Rafe Marquez is 59, a retired wildland firefighter who now runs a one-man firewood delivery and custom fire pit building outfit outside Bend, Oregon. His biggest flaw is the 8-year streak he’s clung to of turning down every date, every casual flirtation, even the friendly widows from his church who bring him casseroles after big snowstorms. He lost his wife to lung cancer six weeks after his crew lead, Jake, died in the 2017 Eagle Creek Fire, and he’s carried both weights like they’re chained to his work boots ever since, convinced any joy he might chase now would be a betrayal of the two people he’d failed most.
He hits the downtown farmers market every Saturday at 9 a.m. sharp, only ever buys peaches from the old Mennonite couple at the far end, and avoids eye contact with everyone else. This week, though, there’s a new stand squeezed between the kettle corn booth and the guy who sells hand-forged garden tools, stacked floor to ceiling with glass honey jars, a fat golden retriever curled at the base of the table. The dog bolts before Rafe can step around the stand, tangles his leash tight around Rafe’s laced-up work boots, nearly sending him sprawling into a stack of wildflower honey jars.
The woman behind the table laughs as she leans down to untangle the leash, her sun-bleached auburn hair falling over her shoulder, her shoulder brushing the bare skin of his calf through the rip in his jeans. He smells lavender soap and raw, unprocessed honey, and for half a second he forgets how to speak. When she stands up, she’s got a tiny silver scar through her left eyebrow, freckles across her nose, and she’s holding the leash in one hand, wiping grass off her jeans with the other. “Sorry about him,” she says, nodding at the dog, who’s now sitting at Rafe’s feet, thumping his tail. “Name’s Cinder. Thinks everyone he meets is his new best friend.”
Rafe snorts before he can stop himself. Cinder. Of course the dog is named Cinder. He says as much, tells her he spent 22 years fighting wildfires, has heard every variation of the joke a hundred times. Her grin softens when he says that, and she leans across the table a little, close enough that he can see the flecks of green in her hazel eyes. “You wouldn’t happen to know Rafe Marquez, would you?” she asks. “My brother was Jake Carter. He talked about you all the time.”
The air leaves his lungs like someone just punched him in the gut. He’s carried Jake’s beat-up brass Zippo in his front pocket every single day since the fire, still has the creased photo of Jake and his little sister taped to the inside of his truck’s center console, the one Jake carried in his fire pack. He’d spent years avoiding Jake’s family, too guilty to tell them he’d been 10 feet away when the tree fell, that he couldn’t pull Jake out in time. He wants to turn around and walk away, pretend he never saw this stand, never met her, but she’s already reaching across the table to hand him a sample of honey on a small wooden spoon, their fingers brushing when he takes it. The contact is warm, static sharp, and neither of them pulls away for a beat longer than is strictly polite.
She tells him she moved to Bend three months prior, finally left her deadbeat ex-husband in Portland, wanted to be closer to the land Jake loved, had been asking around for someone to build a custom stone fire pit for the small cabin she bought outside Tumalo. Rafe’s first instinct is to say no, to tell her he’s too busy, to run as fast as he can from the guilt coiling in his chest, the quiet, unignorable hum of attraction he hasn’t felt in almost a decade. Instead, he pulls Jake’s Zippo out of his pocket, flicks it open and shut once, the familiar click loud over the hum of the market crowd, the distant bluegrass set playing near the entrance. “I’ve carried this since the fire,” he says, his voice rougher than he expects. “I’m sorry I couldn’t bring him home.”
She reaches across the table again, rests her hand on his wrist, her palm warm through the thin fabric of his faded crew hoodie. “Jake told me you pulled three other guys out that day,” she says, no pity in her voice, just steady, sure. “He never blamed you. Neither do I.”
The weight he’s carried for 7 years loosens, just a little, right then. He tells her he builds fire pits, gives her his cell number scrawled on the back of a crumpled firewood delivery receipt he has stuffed in his jeans pocket, tells her he can drive out to her cabin next week to take measurements. She tucks the receipt into the front pocket of her plaid flannel shirt, grins, and says she’ll have fresh peach pie waiting for him when he shows up.
He picks up his bag of peaches from the Mennonite couple on his way out, climbs into his beat-up 2008 Ford F-150, and glances in the rearview mirror before he pulls out of the parking lot. She’s leaning against her honey stand, Cinder at her feet, watching him drive away, and she lifts a hand to wave, slow and easy.
