Chapter 17
I don’t believe in fate, but it’s possible that every choice in my life—every success, every failure—has led me to this very moment: standing here with Diego Cruz in front of a rack of novelty condoms in a New York City souvenir store. Pointing. Laughing. Promoting safe sex.
My wiener does tricks, says one wrapper with a picture of, yes, a dachshund. Luke, I am not your father, says another. I cum in peace, with an alien. And Suck me. I’m famous.
Diego particularly likes that last one. Don’t have to ask me twice.
Back to business, we shimmy through an aisle full of tourists, past the snow globes and stuffed taxis, and over to the T-shirts. They do not disappoint.
“This one. This is the one,” Diego says, proudly holding up his selection.
“Holy shit.”
“It’s perfect.”
“But the whole point of this was to stop you from standing out,” I say. On the front of the white T-shirt, the words U.S.A. OPEN circle a giant tennis ball spinning in front of an American flag. “That’s a walking billboard.”
“Yes, for the USA Open,” Diego replies, really punching the A. “Whatever that tournament is, I’m not in it.”
“Yep, you’ll fool everyone.”
“Oh my god, look at the back.” He flips the shirt around, and it’s ten times worse.
A tennis ball is the prominent feature there too—it’s the USA Open, after all—but so is literally every other ball known to man. It’s a collage of baseballs, basketballs, volleyballs, even a goddamn pickleball. “Just, all the sports,” I say, taking in the monstrosity.
Diego turns and flops it on the checkout counter.
“Sir, I have traveled all the way to New York for the USA Open,” he says, “and I will pay any price for this shirt.”
—
The sun dips just below the trees as we turn onto an unpaved path in Central Park, away from the evening crowd. Surprisingly, not one person has taken a second look at Diego in his knockoff souvenir outfit, now complete with Pizza Rat shorts.
“Speaking of new clothes,” Diego says, ducking under a branch, “are we going to talk about Nike?”
“What about it?”
“You basically got offered a sponsorship deal back there.”
“I don’t know. It sounded pretty unofficial to me.”
“Why aren’t you excited, though?”
I look at him, considering my response.
“Since I got here, all the questions I get—everything is about who I’m attracted to. No one cares that I almost broke a serve record. No one cares about how I’m playing.”
“Why does that bother you, though? Who cares what they say? Just take the money.”
That’s easy for him to say when all anyone talks about is how incredible he is, the future of men’s tennis. “It’s hard to explain. When I came out, it wasn’t a big deal for most people. And now it is. I guess I’m not used to that.”
“But, like…” Diego pauses. “Why did you come out if you weren’t cool with people talking about it?”
I stop, and Diego hangs back. I’m not exactly sure what he’s implying, but his question doesn’t sit right.
And why is he pressing me so hard on this?
I wanted this conversation to come up eventually, mainly to see if I can get any information about his own sexuality, but this is annoying. Whose side is he on?
“I am cool with people talking about it,” I say. “I just don’t want it to be the headline. There’s a difference.”
“I mean, the first gay guy in a Grand Slam—that’s a big deal.”
“To them, yeah. To me…I dunno. It just comes with a bunch of people being assholes online.”
“That’s why you gave up your phone?”
“Kind of.” Which is true, but I skip the part about my sleepless night due to him and his ghosting.
“I’m just trying to understand why that wouldn’t make you proud,” he says, continuing to double down. “I want to be the first Mexican man to win a Grand Slam. That would make me proud.”
There’s a difference between the two things. I can’t really articulate it, though. And now I feel like I have to defend myself. “Being gay does make me proud,” I say. “It’s just not the only thing about me.”
“Right. You’re also smart and funny and bad at Ping-Pong.”
I laugh, and the tension lifts a bit. We keep walking. “And you will be the first Mexican man to win,” I tell him. “It’s hard to believe that’s never happened before.”
“I was really lucky growing up,” Diego says.
“My family lived next to a private club, and I played there every day. I had access to the best coaches in Mexico City, the best training. And then my parents sent me to train in Florida. I had everything I needed to make it. It’s impossible if you don’t have that support. ”
“If you’re as good as you are, you find a way.”
“No,” he responds, breezing past my compliment.
“You have to be rich and you have to be lucky. I know that, and I’m grateful every single day.
