Rafe Marquez, 58, retired forest fire spotter, slumps into the splintered pine picnic table at the back of the Bend, Oregon beer garden, condensation from his cold IPA beading down the glass and pooling on the weathered wood under his calloused palm. The bluegrass trio up front is tuning their fiddles, the air thick with the smell of charred bratwurst, pine from nearby ponderosas, and the sharp, sweet tang of huckleberry lemonade being poured at the bar. It’s 7:17 PM, golden hour, light slanting through oak trees strung with fairy lights so soft it makes even the scuffed-up cowboy boots of the regulars look warm. He’s halfway through his first beer when someone slides onto the bench next to him, not across, close enough that their denim-clad knee brushes his faded work jeans.
He looks over, and it’s Clara Hale. 52, Maggie’s college roommate, he hasn’t seen her in 15 years, not since Maggie’s 40th birthday party. She’s got silver streaks woven through her dark auburn hair, twisted back in a loose braid, a smudge of turquoise polish on the pad of her left thumb, the same dented silver hoop earrings she wore on their 1998 camping trip when she dropped one in a campfire. She holds up a cherry hard seltzer in greeting, her smile crinkling the corners of her eyes the exact same way Maggie’s used to. “Thought that was you,” she says, her voice a little rougher than he remembers, like she’s spent the last decade singing along to too many Tom Petty records at full volume. “Moved here three months ago to open that little silversmith shop on Minnesota Avenue. Saw you walk in, figured I’d stop saying hi before you snuck out early like you do every week.”
Rafe freezes for half a second. For 12 years, ever since Maggie died of ovarian cancer, he’s closed himself off from any casual intimacy, convinced even a friendly conversation with a woman was a betrayal of the 26 years they shared. Clara has always felt doubly off limits, tied so tightly to Maggie’s memory that even looking at her too long makes his chest tight with guilt. He shifts a little away, but their knees still brush, the contact sending a jolt up his spine he hasn’t felt since before Maggie got sick. “You been watching me?” he says, half teasing, half wary. She laughs, loud and bright, and the fiddle player up front hits a first note that makes the table vibrate under his hands. “Everyone watches you, Rafe,” she says, leaning in a little so he can hear her over the music, her shoulder pressing into his bicep. “You’re the mysterious ex-fire lookout guy who never talks to anyone, only drinks IPAs, and leaves right before the last set every Wednesday. Half the single women in this garden have a bet going about whether you’re secretly a millionaire or just grieving so hard you forgot how to have a conversation.”
He snorts, surprised. He’d had no idea anyone noticed his routine, let alone placed bets on it. They talk through the first two sets, her knee never moving away from his, every time she reaches for her seltzer her forearm brushes his thin cotton t-shirt, every time she laughs she tilts her head back and he can see the faint smattering of freckles across her collarbone he’d never registered before. She tells him she was with Maggie the week before she died, that Maggie made her promise she’d check on Rafe if she ever ended up in Oregon, that Maggie told her “he’s gonna hole up like a bear in winter if someone doesn’t drag him out.” Rafe’s throat feels tight. He’d spent 12 years thinking the only way to honor Maggie was to be alone, that any joy with someone else was a slight to the life they built. He almost gets up to leave, guilt coiling tight in his gut, but she puts her hand on his wrist, her palm warm and rough from working with silver, and he stops. “You don’t have to be alone just because she’s gone, Rafe,” she says, quiet enough only he can hear, her eyes locked on his, no pity, just soft, unhurried understanding.
The band packs up right as a light drizzle starts to fall, fat cold drops hitting the table with soft plinks. Rafe offers to walk her to her shop, only a block away, but the rain picks up fast, and they duck under the awning of a closed independent bookstore halfway there. She’s shivering a little, the thin cotton of her t-shirt soaked through at the shoulders, so he takes off his wool flannel, the one Maggie sewed suede patches on the elbows for 10 years prior, and drapes it over her shoulders. His hand brushes the back of her neck when he adjusts the collar, and she shivers again, not from cold. She looks up at him, and before he can say anything, she leans in, kisses him soft, her lips a little chapped, tasting like cherry seltzer and peppermint lip balm. He doesn’t pull away. For the first time in 12 years, he doesn’t feel guilty. He feels light, like the 10-pound weight he’s been carrying in his chest for a decade just lifted a little.
They stand there under the awning for five more minutes, kissing slow, the rain tapping against the metal awning above them, no rush. When the rain slows to a fine mist, they walk the rest of the way to her shop, her calloused fingers tangled with his. She unlocks the door to the apartment above the store, tugs him inside by the front of his t-shirt, the scent of vanilla candles and silver polishing wax wrapping around them before the door clicks shut behind them.
