Page 32 of Unwritten Rules
They can’t leave for dinner until the last out is recorded, until the game MVP gets the world’s largest participation trophy in the form of a truck.
The game has barely ended when Eugenio comes to find him at his stall. “We’re going to head out in a few minutes.”
“Um,” Zach says, though he has a creeping sense that this is a bad decision. That he can’t sit next to Eugenio at a restaurant and pretend that they’re just oldfriendshaving dinner. Especially now that Eugenio has changed into his post-game clothes, collared shirt bright against his midsummer tan. “This place isn’t, like, nice or anything?” And Zach glances down at himself, at the clothes he brought that he shoved into a duffel, wishing he at least considered a dry-cleaning bag.
“Don’t worry, you look just fine.” And there’s that familiar pleased tilt to his mouth.
“Where should I meet you?” Zach asks, and Eugenio’s smile increases even further.
Zach leaves his blueberry of a rental car at the stadium and piles into an SUV with a few others, a driver transporting them to the restaurant. There are only ten players with them in total, and he gets the sense he’s crashing a pre-planned dinner, especially when the service staff at the restaurant hustle to set another place at the table for him.
He’s also the only one in their party not from Venezuela or first-generation like Eugenio. The chatter around him is mostly in Spanish, though he can track enough of it to throw in an opinion about playing at Tampa’s terrible stadium, having banged a home run off its roof in a recent series.
Eugenio shoots him a questioning look after he answers in halting Spanish. “That’s new.”
“I figured I should learn. You know, since teams don’t always have a good interpreter.”
“Yeah, I hear those are hard to find.”
And Zach tries not to flush at that and fails.
They’re in a back room, one with a door separating them from the rest of the restaurant, and Zach expected steaks and bourbon and dark leather. Instead, it’s light wood, favorable lighting, bright without being surgical. A booth in a corner, Eugenio on his right, a Sharks reliever diagonal to him. Eugenio’s sitting close, their legs pressed together, big catcher thigh against his. He smells good, different from how he used to.
“Is that new cologne?” Zach asks it low enough that only Eugenio will hear.
Eugenio’s got a napkin unfolded on his lap, and it slithers off onto the ground. He reaches for it, snagging it with his middle and index fingers, like he might call for a breaking ball in the dirt. “Why?” he says, close. “You like it?”
“I thought you were mad at me.” It sounds petulant, like they just had a lingering spat.
“I’m still deciding.”
And Zach is unsure how to respond, of what he can say in a crowded restaurant. Of what he would say if they were alone.
And so he just nods and considers the menu, reading it closely, deliberately, until Eugenio takes it from him, gently laying it on the table. “Don’t worry. I ordered for us.”
Dinner is loud. It’s ten ballplayers who’ve been drinking since that morning, a few of whom didn’t sleep the night before, and many of whom have known each other since childhood. They eat like baseball players, demolishing plates of food as fast as the service staff can bring them. It’s too loud for him to talk to anyone but Eugenio, which Eugenio doesn’t seem to mind. He reaches past Zach, marshaling plates their way, and telling Zach about this dish or that, laughing when their tablemates propose toasts.
Zach mostly eats, drinking more than he should, and wonders why exactly Eugenio invited him.
“C’mon.” Eugenio picks up his drink in one hand and unthinkingly wrapping his arm around Zach with the other, though he doesn’t move it when Zach glances down at where his hand is resting on his shoulder.
“This is like the only good meal I’ve ever had in Ohio.” Zach is still under the heavy, familiar weight of Eugenio’s arm, which he seems disinclined to move. “How’d you find this place?”
It’s kind of a date question, the sort of question he would ask someone he met online, in the rare instance they get a meal together before fucking. A polite question. Or not one, because of course Eugenio knows how to find the only quality restaurant in the state, one that serves Venezuelan food and is close to the ballpark.
“You know,” Eugenio says, smiling, “I have my ways.”
And Zach cuts an already small piece of beef from his entree even further, eating it slowly, trying to draw out how long they’ll be there, even if most of them are already finished.
“Something wrong with that?” Eugenio nods to Zach’s plate.
“No, it’s perfect.” Except for the fact it’s almost gone. But he continues eating.
“They want to go drinking,” Eugenio says, after the dishes are cleared, nothing left but their drinks and some crumbs.
“You should go. I might call it a night.” And Zach thinks about going back to his hotel. Scrolling through Grindr, hoping not to match with anyone else at the game who might recognize him, and then taking a couple of pills in an effort not to wake up hungover. As much of a routine as anything else in his life.
“We could stay here if you want.”
