Clay Bennett, 58, retired U.S. Forest Service ranger, had spent the last three hours manning the fire department beer tent under a sweltering July sun, his work boots caked in dust from the fairground gravel, his shoulders sore from hoisting 30-packs of craft lager out of the dented ice chest at his feet. He’d signed up for the shift as a favor to his old fire crew buddy, but he’d been dreading it all week—small town fundraisers meant endless small talk, people asking how he was holding up seven years after his wife’s stroke, people pushing their opinions on the latest town drama like he had any stake in it. His worst flaw, he’d admit if pressed, was that he’d built a solid little life of avoiding anything that might rattle the quiet routine he’d built since he hung up his ranger hat: coffee at the diner at 6 a.m. sharp, three hours of hiking the backcountry trails every afternoon, frozen dinner and old Westerns on the couch by 8. No surprises, no mess, no drama.
He recognized Mara Hale the second she walked up to the tent, even though he’d never spoken to her directly. The 54-year-old librarian had moved to town six months prior, and had made local headlines two weeks earlier for chewing out the school board at a public meeting when they tried to ban a stack of young adult novels he’d actually read a few years back, after his granddaughter left a copy at his house. Half the town treated her like a radical troublemaker, the other half like a hero, and Clay had gone out of his way to stay firmly in the middle, avoiding the library entirely so he wouldn’t have to pick a side. He didn’t have time for fights that didn’t involve putting out wildfires or rescuing lost hikers.
She leaned over the folding table, her sun-bleached blonde hair falling loose over the shoulder of her faded linen tank top, and ordered a hard seltzer. The scent of coconut sunscreen and cut pine drifted off her, sharp over the lingering smell of grilled bratwurst and spilled beer from the tent floor. When she reached across the table to grab the can he set down, her forearm brushed his, and he noticed the faint callus on the heel of her palm, the same kind he had from years of gripping a chainsaw and an axe, except hers came from turning thousands of book pages. Their eyes locked for a beat longer than polite, and he fumbled the can opener he was holding, dropping it with a clatter into the ice chest.
She laughed, a low, warm sound that cut through the twang of the country cover band playing 50 feet away. “You’re the only person in this town who hasn’t either yelled at me or asked for my autograph this week,” she said, nodding at the plain front of his ice chest, no “I Support The Library” or “Ban The Books” stickers plastered all over it like every other surface in town.
Clay grunted, wiping his damp palms on the thighs of his worn denim jeans. “Don’t get involved in town drama. Waste of time.”
“Fair,” she said, leaning against the table edge, her knee brushing his where he stood behind the counter. He could feel the heat of her leg through the thin fabric of her cutoff shorts, and he had to fight the urge to shift closer. “I moved here to get away from drama, honestly. Ex-husband was a city councilman in Boise, cheated on me with his chief of staff. Figured a town with 1,200 people would be quieter. Turns out small town gossip is just as loud as city political drama, just with more pickup trucks.”
He found himself laughing before he could stop himself. A group of elementary school kids darted past the tent, chasing a golden retriever with a cotton candy stuck to its collar, and one of them slammed into Mara’s back. She stumbled forward, grabbing his bicep to steady herself, her fingers curling into the faded cotton of his ranger logo t-shirt for half a second before she let go, her cheeks flushing pink.
He grabbed a second seltzer out of the ice chest, sliding it across the table to her for free. “My granddaughter left that book they’re banning on my couch last Christmas,” he said, so quiet only she could hear it, like he was admitting to something illegal. “Read it cover to cover. Thought it was fine. Just didn’t want to tell the guys at the diner. They’d call me a liberal snowflake for a month.”
She grinned, leaning in so her mouth was inches from his ear, her breath smelling like mint lemonade, and he felt a jolt go up his spine he hadn’t felt since he was 19 and asking his wife to prom. “Your secret’s safe with me,” she said. “I won’t tell the good old boys you’ve got good taste.”
His shift ended 20 minutes later, and he handed off the beer tent keys to the kid from the high school football team who was covering the next slot. He hesitated for half a second, then asked her if she wanted to get a brat from the food truck and sit on the tailgate of his 1998 Ford F150 to watch the fireworks later. He fully expected her to say no, expected her to laugh at the grumpy old ranger who’d avoided her for six months suddenly asking her out.
She said yes, slipping her hand into his when they walked out of the tent, her palm warm and calloused against his. A couple of his friends from the diner glanced over from their picnic table, and he didn’t look away, didn’t let go of her hand, didn’t care what they thought. They found a spot on the tailgate, passing a bratwurst slathered in mustard back and forth, as the sky turned deep purple and the first firework exploded overhead, painting the hills pink and gold. The setting sun gilded the edges of her hair, and for the first time in seven years, he didn’t feel the urge to look away when someone smiled at him like that.
