Clay Bennett, 58, retired Glacier National Park ranger, had barely spoken to anyone outside the local hardware store staff in three years. His wife, Ellie, had passed from ovarian cancer in 2020, and he’d built a routine out of solitude: clearing deadfall from his 12-acre property, frying bologna sandwiches for dinner, falling asleep on the couch to old westerns before 9 p.m. His biggest flaw, he knew, was that he refused to let anyone feel sorry for him. He’d turned down every dinner invitation from former ranger buddies, every set-up attempt from the church ladies, every chance to step out of the bubble he’d wrapped around his grief. He’d shown up to the Fourth of July street dance only because his old captain had threatened to come over and drag him by the grizzly scar slashing across his left knuckle, the one he’d earned prying a curious juvenile bear off a hiker’s backpack in 2017.
He leaned against the patio railing of the town’s only bar, nursing a cheap lager that tasted like barley and dish soap, watching teens race up and down the main street with glow sticks stuck in their baseball caps. The air smelled like charcoal grills and burnt sparklers, his work boots still caked with pine sap from clearing a fallen fir that morning. When a shoulder brushed his bicep, he tensed, ready to mumble an excuse to leave, until he turned and saw Maren. She was Ellie’s second cousin, 52, ran a vintage bookshop in Portland, he hadn’t seen her since the funeral, when she’d hugged him and pressed a first edition of *For Whom the Bell Tolls* into his hands, Ellie’s favorite book. She smelled like jasmine perfume and lemon seltzer, her auburn hair streaked with silver pulled back in a loose braid, freckles scattered across her nose that he didn’t remember being there three years prior.
She nodded at his knuckle, grinning, and said she’d never forgotten that story he told at the 2019 family reunion, about the hiker who tried to take a selfie with that same bear ten minutes after Clay had chased it off. He laughed, a rough, rusty sound he hadn’t heard come out of his own mouth in months, and they fell into easy conversation, first about the fireworks scheduled to start in ten minutes, then about Ellie’s famous peach cobbler, the one she’d bring to every Fourth of July potluck, crusted with cinnamon and so sweet it made your teeth hurt. For a second, a sharp twist of guilt hit him, hot and heavy, like he was doing something wrong just talking to her, like Ellie was watching from somewhere and shaking her head. Then Maren laughed at a joke about a hiker who got lost trying to find a “secret waterfall” that didn’t exist, and she touched his forearm, her palm warm, fingertips calloused from turning old book pages all day, and the guilt softened, tangled up with something sharper, warmer, a feeling he’d thought he’d buried with Ellie.
He knew what people would say if they saw them together. The whole town knew who Maren was, knew she was Ellie’s cousin, knew Clay had been a hermit for three years. They’d whisper at the grocery store, snicker at the ranger’s monthly breakfast, say he was moving on too fast, or worse, that he’d had a thing for her the whole time Ellie was sick. That quiet, forbidden thrill hummed under his skin, equal parts repulsive and intoxicating, like he was breaking a rule he’d spent 30 years following. When the first firework exploded overhead, red and gold, painting the sky bright enough to outshine the streetlights, the crowd cheered, and a group of teens sprinted past, one slamming into Maren’s shoulder hard enough that she stumbled. She grabbed his forearm to steady herself, her face inches from his, the light from the next firework painting her cheeks pink, and she said she’d always thought he was the kindest man in the family, even when he was too quiet to talk to anyone but Ellie.
He didn’t pull away. He didn’t make an excuse about having to get up early to fix his fence, didn’t mumble something about not being good company anymore. He let his hand rest light on the small of her back, just for a second, and she didn’t flinch, didn’t step away, just smiled up at him, her eyes glinting in the firework light. When the show ended, the crowd dispersed, groups of people laughing and heading to their cars or their houses, and Maren tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear, said she was staying at the old Miller cabin on the edge of town, the one Ellie used to rent for family reunions every summer. She said she’d brought a first edition of *The Old Man and the Sea* she’d found at a garage sale, knew he’d loved Hemingway since he was a kid, asked if he wanted to come look at it, maybe drink the bottle of bourbon she had stashed in her suitcase.
He glanced over at his old ranger buddies, sitting at a table across the patio, all of them already grinning, nudging each other, holding up their beers in a mock toast. He knew they’d tease him unmercifully for weeks, leave stupid notes in his mailbox, ask him every morning at the coffee shop how the “book club” was going. He nodded. He walked with her down the dark main street, fireflies blinking in the oak trees lining the sidewalk, the distant pop of leftover firecrackers echoing off the storefronts. Her hand brushed his every three or four steps, warm and soft, and when she laced her fingers through his scarred, calloused hand, he didn’t let go.
