Ronan Marlow, 62, spent the last three years building custom fly rods out of his garage in northeast Portland, and the last eight years avoiding any social event that required more small talk than ordering coffee. He’d built his career as a forensic accountant, digging through messy ledgers to catch small-town embezzlers who thought they could outsmart the quiet guy with the thick glasses and perpetually chipped work boots, and the skill left him with a low tolerance for performative nicety. When his golden retriever Gus dragged him across the lawn to the neighborhood block party at 4 p.m. that Saturday, he’d planned to grab one beer, hide by the chip table for ten minutes, and slip back home before anyone could ask him about his “fun retirement hobbies.”
He was three sips into a lukewarm IPA, watching Gus scarf a dropped hot dog bun under the folding table, when she stepped up beside him. Elara Voss, 58, his next door neighbor of two months, who he’d only waved at from a 20-foot distance through the gap in their shared fence, who the neighborhood PTA moms whispered about at the grocery store because she wore red lipstick to walk her cat and played old jazz loud enough to rattle his workshop windows on weeknights. She was wearing a deep teal linen wrap dress that caught the golden summer light, a tiny silver scarab brooch pinned at the V of her collar, and she smelled like jasmine and smoked paprika, the latter presumably from the tray of deviled eggs she’d set down on the table ten minutes prior.
She reached for the same bag of dill pickle chips he’d been reaching for, their knuckles brushing, and Ronan flinched like he’d touched a live wire. He hadn’t had any physical contact with a person who wasn’t his vet or the guy at the bait shop in close to two years. She held his gaze, not looking away like most people did when they realized he was the guy who’d once made a city treasurer cry mid-audit, and grinned, the corner of her mouth tugging up higher on one side. “You’re the guy who carves those pretty wood rods in his garage, right?” she said, nodding toward his house, and Ronan blinked, surprised she’d even noticed.
He wanted to mumble a yes and walk away, wanted to tell himself she was too loud, too much, that the neighbors would stare if he talked to her too long, that he was too old for whatever this was. That was the sharp, familiar edge of disgust, the ingrained habit of shutting down any flicker of desire before it could turn into something that would leave him raw if it faded. But she leaned in a little closer, the frayed edge of her dress brushing his calf, and lowered her voice so only he could hear. “For the record, half the people side-eyeing me right now have bought custom costumes from me back when I ran the burlesque shop downtown. The PTA mom in the khaki capris bought a 6-foot ostrich feather boa for her anniversary trip to Maui last year. The retired cop over there grilling burgers? Ordered a hand-tooled leather harness for his wife for their 30th.”
Ronan snorted, a rough, unexpected sound, and took another sip of beer. She laughed, a low, rough sound like she smoked a single cigarette every night after dinner, and he found himself leaning in too, closing the small gap between them. He told her about the rods, about the cedar he’d cut himself on a solo camping trip last fall, about the way he spent three hours sanding each handle until it fit a fisherman’s grip like it was made just for them. She told him about the costume shop, about the 72-year-old grandmother who’d come in last year to order a sequined tassel dress for her first burlesque performance, about the way she still sews patches for the local drag queens on weekends.
When a group of kids ran past screaming, chasing a water balloon, she stepped closer to him to avoid getting hit, her shoulder pressing against his upper arm for three full seconds before she moved back. He didn’t pull away. He handed her a paper plate when she reached for one, his thumb brushing the soft, warm skin on the inside of her wrist, and he saw the tiny tattoo of a sewing needle inked just above her pulse point.
She tilted her head at him, the sun catching the silver strands in her dark hair, and asked if he wanted to get out of there, go back to his garage, see the rods he was working on. She said she’d been watching him through the fence sometimes when she watered her tomatoes, that the way he held the carving knife, slow and careful, like he was handling something fragile, had caught her eye the first week she moved in.
Ronan hesitated for half a second, glancing over at the group of neighbors who were definitely watching them, then he whistled for Gus, who came trotting over, his muzzle covered in ketchup. They walked the 30 feet to his house side by side, her hand brushing his every few steps, and he didn’t move his hand away. He unlocked the garage door, flipped on the warm overhead lights, and stepped aside to let her in. She walked straight to the half-finished cedar rod he’d been working on for two weeks, running her index finger along the smooth, finished grain, and he reached into the top drawer of his workbench, pulling out the tiny carved wooden scarab he’d made a month prior, for no reason he could name until that exact second. He set it down next to her hand on the workbench, his knuckle brushing hers again, and she picked it up, holding it up to the light to see the tiny carved lines on its back, a perfect match for the silver brooch on her dress.
