Elias Voss, 57, has restored close to 1,200 vintage typewriters in the eight years since his wife died, each machine a quiet, predictable project that never asks more of him than he’s willing to give. He’s the kind of guy who stays late to fix a high school kid’s first typewriter for free, who leaves extra peaches on his elderly neighbor’s porch every summer, who has turned down three separate blind date setups in the last year because the thought of letting anyone new into his space makes his chest tight. His worst flaw, if you ask the few people who know him well, is that he’d rather punish himself for a perceived wrong than ever risk letting anyone else down.
He’s manning a booth at the West Asheville fall block party when she walks up, golden hour light gilding the edges of her chestnut hair, a black cherry hard seltzer in one hand, a stack of library hold slips in the other. She’s Maren Hale, 49, the new county library system director, stepdaughter of his late wife’s childhood best friend, and the person he’s gone out of his way to avoid for the last six months, ever since the ladies at the church potluck started loudly speculating about how “perfect” they’d be together. He’d felt sick at the thought back then, like even acknowledging the comments was a betrayal of the 22 years he’d had with his wife.
She leans in to peer at the 1956 Royal Quiet De Luxe sitting on the edge of his table, her shoulder brushing his bicep, and he catches the sharp, warm scent of lavender hand lotion mixed with the faint, sweet fizz of her drink. He freezes, the microfiber cleaning rag he’d been twisting in his hands going still. “I’ve been looking for one of those for my office,” she says, tilting her head up to look at him, her hazel eyes crinkling at the corners like she knows exactly how flustered he is. She holds eye contact for three full beats, long enough that he has to look away first, wiping an imaginary smudge off the Royal’s chrome trim.
He mumbles something about it being for sale, already kicking himself for not making up an excuse to leave the booth five minutes earlier. She asks if he can show her how to load the paper, and when he nods, she steps closer to the table, her back almost pressed to his chest as she reaches for the stack of blank typing paper he keeps out for kids to leave silly notes. His throat goes dry when he reaches around her to adjust the platen, his calloused, ink-stained hand covering hers for half a second to guide the paper into the feed. He can feel the heat of her forearm through the thin linen of her button-down, can hear the little huff of laughter she lets out when her finger taps the shift key by accident.
“Y’know, you blew right past me at the Ingles last week,” she says, typing a few random keys slow, the sharp clack of the typewriter cutting through the noise of the bluegrass band playing two booths over. “I waved, you turned down the cereal aisle like you’d seen a ghost.” He winces, because he’d done exactly that, had even left his half-full cart by the oat milk so he could check out faster and get out before she had a chance to say hi. “Had a parts run I was late for,” he lies, and she snorts, loud enough that he grins despite himself.
The fight in his head is so loud he can barely hear the music. Half of him is screaming that this is wrong, that he’s supposed to be grieving forever, that anyone who sees them talking will think he forgot about his wife. The other half is counting the freckles across the back of her neck, wondering what it would feel like to tuck that loose strand of hair behind her ear, wondering when the last time was he felt this alive, this not like he was just going through the motions of every day.
She pulls the paper out of the typewriter, folds it in half, and shoves it into his flannel shirt pocket before he can ask what it says. “Don’t read it till I leave,” she says, and when he looks down at her, her expression is soft, no teasing, no smirk, just something that looks like understanding. He nods, and for a second, neither of them moves, their faces less than a foot apart, the noise of the block party fading out entirely. He lifts his hand before he can overthink it, brushing the stray hair off her forehead, his thumb brushing the edge of her cheekbone. She leans into the touch, just a little, and he feels the tightness in his chest unwind, like a spring that’s been coiled for eight years finally letting go.
He asks her if she wants to get carnitas tacos from the food truck at the end of the block once the party wraps up, and she grins, taking a sip of her seltzer before she answers. “Took you long enough,” she says, and he laughs, a real, loud laugh that he hasn’t let out in years. She tells him she’s going to drop her hold slips off at her car, and as she walks away, he pulls the folded note out of his pocket, unfolding it slow. The typed letters are crisp, black on white: You don’t have to be loyal to a ghost to be a good husband.
He shoves the note back in his pocket, starts packing up the typewriters a little faster than he usually would, glancing up every ten seconds to see if she’s coming back. When she rounds the corner, holding two more hard seltzers in her hand, she waves, and he lifts his own hand to wave back, the ink stains on his fingers glinting in the golden sunset.
