They looked so harmless tucked in the booth by the window.
A small allowance for friendships with old people and a celebrity, Betty thought. Innocuous. Safe. Nothing that could throw off the delicate house of cards she’d worked so hard to construct. So she nodded yes. Because if an All-Star and his friends were offering her an opening, she’d be a fool not to take it.
5
Night Two
Sybil
The pancakes gaveSybil a stomachache, but it could have also been her nerves. They’d gotten the pleasantries out of the way before they went inside the diner, and Sybil was mortified to realize about fifteen minutes later when Julian and Zeke were talking sports that she had been completely clueless about Zeke.Beartown.She didn’t mean to be a stereotype, but she had left the sports to Mark. She had been team mom, of course, every season—club soccer, club baseball, club swimming (Eloise still held the freestyle record in the state for fourteen and unders). And though Sybil was an exceptional team mom—snack sign-ups went out as soon as rosters were made, no one ever went without oranges and Gatorade—she did not follow professional sports. While she thought Zeke looked familiar, it wasn’t until he and Julian were chatting about contract negotiations and Julian was making inquiries about Zeke’s injury that Sybil connected the dots.
She choked on the rancid coffee when she realized. Mark had been rabid about the end of the season and absolutely losthis shit when Zeke Rodriguez got beaned by a line drive right on his pitching elbow, ending both the Mets’ and Zeke’s season nearly on the spot. She’d been on her third glass of wine, slightly tipsy, thinking maybe this was the night she would confront Mark about the anesthesiologist, but he was so grouchy about the loss that she knew she had to pick a better moment.
Betty whisked away their dirty dishes, and Zeke grabbed the check, and Sybil wondered if maybe she wasn’t always waiting for a better moment. She didn’t used to be this way, but like so much about her life in her forties, she’d either lost control or given up on it. Those weren’t the same things, and in her more truthful moments, she knew it.
“Well,” she said, “I should probably get home.” It was three in the morning, and she didn’t actually have to get anywhere. But she decided right then that she was going to be the leader of the group, organizationally-speaking. Sybil did not like people to be uncomfortable in any sort of social setting, so didn’t want Zeke or Julian to feel as if they had to linger.
“Betty,” Zeke called toward the kitchen. “If we come back here next week, will you join us? Turn this triangle into a square?”
Betty popped out of the swinging door, wiping her hands on a dish towel. Sybil wanted to leap out of the booth, embrace her and take her home with her. Betty was too thin, Sybil thought, with purple crescents under her eyes. Not that any of them looked their best, because sleeplessness will do that to you. Though to be honest, Zeke actually did look his best. He was so handsome—huge dark moony eyes, poreless tan skin, a thick head of espresso hair, the exact right amount of stubble to weaken your knees—that Sybil had a hard time making eye contact. But Betty wasn’t much older than Eloise, not old enough to be considered a full adult. Maybe Sybil could find her abetter-paying job? Maybe Sybil could rescue her? Though maybe Sybil needed a project more than Betty needed any fixing.
“I’ll be here next week,” Betty said. “And if you tip me well enough, I’ll be happy to join you.” She beamed at Zeke, which for reasons Sybil didn’t understand, reddened her own cheeks. Like Betty’s flirting meant that Sybil was flirting too. Sybil hadn’t flirted in so long, she wasn’t even sure if the muscle still worked. Her stomach turned over, the pancakes sitting like a brick. She was desperate to undo the top button of her jeans, which weren’t particularly flattering to begin with. If she’d known she was meeting Zeke Rodriguez, she would have picked a better outfit.
“Sit for a minute,” Julian said to Betty while Zeke signed the bill. “So that next week, we have less to catch up on.”
Betty hesitated.
“There’s no one else here,” he added, gesturing to the deserted restaurant. “If you’re going to join us, then join us properly.”
“You seem like someone who likes rules,” Zeke observed to Julian.
“I think all three of us probably like rules one way or the other,” Julian replied, accurately sizing up Sybil within just a few hours of meeting her. And to Sybil’s mind, accurately sizing up Zeke too. He was a professional athlete after all.
“Touché,” Zeke said. He pressed his good hand to his eyelid. “This fucking thing has a mind of its own.” Then to Betty, “How can you make ends meet when you don’t have any customers?”
Betty smiled. “I rely on generous tips from the ones I do have,” she said, then frowned. “I think that sounds like I prostitute myself.”
“Honey,no, don’t even imply that,” Sybil said, her tonematernal but her internal joy sky-high. Because she knew it.She knew it!Here was a girl who needed mothering, and Sybil was a woman who knew how to mother. “Zeke, are you leaving her a generous tip?”
Zeke, so easy and gregarious, so unlike Mark, who was a tight-ass with money, said, “Can I pitch a fastball down the middle with my eyes closed?” And when no one spoke, he said, “Well, obviously.”
“Thank you, kindly,” Betty said, and dipped her head. “Anyway, I should probably check on the line cook.”
“Blowing off us old folks?” Julian asked. “I have to admit I’m a little curious why someone your age can’t sleep. The rest of us, well, I guess the older you get, the more problems you have.”
“I’m not that old,” Zeke said, and Sybil was reminded that she must look like a perimenopausal troll sitting across from a man who, if she wasn’t mistaken, was once onPeople’s Sexiest Man Alive list.
“Maybe next time,” Betty said. “If you come back again, maybe I’ll tell you then.”
6
Night Three
Zeke
October 21st
Six nights later,Zeke waspumped. Hadn’t been this pumped up in ages. Certainly not since his injury, so give or take about six weeks. It was one of those perfect fall New York City evenings, so he decided to walk to the diner. The days between their first meeting and now had felt interminably long—there was physical therapy, there were calls with his team to discuss the road back for next season, and there was nightly Sudoku with Sybil and Julian—but there was very little sleep. He wanted to suggest that they meet more often, but he didn’t want to sound desperate, like these two—three, if you included Betty—were the only thing he had going on.
