Javier Mendez, 52, makes his living restoring vintage campers out of a cinder block shop on the edge of upstate New York’s Maple Creek. He’s spent the four years since his wife Maria died in a highway crash keeping to himself, only speaking to clients, his 78-year-old dad who drops off carnitas empanadas every Sunday, and the tabby cat that lives in his shop’s rafters. His biggest flaw, if you ask his old friend Ray who runs the local hardware store, is that he’s convinced letting anyone new get close is a betrayal of the 22 years he had with Maria. He’s at the town’s annual summer block party only because Ray threatened to cut off his discount industrial epoxy if he bailed for the third year running.
He’s leaning against a splintered picnic table, sipping a lukewarm Budweiser, work boots still dusted with fiberglass from the 1968 Airstream he’d been sanding that morning, when a woman slams into his side. A Pyrex tray of peach cobbler tilts just enough that a dollop of warm, syrupy fruit plops right on the sleeve of his faded Carhartt flannel. He recognizes her immediately: Lila Marlow, the woman who moved into the old Henderson ranch three months prior, the one he’d only ever waved at from his F150 when he drove home at dusk, the one the town’s gossips have been whispering nonstop about. She’s the ex-wife of Maple Creek’s new First Baptist pastor, who left him six months before he took the posting here, no kids, no family in the area, fleeing the constant pressure to be the perfect, quiet minister’s spouse.
She’s flustered, grabbing a handful of paper napkins from the table beside them, dabbing at his sleeve before he can even protest. Her knuckles brush the coarse hair on his forearm, and he catches the scent of lavender hand cream mixed with the warm, brown sugar sweetness of the cobbler, the soft crinkle of her linen sundress when she leans in closer. “I am so sorry,” she says, laughing, her hazel eyes crinkling at the corners, “I’ve been chasing my neighbor’s golden retriever for ten minutes, he tried to steal a whole slice off the tray.” She pauses, nods at the camper logo stitched into his flannel pocket. “I’ve actually been meaning to track you down for weeks. I bought a beat up 1972 Winnebago off Craigslist last month and the water heater’s completely shot. Half the people in town say you’re the only one who can fix old stuff like that without charging a fortune.”
Javier hesitates, glancing across the street where Mrs. Henderson, the town’s biggest gossip, is pretending to adjust her granddaughter’s sun hat but is clearly staring right at them. He’s spent four years avoiding any attention that isn’t about camper parts, still feels a sharp twist of guilt every time he even notices another woman, convinced the town will call him disrespectful, that Maria would be angry. But Lila doesn’t act like she cares who’s watching. She grabs his wrist, her palm warm through his flannel, and tugs him over to the tailgate of his F150, sitting down and patting the spot next to her before pulling up photos of the Winnebago on her phone. Her knee presses solidly against his when she leans in to show him a shot of the rotted undercarriage, her hair catching the golden hour sun, smelling like rain on pine.
She tells him she left her ex because he kept trying to force her to fit into a box she never wanted, expected her to host church potlucks and stop working on her own old motorcycles and never argue with any of the congregation’s more backwards takes. She says half the town already acts like she’s a sinner, so she’s stopped caring what any of them think. Javier finds himself telling her about Maria, about how he stopped going to church after she died because the old pastor kept saying her crash was God’s plan, and he’d had to walk out before he punched the guy in the face. He tells her he’s been scared to talk to anyone new, scared he’ll forget the sound of Maria’s laugh, scared he doesn’t deserve to feel happy again.
Lila reaches over, brushes a fleck of fiberglass off his cheek, her thumb lingering on his jaw for half a second, just long enough that his skin prickles. “She’d want you to laugh, right?” she says, soft, as the first firework goes off over the town square, painting her face bright red. He doesn’t answer right away, watching the blue and gold sparks burst over the roofline, listening to the kids scream and cheer a few yards away, and realizes he doesn’t care if Mrs. Henderson is talking about them tomorrow, doesn’t care about the stupid rules he’s been making for himself to avoid the pain of losing someone again.
He tells her he’ll be at her ranch at 9 a.m. the next morning, tools in tow, and he’ll bring the peach cobbler recipe he got from Maria’s abuela, the one that uses extra cinnamon and bourbon in the glaze. She grins, taking a bite of cobbler off the edge of the tray, wiping a smudge of syrup off her chin with the back of her hand. She nods, says she’ll have cold iced coffee waiting, extra cream, just how he likes it—she’d seen him order it at the diner three times in the last month, she admits, and had been working up the nerve to say hi. Javier laughs, picking up a fork and taking a bite of the cobbler, sweet and warm on his tongue, as the next firework bursts overhead.
