Rafe Mendez, 58, spent 27 years as a U.S. Forest Service hotshot crew lead before retiring to carve oversized bears and eagle sculptures out of fallen cedar for small Oregon town parks and front yards. His biggest flaw, per his only sister who lives in Portland, is that he’s spent the six years since his wife Linda died acting like any hint of interest from another woman is a federal offense punishable by six months of solo backpacking in the Siskiyous. He doesn’t argue with her. It’s easier than explaining that every time a woman smiles at him for longer than two seconds, his chest tightens like he’s breathing in wildfire smoke, guilt coiling tight under his ribs.
He’d only signed up for the annual Maple Street summer fair because the parks department begged him, said his carvings always draw a crowd. The temperature hit 92 by noon, and he was still wearing his beat-up gray flannel, sleeves rolled up to his elbows, old habit from years of working around flying sparks and sharp branches. Sweat dripped down the side of his neck, and when he reached for his dented metal water bottle perched on the edge of his table, he knocked over a half-pint jar of his custom beeswax wood finish. It rolled across the asphalt, skittering under the edge of the pie booth next to his.
He bent down to grab it at the same time a woman did. Their hands brushed first, callus on callus, hers from kneading dough six days a week, his from holding chainsaws and fire axes. He pulled back fast, like he’d touched a hot stove, and when he looked up, she was laughing, a low, warm sound that cut through the hum of the cotton candy machine and the bluegrass band playing two blocks over. She was 54, he guessed, streaks of silver running through the dark hair braided down her back, a faded denim apron spotted with blueberry and peach stain stretched across her shoulders, a stray strand of hair stuck to her sun-pink forehead. She smelled like cinnamon and ripe stone fruit, no heavy perfume, nothing fake.
“Elara Voss,” she said, holding out the jar to him, their fingers brushing again when he took it. “I own the Pie Hole on Oak Street. I’ve had that little bear you carved for the community center on my mantel for three years now.”
He grunted a thanks, already mentally kicking himself for how awkward he sounded. He hadn’t held a conversation with a woman who wasn’t his sister or the cashier at the grocery store in longer than he could remember. He was about to turn back to his table when a kid running full tilt with a snow cone in his hand slammed into the edge of her booth, sending a full peach pie tumbling off the display stand, tin and filling splattering across the asphalt.
He grabbed the roll of heavy paper towels he kept in his carving kit before he thought about it, kneeling next to her to mop up the sticky mess. Their shoulders bumped when they both reached for a shard of tin, and he felt the heat radiate off her skin through the thin cotton of her t-shirt. She held eye contact with him for three full seconds, longer than casual, the corner of her mouth tugging up in a half smile that made his ears go hot. He didn’t look away first, for once.
She told him Linda had been her 11th grade English teacher, back in 2004. That Linda used to bring photos of Rafe and his crew to class, tell stories about him fighting the 2002 Biscuit Fire, that she’d even gotten Linda’s famous peach pie recipe at a PTA bake sale two years before Linda got sick. The guilt hit him hard then, sharp and cold, like he’d been caught doing something he shouldn’t. This was Linda’s former student, for Christ’s sake, he told himself. You don’t flirt with your dead wife’s old kid. But he couldn’t stop talking to her, either, asking about her shop, laughing when she complained about the teenager she’d hired for the summer who kept eating the strawberry rhubarb pie before it went on display.
By the time the fair closed down at 7, the sky had turned dark gray, fat raindrops starting to splatter the asphalt. She was struggling to lift a 40-pound cooler of leftover pie into the bed of her beat-up Ford Ranger, grunting with the effort, when he walked over and hefted it into the truck like it weighed nothing. She brushed a strand of hair off her face, leaning against the side of the truck, and asked him if he wanted to come over for dinner. She had grilled salmon marinating in her fridge, and a six pack of cold IPA, she said, no pressure, no strings.
He hesitated for what felt like an hour, his chest tight, Linda’s voice playing in his head, the last thing she’d told him before she died, that she didn’t want him to be alone, that he deserved to be happy. He nodded, once, and the smile that spread across her face made the tight knot in his stomach loosen for the first time in six years.
Her house was three blocks from the fair, a little blue bungalow with a vegetable garden in the front yard and a porch swing hanging from the eave. She flipped on the porch light when they walked up, crickets chirping loud in the grass, the rain tapping soft against the roof. She leaned in a little to brush a cedar wood chip off the shoulder of his flannel, her hand lingering on his bicep for a beat, no apology, no awkward pull back. He didn’t move away.
He followed her into the kitchen, setting the half-pint of wood wax and the leftover slice of peach pie she’d pressed on him at the fair on her counter. She turned to face him, her hip pressed against the edge of the counter, and he stepped closer, no hesitation this time. He tastes cinnamon on her lips when she kisses him ten minutes later, standing in her kitchen next to the crumpled paper towel they’d used to wipe pie filling off his boot earlier.
