Page 23 of Unwritten Rules
“He’s being a killjoy,” Giordano says, as if Zach is single-handedly ruining his good time.
“If he wants to be a killjoy,” Gordon says, “let him.”
“I’m gonna go,” Zach says, getting up.
Gordon tugs on the back of his shirt. “Don’t let this guy push you around.” He nods to Giordano.
“I’m not.” But Zach sits back down.
“Where’s Morales?” Giordano says—or more or less yells—at Zach. His breath smells like red Gatorade, and Zach doesn’t know if his volume is from overcompensating about Zach’s hearing or just because no one can hear over the noise. But either way, it’s annoying.
“I don’t know.” Though Zach’s been watching the parking lot as other guys arrive, looking for the familiar outline of Eugenio’s truck.
“Thought you were tight,” Giordano says. “Text him and tell him to get himself over here.”
“Yeah, text Morales,” Gordon says. “You both are working too hard. It’s making the rest of us look bad.” Though he spends most of his time in the batting cages, perfecting his already perfect swing.
Zach’s phone is up in his apartment. He sits for a minute, hoping that they’ll forget about it, even as he wonders what it’d be like to dance with Eugenio the way that Giordano is now with Braxton, who is trying and failing to find a rhythm but smiling anyway.
It’s quieter now with Giordano away from them, the music fading to an ignorable thump. Gordon’s still sitting there, the gold of his wedding band shining against his light brown skin as he drinks.
“For real, Morales is going to work himself into a demotion if he doesn’t unwind a little.” Gordon says it loud enough that Zach can hear, but not so loudly that it draws attention from their teammates, none of whom look their way. “If that’s your boy, you should be looking out for him.”
And it’s said with no more inflection than anything else Gordon says, no intention behind it beyond pointing out—like Giordano did—that Zach and Eugenio are friends. But it’s enough to make Zach swallow around his own beer, coughing a little.
“I’m trying to,” Zach says, honestly.
“Good.” Like that settles some unspoken matter between them. “Now get going.” And he practically swats Zach on the ass when he gets up to go inside.
It’s quiet in his apartment, the kind of quiet that makes Zach reconsider. He missed a text from his parents, a reminder about that fundraiser he doesn’t want to go to, asking when he’ll know if he can. It’s over the All-Star break. His parents don’t mean anything by it, but the assumption that he won’t qualify to go still kind of stings. He doesn’t text back—for one thing, it’s two hours later in Baltimore, and they don’t know how to mute the notifications on their phones. For another, he doesn’t have anything to say that won’t sound vaguely resentful.
Outside, the party’s still going. He sits, thumbs hovering over the text thread to Eugenio. He could just open whatever app on his phone to see if someone’ll trade pictures long enough for him to get off and go to sleep, the outcome of the exchange both guaranteed and unsatisfying.
Gordon told me to tell you to come over,Zach texts to Eugenio instead.We’re having a party.Eugenio doesn’t answer right away, but three dots appear—him typing—that then disappear.
Gordon told you??comes the response.You don’t want me there?He sends an emoji with it, a winky face.
And Zach doesn’t know what to do with that. If that’s how Eugenio just is over text or if that’s how he is with Zach specifically, so he types,Come over.Eugenio responds, another emoji, this one smiling with a little cartoon blush staining its cheeks. And it’d be one thing if Eugenio was some guy Zach was messaging. But entirely another to have Eugenio send that back—and emojis look different on different phones, and so maybe he didn’t mean anything in particular by it—even if a traitorous impulse in Zach’s gut reminds him that he sent acome overspecifically to see what Eugenio would say.
And so he addsBring foodbefore tossing his phone onto the couch cushion.
Eugenio gets there about twenty minutes later, holding a couple of grocery bags.
“When I said bring food,” Zach says, “I just meant like, I don’t know, something you already had or some chips and dip or something.”
“No, you didn’t.” Eugenio is already rummaging through the kitchen cabinets, his grin bright in Zach’s otherwise dim apartment.
“Yeah, yeah, you caught me. What’d you bring?”
“Come take a look.” Like Zach needs to be invited into his own kitchen. Like he can just go and hook his chin over Eugenio’s shoulder, watching his hands as he makes whatever he brought, listening to him explain it, the two of them standing together in the strange half dark.
Eugenio probably wouldn’t slug him for trying. But he might pack up the stuff he brought, get into his truck and tell Zach he’ll see him at the training complex tomorrow, leaving Zach alone in his temporary apartment to wonder what the hell he was thinking.
He goes to investigate the beer chilling in his fridge instead, uncapping one and then showing a bottle to Eugenio, who nods his approval, then doing a second.
Outside, their teammates have gotten louder, loud enough that, if Zach notices it, the cops might be summoned on a noise complaint like they’re high school kids having a kegger and not millionaires.
“Sounds like quite a party out there,” Eugenio says.
