Milo Rourke, 62, spent 28 years as a forest fire spotter, holed up in 10×10 towers 80 feet above the Oregon Cascades, talking to no one but ravens and his two-way radio for weeks at a time. He’d retired three years prior, after his knees gave out climbing the tower ladders, and still defaulted to the edge of any crowded room, avoiding small talk like he avoided dry underbrush in mid-August. His worst flaw, one he’d never quite shaken, was assuming the worst of anyone tied to the small town’s old conservative establishment, a habit he’d picked up after the former mayor had blocked his late wife’s cousin from staying in his guest room during chemo treatments, citing a 1972 ban on unmarried adults cohabiting even temporarily within city limits.
He sat in the back booth of The Spur on trivia night, nursing a cold IPA, the vinyl sticky under his forearm, the air thick with the smell of fried dill pickles and pine-scented air freshener, Johnny Cash’s *Folsom Prison Blues* humming low from the jukebox. The trivia host yelled that all teams had to be pairs this week, a last-minute change to raise donations for the local fire department, and before Milo could duck out, a woman slid into the booth across from him, her denim-clad knee brushing his calf under the Formica table hard enough that he felt the pressure through his work jeans.
It was Clara Bennett, 56, owner of the town’s only native plant nursery, and the ex-wife of that same former mayor. Milo tensed, ready to mumble an excuse to leave, until she held his gaze for two beats longer than casual politeness required, her hazel eyes flecked with gold, a faint smirk tugging at the corner of her mouth. “Don’t panic. I’m not here to yell at you for leaving that dead pine on the edge of your property line. I’m here to win the bar tab. I’ve got the pop culture category locked down.”
He relaxed, just a little, when she slid the blank answer sheet across the table, her knuckles brushing his as he took it. He noticed the faint calluses along the edge of her thumb, the smudge of potting soil under her fingernail, the faint scent of lavender and cedar clinging to her flannel shirt. For half a second he felt a jolt of heat low in his gut, then immediately hated himself for it—this was the woman who’d stood next to her ex at town hall meetings, who’d let him push that ridiculous ban for 12 years without saying a word.
They worked through the first three rounds quiet at first, then looser, when she snickered at his terrible answer for a 90s rom-com question, leaning forward so her shoulder brushed his when she pointed to the sheet to correct him. “I left him six months before he lost re-election,” she said offhand, when he made a quiet joke about the town’s old stupid rules, the one about the hotel ban that had just been overturned the week prior. “He cared more about controlling what strangers did in their own homes than he ever cared about me. I voted for the ban lift. Organized half the signature drive, actually.”
Milo blinked, the last of his wariness melting away, when she nudged his foot under the table with her boot, intentional this time, no apology when he glanced down. The final question popped up on the projector: 1998 federal forest fire response protocols for high-elevation Ponderosa pine stands. He answered it in two seconds flat, and when the host called their team number as the winner, the whole bar cheered, yelling jokes about the free weekend stay at the new mountain resort they’d won, no more sneaking around to share a room now that the ban was gone.
He expected her to laugh it off, to say she’d split the tab and take the resort weekend with her sister, but she leaned across the table instead, her breath warm against the shell of his ear, close enough that he could feel the heat of her cheek an inch from his. “I’ve been purposely parking my truck next to yours at the grocery store for three months trying to get you to talk to me. You wanna test that new resort rule next weekend?”
He laughed, surprised, his hand brushing hers on the table when he reached for his beer, no flinch from either of them. “Only if you bring that heirloom tomato plant you had on display at the nursery last week. The porch of that resort cabin’s gonna need something green.”
She grinned, lacing her fingers through his for half a second before pulling back to grab the prize voucher from the host, her boot tapping steady against his calf under the table as she yelled a thank you to the crowd.
