Aris Moustakis is 53, makes his living restoring vintage typewriters out of a cinder block workshop behind his West Asheville bungalow. He’s stuck to the same rigid routine for eight years, ever since his wife packed her suitcase and left him for a 28-year-old SaaS sales rep who wore white sneakers to weddings. His biggest flaw is his refusal to let anyone new into his orbit; he walks three blocks out of his way to avoid neighbor small talk, blocks dating app profiles mentioning “casual fun,” and still holds a petty grudge against his ex’s entire extended family for taking her side, even the ones he hadn’t seen in decades.
He only breaks his routine once a month, to set up a booth at the downtown small business market, where he sells fully restored 1950s Royal and Underwood models to college kids and nostalgic writers. Last Saturday, the wind was sharp enough to nip the tip of his nose raw, and the spot he’d reserved was squeezed between a guy selling pickled okra and a woman with a stack of hand-poured candle tins printed with constellation designs.
Their folding chairs were so close their elbows brushed the first time they both reached for their water bottles at 10:17 a.m. He glanced over first, noticed the faint smudge of beeswax on her left cheek, the way her dark hair was pulled back with a frayed silk scarf that looked like the one his ex used to steal from her younger cousin back when they were still married. She smiled, and the laugh lines around her eyes crinkled deep enough to make his chest feel tight for half a second. “You polish those keys so hard you’re gonna wear the letters off,” she said, nodding at the Royal he was buffing with a microfiber cloth. Her voice was low, a little rough, like she smoked a pack a day or spent half her time yelling over workshop machinery.
He mumbled a reply, went back to his work, but he couldn’t stop noticing her. The air around her smelled like sandalwood and burnt sugar, warm enough to cut through the autumn chill. Every time a customer stopped at her booth, she’d lean in a little, speak soft, like she was sharing a secret about the candle’s scent instead of just listing the ingredients. When a harried mom’s 7-year-old bolted past the table and knocked over a stack of her cinnamon scented tins, Aris leaned over to help pick them up. Their hands brushed when they both grabbed the same dented tin, and his knuckles grazed the faint, thin scar on her left wrist, the one from a bike crash she’d had at 16, when she’d visited his ex for Thanksgiving and crashed his old mountain bike into a ditch.
That’s when he placed her. Lila. His ex’s first cousin, 11 years younger, the one who used to sneak sips of his beer at family cookouts and ask him to teach her to type on his old Underwood as a kid. The shock hit him so hard he almost dropped the tin. He’d not spoken to anyone from his ex’s family in seven years, blocked all of them on social media, even skipped his cousin’s wedding when he heard Lila’s sister would attend. He should have packed up his booth right then, left, avoided the whole mess. But he didn’t. She laughed when he froze, said “Took you long enough. I drove three hours from Greenville just to get a spot next to you. Saw your name on the vendor list last month.”
The conflict rose fast after that. He alternated between wanting to lean in and ask her every question about the last 15 years, and wanting to yell at her for ambushing him, for being part of the family that called him a boring, stuck-in-his-routine loser when his ex left. He kept sneaking glances at her, at the way her sweater rode up her wrist when she reached for a candle to show a customer, at the way she bit her lower lip when she concentrated on wrapping a purchase. The disgust he thought he’d feel at talking to anyone related to his ex faded fast, replaced by a warm, tight buzz in his chest he hadn’t felt since his first date with his ex at 20.
Rain hit at 3 p.m., sharp, cold, fast enough that market organizers yelled for everyone to pack up immediately. Lila fumbled with a stack of glass candle holders, dropped one, and it shattered at their feet. Aris stepped forward to help kick the shards out of the way, and a piece of glass sliced through his thin work glove, cutting a deep gash across his index finger. She grabbed his wrist before he could protest, pulled him to her beat-up Subaru parked at the curb, dug a first aid kit out of her glove box.
She leaned in close to dab antiseptic on the cut, her breath fanning across his knuckles, her other hand wrapped around his wrist to hold him steady. “I’ve had a crush on you since I was 17,” she said, quiet enough only he could hear it over the rain hammering the car roof. “Knew my cousin was an idiot the second she said she was leaving you. You’re not boring. You just like things that last. That’s not a flaw.”
He stared at her for a long second, the antiseptic stinging his finger, the smell of her perfume wrapping around him, the old grudge he’d carried for eight years feeling lighter than it ever had. He didn’t overthink it, didn’t list all the reasons this was a bad idea, all the family drama it would spark, all the ways it could blow up in his face. “There’s a diner 10 minutes from here,” he said. “Makes the best apple pie west of Charlotte, extra crust, no goopy filling. You wanna go?”
She grinned, wrapped a bright pink dinosaur-print band-aid around his finger, laced her fingers through his uninjured hand. “Only if you let me type my number into one of your old Royals when we get back to your place later.”
He helped her load the last of her candle boxes into the back of her SUV, slammed the tailgate shut, and climbed into the passenger seat next to her, the rain still pouring down, the neon diner sign glowing three blocks ahead.
