Elroy Mendez, 52, has been a minor league baseball scout for the Cleveland Guardians organization for 19 years, and his biggest flaw is that he hates deviating from routine. For eight years straight, after every scouting trip within 100 miles of his Akron apartment, he stops at the same diner off I-71 for a meatloaf special and a black coffee, no exceptions. The night he rolls into tiny Millersburg, Ohio, after watching a 17-year-old lefty throw 92 mph fastballs for three shutout innings, that diner is closed, plastic wrap stretched over the front windows, a handwritten sign taped to the door blaming a burst pipe. He grumbles, turns his beat-up 2008 F150 toward the only lit spot on Main Street: a dive bar called The Hitching Post, neon sign flickering like it’s one power surge away from dying for good.
The air inside smells like fried pickles, old pine floorboards, and the faint, sweet tang of someone’s vanilla vape. The only other patrons are a group of old farmers playing dominoes in the back booth, so Elroy slides onto the bar stool farthest from the door, tucks his scouting notebook into the inner pocket of his faded flannel, and orders a Bud Light. The bartender, a woman in her late 40s with streaks of silver in her dark braid and chipped mint-green nail polish, brings the cold bottle over a minute later, and their fingers brush when Elroy reaches for it. He yanks his hand back like he touched a hot stove, because he hasn’t had casual physical contact with anyone who isn’t a high school coach or a player’s dad in almost a decade, not since his ex-wife left him for a real estate agent with a boat and a better work schedule.
She smirks, doesn’t comment on his reaction, just leans against the bar across from him, her elbow six inches from his, the neck of her denim overalls slung loose over a faded Dolly Parton t-shirt. The jukebox in the corner plays Conway Twitty’s “Hello Darlin’” low enough that they don’t have to raise their voices to talk, and she asks him what he’s doing in town, no trace of small-town prying in her tone, just casual curiosity. He makes a vague comment about traveling for work, and she laughs, nodding at the edge of his scouting notebook that’s sticking out of his flannel pocket, says she figured he was either a cop or a baseball guy, since he kept glancing at the crumpled box score sticking out of his back pocket.
He laughs, surprised, and they trade dumb stories for the next 45 minutes: him talking about the time a 16-year-old catcher threw a fastball that hit him square in the nuts during a pre-draft workout, her talking about the time she had to kick a group of Amish teens out of the bar for trying to order hard cider while still in their plain clothes. When she leans past him to grab a stack of napkins from the dispenser behind his stool, her hip brushes his shoulder, and he can feel the heat of her through the thick denim of her overalls, catch the scent of lavender hand lotion and lemon Pledge on her clothes. He freezes for half a second, suddenly hyper aware of how close she is, how her hair smells like rain, how she holds eye contact for a beat longer than necessary when she pulls back.
The conflict hits him square in the chest when she mentions her son was the lefty pitcher on the mound that afternoon, the same kid Elroy is in town to scout. League rules strictly prohibit fraternizing with players’ family members before the draft, penalty is a suspension or even termination, and he’s spent 19 years following every rule to the letter, never giving his bosses a reason to doubt him. A wave of hot, sharp guilt hits him first, half disgust at himself for even entertaining the idea of breaking a rule he’s followed for almost two decades, half buzzing, unnameable desire he’d thought he’d outgrown years ago. He sits up straight, pulls his notebook out of his pocket, sets it on the bar like evidence, tells her he can’t do this, that talking to her is a conflict of interest that could cost him his job. She doesn’t even flinch, just smirks, pours herself a shot of tequila, says she knew exactly who he was 20 minutes into their conversation, that her son has already gotten three other D1 offers, that no one is gonna accuse them of rigging anything if they get a burger from the food truck out back after her shift ends in 10 minutes.
He hesitates for 17 full seconds, the part of him that’s spent 8 years sticking to his routine screaming that he should pay his tab and drive home, the other part of him, the part he thought died when his wife left, thrumming with a giddy, forbidden kind of excitement he hasn’t felt since he was a kid sneaking into minor league games with his dad. He nods, pays for his beer, waits for her to lock up the bar. They sit on the tailgate of his F150, eat greasy cheeseburgers that drip down their wrists, and she steals a fry off his plate without asking, like they’ve known each other for years instead of an hour. He wipes a smudge of ketchup off her chin with the pad of his thumb, and she leans into his touch for half a second before pulling back, grinning, the corner of her mouth turned up. The crickets chirp loud in the trees lining the street, the humid August air starting to cool off as the sun dips below the horizon, and a group of teens drives by blaring Luke Combs so loud the truck’s mirrors rattle. He doesn’t overthink it, just reaches over, laces his fingers through hers, and lets her squeeze his hand tight.
