Cole Hargrove, 58, retired Forest Service hotshot crew supervisor, hunches over a hazy IPA at the Silverton summer beer garden, the scuffed toes of his work boots propped on the lower rung of the picnic table. He’d only shown up because the HOA tried to ban the 40-year-old tradition this year, and he’d signed Mara Carter’s petition to keep it mostly out of spite, not any urge to socialize. His flaw is predictable, one he’s nursed for seven years ever since his wife dropped dead of a heart attack mid-hike: he avoids any interaction that might crack the carefully built wall he’s erected between himself and the rest of the town, convinced he doesn’t get to have nice things anymore.
The wind picks up, sharp with the scent of hop malt and grilled bratwurst, and blows a stack of neon-pink flyers straight into his lap, the rough paper catching on the frayed cuff of his old fire crew hoodie. He looks up just as Mara hurries over, silver streaks in her dark shoulder-length hair catching the late sun, her faded Fleetwood Mac tee riding up a little above the waist of her cutoffs, work boots caked in the same cedar dust that coats every surface of the bookstore she runs downtown. She’s 52, he knows, divorced three years, the only person in town who’s got the guts to yell at the HOA president for 20 minutes straight over a noise variance.
“Sorry about that,” she says, leaning down to grab a flyer stuck under his beer bottle, her bare shoulder brushing his forearm, warm and soft, the scent of lavender shampoo and old paper curling into his nose. They reach for the same flyer at the same time, her calloused fingers—from stacking 100-pound boxes of books every week—brushing his, and she holds eye contact for a beat longer than polite, a little half-smile tugging at the corner of her mouth. He doesn’t pull away.
She sits down across from him without asking, knees almost touching his under the table, and says she recognized his name from the petition, that she’s seen him carry Mrs. Henderson’s groceries to her car every Saturday after he buys a mystery paperback from her shop. He freezes for half a second; he’d thought no one noticed him, that he’d mastered the art of blending into the background. She teases him for always hiding in the farthest corner of every town event, and he teases her back for starting a public screaming match with the HOA’s lead Karen over the town’s old boat launch last month. The bluegrass band on the stage picks up the tempo, the fiddle twanging loud enough that they have to lean in closer to hear each other, their faces only a foot apart now.
Half of him is screaming to leave, to go back to his empty cabin and his quiet nights, to not risk the pain of losing someone again. The other half is fixated on the little freckle above her lip, the way she tucks her hair behind her ear when she laughs, the rasp in her voice when she talks about growing up coming to this beer garden with her dad. He hasn’t felt this light since before his wife died, and the guilt of that sits heavy in his chest, tangled up with the hot, quiet thrill of being seen, of being wanted even a little.
The HOA president, Roger, storms over then, pastel golf shirt stretched tight over his beer gut, face red with anger, yelling that they’re violating the noise ordinance and he’s calling the cops. Mara stands up immediately, jaw set, ready to tear into him, but Cole stands too, six foot two, broad-shouldered from 30 years of hauling fire hoses up mountain sides, and says calm as anything that the town voted for a noise variance until 10 PM, he has a printed copy of the ordinance in his truck if Roger wants to read it. Roger stares up at him for a second, huffs, and storms off without another word.
Mara turns to him, grinning so wide her cheeks dimple, and touches his bicep lightly, the pressure warm through the thin fabric of his hoodie. She says she knew he was more than just the quiet guy who only bought hardboiled detective novels. He admits he only comes into the bookstore on Saturdays because he knows she’s working, not because he needs another book to add to the stack unread on his coffee table.
The band shifts to a slow, twangy cover of *Dreams*, and she tilts her head, asking if he dances. He says he hasn’t since his 20th wedding anniversary, but he takes her hand anyway, the calluses on her palm fitting perfectly against the ones on his from years of swinging an axe. He pulls her close on the patch of grass by the stage, close enough that he can feel her breath on his neck, close enough that he can taste the citrus seltzer she’s been drinking when she leans up to kiss him as the sun dips below the oak trees lining the park.