That’s why I’m starting my foundation. It’s going to fund public courts in Mexico, make scholarships.
I want kids to have the opportunities I had, but that takes lots of money. ”
He’s not wrong, and I’m well aware of that.
Most of the players on tour come from wealthy families all over the world.
“The only reason I’m here is Robbie,” I say.
“He hasn’t charged my family anything since I started working with him in juniors.
He’s the rich one, not us. No way could we afford him. ”
“See, there’s the luck part. You’re lucky he’s rich,” he says with a head tilt. “Also”—he winces, looking down at his shoes—“I’ve been trying not to complain, but these loafers are killing me.”
“I told you to get the matching Pizza Rat flip-flops.”
We veer off the path and take a seat on a large rock overlooking a grassy field. Diego peels off his shiny leather loafers, now coated in a thin layer of dirt from the walk. We sit together, watching a softball game in the distance.
After a moment, Diego turns to me slightly and asks, “Why did you come out?”
“Because I’m gay. You haven’t seen the articles?”
He laughs. “No, like, was there something that inspired you?”
I sigh as I consider which version of the story I should tell him. But if I’m honest, maybe he’ll be more comfortable being honest too.
“My best friend when I was growing up. We were really close. And we would like…mess around and stuff. And it got to the point where we were doing it all the time, hanging out all the time, and I was like, We’re basically dating already.
Let’s make it official. So we did. We agreed,” I say, adding a shrug. “Freshman year of high school.”
The story’s simple and sweet up to then. It was wonderful—falling in love with my best friend, and shouting about it to the world.
“I was thrilled. I told Charlotte, my parents, a few friends. I don’t think anyone was surprised. They all saw me sobbing at Patrick singing ‘The Best’ to David on Schitt’s Creek.”
Diego nods. “I loved that part. It made me want to learn guitar,” he says. Hearing that would normally make my heart skip a beat, but I have to finish the story, and unlike Schitt’s Creek, it doesn’t have a happy ending.
“And then I posted a photo. Me and Jake holding hands. Just a photo of our hands, no caption or anything. I was so nervous to post it, but when I did, it felt amazing, like a weight was lifting from my chest. And I don’t think it was because I was finally coming out to everyone.
I think it was about him. He meant so much to me, I was so happy when I was with him, and I wanted everyone to know. ”
I clear my throat.
“The next day…he changed his mind. He asked me to take the post down. He took it all back like it never even happened, and we basically never hung out again. He wouldn’t answer my texts, ignored me at school, at lunch.
And, yeah, that’s about it. I went from having a best friend to having a boyfriend to having… nothing at all.”
“Shit,” Diego says softly.
“The rest of the school was cool about it. My family was wonderful. The only issue was him. For some reason, it was just him.” I shake my head.
After all these years, I still don’t understand it.
“So yeah, it was really shitty, but I just took everything I had left in me and poured it into tennis.” I shrug. “That part worked out, I guess.”
Across the field, a batter winds up and cracks a softball into the sky. Bright red and white jerseys scatter the bases.
“Oh, and my dad died a few months later.”
“Fuck.”
“Yeah. Fun times.”
Diego is quiet for a few moments. I don’t blame him. There’s not much you can say after that.
“Have you dated anyone since then?” he asks.
“Not really, no.”
“Hooked up?”
I pause. Interesting question. “No.”
Why did I choose honesty here? If Diego thought I was cool in any way before, all of that will get blown up when he does the math and realizes I haven’t touched a dick other than my own in five years.
“What would you do…when you guys hooked up?” he asks.
I turn to him, my eyebrow dipping. “What do you mean?”
He chuckles, looks away. “Never mind.”
“Like, what would we do?” I ask, basically repeating him, but I want to make sure I understand what he’s asking. And it buys me a little time to cover my shock at his directness.
He turns back to me, shrugs his shoulder. “Yeah.”
“I would jerk him off. He would jerk me off. And then we moved on to…mouths.”
Diego meets my eyes.
“Oh. Wow, yeah. Good for you,” he says, twisting his hands together.
“What about you?” I’m surprised I asked the question, but hey, he opened the door.
“What about me?”
“Have you dated anyone…recently?” I ask, playing a little dumb, because I’m pretty sure of the answer.
“Yeah. There was someone for a second, but she lives in Milan, and it never really worked with the distance.”
