The air smelled like fried walleye, charcoal lighter fluid, and the faint, sweet tang of wild raspberry bushes growing along the edge of the park. His Carhartt overalls were dotted with grease smudges, his work boots caked with lake mud from the job he’d wrapped that morning, and the plastic Spotted Cow cup in his hand was sticky with condensation that dripped down his wrist when he shifted his weight against the pine tree he’d claimed as his spot. He was half watching a group of kids race each other up the playground slide when a shoulder brushed his bicep, soft and warm, through the thin cotton of his undershirt.
He turned, and his throat went dry. Clara Hale, who’d reverted to her maiden name after her divorce, Marnie had mentioned it in one of the last Christmas cards she’d sent out before she got sick. She was 58, owned the new used bookstore on Main Street that had opened back in spring, and Marnie had teased him for having a harmless little crush on her back when all three of them were in their 20s, living in Chicago, going to the same dive bar on weekends. She wore cutoff jean shorts, a faded Nirvana tee, a red flannel tied around her waist, and white Birkenstocks that showed off chipped red toenail polish. She smelled like lavender laundry soap and cedar, the same scent Marnie used to use for the linen closet.
“Rafe Mendez, I thought that was you,” she said, grinning, and she held eye contact longer than a standard casual greeting called for, the corners of her eyes crinkling the same way Marnie’s did when she was amused. She reached past him for the napkin dispenser nailed to the tree, her arm brushing his chest this time, and he could feel the heat of her skin through his shirt. She grabbed a handful of napkins, wiped a smudge of fryer grease off her cheek, and nodded at the grease spots on his overalls. “Heard you’re the guy to call if I want my 1972 Evinrude to stop sounding like a lawnmower with a death wish. It’s been sitting in my garage since I moved back, I haven’t had the guts to try to fix it myself.”
His first instinct was to say he was swamped, that he didn’t have time, that he’d give her the number of the kid down the road who did small engine work on the side. He’d had that script ready for eight years, for any woman who so much as asked him for a light or directions to the gas station. But then she held out a paper plate with a piece of walleye and a scoop of potato salad on it, and their fingers brushed when he took it, and a tingle ran up his arm that he hadn’t felt since Marnie kissed him for the first time in the parking lot of that same Chicago dive bar. He froze for half a second, and she laughed, soft, low, not mean.
“Marnie always said you were the quietest guy she ever met,” she said, leaning in a little closer when a group of drunk teens yelling about cornhole walked past, her breath warm on his ear. “Said it took you three months to ask her out, even after she’d already told all her friends she was gonna say yes. I always thought that was sweet. Most guys back then were too busy yelling over each other to impress anyone.”
The guilt hit him then, sharp and hot, like he was doing something wrong just standing there talking to her, laughing at her jokes, noticing the tiny anchor tattoo on her wrist, the same exact one Marnie had gotten on their 25th anniversary trip to Florida, when the two of them had snuck off to a tattoo parlor while Rafe was out deep sea fishing. He’d forgotten they’d gotten matching ones, and the memory softened the edge of the guilt, made him remember Marnie sitting on the porch of their old Chicago apartment a month before she died, holding his hand, telling him not to mope around the house after she was gone, not to close himself off from people who cared about him, to find someone who made him laugh as hard as she did.
She was watching him, her head tilted a little, like she could see the thoughts running through his head, and she didn’t push, just sipped her own beer, nodded at the band that was starting to play a slow Toby Keith track. “I got a bottle of 18 year old bourbon sitting on my kitchen counter,” she said, after a minute, casual, like she was talking about the weather. “I was gonna save it for my birthday next month, but I think it’d be better put to use while we tinker with that Evinrude. You can stop by around 7, if you want. No pressure.”
He nodded before he could think better of it, and she grinned, bright, and tucked a strand of blonde hair that had fallen in her face behind her ear. She said she’d leave the porch light on, then waved and walked off toward her beat up silver pickup truck parked at the edge of the park, glancing over her shoulder once to wink at him before she climbed in.
He finished his beer, tossed the empty cup in the trash can next to the tree, and checked his watch. It was 6:15, enough time to run back to his shop to grab his toolbox, stop at the corner market for the jar of spicy pickled garlic Marnie always said Clara was obsessed with. The sun was dipping low over the lake, painting the sky pink and orange, and the air had cooled off enough that he could feel a faint chill on his arms when he walked to his own F150. He unlocked the door, tossed his toolbox in the passenger seat, set the jar of pickled garlic in the cup holder next to it, turned the key in the ignition. He pulled out of the parking lot, headed down the lake road toward her house, the low rumble of the engine matching the light, unfamiliar buzz of excitement in his chest.
