Rafe Cervantes, 67, retired Border Patrol canine handler, leaned against a splintered pine post at the annual West of the Pecos Chili Cookoff, swirling a paper bowl of his brisket chili so the grease pooled at the edge. He’d won first place three years running, but he’d skipped the award ceremony the last two, hated the way people stared at the scar snaking up his left forearm—earned in a 2018 bust when a smuggler slashed him with a box cutter while his K9 Max bit the guy’s ankle—and asked too many questions about his career. His only company most days was the half-feral barn cat that slept on his porch, and he preferred it that way—stubbornness was his worst flaw, his sister told him every Sunday over pot roast, but it had kept him alive for 28 years patrolling the Rio Grande, and kept him from falling apart when his wife Elena died three years prior.
He’d spotted Clara ten minutes earlier, across the stretch of picnic tables, and had been pretending not to watch her ever since. She was the new town librarian, 48, moved to town from Portland six months back, and Rafe had avoided stepping foot in the library since she’d started, too self-conscious of his scuffed work boots, his calloused hands, the fact that he’d never read a book that wasn’t a canine training manual or a western paperback in his whole life. She was carrying a stack of neon flyers, wearing a linen dress the color of desert sage, scuffed white Converse peeking out from the hem, and Rafe had to bite back a smile when he saw the tiny chili-pepper stud in her left earlobe, a far cry from the pencil skirts and blouses he’d seen her wear at the grocery store.
A kid on a neon orange scooter zoomed around a cotton candy stand, clipped the edge of Clara’s stack of flyers, and she stumbled forward, right into Rafe’s chest. Her palm landed flat over the old Border Patrol badge he kept pinned inside his denim shirt, the heat of her hand seeping through the thin fabric, and Rafe froze, his free hand flying out to catch her elbow, his calloused fingers wrapping around soft, sun-warmed skin. Her hair smelled like jasmine and the roasted elote from the food truck ten feet away, and when she looked up at him, hazel eyes flecked with gold wide with surprise, he forgot how to speak for two full seconds.
They knelt to pick up the scattered flyers together, their hands brushing when they both reached for the one on top, advertising a library summer panel on local Border Patrol history. “I’ve been trying to track you down for three weeks,” she said, holding eye contact long enough that Rafe’s ears went pink, the way they hadn’t since he was a 19 year old kid in academy training. She said she’d heard he’d worked with K9s for his entire career, and she wanted him to speak on the panel, tell stories about the dogs he’d handled, the work no one ever talked about. Rafe’s first instinct was to say no—he hated talking about the dogs that didn’t make it home, hated the way people looked at him like he was a hero when he’d just been doing his job—but then she leaned in a little, her knee brushing his where they knelt on the gravel, and he found himself saying he’d think about it.
They moved to an empty picnic bench in the shade of a mesquite tree, Rafe sliding his bowl of chili between them so she could try a bite. She took a spoonful, coughed a little, her eyes watering, and laughed when Rafe handed her a napkin, the sound light and bright over the wail of the mariachi band playing at the other end of the park. “My neighbor brought me a container of this last year,” she said, dabbing at her eyes. “I cried for 20 minutes and ate the whole thing anyway.” Their knees pressed together under the table the whole time they talked, Rafe telling her about Max, his last K9 partner, who retired with him and died last year of old age, and she didn’t flinch when he talked about the bust that gave him the scar, or the night he held Max while he took his last breath. He’d never told anyone that story, not even his sister.
When the sun started to dip low over the desert, painting the sky pink and tangerine, she leaned in again, so close he could smell the peppermint gum she was chewing, and asked if he wanted to come back to her place. She had a bottle of Ancho Reyes mezcal she’d been saving, she said, and she wanted to see the old photos of Max he kept in the glove box of his truck. Rafe hesitated for half a second, that stubborn voice in his head saying he was too old for this, he’d mess it up, he’d end up missing Elena more than he already did, but then she smiled, and he said yes.
He held her car door open for her, his hand brushing the small of her back when she climbed in, and she leaned up, pressing a quick, soft kiss to the stubble on his jaw before she pulled the door shut. Rafe walked back to his beat up Ford F150, the gravel crunching under his boots, the taste of chili and the faint scent of jasmine still lingering on his tongue. He climbed into the driver’s seat, turned the key, and followed her taillights down the dirt road leading to the edge of town, the wind blowing through his gray hair, the photo of Max and Elena tucked in his sun visor glinting in the sunset light.
