7. Diaz #2
“So, today,” I started carefully. “When the box collapsed—”
“Logically, I know it’s just a baking show. Nobody cares except for me. But at that moment, all I could think about was everyone watching me fail in real time.”
He let out a quiet, embarrassed breath.
“It sounds stupid, I know.”
“No. It doesn’t.”
“Peter, it was a cookie box.”
Something sharp and immediate twisted in my chest. And not only because he’d used my first name. I turned my head toward him in the dark, frowning even though I knew he probably couldn’t fully see it.
“You’re doing it again,” I grumbled.
“What?”
“Talking about yourself like your feelings don’t matter. That’s twice in one night, and I don’t like it.”
Silence.
“Just because you care about doing things better than the rest of us assholes doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with you,” I continued quietly. “Don’t minimize your feelings just because somebody else might’ve handled it differently.”
He didn’t answer right away.
And for some reason, that bothered me more than it should’ve. Because I knew that feeling, the instinct to dismiss your own hurt before somebody else could.
I’d spent years doing the exact same thing.
“My therapist says stuff like that,” he finally admitted.
“Well, your therapist sounds incredibly intelligent and sexy.”
That pulled a startled laugh out of him. “Her name is Florence, and I’m pretty sure she was alive during the world war.”
I snorted. “Which one?”
“Take your pick.”
The last few pieces of the Matty Miller puzzle were starting to click into place. And honestly, the final picture put a lot into perspective, things I’d known about him for years.
Whereas most of our teammates could wash away a bad game with a scalding shower and some fatty, postgame meal, Matty would sit at his locker replaying every at-bat in his head like game tape. Every missed swing, every defensive play he thought he could’ve handled cleaner.
I couldn’t count how many times I’d walked into the cages early and found him already there, drenched in sweat and trying to “fix” some microscopic flaw in his swing mechanics nobody else had even noticed.
The guy was a two-time Golden Glove nominee.
I had always chalked it up to him being intensely competitive. Having the kind of obsessive work ethic coaches drooled over. But lying here beside him now, I understood it differently.
It wasn’t just perfectionism. It was deeper than that.
It was the fear that if he wasn’t flawless, people would stop seeing him at all.
“You know, you’re not exactly easy to read either,” he said after a minute.
I let out a soft laugh. “Trust me, Alabama. My book is more like People magazine.”
“That’s bullshit and you know it.”
Matty’s voice was quiet, but firm. Like he was tired of letting me get away with the easy version of myself.
Join the club.
“I’m serious. No jokes, no bullshit. Just talk to me.” The mattress shifted as he rolled onto his side to face me. “The way you used to.”
The way you used to.
As the stranger on the other end of our DMs. PeteRoseCity9.
The easy answer hovered right there on my tongue. Something light and silly, a joke about eldest child syndrome. Anything to redirect the conversation somewhere safer.
But Matty deserved more than that.
He had already given me the truth tonight. It only felt fair to meet him there.
I swallowed hard.
“My mom died when I was twelve.”
The words sounded strange out loud. They tasted even worse.
“Abuelita and Guelo were suddenly raising their four grieving grandchildren while trying to grieve for themselves. My little sisters were terrified all the time.” I swallowed. “And my brother . . . he stopped speaking for almost three months.”
Beside me, Matty went very still.
“So, I found a way to fix it.”
I stared up at the ceiling, tracing the knots in the wood overhead with my eyes.
“At first, it was dumb little things. I’d make up ridiculous games to distract my sisters when they started crying.
I learned every dance from High School Musical because it was my brother’s favorite movie at the time.
” A quiet breath escaped me. “I started cooking with Abuelita too, mostly because the kitchen was the only place people still talked to each other.”
Matty didn’t interrupt or rush to fill the silence. He just listened.
“If the house got too quiet, I’d turn on music and force everybody into the living room. I basically became a one-man emotional support circus.”
That earned the faintest huff of laughter from Matty.
But my smile faded quickly.
“The thing is . . . it worked.” I swallowed again. “People laughed more and the house felt lighter. After a while, I think everybody just got used to me being the happy one.”
“The fixer,” Matty murmured.
“Mm-hmm. And once people start relying on you to keep things together—”
“It’s hard to stop.”
My throat tightened unexpectedly.
