Manny Ruiz, 53, minor league baseball scout for the Diamondbacks’ Low-A affiliate in Hillsboro, had been dragged to the Tucson annual taco festival against his better judgment. His childhood friend Javi had shown up at his door at 2 p.m. with a six pack of Modelo, called him a stubborn old mule for missing eight straight years of the event just because it’s where he’d had his first date with his ex-wife. Manny didn’t argue. He knew Javi was right. He’d spent the better part of a decade clinging to a grudge that didn’t even fit right anymore, turning down setups, skipping neighborhood cookouts, spending most of his off days alone with his three-legged beagle Scoop and his half-restored 1972 F-100.
He was halfway through a plate of al pastor, debating if he could slip out early without Javi noticing, when the monsoon hit. One second the sun was blistering, the next the sky turned dark as asphalt, rain pouring so hard it stung the back of his neck. He grabbed his half-empty horchata and darted for the closest small canopy, stepping back hard to avoid a kid in a neon soccer jersey sprinting through the mud, and slammed straight into someone. His elbow knocked a paper plate out of their hand, a single carnitas taco toppling into the mud at their feet.
He looked down, ready to apologize, and froze. It was Lena, the woman who ran the Southside food bank where he dropped off leftover game day concessions every other Sunday. He’d never spoken to her for more than 30 seconds at a time, always unloading the boxes of hot dogs and peanuts fast so he could get back in his truck before she asked any personal questions, but he’d thought about her more than he’d care to admit. The streak of silver in her dark wavy hair, the scuffed work boots she wore every single time he saw her, the way she laughed loud enough to be heard across the parking lot when one of her volunteers made a joke.
She waved off his fumbling apology, grinning so the crinkles at the corners of her eyes deepened. “Don’t worry about it. That was my fifth taco. I was already looking for an excuse not to finish it.” The canopy was barely four feet wide, so their shoulders were pressed tight together, rain drumming so loud on the thin plastic above their heads the mariachi band three tents over sounded muffled, like they were playing through a pillow. He could smell coconut shampoo and roasted pineapple on her, the hem of her gray flannel shirt dotted with rain, her arm warm where it pressed against his bare bicep.
He glanced down at her left wrist first, noticed the tiny faded baseball tattoo just above her knuckles, next to a thin scar that ran across her index finger. She noticed him staring, held her wrist up so he could see it better. “Got it last year when my son made little league all-stars. The scar’s from when I fell off my bike trying to practice catching with him. Don’t tell him I’m that bad at it.” He laughed, a rough unexpected sound, and told her he was the guy who dropped off the game leftovers every other week. She nodded, said she knew. She’d recognized his truck the second he walked in, the faded Diamondbacks sticker on the back window, the dent in the passenger door from when Scoop jumped out to chase a jackrabbit last spring.
He’d had no idea she’d paid that much attention. They talked for 22 minutes, he counted, the rain slowing to a soft drizzle, and neither of them made a move to leave. He told her about the 17-year-old shortstop he’d scouted in Nogales the week before, how the kid had an arm like a rocket but kept swinging at every pitch two feet outside the strike zone. She told him about her 11-year-old son, who was convinced he’d be the next Nolan Ryan even though he could barely throw a strike half the time, and how she’d been leaving extra homemade empanadas in the donation bin for him for three months, hoping he’d stay to talk sometime.
He felt his face heat up, embarrassed he’d never noticed the empanadas, had just grabbed the box and left every time. His brain was screaming at him to shut up, to not make a fool of himself, that he was on the road half the year, that he’d just mess this up like he messed up his marriage, but the words slipped out before he could stop them. He asked her if she wanted to get dinner later, not at a taco place, at that little steakhouse off Valencia Road with the peanut shells on the floor and the cold draft beer, the one he’d been going to since he was a teenager.
She grinned, leaned in a little so her shoulder brushed his chest, and said she’d been waiting for him to ask for six months. She held out her hand to step over the deep puddle between the canopy and the sidewalk, and he didn’t just offer her his elbow, he laced his fingers through hers, her palm calloused from loading 50-pound food boxes, warm even through the dampness from the rain.
They walked the two blocks to his F-100, him holding his flannel over her head to keep the last of the drizzle off her hair, and he opened the passenger door for her, grabbing the extra wool blanket he kept behind the seat to wrap around her shoulders, since her shirt was soaked through. He climbed in the driver’s seat, turned the key, the old truck rumbling to life, and she reached over to twist the radio dial to the old tejano station his mom used to play when he was a kid. Ramon Ayala’s voice cut through the hum of the heater, she tapped her scuffed work boot along to the beat, and he pulled out of the parking spot, grinning so wide his cheeks hurt, not heading for the steakhouse just yet, taking the long way around the park so they could listen to the whole song.
