Elias Voss, 62, spent 36 years patrolling the Great Smoky Mountains National Park before retiring to restore vintage backpacks and camping stoves out of his cinder block garage. He’d avoided the town’s annual fire department chili cookoff for 17 straight years, but his 16-year-old grandson Jax had spent three weeks tweaking a venison chili recipe, begged him to come, and he couldn’t say no. He leaned against the splintered side of the fire truck, beer in one hand, paper bowl of Jax’s chili in the other, scanning the crowd for familiar faces when his jaw went tight. There she was. Marnie Carter. The woman he’d blamed for his divorce for 18 years.
He’d not spoken more than three words to her since the split, convinced she’d tipped his ex-wife off to the backcountry fishing trip he’d taken instead of their 25th anniversary dinner. She was 60 now, her dark hair streaked with silver pulled back in a loose braid, worn work boots on her feet, a faded flannel tied around her waist over a tight white tank top. She’d been widowed two years prior, he remembered hearing at the grocery store, her husband had dropped dead of a heart attack while fixing the roof on their cabin. She looked up, caught his eye, and smiled. Not a polite, distant smile, the slow, knowing one she used to give him back when they were all younger, when he’d sneak her extra s’mores at neighborhood cookouts when his wife wasn’t looking.
He tensed, ready to pretend he’d seen a deer across the field and bolt, but she was already weaving through the crowd, two plastic cups of sweet tea in her hand, her hips swaying a little like she still remembered the line dancing they used to do at the county fair. “Figured you’d hate the beer they’re serving,” she said when she got close enough to smell, that lavender perfume he’d always liked wrapping around him, soft and warm, no heavy synthetic edge. She held out one of the cups, and when he reached for it, their fingers brushed. Her skin was calloused at the knuckles from gardening, he noticed, warm, and the contact sent a jolt up his arm he hadn’t felt since he was 20 years old sneaking his first girlfriend into the park after dark.
He took a sip of the tea, perfect, just the right amount of sugar, and grunted. “Thought you’d be off at one of those book club things you used to go to.” She laughed, the sound low and throaty, and leaned against the fire truck next to him, their shoulders six inches apart, close enough that he could feel the heat coming off her skin through his flannel. “Quit the book club last year. All they do is complain about their kids and gossip about who’s sleeping with who.” She paused, took a sip of her own tea, and glanced over at him, her brown eyes sharp. “For the record, I never told Linda about that fishing trip. She found the gas station receipt in the pocket of your rain jacket when she was washing it. You left a whole bass in the bed of your truck too, remember? Stunk up the garage for three days.”
Elias froze, his grip on the tea cup tightening so hard the plastic crinkled. 18 years. He’d spent 18 years hating her, avoiding her, talking shit about her to anyone who’d listen, and he’d been wrong this whole time. Disgust curled in his gut first, disgust at his own stupid pride, at the years he’d wasted holding a grudge over something that wasn’t even her fault. Then something softer, warmer, tangled with it, the memory of how he’d always thought she was prettier than his wife, how he’d caught himself staring at her at cookouts, at the way her lips looked when she smiled. The first raindrop hit his cheek, cold, and then the sky opened up, people screaming and grabbing their coolers, running for their cars.
He didn’t even think about it, grabbed her wrist to keep her from slipping on the wet grass, his big calloused ranger hand wrapping completely around her small wrist. “I drove my truck. C’mon, I’ll take you home.” She nodded, letting him lead her through the rain, both of them soaked through by the time they climbed into the cab of his beat up 2008 F150. The heat was stuck on high, fogging up the windows immediately, and when they both shifted to close their doors, their knees pressed together under the dash, neither of them pulling away. “I’m an idiot,” he said, quiet, staring at their knees touching, the denim of his jeans dark from rain, the denim of hers lighter, worn thin at the knee. “18 years I blamed you. I’m sorry.” She reached over, brushed a wet strand of hair off his forehead, her fingers lingering on his cheek, and he leaned into the touch without thinking. “I know you are,” she said, and then she leaned in, kissed him, soft, her lips tasting like sweet tea and peppermint, the way he’d always imagined they would.
The rain beat against the truck roof loud enough that no one passing could see what they were doing, and he kissed her back, slow, like they had all the time in the world, no anniversaries to miss, no grudges to hold. When they pulled apart, she laughed, wiping a smudge of chili off his chin with her thumb. “My back screen door’s been sticking for a week. You’re good with fixing stuff, right?” He nodded, already reaching behind the seat for the small tool bag he kept there, his fingers brushing the edge of a vintage backpack he’d been restoring for Jax. He turned off the truck, grabbed the bag, and followed her up the slippery porch steps to her front door, his boots thudding against the wood, the smell of lavender and rain wrapping around him the whole way.
