Work Text:
My mind's got a mind of its own right now
And it makes me hate me
I'll explode like a dynamite if I can't decide, baby"My Head and My Heart" - Ava Max
During the season, most days at home start the same for Aaron: wake at six, seven if the game went late. Kiss Sam on the forehead, admire the dark spill of her hair across Egyptian cotton. The way both puppies curl up beside her, nose to nose, along the curve of her belly.
Say a silent prayer. Notice it’s still dark. Autumn in New York.
Drink one green tea. Swim laps for fifteen minutes in the building pool before the idle housewives show up, get the heart racing. Shower. Brush. Floss. Moisturize. Sunscreen to keep the freckles at bay. Another cup of green tea, this time with a side of yogurt and muesli and whatever berries Milena found at Union Square a day or two before. Three hard boiled eggs and a chocolate protein shake.
Through the floor-to-ceiling 25th floor windows in their kitchen, the sun is barely a promise, peeking over the horizon on the Jersey side.
Check the group chat. Check the other group chat. Check the family group chat. Penny and Gus won’t stir until Sam does.
He has three hundred unread texts. Boggle, then remember that he’s going to the World Series. Scroll through another 75 variations on “congrats!”
Another 200 texts from people he actually knows and at least sixteen of those are from Wade. Every single one some variation of “what’s up bro?” and “you better fuck the Dodgers up for us, bro,” and “Soto and GT, huh?” and “maybe not lmaooooo” and “isn’t Trevy married?” and “isn’t TORRES??” and “damn you bitches wasted” and “shit your boy GT is having funnnnnn, brother,” and “lol slut” and “guess you gotta let that shit fly these days huh daddy??” Winky face emoji, winky face emoji, winky face emoji.
Aaron grimaces. He doesn’t have to stop himself. He’s in his own kitchen. Even his dogs aren’t awake yet. Sam won’t be awake for another hour. She’s due in a few months and more tired than she's ever been. He makes himself scroll through Tyler’s texts again and looks at the pics this time. He’s been on Twitter, that much is obvious.
When Aaron finds the inevitable video, lovingly republished by some avid fan from Instagram live, he stops. He turns down the sound. Pulls up the full screen clip.
Team plane. Two nights ago. Looking at it 48 hours later almost makes him feel that bone deep relief and weariness all over again. How remarkable that the human body can recover and thrive just to rinse and repeat. What an incredible feat of design, that anyone can sustain this level of mental stress for so long.
Aaron figures that’s why. He figures that’s why someone…
No. He knows that’s why.
Why a young man might make an immoral decision every now and again. For some unknown quantity of immoral. Why one might. Why he might. Why you might find yourself wrapped up in someone when you could turn to more appropriate outlets.
Aaron’s own face looks back at him from his iPhone. Benign, amused, eyes crinkled at the edges, smile just a little strained. On screen, he shakes his head, abashed. Ashamed at the twinge he’d felt in his gut, the sweat on his palms, but he’d never admit it.
On screen, Gleyber laughs. He’s buoyant, delighted. At 27, he still looks like a kid. He takes a bite of the burger he somehow took forty minutes to eat and sings with his mouth full. Gleyber is the slowest eater Aaron has ever met.
Out of frame, Juan Soto puts his hand on their second baseman’s bare stomach and his chin on Gleyber’s shoulder, and Gleyber feeds him a bite of his maimed burger. And Gleyber. He looks directly at Aaron, lips curving just so, and everyone on Instagram Live looks too.
Aaron feels his heart rate pick up, right there in his 40-million-dollar kitchen.
The moment breaks. Nestor starts singing. The Live stream goes black.
That’s when Gleyber put his phone down. That’s when he turned in the circle of Juan’s arms, when Jasson sat down with the other rookies, and when a cute pantomime, a little bit of saucy dancing, turned into something else. Aaron can see their bodies come together, he can see Juan’s hand move from stomach to side and then lower. Gleyber giggling as they tumble gracelessly into a row of airplane seats together. Too blissed out, too stunned, too caught up in the swell of history to care who can see. Who knows. How obvious it is. No one has ever accused Juan Soto of subtlety.
