Marlon Voss, 67, retired smokejumper, has manned the burger grill at the annual Deschutes County fire department fundraiser every year since he hung up his parachute 12 years prior. His forearms are crisscrossed with pale scars from stray embers and tree branches, calluses so thick on his hands he can flip a patty straight off the coals without flinching. He’s avoided Clara Mendez all afternoon, his eyes darting away every time he spots her wavy silver-streaked brown hair bobbing through the crowd, the hem of her flannel shirt dusting the tops of her work boots as she hauls folding chairs for elderly attendees. He’d known her for 32 years, first as his jump partner Ray’s wife, then as Ray’s widow, and for the last eight, as the woman he’d caught himself staring at across the grocery store produce aisle, his throat tight, before he’d turn and haul ass down the cereal aisle like a spooked deer.
The taboo of it nags at him like a blister he can’t pop. Ray had saved his life on a jump outside Bend in 2001, pushing him out of the way of a falling ponderosa pine that would’ve crushed him flat. His wife Linda had made him promise a month before she died of ovarian cancer that he wouldn’t spend the rest of his life alone, but he’d written that off as morphine-induced sentimentality, too stubborn to admit he was more lonely than he’d ever been in his life. He’s half convinced acting on the stupid, warm buzz he gets when she laughs would be a betrayal of everyone he’d ever loved, so he’d kept his distance, only speaking to her when she dropped off native saplings for the reforestation projects he runs on county land, their interactions polite, brisk, over in two minutes flat.
The crowd thins out as the sun dips below the pine line, the sky turning soft pink and tangerine, the smell of charcoal smoke mixing with the pine scent drifting off the national forest land bordering the park. He’s scraping burnt crumbs off the grill when he feels a soft pressure on his hip, her shoulder brushing his as she leans past him to grab a jar of pickled onions off the folding table next to the grill. “Figured I’d grab one before some kid dumps the whole jar on his hot dog,” she says, and he can smell lavender lotion and pine sap on her skin, the sound of her voice warm, familiar, like the crackle of a campfire he’s sat next to a hundred times. Her fingers brush his when he passes her a paper plate stacked with a burger and a side of potato salad, and he freezes for half a second, his skin prickling like he’s touched a live wire. She holds his eye contact for three beats too long, a small, teasing smirk tugging at the corner of her mouth, before she nods at the burnt edge of the patty. “Some things never change. You still burn the goddamn burgers like you did at jump camp in ‘98.”
He snorts, wiping his hands on the front of his faded fire department hoodie, and for the first time all day he doesn’t look away. “They taste better charred. You’re just picky.” She gestures at the empty picnic bench 10 feet away, half hidden behind an oak tree, and he follows her without thinking, his boots crunching on discarded paper plates and crumpled napkins. They sit, and her knee presses against his under the table, the heat of her leg seeping through the denim of his jeans, and he doesn’t move away. She tells him about the nursery she’s run for 15 years, about the new batch of ponderosa saplings she’s growing for his reforestation project, about her mom’s recent hip surgery, and he listens, more tuned in than he’s been to anyone talking since Linda died. He tells her about the old fire lookout he maintains up on Mount Bachelor, the way the sun rises over the Cascades so bright it makes your eyes water if you don’t wear sunglasses, and she leans forward, her elbows on the table, her eyes soft, like she actually cares what he’s saying.
The crickets start chirping, the last of the crowd loading into their trucks and driving off, the distant sound of country music fading down the road. He’s halfway through telling her about the time Ray tripped over his own parachute harness and face-planted in a mud puddle right before a jump, when she reaches out, her fingers brushing the scar on his forearm, the one he got from the pine that almost killed him. “Ray always said you were too stubborn for your own good,” she says, her voice quieter now, no trace of the teasing from earlier. “Said you’d punish yourself for being happy if you thought you didn’t deserve it.” He feels his throat go tight, the old guilt bubbling up, the part of him that screams he’s betraying Ray, betraying Linda, and for a second he wants to stand up, mumble an excuse, and drive home to his empty cabin. But then she squeezes his arm, and he looks at her, at the silver threads in her hair, the small laugh lines around her eyes, and he realizes he’s tired of being angry, tired of being lonely, tired of punishing himself for outliving the people he loved.
He reaches up, his thumb brushing a stray strand of hair off her face, his calloused finger grazing her cheek, and she doesn’t pull away, her breath catching soft enough that he almost doesn’t hear it. “I’ve got extra coffee up at the lookout next Saturday,” he says, his voice rougher than he expects. “If you want to come see the sunrise.” She smiles, the same warm, wide smile he’s seen in a hundred old photos of her and Ray, the same smile he’s dreamed about more times than he’d ever admit out loud, and she nods, squeezing his hand where it’s resting on the bench between them. She stands up a few minutes later, slinging her canvas work bag over her shoulder, and she doesn’t let go of his hand until she’s halfway to her beat-up Subaru, her fingers slipping slow out of his. He sits there for another 20 minutes, the grill long cold, the moon peeking out over the pine tops, and when he pulls his phone out to text her the address of the lookout trailhead, his fingers don’t shake.
