Manny Ruiz is 59, runs a one-man vintage motorcycle restoration shop out of the converted garage behind his East Austin bungalow, and his worst flaw is he’d rather spend 12 hours sanding rust off a 1968 Triumph tank than make small talk with a neighbor. His wife passed eight years prior, and he’d settled into a routine so rigid the local taco truck guy knew his order before he opened his mouth, the bar down the street kept his preferred lager on tap for when he wandered in once every three weeks. He only showed up to the annual fall block party because his college-age niece, in town for a long weekend, practically dragged him out the door, calling him a reclusive old coot until he caved and slipped on a faded flannel and work boots.
He was leaning against the chili cookoff food truck, half-drunk beer in one hand, ignoring a group of local real estate agents trying to pitch him on selling his lot, when Elara stumbled into him. She was the new neighborhood librarian, had moved into the blue bungalow three blocks over three months prior, had stopped by his shop once a few weeks back asking about the 1972 Honda CB350 her late dad had left her stored in a shed up in Waco. She’d been carrying a paper plate loaded with chili and cornbread, tripped over a toddler’s scooter left in the grass, and her free hand clamped hard around his forearm to steady herself, beer sloshing over the rim of his can onto his sleeve. He smelled lavender hand lotion and cinnamon from the cornbread on her plate, heard her laugh, low and throaty, not the high, tight polite laugh he’d expected from the woman who wore cardigans every time he’d seen her and only ever spoke in soft, even tones at the community meetings he’d begrudgingly sat through.
She didn’t pull away right away, held his eye contact for three full beats longer than casual politeness required, the corner of her mouth tugging up when he didn’t jump back like she was contagious. He’d always written her off as the boring, no-fun type, the kind who’d tsk at him for leaving his work boots on his front porch or playing old outlaw country too loud on weekends, so the jolt of heat he felt when her thumb brushed the scar on his forearm from a 1998 motorcycle wreck caught him off guard, made him feel stupid, almost, for even noticing how her cream sweater hugged her hips, how freckles dotted her collarbone just above the neckline of her shirt. For half a second he felt a flash of guilt, like he was doing something wrong, something disloyal to the memory of his wife, before he shook it off, realized she’d have yelled at him for hiding away for eight years like he was serving a sentence.
They moved off to the side, leaning against the trunk of the big live oak at the edge of the park, far enough away from the blaring cover band that they didn’t have to yell to hear each other, close enough that their shoulders brushed every time a group of kids ran past chasing a golden retriever. She kept leaning in when he spoke, her chestnut hair brushing his jaw once when a gust of wind picked up, and he didn’t shift away, didn’t even pretend to. She told him she’d stopped by his shop every Saturday for a month after that first visit, but he’d always had his head buried under a gas tank or was under a bike on a creeper, never even looked up to see her standing there. He felt a twist of something sharp in his chest, realized he’d been so focused on keeping the world out he’d missed the first person who’d tried to get his attention in years. She teased him that everyone on the block said he was a grumpy hermit who only talked to people who brought him rare motorcycle parts, and when he laughed, she reached out and touched his wrist, her palm warm through the thin flannel, and said she thought the grumpiness was a good look on him.
He didn’t overthink it, asked her to come by his shop the next morning, said he’d make black coffee strong enough to strip paint, they could look through the photos of her dad’s bike she said she had saved on her phone, figure out what it would take to get it running again. She grinned, pulled a crumpled napkin out of her jeans pocket, scribbled her cell number on it in blue ballpoint, and pressed it into his palm, her fingers lingering on his for a beat before she pulled away. She turned to walk back to the group of elementary school teachers she’d come to the party with, and Manny stood there holding the napkin, watching her glance over her shoulder halfway across the grass and wink at him before she sat down on a picnic blanket.