Aaron almost said something. But what? “Hey, stop?” “Hey, maybe not here?” “Hey, he’s…” he cannot follow that sentence to its natural conclusion and besides.
Even their rookies know better than to talk. Aaron was the only one frozen in place, staring at two sets of sneakers dangling into the aisle, noting a flailing hand. Scenting the air like some kind of deranged reptile for God only knew what.
Most of the boys looked down at their phones. Nestor turned the music up. Cole was snoring. Clarke redealt the poker hand and Harkey handed Volpe another beer.
Rizz touched the back of his hand where it was gripping the cushy headrest, fingers leaving indents in the leather. It made him shiver. Or maybe — maybe it was GT’s hiccupped little gasp, louder than the chorus of Gasolina.
“Sit.” Rizz tapped his hand again. His eyes said six different things. “There’s a whole season of Only Murders to watch.”
“Yeah.” In the memory, Aaron thinks he can see Gleyber’s gray bomber hit the plane carpet but that could be in his head. “Yeah, good call.”
Rizz pulled out his iPad and patted his knee.
Aaron Judge and pity have never belonged in the same sentence.
The thing with men, it started years ago. Before he was sure about anything. Before he was sure about Samantha. Before he became the Captain and the idea of flirting with, let alone fucking his teammates, became unthinkable. He never has, not since whatever happened with Wade in the minors.
The thing with Gleyber... it was different. It was nothing. It was a litany of possibilities and unasked questions and dark plane rides and his hand on Gleyber’s thigh and nothing more. It was wrapping the championship belt around Gleyber's waist after the ALDS in 2019 and feeling his breath catch at the hot proximity of their bodies.
The thing with Gleyber. Aaron used to think his minor league days with Tyler, when he’d admittedly indulged the most, were sleazy. What kind of good Christian boy took the day out on his laughing, floppy haired roommate? That’s how he used to think of it. Like he was “taking it out” on Tyler, even though Tyler would ask for it. Tease him relentlessly. The better the game was, the worse the game was, Tyler was there: lidded eyes and a smirk so wicked Aaron could feel it go right through him.
Tyler always had a joke on his tongue and a ready mouth. Everything was just bros. It was all “no worries, bud.” He made Aaron feel normal: from his size to his crooked teeth, from his unspoken needs to his preternatural seriousness and tendency to dwell on past mistakes. Tyler made him someone who could relax a little.
Aaron assumed it would end, and it did. They had girlfriends. They didn’t have girlfriends. He got called up. Tyler didn’t.
And Tyler, Tyler clocked whatever was going on with GT all the way from Scranton. “New buddy?” “Neck tattoo, huh?” And much later, after Wade and GT knew each other, after Tyler had seen enough and ribbed him mercilessly about the 'crush' he'd never act on: “do you rail him in a god-honoring way or?”
Aaron had rolled his eyes and told him to go back to his teenaged girlfriend at FSU. They laughed about it later.
He thinks they laughed about it later.
By then, he and Sam were married. And it was over anyway. Whatever he’d had with Gleyber — which, he’ll be honest. He was honest with Sam. With God. And the honest truth? It was nothing. It was a long look every now and then. A touch. A suggestive smirk. A shoulder shimmy on first base and a coy glance at home plate like, “maybe, if you hit one hard enough, you’ll catch me on the base path, and you can have me right there.”
Looking back now, maybe it was all in Aaron’s head.
This isn’t. This is happening.
Aaron remembers with gut wrenching clarity the first time he knew. GT sleeps late, like Sam. He's never early to the clubhouse.
It was Aaron who told Boonie to bench GT after that one egregious game in August. And it was Aaron who watched as Gleyber argued. And sulked. And then sat. That was Aaron's doing. And the next day there was Gleyber: early as hell, sleepy and shower damp, and wearing Soto’s Boras hoodie, cheeks flushed, smiling behind his hand, and drinking something made with whole milk. He smelled like the wrong aftershave.
Aaron can only imagine. He’s imagining right now. Beyond the team plane the other night, beyond the nearly indecent champagne cellies that do more than allude to shared showers.
