Ray Voss, 58, retired bridge foreman and seven-year widower, perches on a wobbly plastic picnic table bench at the local VFW’s third-Thursday fish fry, cold Miller Lite in a faded Navy koozie in one hand, plastic plate piled high with crusted catfish, crispy hushpuppies, and vinegar-doused coleslaw in the other. He’s only here for the catfish, the best within 20 miles, not the company; he’s spent the last half hour dodging questions from the guys he served with about when he’ll “finally stop moping and get back out there.” The air smells like hot fryer grease, stale cigarette smoke from the group clustered by the door, and the sweet, sharp tang of cut grass from the adjacent field. Crickets hum loud enough to cut through the jukebox’s low blast of 90s country, and the humidity sticks to the back of his neck like a damp hand. He still wears his thick silver wedding band, and he sleeps only on his side of the bed back at his tiny Pensacola bungalow; his greatest flaw is the stubborn, self-punishing belief that letting anyone new in would be a betrayal of his late wife, Carol.
He’s halfway through his first hushpuppy when someone drops a plate across from him, the plastic clattering loud enough to make him look up. Clara Bennett, 54, runs the local animal rescue, ex-wife of his old crew lead Mike, who he’d worked with for 22 years back in Ohio. He hasn’t seen her since Mike moved to Jacksonville four years prior, leaving her with the house, the rescue, and a stack of unpaid vet bills. She’s got sun-streaked brown hair pulled back in a messy braid, a smudge of mud on her left cheekbone, calloused, nail-polish-free hands, and she’s wearing cutoff denim shorts and a faded gray tee that says “ADOPT DON’T SHOP” across the chest, a tiny hole torn at the hem.
She slides into the bench, her knee brushing his under the table, the heat of her leg seeping through the worn denim of his work jeans. He flinches before he can stop himself, and she grins, the corner of her mouth tugging up the same way it did back when she’d bring the crew donuts on cold winter mornings before a concrete pour. “Relax, Mike’s not here,” she says, popping a french fry in her mouth. “He’s up in Jacksonville with his girlfriend half his age, last I heard. Wouldn’t be caught dead at a fish fry that doesn’t serve overpriced craft beer.” He catches a whiff of coconut sunscreen mixed with faint, piney dog shampoo, and for a second he’s so distracted he forgets what he was about to say.
He snorts, takes a sip of his beer, and the familiar twist of guilt hits him low in the gut immediately. Bro code says you don’t mess with your buddy’s ex, even if your buddy is an asshole who left her high and dry. Plus, the weight of his wedding band on his finger feels heavier suddenly, like a physical reminder of the promise he made to himself after Carol died, that he’d never love anyone else. But he can’t look away from Clara, from the way she laughs when a fluffy golden retriever puppy trots past the table, tail wagging, from the way she leans forward when he talks about the 1972 fishing boat he’s restoring in his garage, like she actually cares what he has to say. When she passes him an extra hushpuppy she grabbed from the fry stand, their fingers brush, and he feels a tingle run up his arm, the kind he hasn’t felt since Carol was alive, back when they’d sneak kisses in the grocery store produce aisle like teenagers.
She teases him about the wedding band, nudging his hand with her own across the table. “Carol would kick your ass for moping this long, you know that,” she says, soft, no bite to it. He freezes, because she’s right. Carol had told him, a week before she died, that if he didn’t get back out there after she was gone, she’d come back to haunt him, hide all his favorite fishing lures. He’d laughed it off then, but now it hangs in the air between them, thick as the humidity.
The sky opens up without warning, fat raindrops slamming down so hard they bounce off the picnic tables, sending everyone scattering for their cars. He grabs her plate and his, tosses them in the trash by the door, and offers her his arm. “C’mon, your truck’s parked all the way at the end of the lot, right?” he says. She laughs, loops her arm through his, and they run through the rain, soaking through their clothes in 10 seconds flat, her braid coming loose, strands of wet hair sticking to her neck.
By the time they get to her beat-up Ford F150, they’re both dripping, her tee clinging to her shoulders, rain dripping off the brim of his old Cleveland Browns ball cap onto his nose. She leans against the truck door, looking up at him, rain running down her cheeks, and says she’s liked him since the first time she saw him, back at Mike’s 30th birthday party, when he’d carried a passed-out Mike up two flights of stairs and didn’t even complain. He hesitates, his chest tight, that war still going on in his head—this is wrong, this is Mike’s ex, this is betraying Carol—fighting against the way his skin is buzzing where her arm is still pressed to his, the way he hasn’t felt this alive in years.
He reaches up, brushes a strand of wet hair off her face, wipes the remaining smudge of mud off her cheek with his thumb. “Mike’s gonna kill me if he finds out,” he says, half-joking. She snorts, her hand coming up to rest on his chest, right over his heart, the wet fabric of his tee sticking to his skin. “Mike hasn’t asked how I’m doing in three and a half years. He can get over it.”
He tugs his wedding band off his finger, tucks it into the inside pocket of his wallet, the spot where he keeps a crumpled photo of Carol on their wedding day. He leans down, kisses her slow, the rain dripping off his cap onto her forehead, the distant sound of thunder rolling across the gulf. It’s soft at first, tentative, then she tangles her hand in the back of his hair, pulls him closer, and he forgets every stupid rule he’s made for himself over the last seven years.
When they pull apart, she’s grinning, tells him she’s got a 3-month-old golden retriever puppy at the rescue that’s been waiting for someone who likes to take long walks on the beach and share leftover hushpuppies. He laughs, tells her he’s free tomorrow morning, he’ll bring coffee and glazed donuts, the kind she used to bring the crew back in Ohio. He walks back to his own truck, rain still pouring down, his boots squelching in the puddles forming in the potholes of the lot. He climbs in, turns the key, and the radio blasts that old Johnny Cash song he and Carol used to dance to in the kitchen after dinner, when the kids were asleep and the house was quiet. He reaches for the volume knob, turns it up, and for the first time in seven years, he sings along without feeling guilty.