There he went again. Looking straight through me like it was the easiest thing in the world.
I turned my head toward him. Even in the dark, I could make out the shape of his face, the sad smile on his lips.
I swallowed hard. “Florence would love this.”
“Florence would charge you three-hundred bucks an hour.”
“That’s criminal.”
That earned me a sleepy snort.
Then quieter, more hesitant, Matty asked, “Is that why you started writing?”
The question settled over us gently.
I thought about all those late nights hunched over my laptop. All the things I’d poured into stories because I didn’t know how to say them out loud. And I wasn’t just talking about the sexy stuff.
“Yeah,” I finally admitted. “I think it was the first time I could be honest without feeling . . . exposed.”
“Until I accidentally stumbled across your secret identity.”
“Like a redheaded Lois Lane.”
Matty snorted softly. “I thought she was a redhead.”
“You’re thinking of Mary Jane. From Spider-Man.”
“Okay, nerd.” I could hear the smile in his voice now.
Okay, tesoro.
Fucking finally.
After months of awkward silence and stunted conversation, it felt like we were finally us again. The real us that used to text until the wee hours of the morning about nothing in particular.
I wanted to roll over, pull him close, and kiss him until neither of us could remember why we’d ever been angry.
But I couldn’t. I wouldn’t.
Not after everything he’d laid bare. Not when I was the one who’d broken his trust in the first place. Instead, I stayed on my side of the bed, Mo a warm, little barrier between us, and did my best to ignore the ache sitting low in my stomach.
The same one tenting my silk boxers.
No, my balls were in his court now . . . or however that saying went.
“For what it’s worth, I didn’t mean it,” he admitted after a while.
“Didn’t mean what?”
“I never thought your feelings for me were fake.”
I turned my head toward him, finding his eyes in the dim light filtering through the curtains.
I smiled. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
For a second, neither of us moved. Then, I felt it—a brief squeeze against my arm beneath the sheet. Warm, gentle. Reassuring.
And then, just as quickly, he pulled away.
Not quick enough, though. I was suddenly way too aware of the exact spot he’d touched.
Silence settled over us again, broken only by Mo’s tiny snores. Just when I thought Matty might’ve drifted off, he cleared his throat.
“Can I ask you one more thing?”
The question came so quietly, I almost missed it. Something in his voice made my stomach tighten.
“Sure,” I replied carefully.
A beat passed.
“Exactly how many pairs of silk boxers do you own?”
I turned so fast, the mattress squeaked.
Matty stared straight up at the ceiling, wearing the kind of perfectly innocent expression that told me he was absolutely full of shit.
“That’s what you want to talk about now?”
“I take it back,” he said. “I’ll settle for a rough estimate. More than ten?”
“Unbelievable.”
“Yup. Definitely more than ten.”
“I don’t have to take this,” I grumbled, fighting the urge to smile.
His shoulder shook. “You do if you want to take advantage of my air conditioning. All I’m saying is they’re a bit . . .”
“Luxurious? Sexy? Dickmatizing?”
“Impractical.”
I gasped audibly, feigning horror.
Then, as if on cue, Mo farted in her sleep.
Not a cute little pfft, either. No, this thing went on, echoing through the room. Like somebody had stepped on a haunted accordion.
In a cave.
Matty slowly turned his head toward the tiny dog loafed between us. Mo didn’t even twitch. Just kept snoring away, completely unbothered by the biological warfare she’d unleashed.
And then, the smell hit.
“Diablo!”
My entire body recoiled.
Matty made a strangled noise beside me. “Lord have mercy.”
“Is she dying?”
“Bite your tongue,” he whisper-shouted. “She had eggs earlier—”
“WHY THE FUCK WOULD YOU FEED HER EGGS?”
At that point, Matty completely lost it.
The laugh burst out of him so suddenly, he folded in half, burying his face in the pillow while the mattress shook beneath us. I lasted maybe three more seconds before I cracked too.
And then we were both gone.
Absolutely losing our shit in the middle of the night over the farting wiener dog sandwiched between us.
Every time we started to get it together, one of us would look at Mo, still fast asleep, and launch into another laughing fit.
By the time it finally died down, my stomach hurt. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d laughed that hard. Or fallen asleep with a shit-eating grin on my face.
I had a feeling Matty was smiling too.