No point in pretending he hasn’t pictured it before. He’s self-actualized. Can’t deny he watched it build. He’s the captain. It’s his job to keep a good read on the room. They moved Gleyber into the leadoff spot at his urging. Boone was with him, but he pushed for it, and he thinks that’s when it clicked, if not when it began. With Soto in the on-deck circle, watching GT’s at-bats, watching him in the batting box, hot little tongue caught between his front teeth. Hand on Gleyber’s shoulder in the cage, hand on his hip, standing behind him, giving little tips. The way Soto's fucking hips move is barely safe for primetime on the best of days. Plus, they’re around the same size. What does someone Aaron’s size have to give by way of pointers?
This is what kills him: GT would let him have it. He would have given it up years ago, when it wasn’t impossible. Aaron could have scooped GT into his lap in the damn dugout and Gleyber would have gone happily, gamely.
All of the flirting and the fleeting touches and the way Gleyber would fall asleep with his head on Aaron’s shoulder when they had a long flight home. And then Aaron would wake him with a gentle shake when they landed, and Gleyber would blink groggily at him, smile all relaxed and sloppy with sleep, and pout almost like he wanted Aaron to pick him up and carry him off the plane and take him home.
Aaron can imagine what it was, and what it might have been, so perfectly, and it makes him ache. He is happy, he is so happy in his marriage and his life and with his team, but it makes his head ache and his heart ache all the same.
How can you ache for something you’ve never had? He supposes it’s not unlike wanting to win so badly it hurts, becomes a physical need. A knot in your chest that can only be released by finally carrying the day.
That thought follows him down to the garage and eventually up to the Bronx.
It’s an optional workout day but nearly everyone shows. Aaron pretends he’s not scanning the field for GT. And if he is, it’s only to check in. Gleyber’s there, of course, posted up at the on-field cage, joshing around with Waldo when he isn’t watching rapt as Juan takes live BP. But isn’t everyone like that when Juan Soto hits?
During the season, most off-days at the stadium are the same for Aaron: first the weight room. Live BP. Fielding as an exercise in camaraderie more than anything else. Grilled chicken and vegetables over penne. Treatment. Fend off Tommy. Go through game tape, sitting in one of the little rooms the team has for just this purpose.
Boonie says it’s worse before the game, that once you’re in it, playing with the boys, nothing else matters. Boonie is right. In these lavish surroundings, laser focused on this mistake or that one, on the way Yoshinobu Yamamoto hung a curveball on him, or fired a 97-mph heater high in the zone for strike, Aaron can feel his focus slipping. An hour ago, on the field, he had felt cool and calm about everything. All the anguish from the morning slipped away. On the field, they were his teammates: as loving and supportive of each other as they all are, as enthused, as excited.
Alone in the half-dark, with his own mistakes laid out for his appraisal, Aaron can’t chase the images from his head. They don’t head to LA until Wednesday, and he’s already thrumming with nervous energy. It’s like he can feel it crackling under his skin, sparking a pornographic slideshow in his head.
His iPhone buzzes in his pocket. Aaron fishes it out and, as though summoned by his spun-out thoughts, it’s GT.
“Heyyyyy. Where you at??? 👀.”
He flips his phone over, rubs his hands over his face. He is so fucked. It’s deviant shit to picture what your teammates could get up to on a five-hour flight. It's fucked up to work yourself into a froth over what was probably fleeting recklessness.
In that he’ll never be privy to it like that again. Only the hints.
He thinks: this is not the kind of problem you can bring to the mental skills coach.
He thinks: how do you get this kind of shit out of your system?
He thinks: oh Jesus fuck, not again, because a door slams just beside his tape room, and he’d know that laugh anywhere. That breathy, stupid, sexy giggle. The smile that goes with it.
He had thought these rooms were soundproof. He remembers from the tour, when the new clubhouse opened, the way Lou Cucuzza had pointed out the video rooms proudly and noted the total privacy they afforded.
A thump from the other side of the wall puts that misapprehension to bed.
Aaron takes a deep breath. On screen, he whiffs at Yamamoto during his second at bat that day in June.
