Rafe Marquez, 58, retired air traffic controller, had spent the last seven years perfecting the art of being left alone. After his wife left for a real estate broker in Scottsdale, he’d packed up his Phoenix condo, moved to a tiny coastal Oregon town, and dumped every spare minute into restoring the 1972 Boston Whaler his dad had left him. His only consistent social interaction was yelling at the seagulls that stole his sandwich off the dock, and he liked it that way. He’d only agreed to show up to the town’s annual chili cookoff because his 82-year-old next door neighbor had baked him peach pie all spring and badgered him until he caved.
He was leaning against the side of the craft beer truck, sipping a hazy IPA and pretending to check his flip phone for text messages he didn’t have, when someone slammed into his left side. A glop of bean and beef chili splattered across the navy blue flannel he’d worn even though the sun was beating down hard enough to make the back of his neck sweat. He opened his mouth to snap, then stopped.
The woman in front of him was Lila Hale, 52, who’d bought the bait shop at the end of the dock six months prior. He’d heard the town gossip: she’d walked away from a six-figure marketing job in Portland, left a long-term boyfriend, and once poured a full pint of IPA over a guy’s head at the dive bar for making crude comments about high school girls waiting in line for tacos. He’d avoided her on purpose, written her off as the kind of chaotic mess he didn’t have time for. Now she was grinning, the corner of her mouth tilted up like she thought the whole thing was funny, her sun-bleached auburn hair pulled back in a messy braid, a streak of charcoal on her left cheek from restocking briquettes at her shop that morning. She smelled like coconut sunscreen and cedar, like she spent every minute of her day outside, and he couldn’t remember the last time a woman’s scent had hit him that hard, that fast.
“Sorry about the flannel,” she said, wiping a stray smudge of chili off her own cutoffs with a calloused hand. “Some kid on a skateboard came flying around the corner and I had to dodge.” She nodded at the stain, then met his eyes, held the gaze longer than most people did, like she wasn’t scared of his usual gruff scowl. “I live two minutes from here, my Airstream’s parked right off the boardwalk. I’ve got stain remover, can get that out before it sets. I’ll even throw in a free beer as apology.”
He hesitated for half a second, his first instinct to say no, to go home, change, and hide out with his Whaler for the rest of the weekend. But he was already tired of the cookoff, tired of strangers asking him how the boat restoration was going, and he was curious. Curious if she was as sharp as the rumors said, if she really was as unapproachable as everyone claimed. He nodded.
They walked side by side down the boardwalk, their shoulders brushing every few steps, the sound of the cookoff’s country band fading behind them, replaced by the crash of the waves and the squawk of seagulls overhead. Her Airstream was a faded silver 1978 model, strung with warm fairy lights along the porch, a scruffy border collie mix curled on the steps that stood up and wagged its tail when they approached. She let the dog nudge her hand for a scratch before unlocking the door, then waved him inside.
He sat on the couch while she ran the flannel under cold water in the tiny kitchen sink, dabbing it with dish soap and stain remover, chattering the whole time about the idiot who’d tried to steal a bucket of live shrimp from her shop the week before, about the pod of gray whales she’d spotted off the pier the day before. He found himself leaning forward, listening, answering her questions about air traffic control, telling her the story of the time he’d talked a panicking float plane pilot through landing in a thunderstorm off the California coast, a story he hadn’t told anyone since he’d retired.
When she brought the flannel back, the stain was gone, still damp, and she handed him another cold beer before they stepped out onto the porch to wait for it to dry. They leaned against the rail, their elbows brushing when they both reached for the bowl of salted peanuts she’d set out between them. Once, when he laughed at a joke she made about the town’s mayor wearing a toupee that kept blowing off in the wind, she reached up and brushed a crumb of peanut off his chest, her fingers lingering on the fabric of his white undershirt for a beat longer than necessary, her hazel eyes flecked with gold locking onto his.
He didn’t overthink it. He leaned down, kissed her slow, and she kissed him back, her hands curling around his waist, her lips tasting like lime and IPA and salt from the ocean air. He’d spent seven years telling himself he didn’t need anyone, that being alone was easier, that the hassle of getting to know someone wasn’t worth the risk of getting hurt again. But right then, with the sun setting pink and orange over the ocean, her hands warm on his back, the dog curled at their feet, he couldn’t remember why he’d ever thought that.
They ate grilled salmon and corn on the cob on the porch later, talking until the moon was high in the sky, the sound of crickets humming in the dunes all around them. When he reached for her hand across the small wooden table, she laced her calloused fingers through his, no hesitation, no awkwardness. A stray gust of wind blew a strand of her hair across her face, and he tucked it behind her ear, his thumb brushing the soft skin of her cheek as he did.
