Elias Voss, 62, retired high school woodshop teacher, had only showed up to the county fire department’s annual pig roast because his next door neighbor begged him to drop off the custom cornhole boards he’d spent three weeks carving. He’d planned to stay 20 minutes max, avoid the pitying hugs from people he’d known for 30 years, slip back to his quiet garage where the only noise was the whine of his table saw and the hum of his old classic rock radio. He’d been avoiding large gatherings since his wife died four years prior, hated the way people’s voices dropped an octave when they asked how he was holding up, hated the unspoken assumption he should be lonely, should be miserable, should still be wearing his wedding ring even though he’d tucked it into a box on his workbench six months earlier.
She reached past his arm to grab a napkin from the stack nailed to the pole, her sun-warmed forearm brushing his, and he noticed the faint white scar on her wrist he remembered from when she’d fallen off a ladder painting her classroom 12 years earlier. She held his gaze for two beats longer than was polite, the corner of her mouth tugging up in a smirk he remembered from dozens of staff meetings where she’d side-eye him when the coach started ranting about “kids wasting time on birdhouses instead of weight training.” “Thought you hid out in your garage 24/7 these days,” she said, popping open the pickle jar and holding it out to him. The sharp tang of vinegar and dill hit his nose before he even reached for one.
He took the pickle, crunched into it, salt bursting on his tongue. “Got roped into bringing the cornhole boards,” he said, nodding at the set across the field where a group of firemen were already yelling over scores. “Was just about to leave.” She snickered, leaning her shoulder against the pole next to him, the sleeve of her cut-off Steelers hoodie brushing his bicep. “Of course you were. You always bailed on staff parties early too, remember? Used to sneak out to your truck to eat a sandwich instead of listening to the coach ramble about playoff runs.” He laughed, a real one, the kind he didn’t let out often these days, and her hand landed on his arm, calloused from the pottery she’d been selling at the farmers market, and she didn’t move it for three full seconds.
Something tight in his chest loosened, and before he could think better of it, he told her about the birdhouses he’d been building for the local animal shelter’s silent auction, about the custom dining table he’d just finished for a couple who’d gotten married at the county park. She told him she’d bought three of his birdhouses at the auction the month prior, had hung them all in her backyard, that the bluebirds had already moved into one. For a minute he forgot he was supposed to be leaving, forgot about the pitying looks, forgot about the quiet empty house waiting for him. The band started playing a slow, scratchy version of Willie Nelson’s “Always on My Mind,” and she tilted her head at the patch of grass between the tent and the cornhole boards. “You dance?” she asked.
He froze for half a second. He hadn’t danced since his wife’s funeral, when his sister had dragged him into the kitchen for a slow song after everyone else had left. Part of him screamed that this was wrong, that he was betraying the wife he’d loved for 34 years, that messing around with his old co-worker’s ex was the kind of trashy move he’d judged other guys for back when he was younger. But the other part of him, the part that had been cold and hollow for four years, was warm, buzzing, hungry for the way she was looking at him like she actually cared what he had to say, like she didn’t see him as just the grieving widower. He wiped his sweaty palm on the leg of his work jeans, nodded.
They didn’t go over to the actual dance floor, just swayed a little right there next to the tent pole, her hand on his shoulder, his hand on her hip, the rough fabric of her cutoff jeans under his palm. Her hip pressed against his, her hair smelling like lavender and campfire smoke, and she leaned in so her mouth was next to his ear, her breath warm against his neck. “I always thought you were the only decent guy in that whole school,” she said. “Used to make up excuses to drop by the shop just to say hi, back when we were both married. Was too much of a coward to do anything about it.” He laughed soft, told her he’d used to carve extra fancy pencil boxes for her son when he was in his woodshop class, just so he’d have an excuse to drop them off at her art room.
She pulled back a little, looked up at him, and before he could say anything else, she kissed him, quick at first, like she was testing to see if he’d push her away, then slower, when he didn’t. No one was looking, everyone was too busy yelling over the cornhole tournament, too busy cheering for the band, too busy eating their third serving of pulled pork. When she pulled back, her cheeks were pink, her lip gloss a little smudged, and she grinned at him. “You still gonna leave early?” she asked.
He shook his head, tossed his empty beer can in the trash next to the pole. They spent the next two hours sitting on the tailgate of his beat up 2008 Ford F150, sharing her jar of pickles, making fun of the coach who was currently yelling at his teenaged kid for missing a cornhole shot, talking about everything and nothing. When the sun started to dip below the tree line, she slung her bag over her shoulder, nodded at the truck. “I got a peach pie cooling on my kitchen counter that I baked this morning,” she said. “You wanna come split it with me? Got vanilla ice cream in the freezer too.”
He held the passenger door open for her, and when she slid in, she tucked a strand of gray-streaked dark hair behind her ear and winked, and for the first time in four years, he didn’t feel like rushing to get home to an empty house.
