Rafe Mendez, 53, third-generation cattle auctioneer out of Burnet County, Texas, kicks a clump of dust off his roper boots as he cuts through the back of the county fairgrounds, his throat still raw from calling 42 lots at a feeder sale the day before. The August heat hangs thick enough to chew, sharp with the smell of fried Oreos, fermented cotton candy, and fresh hay wafting from the livestock barn where he’s set to judge the steer show in three hours. He’s only detoured to track down the wildflower honey he buys every year for his morning coffee, the one sold by the traveling beekeeper crew that rolls through after wildfire season to help pollinate the recovering pasture land.
The honey booth is tucked between a homemade jam stand and a booth selling custom belt buckles, a glass display case stacked with glowing gold jars, a few dozen docile honeybees buzzing slow behind the mesh front. The woman behind the counter is leaning over to restock the bottom shelf, cutoff jean shorts frayed at the hem, work boots caked with mud and beeswax, silver streaks cutting through the dark hair pulled back in a loose braid. When she stands up and wipes her hands on her flannel shirt tied around her waist, Rafe recognizes her instantly: Clara Marquez, his 11th grade biology lab partner, the girl who laughed so hard she snort when he fainted mid-frog dissection.
He stops short, hat pulled low over his forehead, half ready to turn around before she spots him, but she looks up right then, holds his gaze for two beats longer than polite, and grins so wide the corners of her hazel eyes crinkle. “Don’t tell me you’re here to dissect another amphibian,” she says, leaning her elbows on the counter, close enough that Rafe can smell clover and lemon furniture polish on her shirt, see the tiny bee tattoo inked on the inside of her left wrist, the chipped neon yellow nail polish on her fingers.
He huffs a laugh, leans in against the counter too, their elbows brushing when he reaches for a jar of mesquite honey on the top shelf. The contact is warm, her skin calloused from lifting heavy hive boxes, a faint smudge of beeswax rough against his forearm. “Nah,” he says, turning the jar over in his hands to read the label. “Just here for honey. Faint at the sight of lab reports these days, not frogs.”
They fall into easy conversation, the way people who knew each other when they were too stupid to know how to be self-conscious do. She tells him she’s been running the beekeeping operation alone since her husband died in a logging accident four years prior, moves her hives across the state every few months to help repopulate bee populations in areas hit by wildfires, sleeps in a converted van with three rescue cats. He tells her about his ranch, the 12 head of cattle he keeps when he’s not on the auction circuit, how his wife Elaina died of breast cancer seven years back, how he’s spent most of the time since avoiding anything that doesn’t involve work or his old hound dog, Duke.
The whole time, part of him is screaming at himself to leave, that this is wrong, that he’s betraying Elaina by even enjoying talking to another woman, by noticing the way she tucks a stray strand of hair behind her ear when she laughs, by the warm hum in his chest he hasn’t felt since the last time Elaina kissed him goodbye before a sale. But then Clara mentions she’d run into Elaina at a grocery store a year before she died, that Elaina had told her Rafe still talked about that dissection, that he’d always had a soft spot for her, that he was too stubborn to reach out first.
The sky darkens fast, sudden as a flipped switch, and a crack of thunder booms so loud the jars on the counter rattle. Rain starts pouring down in sheets, fairgoers screaming and running for cover, the awning over the booth leaking a steady drip right on the stack of custom jar labels sitting on the edge of the table. They both lunge for the stack at the same time, their hands landing flat on top of each other, and neither of them pulls away. The rain drums so loud on the awning it drowns out every other sound, the bees humming soft and steady in their transport hives tucked under the table, Clara’s palm warm and rough against his.
She’s the first to speak, her voice low, just loud enough to hear over the rain. “I’m renting a cabin out on Lake Buchanan for the next three days,” she says, her thumb brushing the back of his knuckle, slow and deliberate. “I make peach cobbler with honey glaze. You should come over for dinner tomorrow. If you want.”
Rafe hesitates for half a second, the ghost of Elaina’s laugh in his head, the one she used when she was teasing him for being an idiot. He nods before he can overthink it. “Yeah,” he says. “I’d like that.”
He leaves the booth a few minutes later, once the rain slows to a drizzle, two jars of honey tucked under his arm, his boots squelching in the red mud, thunder still rumbling soft in the distance. He pulls out his phone to text his buddy Jimmie to cover the steer show check-in tomorrow, and he realizes he’s grinning so wide his cheeks hurt, the faint tingle of Clara’s hand on his still lingering on his knuckles.