This is zero news to me—the someone he’s referring to is a famous Italian model—but describing the relationship as having lasted “a second” is a little suspect. Based on his posts, and my very normal and not at all stalkerish sleuthing, it was six months, maybe longer.
“We barely saw each other, though,” he continues, “and sexting can only get you so far.”
“Can only get you off so far.”
He stares at me, then finally laughs. It took him a beat, but he got there. I had to go for the joke to distract myself from thinking about him having sex with that beautiful woman.
“There was this one time, though,” he says, leaning in closer.
“We had this private villa on Lake Como, with a heated pool. We’re enjoying some wine in the water.
I’m behind her, arms wrapped around shoulders, and she reaches back and just pulls down my shorts.
And we”—he pauses, lowers his voice—“do it right there, watching the sunset. Anyone could have seen. Maybe someone did.” He turns back to the baseball game with a smug look on his face.
“Romantic” is all I can say, as jealousy courses through me and gathers in my pants. And now I’m as hard as this rock we’re camped out on.
“I don’t know. I don’t have time for any of that now. I wasn’t that sad when we ended.”
“Seems like you have a little time now.” The words slip out of my mouth before I can catch them. That was fucking forward. He looks at me, smirks, and shakes his head as he hops up. Fuck, I wish I hadn’t said that. He slides his shoes on and holds his hand out to pull me up.
“Uh, I’ll just sit here a second longer.”
“Why?”
I pause, shift around, trying to think of a good answer as I wait for my blood to return to its normal places.
“Oh, I see now,” he says with a smirk. Apparently I wasn’t discreet. He reaches out to grab my hand anyway, yanks me up. “Walk it off,” he says, and smacks my back. “Hardy boy.”
I’ve never been so embarrassed and turned on at the same time.
“Should we play Mario Kart?” Diego asks.
“I don’t want to shatter your confidence before tomorrow,” I reply as we start walking, my hand in my pocket, hiding my dick against my leg.
“You can’t say shit like that to me. Now we definitely have to play.”
We cut toward the street as the sky lights up in cotton candy pink and I find myself about to host Diego in my hotel room once again—at his suggestion.
I love that we’re getting more comfortable with each other, sharing our hopes, dreams, sexual histories, but I can’t help the nerves creeping back in.
I’m so curious about him. He seems just as curious about me—but is it for the same reasons?
I’m still clueless about what he ultimately wants here, but I’m enjoying this friendship—I need this friendship—and I don’t want to fuck things up. Not again.
—
In my hotel room, I’m cruising in first place when a blue shell finds me and hovers just above my head. There’s no recovering from this, because I know Diego is right behind me, ready to pounce. He’s probably the one who launched it.
The shell detonates in a cloud of smoke, and Peach screams, flying into the air. Diego speeds past me to win the gold, and I’m left in fifth place—an anticlimactic finish for me.
“Next time, Hardy Boy,” Diego says, reaching for his phone.
He’s chosen a healthy distance from me on the bed, and it’s been another very platonic hangout.
“Oh shit, look at this.” He moves across the bed to shove his phone in my face, and suddenly our bodies are much closer.
On his screen, a helicopter darts across the New York City skyline.
“A sponsor wants me to take this to site tomorrow morning.”
“Whoa.”
“What time are you going over there?”
“I think Robbie said nine?”
“Okay, that would work. Want to come along?”
“In that thing?” I’m scared enough on airplanes, and a chunk of metal hovering in the air sounds worse.
“Come on. It would be so fun.”
“You don’t have to go with your team?” I ask, searching for any way out of this instead of telling him that falling from the sky is my number three fear of all time.
“No, they can just take a car. Technically, I’m the only one who needs to be in it—and film some stuff for social.”
“And you trust me as a cameraperson?”
“I do,” he says, patting my chest. It’s hard to say no when he does that. I sigh, leaning back against the bed frame, continuing to flip through excuses. “Robbie will literally kill me if I ask him about this.”
“Why?”
“He’ll say it’s unnecessary. He doesn’t like”—I search for the word—“extravagance.”
“You seem pretty smart. You’ll figure out a way.” His grin pierces my heart, and at that moment I know that I will. I’ve reached a point where I would risk death to spend even an extra minute with Diego, so I guess I’ve got a new ride to work.