Page 18 of Unwritten Rules
“Tenuous,” Zach repeats, chewing on the word, a little teasing.
“Yeah, yeah.” Even with the lights the rental place has, Eugenio looks slightly flustered by it, clipping his bottom lip with his teeth.
“I did a year at a community college, mostly just to please them. Though I kind of flunked out. Or I didn’t, because they weren’t letting baseball players flunk, but I didn’t go back.” It was a bad year—they kept assigning him tutors who were more or less paid to do his schoolwork for him, and who were frustrated by the fact that Zach actually wanted to do his own work. “People see my name, and I don’t know, they expect me to be smart. Good at math. That kind of shit.”
Eugenio doesn’t ask, but he raises his eyebrows.
“Zach Glasser. It’s the kind of name that—I don’t know if there’re a lot of Jewish people in Indiana, but I’m assuming there aren’t—but it’s a pretty Jewish name. I got off easy. My brother’s name is Eitan and my sister’s named Aviva.”
“Oh.” Eugenio glances down at the pork chop that Zach is in the process of dissecting. “Oh, shit. I’m sorry. I guess I should have known with the shellfish thing.”
“I eat pork. And meat and cheese. The shellfish thing is ’cause I’m from Baltimore and don’t believe in eating seafood in places not touching the ocean.”
Eugenio laughs then, that big laugh of his that makes Zach want things he shouldn’t, to hear it again in the closed-off confines of his apartment or early morning in the bullpen when the rest of the team hasn’t come to interrupt them. He refocuses on his food, eating his pork chop like he’s proving a point.
“Thanks,” Zach says, after they’re done eating and are carrying their plates back indoors. “That was really good.”
“No problem, I guess I kind of missed cooking for people.” Eugenio has plates in both his hands, and he pauses at the top step to Zach’s rental, waiting for Zach to open the door. Zach has the key out, fumbling it a little, Eugenio standing close behind him. The exhalation of his breath, warm in the cool night air, makes the hair on the back of Zach’s neck stand up. Enough that he feels like he’s glowing with it, hot as the grill charcoals and obvious in the darkness.
He finally gets the door open, letting Eugenio slide past to scrape plates off into the kitchen trash can. He turns the lights on in the kitchen, the small living room, the hallway leading to his bedroom, like if he floods the place with enough light, Eugenio won’t notice the way he’s looking at him. “I need to hit the head,” Zach says, and then retreats to the sanctuary of his little rental bathroom.
When he comes out, Eugenio has cleaned up, dishes sitting in the dish rack, all evidence of their dinner together washed away. “Thanks for letting me use the pool,” he says, and then, “I should probably get going,” just as Zach says, “Yeah, any time.”
They both laugh, a kind of an end-of-a-date laugh, like Eugenio is waiting for Zach to do something other than stand there in his overly bright kitchen. Like Zach could lean forward and run his hand up the back of his neck or cup his jaw with his palm. Like he’d be met with anything but confusion, disgust.
“If you’re really having problems sleeping or whatever, the team medical staff is okay,” Zach says.
“Do you tell the team everything?”
Zach shrugs because of course he doesn’t.
“It feels like, if I go to them, it’ll sound like a bigger deal than it is.” Eugenio chews on his lip for a minute, considering. “And if I don’t make it in baseball, I have to go back to my parents’ place in Indiana.” He doesn’t sayand admit they were right, but Zach can hear it anyway.
“You’ll make it.”
“You can’t be sure of that. But thanks for saying it.”
“Yeah, well.” Zach anchors his feet into the linoleum surface of the kitchen floor so that he doesn’t do something stupid. Like step into Eugenio’s space or offer him some other form of reassurance.
“It’s late. I should get out of here,” Eugenio says.
And Zach locks the door after Eugenio leaves, and stands there, leaning against it, imagining he can hear Eugenio’s truck pulling away into the Arizona darkness, imagining he had the guts to ask him to stay.
Chapter Seven
July, Present Day
Zach stands in the All-Star Classic clubhouse, his feet rooted to the floor. It hasn’t actually been that long since he saw Eugenio. The Gothams and Swordfish play each other about twenty games a season, the Gothams the closest thing Miami has to a rival.
But usually one of them is wearing a mask, set up behind the plate, and the other is at-bat, and they don’t say anything to one another beyond the basic interactions necessary to complete a game of baseball. A task made easier by the chaperoning presence of an umpire and spectators in the stands. Not that Zach would know what to say even in their absence.
Now he stares at Eugenio for a minute, long enough to be awkward, before Eugenio says, “Hey,” and Zach says, “I didn’t know you were coming,” at more or less the same time.
Around them, players continue to greet each other, giving the sort of back-slapping hugs that Zach and Eugenio have, conspicuously, not tried, one that would confirm if Eugenio still smells the same: like cologne and the cigarettes he sneaks when he’s having a bad day. He looks good, like he was at the barber recently, a neat fade to his sideburns. Like he got a few years of good nights’ sleep, even if he’s been on a bunch of New York nightlife websites that Zach definitely doesn’t follow, connected with this or that actress or musician.
“Here.” Eugenio points to the chair next to where he’s sitting, which Zach eyes, wondering if he’s only talking to him now because of the forced proximity of the game. “I was gonna go get another.”
He holds up a mostly empty beer, the kind of craft thing he used to drink and convinced Zach to try, even if Zach thought it tasted like soap and flowers. “You want one?”
