Rayford “Ray” Pritchard, 61, only showed up to the Deschutes County fire department barbecue because his next-door neighbor banged on his workshop door at 2 p.m. sharp and reminded him the crew had pulled his half-restored 1968 Airstream from a wiring blaze last spring. He’s a vintage travel trailer restorer by trade, calloused palms crisscrossed with tiny scars from sheet metal snips and staple guns, face crinkled at the corners of his eyes from decades of working under the eastern Oregon sun, and his biggest flaw is that he’s hidden away from any sort of community event since his wife died eight years prior. He’d rather spend his nights sanding cabinet doors and listening to old Merle Haggard records than make small talk with people who still look at him like he’s one missed meal away from falling apart.
He stands off to the side by the rolling beer cooler, half-hidden behind a stack of folding chairs, beer sweating through the paper label in his hand, when she steps up next to him. She’s closer than most people get these days, close enough that he can smell lavender lotion and the faint, sweet mildew of old paper on her clothes, can see a smudge of blue ink on the side of her thumb, a tiny pine needle stuck to the hem of her linen sundress. She reaches for a seltzer on the top shelf of the cooler, and her forearm brushes his, warm and soft through the thin fabric of his faded Carhartt shirt. She pulls back fast, apologizes, and holds eye contact for a full two seconds longer than polite small talk requires, dark brown eyes crinkling at the corners like she’s already amused by him.
She introduces herself as Margot, the new county librarian, and says she’s been trying to track him down for three weeks. He blinks, confused, until she mentions the box of tattered 1970s backcountry camping guides he dropped off at the library’s donation bin back in May. He’d forgotten he’d even donated those, had stuffed the box in his truck after clearing out his late wife’s old camping gear, didn’t leave a name, but she’d found an old utility bill tucked between the pages of a guide to Pacific Northwest hiking trails with his address scribbled on the back. He tenses up at first, expecting the usual soft, pitying tone people use when they mention his wife, but she doesn’t go there. She just teases him for hoarding guidebooks that lie about how easy it is to set up a canvas tent in a rainstorm, and laughs so hard at his story about spending three hours fumbling with a tent pole in a downpour on his honeymoon that her shoulder presses against his for three long seconds. He doesn’t pull away.
Hickory smoke from the grill curls through the air around them, citronella candles crackle a few feet away, the sound of kids screaming on the nearby playground mixes with old Johnny Cash playing on the portable speaker by the food table. She tells him about the library’s new summer program for teens in the foster system, says they’ve been asking for hands-on workshops, and she’s been trying to find someone to teach them how to fix up old camping gear. He opens his mouth to say no, has the excuse ready that he’s too busy with three trailer restorations due before fall, but then she leans in, brushes a fleck of grilled burger ash off his jaw with the tip of her index finger, and he goes still. Her skin is warm, softer than anything he’s touched in years, and she doesn’t look embarrassed when she pulls back, just raises an eyebrow like she’s daring him to say no.
He says he’ll do it, but only if she brings the homemade blackberry pie she mentioned baking last weekend as payment. She grins, bright and unapologetic, and says she’ll bring two, one for the kids, one for him to take home to eat while he works on his Airstream. They stand there talking for another hour as the sun dips below the pine trees, turning the sky pink and orange, the string lights strung between the tree trunks flicker on, casting soft gold light over her hair. He finds himself telling her stories about the trailers he’s restored, about the old couple who drove their 1962 Shasta from Maine to Alaska for their 50th anniversary, about the teen who saved up for two years to buy a beat-up 1970s camper to live in while she attends community college, and he doesn’t even notice when he runs out of beer.
When she says she has to head home to feed her two rescue cats, he walks her to her beat-up Subaru, opens the driver’s side door for her. She pulls a crumpled slip of notebook paper out of her purse, scribbles her cell number on it in that same blue ink that was smudged on her thumb, and shoves it into the pocket of his Carhartt shirt, her knuckles brushing his chest through the fabric. She tells him she’ll text him the workshop dates first thing Monday, then winks before she pulls the door shut. He stands there in the gravel parking lot until her taillights disappear around the bend in the road, the crinkle of the paper in his pocket a soft, warm weight against his hip.
He twists the cap off his third cold beer, leans back against the cooler, and already starts making a mental list of the old tent poles and vintage camp stoves he can bring for the kids.
