Elroy Voss is 62, retired lineman with 38 years on the job for Auglaize County’s electric co-op, a faint white scar snaking 4 inches across his left forearm from a 2017 transformer blowout that put him in the ER for three days. He’s lived in the same 1200-square-foot ranch outside Wapakoneta his whole adult life, hasn’t dated anyone since his wife Karen died of ovarian cancer 8 years ago, and his biggest flaw is that he’d rather chew off his own boot than admit he was wrong about anything, especially if he yelled about it in a public setting. He’d shown up to the April 2022 town hall red-faced, screaming about the new county health director’s mask mandate for local bars and restaurants, called the policy “government overreach for spineless sheep” loud enough that the room went quiet for 10 full seconds. He’s avoided running into her ever since.
He’s at the annual downtown street dance on a humid July Saturday, grabbing a Miller High Life from the beer tent cooler, when he turns and his knuckles brush someone else’s reaching for a lime seltzer. He looks down, then up, and there she is. Marisol Reyes, 48, half Puerto Rican, moved to the county from Columbus last year, sharp dark hair pulled back in a ponytail, wearing a yellow sundress that hits just above her knees, silver hoop earrings glinting in the string lights strung across the tent. She smirks, and he feels his neck go hot enough to fry an egg. “Elroy, right? I’d recognize that work boot tan anywhere. I still have the comment card you submitted to my office calling me a ‘power-hungry bureaucrat.’”
He thinks about making an excuse to leave, about hightailing it to his truck before he makes a fool of himself, but she nods at the keychain hanging out of his front pocket, the faded plastic 1972 F-150 logo on it, says she saw the truck parked at the fairgrounds shop last week when she was dropping off health inspection forms for the 4-H booths, her dad had the exact same model, same forest green paint, same dented passenger side mirror. He lights up, tells her about rebuilding the transmission last month, about dropping the whole thing on his steel-toe boot and limping for three days, and she laughs so hard she snorts, leaning in so her knee brushes his when the band cranks up a louder song. He’s fighting every urge he has to tuck the stray strand of hair falling in her face behind her ear, feels guilty for even thinking about it, like he’s betraying Karen somehow, like he’s too old, too rough around the edges, too much of a former asshole to deserve someone this sharp, this warm, this willing to tease him for his past stupid comments.
A group of kids running from the rain slams into his side out of nowhere, and he stumbles, reaching out automatically to catch Marisol by the waist so she doesn’t trip over the cooler at their feet. His calloused hand rests on the soft fabric of her dress for three full beats, and she doesn’t pull away, just looks up at him, her dark eyes bright in the dim tent light, her lower lip caught between her teeth. The rain slows to a light drizzle, and he nods his head toward the edge of the fairgrounds, where the F-150 is parked under the overhang of the 4-H beef barn. “Wanna see it?” he says, quiet enough that only she can hear. “I got the original radio working, plays nothing but 70s country.”
She grins, laces her fingers through his, her hand smaller than his, softer, but her grip is firm, and they run through the leftover drizzle together, their shoes squelching in the puddles on the asphalt. He opens the passenger door for her, she slides in, the vinyl seat still warm from the afternoon sun, and he climbs into the driver’s side, turns the key so the radio flickers to life, Johnny Cash’s “Folsom Prison Blues” humming low through the speakers. She leans over, runs a finger lightly along the scar on his forearm, and he doesn’t flinch. “I always liked guys who know how to fix things,” she says, soft, and he reaches over, brushes the wet strand of hair off her face, his thumb grazing her cheek for half a second before he pulls his hand back. The fair lights glow pink and gold through the steam fogging up the truck windows, and the rain taps soft and steady against the glass.
