Clay Bennett, 58, retired lineman with 32 years of repairing downed power lines across East Tennessee under his belt, had been dragged to the local fire department’s annual chili cook-off by his 27-year-old daughter, who’d spent three weeks nagging him to stop “holing up like a hermit” fixing vintage lawnmowers in his garage. It was mid-October, crisp enough that his breath fogged a little when he exhaled, the air thick with wood smoke, charred hot dog grease, and the acrid tang of too much cumin in most of the chili entries. He hated the forced cheer of post-lockdown community events, the way half the crowd was filming every bite for TikTok, the way neighbors kept asking if he was “finally seeing anyone” seven years after his wife Linda passed from lung cancer. He was leaning against a splintered pine picnic table, burning his tongue on a bowl of three-alarm chili, when he twisted to grab a napkin and slammed his shoulder into a woman holding a plastic cup of cheap lager, the cold beer sloshing down the front of his faded 2018 SEC championship flannel.
He opened his mouth to apologize, then recognized her immediately. Mia Carter, 54, ex-wife of Jimmie Carter, the old crew rival who’d kissed their supervisor’s ass for six months to steal the senior lineman promotion Clay was supposed to get back in 2009. He’d badmouthed Jimmie to every guy on the line crew for two decades straight, had never said more than two words to Mia at company picnics, always written her off as part of Jimmie’s annoying, overinflated persona. She laughed instead of snapping, stepping closer to dab at the damp spot on his sleeve with a crumpled paper napkin from her hoodie pocket, her soft hand brushing the coarse hair on his forearm for three beats too long before she pulled back. She had silver streaks running through the dark braid pulled over her shoulder, a faint scar along her left eyebrow from a college car crash he’d heard Jimmie joke about once, and she smelled like cinnamon gum and the pine cleaner she used for her house cleaning side gig. Her shoulder pressed to his for a split second, warm through the thin fabric of her faded Dolly Parton hoodie, before she stepped back to meet his eye, no hint of awkwardness on her face.
She told him she’d always thought that promotion was garbage, that she’d yelled at Jimmie for three straight nights after the announcement, called him a spineless cheat for taking a job he hadn’t earned. Clay blinked, stunned that she’d even known the details, let alone cared enough to fight with her ex-husband over it. Half his brain screamed to walk away, that messing with Jimmie’s ex was the kind of unneeded drama he’d spent seven years avoiding, that there was an unwritten line crew rule you never touched another guy’s wife, even an ex-wife. The other half was fixated on the way her eyes crinkled when she smirked, the way she didn’t lean away when he was quiet for 10 whole seconds processing what she’d said. They drifted over to the empty metal bleachers by the fire truck bay, away from the crowd yelling over the chili contest results, the noise fading to a low, distant hum. The bleachers were cold under his work jeans, the metal biting through the thin denim when he sat down.
She told him she’d divorced Jimmie three years prior, found a string of texts from a 28-year-old yoga instructor he’d met on a golf trip to Florida on his phone. He’d left two weeks after she finished her last round of chemo for stage two breast cancer, promised to fix her broken riding mower before he moved out and never showed up. Clay’s chest tightened, remembering sitting through Linda’s chemo sessions, how he’d taken three months off work to sit with her, how Jimmie had made fun of him for “wasting PTO babysitting a grown woman.” He shifted closer without thinking, his knee knocking against hers, the rough denim of his work jeans rubbing against the softer fabric of hers, and she didn’t move away. He mentioned he fixed vintage mowers out of his garage now, charged neighbors next to nothing, just liked working with his hands when the silence of his empty house got too loud.
She held his gaze when he lifted his hand to brush a stray braid strand off her cheek, his calloused palm catching on the soft skin next to her eyebrow scar. She leaned into the touch a little, her breath catching so quiet only he could hear it, and said she’d seen his repair ads on the neighborhood Facebook group, had been meaning to message him for months, was too nervous. She said Jimmie used to tape crew photos to the fridge back when they were married, rant about Clay for hours every time he outperformed him on a job, and she’d always stared at the shot of him covered in mud after fixing a downed line during the 2019 ice storm, thought he looked like the kind of guy who kept his promises.
Clay pulled a crumpled auto parts receipt from his flannel pocket, scribbled his personal cell number on the back, not the business line he gave to random customers. He told her he’d be at her house at 9 a.m. the next morning, would bring a thermos of his homemade pecan coffee, brewed strong enough to strip paint, would fix the mower for free as a long-overdue apology for all the times he’d talked shit about her ex-husband within earshot. She laughed, tucking the receipt into the back pocket of her jeans, squeezed his wrist with her cold, beer-chilled hand before she stood up to go meet her sister by the corn dog truck.
He watched her walk away, the hem of her hoodie brushing the top of her scuffed work boots, and she glanced over her shoulder halfway across the grass, winked. The leftover chili in his paper bowl had gone cold, but he didn’t bother tossing it, the faint smell of cinnamon gum still lingering on the palm of his hand where he’d touched her cheek. He pulled out his beat-up iPhone, texted his daughter he was heading home early, that he had plans the next day.
