Arlo Mendez is 62, retired tree trimmer, spent 38 years hoisting chainsaws up oak and maple canopies across northwest Ohio, has a scar snaking up his left forearm from a 2017 encounter with a dead ash branch, still lifts 50 pound feed bags for his neighbor’s goats three times a week just to stay sharp. His biggest flaw? He’d rather chip his own tooth on a jawbreaker than admit he’s lonely, ever since his wife bailed on him eight years back for a software sales rep half his age who drove a Tesla and couldn’t change a flat tire if his life depended on it. He’d turned down every blind date his sister tried to set him up on, convinced anyone under 70 would look at his weathered face and calloused hands and see nothing but a washed up old guy who spent too much time talking to his border collie, Mabel.
The fire department cookout was the last place he wanted to be on a humid June Saturday, but he owed the fire chief a favor for bailing Mabel out of a storm drain last winter, so he’d showed up at 10 a.m. with a case of beer and an apron that said “World’s Okayest Grill Master” and got put on burger duty. He was three dozen burgers in, sweat beading at his hairline and dripping down the back of his faded flannel, when he felt a shoulder brush his bicep, soft and warm, and smelled lavender lotion cut with the faint tang of sweet iced tea.
He turned, and it was Lila Carter, 44, his late best friend Tom’s only daughter, who’d moved back to town three months prior to run the small public library after her ex-husband took a job in Singapore and left her with the family home and a very bitter divorce settlement. Arlo had carried her on his shoulders to watch Fourth of July fireworks when she was 7, had helped her fix the flat tire on her beat up first car when she was 16, had sat in the front row of her college graduation back in 2001. He’d avoided her since she moved back, scared his stupid, unbidden thoughts about how well her high-waisted jeans fit would show on his face, scared he’d cross a line he could never come back from.
“Still burning the patties like you did at my 16th birthday, huh?” she said, grinning, holding out a paper plate. Her wire rim glasses slid down her nose a little, and she pushed them up with one finger, her eyes crinkling at the corners the same way Tom’s used to when he was teasing someone. She leaned in a little closer than she needed to, her elbow brushing his again when she reached for a slice of cheddar off the tray next to him, and Arlo felt his throat go dry. He fumbled for a spatula, dropped it on the sun-warmed concrete with a clatter, and she laughed, a low, warm sound that made the back of his neck tingle.
He made her a burger, extra pickles like he remembered she liked, and when the crowd started thinning out around 7 p.m., she found him leaning against the tailgate of his beat up 2008 F150, sipping a beer and watching Mabel chase fireflies across the overgrown ball field. She sat down next to him, close enough that their knees pressed together through their jeans, and handed him a cold can of lemonade spiked with vodka, the kind her mom used to make for summer cookouts, sweet and tart enough to make your eyes water a little.
They talked for an hour, about the library’s new after school program for foster kids, about the big oak tree in her front yard that needed dead branches trimmed off before storm season hit, about how Tom would have yelled at Arlo for burning half the burger batch and stolen the least charred one for himself. She leaned in every time he spoke, her eyes locked on his, no awkward glances away, no checking her phone every two minutes like every other person his age complained about. When he squinted to look at the sunset dipping pink and orange over the nearby cornfield, she reached up and brushed a stray strand of gray hair off his forehead, her fingers lingering on the scar on his jaw from the time he fell out of Tom’s oak tree back in 2001, cutting it down after a tornado tore through town.
“You still have that,” she said, her thumb brushing the scar soft, like she was checking it was real. Arlo’s heart was hammering so hard he was sure she could hear it over the crickets chirping in the grass. He’d spent three months telling himself he was a disgusting old creep for even noticing her, for daydreaming about what her laugh would sound like in his kitchen over morning coffee, about how soft her hands would feel against his. He’d avoided the library, avoided the grocery store on Tuesday afternoons when he knew she shopped there, convinced he was doing the right thing, that any interest from her was just pity for the lonely old guy her dad used to hang out with.
“I’ve been avoiding you,” he blurted out, before he could stop himself. He expected her to pull away, to look offended, to call him a creep and walk off. Instead, she laughed, leaning even closer, her shoulder pressed tight to his.
“I know,” she said. “I’ve been leaving extra copies of those western novels you like on the hold shelf for you for three months. You never came to pick them up.” She laced her fingers through his, her soft hand wrapping around his calloused one, the scar on his knuckle catching against her faint wedding ring indent, still visible even a year after her divorce was finalized. “I had a crush on you when I was 17, you know. Thought you were the only guy in this whole town who didn’t act like he was compensating for something every time he opened his mouth. You still are.”
She told him she’d baked a peach pie that morning, the same recipe her mom used, the kind Arlo used to beg for every time he came over for Sunday dinner, and asked him if he wanted to come back to her place to eat it, no strings attached, no pressure. Arlo didn’t overthink it, didn’t run through the list of stupid reasons he should say no, didn’t worry about what the town gossips would say when they saw his truck parked in her driveway. He just nodded, helped her load the leftover paper plates and napkins into her hatchback, and held the passenger door open for her. She squeezed his hand before she got in, standing on her tiptoes to press a quick, soft kiss to his cheek, the lavender from her lotion clinging to his skin.
He slid behind the wheel of his truck, Mabel curled up on the passenger seat next to him, and followed her taillights down the dark county road, the faint smell of her lavender lotion still clinging to the cuff of his flannel shirt.
