Russell “Rust” Pritchard, 62, retired wildland fire crew boss, moved to southeast Ohio 10 months prior after his wife of 34 years passed from breast cancer. He’d spent 32 years chasing blazes across national forests out west, had the scar splitting his left eyebrow and a permanent rasp in his throat from smoke inhalation to prove it. His only soft spot was his 7-year-old granddaughter Lila, so when she begged him to come to the local Lions Club end-of-summer fish fry, he couldn’t say no, even if he’d rather have spent the night sanding the hull of his late dad’s 1978 Chris-Craft alone.
The air hung thick with the smell of burnt cornmeal, vinegar-drenched coleslaw, and faint diesel fumes from the boat ramp two blocks over. Lila had run off 20 minutes prior to enter the hushpuppy eating contest with her friends, so Rust was waiting in line for a second plate when someone yelled his name. He turned too fast, sloshing a heaping scoop of coleslaw down the front of a woman’s pale blue linen button-down. It was Mara Carter, Lila’s 48-year-old preschool teacher, newly divorced, the woman he’d only spoken to twice at parent-teacher conferences, always thought was too sharp, too put-together to waste time chatting with a grizzled ex-firefighter who still wore steel-toe boots to grocery runs.
He fumbled for a crumpled napkin in his jeans pocket, swore under his breath, reached out to dab the mess off before he thought better of it, his knuckle brushing the soft skin just above her collarbone. She didn’t step back. She held his gaze, warm brown eyes crinkling at the corners, and said she’d been meaning to corner him anyway, heard he knew every hidden fishing cove on the upper Ohio River. The thought twisted in his gut fast: she was 14 years younger, everyone in this small town talked, he’d told himself he’d never so much as look at another woman after Diane died. But she was leaning in a little, the scent of jasmine lotion cutting through the fried food stench, her knee brushing his where they stood an inch closer than casual acquaintances ever would, and the resistance fizzled out fast.
He offered to take her out Saturday morning, left out the part where he’d planned to spend the whole day drinking cheap beer and listening to old Waylon Jennings records alone. She said yes before he finished the sentence, scrawled her number on the back of a fish fry ticket, tucked it into the pocket of his flannel shirt, her fingers lingering on his wrist for a beat too long.
Saturday was perfect, 72 degrees, no wind, the sun filtering through oak leaves in dappled gold patches on the water. They anchored in a quiet cove he’d fished since he was a kid, the only sound the lap of water against the hull and a woodpecker tapping somewhere in the treeline. She’d never cast a rod before, so he stood behind her, adjusted her grip on the reel, his chest pressed to her back for 10 seconds longer than necessary. She reeled in a 12-inch smallmouth 20 minutes later, whooped so loud a flock of geese took off from the shore, lost her balance when she leaned over to grab the net, and fell straight into his lap.
Their faces were three inches apart. He could smell coconut sunscreen on her skin, see the faint smattering of freckles across her nose he’d never noticed at parent conferences. She tilted her chin up, and he kissed her, slow, no rush, no overthinking what the neighbors might say, no guilt about Diane, no stupid rules he’d made up for himself out of grief. She tasted like the peach iced tea they’d brought along, her hand coming up to rest on the side of his face, the callus on her thumb from holding crayons all week brushing the scar on his eyebrow. They didn’t talk about labels, didn’t make plans past grabbing cheeseburgers at the dive bar off the ramp on the way back. He pulled back after a minute, grinning, and teased her that if she wanted a better catch than the smallmouth, she didn’t have to fake a fall to get it. She snort-laughed, swatted his shoulder, and picked her rod back up, her knee pressed firm to his the whole rest of the afternoon.
