Jaxson Marlow, 53, made his living twisting wrenches on commercial fishing boat engines and winches out of a cinder block shop wedged between two bait shacks on the Oregon coast, and he’d spent the last six years perfecting the art of avoiding small town social events. His divorce had left him with a thick, unshakable distrust of any situation that could spawn gossip, and he’d turned down no less than twelve dinner invitations and three blind date setups in the last three months alone, preferring the quiet clank of his socket set to forced small talk over lukewarm pot roast. He only agreed to come to the annual coastal crab feed because his old fishing partner, Tom, had showed up at his shop at 4 PM with a six pack of his favorite hazy IPA and threatened to drain the oil from his personal pickup if he bailed.
She sat down next to him without asking, her bare knee brushing his denim-clad one when she shifted to cross her legs, and he didn’t move away. That alone was a shock; he’d spent so long leaning out of any physical proximity to anyone that the warmth of her leg against his sent a jolt up his spine he hadn’t felt since before his divorce. He teased her about still being as clumsy as she was the day she’d fallen off the dock trying to untie his boat, and she shoved his shoulder playfully, her hand lingering on his bicep for a beat longer than necessary. She told him she’d moved back to town two weeks prior to take a part-time job at the small local library, and he found himself leaning in when she lowered her voice to tell him about the elderly regular who’d tried to check out 13 true crime novels in one visit, claiming he was “researching his next prank on the HOA board.” Her breath was warm against his ear, and he fought the stupid, overwhelming urge to tuck a loose strand of wind-tousled hair behind her ear.
The logical part of his brain was screaming at him to get up and leave. Tom was her dad, for Christ’s sake, and the town gossips would have a field day if they saw them sitting this close, laughing like they didn’t have a 24 year age gap between them. He’d be labeled a creep, Tom would never speak to him again, and he’d lose the only real friend he had left. But the part of him that had been dormant for six years, the part that missed feeling seen, that missed the quiet thrill of talking to someone who didn’t look at him like he was a broken, bitter old man, was louder. When the first firework exploded over the ocean, painting the sky neon pink and painting her face soft rose, she shifted even closer, her shoulder pressed fully against his, and he looked down to find her staring up at him, not at the show.
She laced her fingers through his calloused, grease-stained ones on top of the bench, and he didn’t pull away. He saw Tom glance over from the next table a second later, raise an eyebrow, and then grin and lift his beer in a quiet toast, like he’d been waiting for this to happen for years. Jax didn’t care about the stares, didn’t care about the gossip that would be all over the town diner counter by tomorrow morning. He squeezed her hand, and she smiled, leaning her head against his shoulder as the next round of fireworks boomed over the water.
