find.

I turn around to change into the bra, and pull on the tights before sitting down to put socks and runners on. The heating in our apartment is too efficient for me to pull the jacket on.

“Now, will you tell me where we’re going?”
“Yep, Mark’s waiting down stairs. We’re going to start your marathon training today.” He says with a cunning grin, giving me a chance to glaze my eyes over his outfit, black trackpants and a grey nike jumper.

Damn.

“Mark, as in 1D’s trainer?”

“One and the same. Come on, we’ll take the stairs.” He enthuses, jumping up and down on the phone while he waits for me. I put my phone in the pocket of my jacket and follow him out through the apartment and down the stairs, which he takes two at a time.

It’s been a little while since I ran, like since last year, and I haven’t the faintest idea of how to train for a marathon.

When we walk out onto the street, Mark is stretching against a short brick fence.

“Here, drink this.” He chucks me a bottle full of orange liquid.

“Pre-workout.” He answers the question I hadn’t even asked, but clearly the look on my face of confusion was enough to ask it for me.

I gulp it down, chucking the empty plastic bottle into a nearby bin.

“What’s your running like?” He asks, telling me to mimic his movements as he stretches out his arms, and then swings his legs back and force individually. Harry does the same. It’s fucking freezing out here, surely I can’t be the only one to be feeling the cold.

“Um, it’s been a while. I used to be able to do 10km pretty easy.”
“Alright well today we’ll start with that, see how far you can go and then I’ll do up a training plan for you. London Marathon is at the end of April, you could aim to do that.”
“But it’s January now, there’s no way I’ll be fit enough by then.” I protest. That’s insane, it takes atleast 6 months.

“Yeah well Harry’s been singing your praises, he said when you put your mind to something you smash it.” Mark chuckles, glancing over at Harry who I’m now glaring at. Don’t build me up too much.

“Alright, let’s go.” Mark smiles, breaking into a light jog and fiddling around with an app on his phone, presumably to measure distance.

“Come on Jones, match my pace.” Harry grins, taking off in front of Mark and me, giving me a way too good view of his arse.

“Harry’s actually quite a good runner, he’ll be a major help to your training.”

“Yeah well as long as he runs in front of me I should be plenty distracted.” I smirk, trying to focus on my breathing and not the perfect body in front of me.