Page 93 of Diamond Ring
“Gordon wanted me to ask you about—” Jake begins but stops when Alex shakes his head.
For twenty crawling minutes, the only sounds are the ping of rain, the shush of the truck’s tires, and Alex’s frustrated breathing.
“Do you want to pull over and switch?” Jake asks. “I learned to drive in the rain.” An unavoidable fact in Maryland.
“I’m good.” A statement at odds with the heavy grip of Alex’s hands on the wheel.
The rain intensifies, the flat pavement not providing much drainage. Puddles encroach on the road. Alex drives through one, water splashing against Jake’s window.
Another puddle, deeper than it looks. A jerk as their tires skid, then the loose free-fall of the truck hydroplaning, the bite of Jake’s seat belt across his chest as Alex slams the brakes only to slide, unassisted, onto the shoulder of the road. They come to a hard stop, fortunately clear of traffic around them, cars taking a wide turn around the puddle.
But the truck is black, its taillights possibly obscured by the rain, and they might get rear-ended. “Can you pull up a little more?” Jake says, keeping his voice soft.
Alex is shaking, breath rapid, and Jake’s never seen him like this, face ashen, hands unsteady as he grips the wheel and urges the truck forward onto a pull-off. He cuts the engine, leaving the hazard lights on, then slowly collapses, head resting in his hands.
Jake reaches over the console, wrapping himself around Alex. A set of nothing words,it’s okays, andwe’re safes that seem insufficient, so replaces them with a long kiss to the spikes of Alex’s hair and a hard gathering of his arms around him.
“Sorry.” It’s unclear if Alex means for his driving or for the state he’s currently in.
“Take a minute.” He feels Alex’s nod more than he sees it, then breathes, the slow measure of his breath Alex begins to match.
“I know we weren’t going that fast,” Alex says. “I just kept thinking about if you got hurt.”
Jake presses his mouth against his neck. Around them, the honk and squeal of other cars. “You’re allowed to be upset.”
“I love you,” Alex says, low enough that it’s almost inaudible. “I didn’t want to tell you like this.”
Jake tightens his grip. “Tell me again, later. As many times as you want.”
“Thank you.” Alex’s voice is hoarse. They sit like that until Alex lets out a long exhale. “I’ll be okay. We should probably get back.”
“I can drive.” Jake expects a refusal, for Alex to insist he’s all right, even if he still looks pale.
A nod. A check to make sure the truck’s still in Park, the emergency brake on for good measure, before Alex opens the door and climbs out into the rain.
Jake drives them back, navigating slowly, attentive to the weather, to other vehicles, to Alex tense in the passenger’s seat, until he finally pulls them into Sofia’s driveway.
Inside, they change out of their rain-soaked clothes, Alex into a T-shirt, laughing when Jake shivers and asks to borrow a hoodie. Tea at Alex’s insistence, like Jake will get hypothermia on a July afternoon, a process that involves loose-leaf, a strainer, steeping time.
The house is cluttered, books double-stacked on bookshelves, craft objects and art and the occasional tool lining various surfaces. Jake spent his first day here monitoring to see if his brain was going to object to any of it. Instead, all the stuff takes on a mosaic-like quality: that everything is in a logical place, even if Jake doesn’t quite understand the logic. The rain only intensifies the effect, casting the living room in shadow, as he and Alex sit on the relatively dust-free couch.
I could live here. Here or in a house like this one, maybe with a couple of kids. Something about it warms him like taking a sip of perfect-temperature tea.
A vision tempered by the reality that he doesn’t know what’ll happen if word got out that he and Alex are living together. People might just pronounce it a baseball oddity and move on. Or maybe they wouldn’t. At best they might end up a trivia question. At worst it might make the day after the series in Oakland seem tame. That whatever privacy Alex wants—that he’s earned—will be erased.
“You ever think about what it’d be like if...” Jake begins.If we weren’t ballplayers. If we hadn’t lost. If everything was different.
Alex looks at him in question.
“Just thinking about how I always took it as given,” Jake continues, “I could play, or I could be open, but not both.”
An agreeing noise. “I’ve thought about it.”
“Coming out?”
“I wanted to get my ten years first.” Alex shrugs, like having ten years of service time and a major-league pension is no big thing, even if ninety percent of players never get that far. “Maybe do something that makes people shut up about us losing.”
That’s the other thing—the failure that’s been riding Jake for most of his career.Gay Players Botch World Championshiplikely to make every headline even if Jake is technically bi. “Decided it wasn’t worth it?”
