Rafe Mendez, 53, leans against the polished chrome bumper of the 1962 Airstream he spent six months restoring, swirling lukewarm draft beer in a flimsy plastic cup. The air smells like fried apple pies, burnt marshmallows from the kids’ craft tent, and sharp pine drifting down from the Blue Ridge ridges outside the small town festival grounds. His work jeans are dusted with fine aluminum polish, his knuckles crisscrossed with tiny scabs from buffing out rust spots that clung to the trailer’s frame like bad memories. He’d argued with the event coordinator for three weeks about getting this booth, said the Airstream deserved prime foot traffic, and now he’s mostly just bored, avoiding small talk with passersby who ask the same dozen questions about gas mileage and where he’s going to take it once it’s done.
The first time he sees Lila, she’s leaning over the counter of the kettle corn booth two spots over, wiping caramel off her forearm with a crumpled paper towel. He hasn’t spoken to her in four years, not since Gary, his former business partner, left her for a 28-year-old barista from the coffee shop they used to frequent, then ghosted Rafe without paying him the twelve grand he was owed for their last trailer flip. His throat tightens a little when she laughs at a kid’s dumb joke, her hazel eyes crinkling at the corners the same way they did when she’d drop by their old shop with homemade chocolate chip cookies and tease them for working 12 hour days for less than minimum wage. He’d always told himself he didn’t think of her like that, that bro code came first, even when Gary would complain about her to anyone who would listen, even when he caught Gary texting other women on his work phone during lunch.
A sharp gust of October wind hits just before dusk, sending a stack of her branded kettle corn bags flying into his booth, scattering across the Airstream’s new wool rug. They both bend down at the same time to grab them, their foreheads knocking hard enough that he sees spots for half a second. “Jesus, sorry,” she says, rubbing the side of her head, and when they both reach for the same neon orange bag at the same time, their hands brush. It’s a tiny touch, just the backs of their knuckles, but he feels it all the way up his arm, warm as the static shock you get touching a trailer’s aluminum frame on a dry day. She flushes pink, tucking a strand of gray-streaked brown hair behind her ear, and he finds himself offering to help her restack her supplies once the post-dinner rush dies down.
He spends the next hour half paying attention to the people stopping by his booth, glancing over at her every few minutes, fighting the stupid voice in his head that’s yelling about bro code, about not crossing lines, about how it’s messy to get involved with someone your old friend used to marry. He hates that voice. Hates that he still listens to it, even after Gary screwed him over, even after Gary left Lila to raise their two teen kids alone while he moved to Costa Rica to run a surf shop. Half the guys he grew up with would call him a traitor for even talking to her, and half of those guys are deadbeat dads who’ve cheated on every woman they’ve ever dated, so he’s not sure why their opinions matter anyway.
By 9PM, most of the festival crowd has cleared out, the bluegrass band packing up their fiddles on the main stage, string lights strung between the booths glowing soft gold against the dark sky. He walks over to her booth, grabs the heavy cast iron kettle corn machine off the counter without asking, and carries it toward her beat up 2018 Ford F-150 parked behind the booth row. When he lifts it into the truck bed, it shifts, and he reaches out to steady it, his hand brushing the soft curve of her waist where her flannel shirt has ridden up a little. She doesn’t flinch, doesn’t step back. She just looks up at him, her eyes glinting in the string light, and says she always thought he was the good one, that Gary never deserved either of them.
He leans in before he can overthink it, kissing her slow, the salt from the kettle corn on her lips mixing with the cherry seltzer she’d been sipping all night. She kisses him back, her hand fisting in the front of his worn flannel shirt, and for the first time in years, he doesn’t feel that stupid twist of guilt in his gut, doesn’t feel like he’s doing something wrong.
They sit on the step of the Airstream after all her supplies are loaded, sharing a bag of leftover sweet and salty kettle corn, watching the last of the festival volunteers carry folding tables to a pickup at the end of the row. He tells her about the custom oak cabinets he built inside the trailer, the tiny wood stove he installed for winter camping trips up in the mountains, the built-in record player he tucked under the counter that plays old Merle Haggard and Johnny Cash albums. She asks if she can see it. He stands, holds out his hand for her to take. He licks a crumb of caramel off her knuckle before he follows her up the step.
