Leo Rios, 62, retired highway construction foreman from Dayton, had spent the better part of the last hour dodging well-meaning church ladies at the county fall harvest festival. He’d dug in his heels for four years straight, ever since his wife Elaine passed from lung cancer, insisting he didn’t need company, didn’t need to “get back out there,” hated that half the town looked at him like he was a lost puppy with a broken paw. He’d only showed up that Saturday because his 10-year-old granddaughter Lila was competing in the junior pie baking contest, and he’d promised he’d be front row for the awards. He’d ducked behind the hot spiced cider tent to catch his breath, steam curling up to fog the edge of his wire-rimmed glasses, when it happened.
He reached for a steaming paper cup at the exact same time a woman he’d never seen before did, their knuckles brushing hard enough that he almost dropped the crumpled $2 bill he’d pulled out to pay. Her hand was cool, calloused at the fingertips, a smudge of deep purple blackberry jam streaked across her wrist just above the rolled cuff of a well-worn gray flannel shirt. She laughed, a low, throaty sound that cut through the twang of the bluegrass band playing two tents over, and didn’t yank her hand away like most people did when they realized who he was, the widower who shut everyone out. She was Mara Carter, 58, the new part-time librarian who’d moved to town three months prior from upstate New York, running the jam booth to raise money for the library’s crumbling 19th century map collection.
When he mentioned he’d spent 38 years drawing custom route maps for highway construction projects, mapping out drainage lines and curve grades that most engineers couldn’t be bothered to get right, her face lit up. She leaned in, close enough that he could smell vanilla lotion and the sweet, tart scent of the jars lined up on the table behind her, and started asking him questions about what it was like to map land that no one had bothered to look closely at before. He’d spent the last four years shutting down conversations that even hinted at anything more than small talk, but he found himself answering. He told her about the time he’d mapped a stretch of Route 35 through the hills outside of town, found an old abandoned one-room schoolhouse no one had recorded in county records in 70 years. He told her about how Elaine used to tease him for bringing half-drawn maps home to spread across the kitchen table after work. For the first time, talking about Elaine didn’t feel like a wall he was putting up between himself and someone new. It felt like sharing an old, good memory.
A group of kids chasing a runaway golden retriever jostled past them, bumping Leo’s shoulder hard enough that he stumbled a half step into her. She didn’t step back. She just rested her hand on his bicep for a beat to steady him, her thumb brushing the frayed edge of his oil-stained work jacket, and grinned when he mumbled an apology about kids having no sense of their surroundings. She offered him a sample of her award-winning blackberry jam, holding a small plastic spoon out between them, when the same golden retriever darted past again, knocking her hand off kilter. A dollop of jam landed right on the edge of his jaw, just below his left ear. She huffed a laugh, reached up without thinking, and wiped it off with the pad of her thumb, her skin warm against his silver stubble. She held her hand there for two, three beats, their eyes locked, and he didn’t flinch, didn’t pull away, didn’t make a self-deprecating joke about being too old for messy food accidents. The sharp twist of guilt he’d expected to feel, the voice in his head telling him he was betraying Elaine, never showed up. He just felt warm, and seen, and a little giddy, like he was 16 again sneaking into the drive-in with a girl he liked.
When she pulled her hand away, she wiped the jam off on her jeans and raised an eyebrow, asking him if he planned on telling her if the jam was any good or if he was just going to stare at her all afternoon. He laughed, took the spoon from her, tasted the jam, sweet and sharp and perfect, and told her it was the best thing he’d eaten all year. He asked her if she wanted to come sit with him for the pie contest awards, and if after that she wanted to split a piece of Lila’s apple pie, the one Lila had spent three nights practicing, crust crimped just like Elaine used to do. She nodded, grabbing a jar of the blackberry jam off the table to tuck under her arm, and fell into step next to him as he walked toward the contest stage. The bluegrass band struck up a slow version of “Folsom Prison Blues” as they walked, fallen maple leaves crunching under their boots, and when she slipped her hand into the crook of his elbow, he laced his fingers through hers without hesitation.
