Manny Ruiz, 59, has restored vintage typewriters out of his detached Portland garage for 14 years, ever since his wife walked out and left him with a half-finished collection of 1950s Royals and a note calling his work “pointless nostalgia.” His biggest flaw is he still believes that note, half the time. He avoids casual dates, turns down invites to neighborhood cookouts, sticks to his set routine: farmers market every first Saturday, beer at The Rusty Tap every Wednesday, workshop from 8am to 4pm every weekday, no exceptions.
The first Saturday of October bites cold, crisp enough that his knuckles are pink through the holes in his work gloves when he sets up his folding table under the oak tree at the market. The air smells like roasted hazelnuts from the stand two rows over, like wood smoke from the food truck selling smoked salmon sliders, like wet dirt. He’s adjusting the ribbon on a mint 1956 Quiet De Luxe when someone leans over the table, and he catches a whiff of jasmine perfume mixed with hazelnut creamer, the same kind he buys in bulk at the grocery store.
He looks up. It’s Lila Carter, his next door neighbor’s daughter. He hasn’t seen her since she was 16, slamming her mom’s screen door, neon pink hair, yelling that all his “old junk” was worthless. Now she’s 32, dark hair streaked with auburn, half pulled up with a leather cord, paint-splattered carpenter jeans, a flannel tied around her waist, hoop earrings that glint in the weak sun. She grins, and he can still see the gap between her two front teeth that she refused to get braces for when she was 12.
She reaches across the table to tap the Royal, and her elbow brushes his. The contact is warm, light, and he yanks his hand back like he touched a hot soldering iron, his face heating. He feels stupid, guilty, like he’s staring at someone he has no business noticing. “You’re back?” he says, voice rougher than he means it to be. She says she just moved home last week, took a senior graphic design job at a local outdoor brand, and she’s been hunting for a working typewriter for months to hand-draft quote art for her clients. She’d seen his market booth listed on the local small business Instagram page, had no idea it was him.
He fumbles through explaining the different models, and when she asks if he can show her how to load the replacement ribbon, he steps around the table to stand next to her. The walkway is narrow, so their shoulders press together, tight enough that he can feel the heat of her through his flannel shirt. He’s mid-explanation when he drops the small metal ribbon spool, and they both bend down to grab it at the same time. Their heads knock, soft, and she laughs, bright, and rests her hand on his forearm to steady herself. The callus on her palm from holding paintbrushes rubs over the scar on his forearm, the one he got from a table saw accident when he was 48, and a jolt shoots up his arm that he hasn’t felt since before his wife left.
He stands up fast, shoving the spool into the typewriter, his brain screaming that this is wrong, that this is Mara’s kid, that he helped her change a flat tire in the rain when she was 17, that the whole neighborhood would call him a creep if they saw them this close. But when he looks down at her, she’s still grinning, no awkwardness, no weirdness, and she asks if he wants to get a beer at The Rusty Tap after he packs up his booth. Says she’s been meaning to catch up, that she always thought his work was cool, even when she was a teen and pretended to hate everything that wasn’t pop punk and glitter.
He hesitates for three full seconds, then says yes. He can’t think of a single good reason to say no, even as his chest tightens with guilt, even as he reminds himself she’s 27 years younger than him, even as he pictures his ex-wife’s note calling him stuck in the past.
They sit in the back booth of The Rusty Tap, the one he always sits in, the vinyl cracked at the corner, the light dim enough that the freckles across her nose glow when the neon beer sign hits them. The jukebox plays Johnny Cash, low, and their mugs of amber ale sweat on the chipped Formica table. She tells him she had a huge crush on him when she was 16, that she’d make up excuses to go over to his workshop to borrow tools, just to talk to him, because he was the only grown up who didn’t talk to her like she was an idiot, who let her mess around with scrap wood and broken typewriters when her mom was fighting with her dad.
He sits frozen for a minute, his beer halfway to his mouth, shocked. He admits he’s attracted to her, that he’s been fighting it since the second he saw her, that he feels like a dirtbag for even noticing her, that the age gap, the fact that he’s known her since she was in pigtails, makes him feel like he’s breaking some unwritten rule. She leans across the table, covers his hand with hers, her thumb brushing the scar on his knuckle. “I’m 32, Manny,” she says, soft, no teasing, no game. “I get to choose who I spend time with. You don’t have to punish yourself for being someone I like.”
He stares at her hand on his, and for the first time in 12 years, he doesn’t pull away.
They finish their beers as the sun dips below the west hills, painting the sky pink and orange. They walk the six blocks back to their neighborhood, their boots crunching over fallen maple leaves, the air cold enough that they can see their breath pluming in front of them. She stops at the edge of his driveway, leans in, and kisses him, soft, her hand on the back of his neck, her lips warm against his cold ones. He kisses her back, slow, no rush, no pressure, no voice in his head screaming that he’s doing something wrong. When she pulls away, she says she’ll come by his workshop tomorrow with takeout tacos and help him organize his spare parts, after she picks up the Royal. He nods, watching her walk next door to her mom’s house, the porch light turning on as she opens the screen door. He fumbles with his garage door opener, his fingers still tingling where her hand touched his, the sound of her laugh still ringing in his ears.
