Ronan O’Malley, 62, retired lighthouse keeper who spent 28 years manning Cape Elizabeth Light before moving to Tampa last year, leaned against a splintered wooden tent pole and sipped his pale ale, already mentally mapping his exit route. He’d only shown up because his 10-year-old granddaughter had slipped a free festival ticket under his door the night before, decorated with a crayon drawing of a T-Rex wearing a cowboy hat, and he’d never been able to say no to her. The crowd of gray-haired people doing the Macarena on the patchy lawn in front of the stage made his skin crawl; he’d spent most of his adult life around only seagulls and the crash of the Atlantic, and small talk still felt like a foreign language. His wife Eileen had been the social one, the one who dragged him to potlucks and holiday parties, and since she’d died three years prior, he’d made a point of avoiding any gathering that required more than three people in a room.
The first time their bodies brushed, he jumped like he’d been zapped by a live wire. Marisol, 56, owner of the empanada truck parked directly next to the beer tent, had been reaching over the low barrier to yank a stuck napkin dispenser free, her elbow knocking solidly against his ribcage. She pulled back fast, laughing, her hazel eyes crinkling at the corners, and didn’t look away when he met her gaze. “Sorry about that,” she said, wiping her hands on the faded blue flannel she wore rolled up to her elbows, a faint scar snaking across her left wrist from a kitchen knife accident a few years back. “Thing’s been jamming all day, and the festival crew won’t answer their radios.” He grunted, then surprised himself by nodding at the dispenser. “Want a hand? I spent three decades fixing everything from busted fog horns to leaky pipework, I can handle a napkin dispenser.”
She hopped over the low barrier, and when she passed him the screwdriver she kept in her apron pocket, their fingers brushed for half a second. He could smell cumin and lavender shampoo on her, under the faint smell of fried dough, and his throat went dry. He fixed the dispenser in 90 seconds flat, and she rewarded him with a free beef empanada, still steaming, the crust crispy and flaking when he bit into it. They stood there talking for the next hour, leaning against the tent pole while the festival speakers blared old Tom Petty and people milled past carrying cotton candy and funnel cakes. He told her about the time a baby seal had wandered up the lighthouse steps in the middle of a January blizzard, and he’d kept it in his kitchen for two days until the coast guard could send a crew to pick it up. She told him about her ex-husband, who’d left her for a 22-year-old bartender, and how she’d started the empanada truck with the $12,000 she’d gotten from selling their wedding ring. He felt a flicker of guilt at one point, like he was betraying Eileen by laughing this hard with someone else, but the feeling faded fast when she snickered at the guy in the neon fanny pack who tripped over a lawn chair and spilled his beer all over his shirt.
The rain hit without warning, warm, heavy Florida downpour that sent everyone scrambling for cover. The side of the beer tent flapped loose, and they both stumbled back into the narrow dry gap between the tent and her truck, their shoulders pressed tight together, his arm brushing hers every time one of them shifted. He could feel the heat coming off her skin through their flannel shirts, and when she tilted her head up to look at him, a few strands of her dark wet hair stuck to her forehead, he didn’t overthink it. He lifted his hand and brushed the hair off her face, his thumb brushing her cheekbone for a beat longer than necessary. She didn’t pull away. She leaned into the touch, just a little, and smiled, the corner of her mouth tugging up like she knew exactly how long it had been since he’d touched anyone this way. “You know,” she said, her voice low enough that only he could hear it over the patter of rain on the truck roof, “you don’t look half as grumpy as you did when you walked up here an hour ago.”
The rain slowed to a drizzle 15 minutes later, and people started wandering back out onto the lawn, shaking water off their jackets and laughing. She grabbed a napkin from the newly fixed dispenser and scribbled her phone number on it in bright purple marker, along with the address of the waterfront spot she parks her truck at every Saturday. “If you’re not busy,” she said, handing it over, “I’ve got a new pork and pineapple recipe I’ve been testing. No charge, if you promise to tell me what you really think.” He folded the paper twice and tucked it into the inside pocket of his flannel, right next to the folded-up drawing of the T-Rex his granddaughter had given him. He didn’t make a joke about blowing her off, didn’t make an excuse about being busy, just nodded. “I’ll be there,” he said.
He walked back to his beat-up Ford F-150 10 minutes later, crumbs of empanada still stuck to the cuff of his jeans, and didn’t even scowl when a group of seniors singing along to “Free Fallin’” waved at him as he passed. He pulled out of the festival parking lot, the crinkle of the paper with her number in his pocket rubbing against his thigh the whole drive home.