Another thump. The sound of a plush wheeled chair being pushed aside, hitting the built-in work surface. A muted, but unmistakable moan.
Aaron could put on his headphones. He could pick up his phone and text GT. Ask to speak to him. Pull some captain shit. He could make it sound threatening. He could.
He could knock. He could put an end to this right now.
But that’s the problem, isn’t it? The sixteenth captain of the New York Yankees does not insert himself into the sordid indiscretions of his teammates. Not when the thought makes his heart race with pent up longing rather than some protective, leaderly desire to protect the team or the boys or, God forbid, the image.
He can picture it. That smug little thing Juan does with his mouth, the way his eyes issue a challenge as quickly as they prelude laughter. He can see the point of his tongue, the curled upper lip. Aaron knows—he fucking knows how easy Gleyber is for it. How much he loves attention, a hand on his shoulder, how he’d go to his knees.
Is that Juan saying, "so good, GT...so fuckin’ good." And a bit later, after Aaron realizes he's basically holding his breath, "vamos baby...hazme corra." Or is it just in Aaron’s head?
The heel of his hand is pressed against his uniform trousers before he’s fully conscious of it. He’s hard. Obviously he’s hard. He got hard the second he heard Gleyber’s laugh and felt as much heard the door slam.
What would he say? If he were the one desecrating the clubhouse, the team plane, the showers, the fucking lockers, if he were getting his dick sucked at home plate?
He’d touch Gleyber’s silly, decoratively shaved eyebrow. His curls. Aaron would look at him like he loved him, whisper “baby, baby, baby.” He’d brush a thumb over GT’s mouth, cup his cheek and feel where his dick pushed things to the limit.
He thinks he can hear two sets of lungs breathing harshly and so loud. Or maybe that’s his own breath. Maybe the silence is the ebb and flow of traded kisses, of Juan tasting himself in the corners of GT's red mouth. Aaron's belt buckle hits the edge of the table in his haste to get pants open and his hand down the front of his briefs. He barely has to touch himself; he’s always been quick to go off, wound tight. He cups his dick, and next door he would swear on all things holy he hears Gleyber Torres call Juan Soto “papi.”
Aaron comes over the loose grip of his fingers in a rush. Involuntary.
Fuck Lou for saying these stupid little rooms are soundproof. At least there’s a box of tissues handy. He cleans up. He takes a sip of lukewarm water from his ever-present water bottle. Wipes the back of his fist over his mouth and catches his own scent. Groans. He’s going to have to rewatch this entire game, his routine derailed.
For a moment, he strains to hear what’s happening in the adjacent booth. He didn’t hear the door open. He tilts his head and—
“Mira,” Juan says—and Aaron can hear the smile in his voice, the affection. He can picture Juan’s matinee idol mouth close, close to Gleyber’s ear, the way he’s leaning over Gleyber’s shoulder and pointing at the screen, tilting his head just enough to run his lips over GT’s neck in the space between one sentence and the next—“Mira, baby, you were chasing just a lil’ with Flaherty back in ‘23. Not this time, nena. You got this.”
Of course. Now they’re working. Who has a better view of Gleyber’s at-bats then Juan? Standing on-deck, watching every pitch with a hunter’s eye. Who else could offer that kind of expert insight?
(He could.)
Aaron turns back to his own screen. He cues up the tape, back to the start of the game. He feels… more loose somehow. Unwound. His blood feels settled in his veins, his thighs untensed. His whole body saying, “you needed that, now lock in.”
They leave for LA in less than 24 hours and the circus will kick into full gear. Aaron Judge, Sixteenth Captain of the New York Yankees, locks in.
—
Later, much later, he will hit home run number four of his second World Series. It is his most successful postseason showing to date. Soto on first, Gleyber on second. He’ll round the bases, and when he crashes into both of them at home plate, as the team spills out and surrounds them, Juan will look directly at him, eye-contact worthy of a romance film confession, and say, “got you going back then, didn’t we?” somehow aware that Aaron could never forget and hasn't looked away since.
And then...he’ll wink.