Page 76 of Unwritten Rules
“It doesn’t really work like that,” Zach says. “Besides, what did your parents think of these?” He taps one of Eugenio’s tattoos with his index finger.
“Mine weren’t that happy about them, until they saw I wasn’t gonna get, I don’t know, something horrifically tacky.”
And Zach thinks about the one Giordano has on his hip, which manages to combine praying hands and a Bible verse, and the one on his forearm that’s a semicolon, neither of which Zach has asked about.
“You can come and help me pick it out,” Eugenio says.
“Yeah?”
“Only if you don’t make fun of me for having to get up every few minutes. They hurt closer to the bone.”
They eat that night out on the deck, the ocean rolling in the distance. Eugenio talks about all the wineries nearby, about where he wants to go hiking or rent bikes.
“You gonna let me have some vacation on this vacation?” Zach asks. Their house is set back from the others on the block, the deck arranged so that they can’t be seen from either side. And Zach kisses him, tasting the bourbon Eugenio’s drinking.
“Eventually you’ll get bored of lying around in bed.”
“You know, I don’t think I will.” Because the offseason never feels long enough, even if Zach wished it was shorter, their season extended on a deeper playoff run. Eventually, he’ll have to call his agent to discuss how much he’ll argue for in arbitration, though the team has made it clear they see him as expendable. Something that chills him now: that they’ll likely offer him less than he’s currently making and that he’ll say yes to whatever they do in order to stay.
Next to him Eugenio drinks his bourbon.
“We could get started on that,” Zach says.
Eugenio raises an eyebrow in question.
“I meant, lying around in bed.”
And Eugenio drains his glass before offering Zach a hand up.
They go to bed early, sleep in, the morning sun waking Eugenio, who grumbles and shuts the shades and sleeps for another hour while Zach goes and makes coffee. They don’t do anything more ambitious than swim for the first few days, Zach chattering in the cold California surf until Eugenio tells him to suck it up and buy a wetsuit, though he mostly reads on the beach.
“I thought you liked swimming,” Zach says.
“I like my balls outside my body.” And he laughs when Zach just says, “Same.”
There are tidepools by the beach, a rocky inlet they navigate together, cloistered from the world by the U-shaped coastline. Eugenio spends time trying to get pictures of them, the pulsing anemones and rapacious starfish. He sends them to Gordon, whose daughter apparently wants to be a marine biologist.
“Where did you tell him you were?” Zach asks.
“At the beach with you.”
“Has he said anything about us?”
“He saw me once, coming out of your hotel room.” And Zach’s hands start to sweat, his pulse hammering like the waves against the shoreline, until Eugenio adds, “He said it was good for us to plan together. You know, in terms of handling pitchers.”
“Oh, I mean, that’s good.”
“I learned a lot this year. Stuff the other team didn’t know how to teach me and that I couldn’t have learned otherwise.”
“Even if it didn’t turn out how we wanted.” Especially in their final game against the Union, one that ended in crushing defeat.
“I mean—” Eugenio glances up and down the stretch of beach, which is deserted this late in the afternoon, this far into October. “Who says it didn’t?”
Zach slides his hand from Eugenio’s elbow to his forearm to his wrist, thumb brushing over his knuckles, then winds their fingers together. And kisses him, standing there, in the salt spray of the ocean, their feet finding solid purchase on the rocks. It’s the kind of kiss without particular urgency or hesitancy, Zach’s hands against the broad muscles of Eugenio’s back, on the blank stretch of skin at his ribs, a space waiting for Zach to fill it in.
“I love you,” Eugenio says, pulling back. “I’ve been waiting to say it.”
Eugenio’s hair is long enough that it’s windblown. His face is bright from being out in the sun. There’s an entire ocean behind him, one Zach can’t see right now, Eugenio occupying his field of view, the world for once held at a distance.
