Clay Bennett, 58, retired TVA lineman with a scar snaking up his left forearm from a 2017 transformer blow, has spent the last four years turning down every fix-up his fishing buddies try to push his way. His wife, Linda, died of metastatic breast cancer in 2019, and he’s spent every day since convinced even a casual coffee with another woman counts as betrayal. He avoids the town’s busy community events when he can, but the fire department chili cookoff is non-negotiable—he’s judged the spicy category for 16 years running, and skipping it would get him roasted harder than the overcooked brisket some rookie firefighter dragged in this year.
He’s leaning against a splintered pine picnic table, half-empty bottle of Pabst in one hand, plastic bowl of 5-alarm chili in the other, when he smells coconut sunscreen and cut grass, sharp over the thick smell of charcoal and burnt onions. He turns to grab an oyster cracker packet from the stack beside him, and his hand slams straight into someone else’s. He yanks his back like he touched a live wire, and the woman in front of him laughs, low and warm, not the high, pitying titter most women give him these days when they realize who he is. It’s Mara Hale, 52, the new county public health nurse, ex-wife of his old crew foreman Jimmie, who left him two years ago after he got a DUI and crashed her work truck into the side of the feed store. Everyone in town knows Jimmie still throws a fit if he sees anyone so much as wave at her, and Clay’s spent the last year crossing the street when he sees her coming, just to avoid the drama.
She’s wearing a faded 1997 Fleetwood Mac tour tee, scuffed work boots, and jeans with a frayed hole at the knee, no fancy makeup, silver streaks running through her auburn ponytail. He notices the faint callus on the side of her thumb, the same kind he has on his palm from holding lines for hours, only hers is from pressing down on syringe plungers three days a week at the free clinic. “You still jump that bad when someone gets close?” she teases, popping an oyster cracker into her mouth, and Clay feels his face heat up, the way it hasn’t since he was a teen sneaking into the drive-in with Linda. He mumbles an apology, and she leans against the picnic table beside him, close enough that her shoulder brushes his bicep through his flannel shirt when she shifts her weight. He can feel the heat of her through the fabric, and he tenses, half ready to step away, half ready to lean into it.
They talk for 20 minutes, first about the chili—she laughs when he tells her the entry from the Methodist church has more sugar than a kid’s Halloween bag—then about old work days, how she remembers him bringing Linda’s peach pie to the company picnic every year, how he brought her a slice when she was recovering from a broken arm back in 2018. Clay’s surprised he forgot that, and the guilt hits him sharp, right in the chest, that he’s enjoying talking to her this much, that he hasn’t thought about Linda’s empty side of the bed for almost half an hour. He keeps glancing across the lot, where Jimmie is flipping burgers on the grill, red-faced and yelling at a kid who dropped a pack of buns. Mara follows his gaze and snorts. “You still scared of Jimmie? You outranked him for 12 years. He couldn’t even tie his own tool belt without asking you for help back in 2015.”
A group of kids runs past, chasing a golden retriever with a half-eaten corn dog in its mouth, and one slams into Mara’s back. She stumbles forward, grabbing Clay’s bicep to steady herself, and he can feel the pressure of her fingers, the rough callus on her palm, right through the thin flannel. His heart thuds so hard he swears she can hear it, and for a second he’s ready to pull away, to mutter an excuse and head to his truck, to go home to his empty house and his frozen lasagna and the photo of Linda on the mantel. Instead he asks if she wants to walk down to the creek behind the bar, get away from the noise. He’s shocked the words come out of his mouth, and she blinks, then grins, and nods.
The gravel crunches under their boots as they walk, the noise of the cookoff fading behind them, replaced by the buzz of crickets and the gurgle of the creek over smooth rocks. They sit on a fallen oak log half-buried in moss, and Mara tilts her face up to the sun, closing her eyes for a second. “I see you at the grocery store every Sunday,” she says quietly, not looking at him. “You always buy the same frozen lasagna, the same six-pack of Pabst, the same peppermint candies. I didn’t want to bother you. Figured you wanted to be left alone.” Clay’s throat feels tight. He hasn’t told anyone how hard Sundays are, how he buys the lasagna because it’s the only thing he can make without burning it, how he used to make peppermint ice cream with Linda every summer. He admits he’s been scared, that he feels like even talking to her is cheating, that he thought he’d never want to be around anyone else again.
Mara turns to look at him, and her hand brushes his where it’s resting on the log beside him. He doesn’t pull away. “Linda would’ve kicked your ass for eating that garbage lasagna every week,” she says, and Clay laughs, a real laugh, the kind he hasn’t had since before Linda got sick. The first firework goes off behind them, bright pink, painting the surface of the creek pink for a second, then orange when the next one pops. She leans her shoulder against his, warm and solid, and he doesn’t move. He pulls the crumpled pack of peppermints out of his jeans pocket, shakes one out into his palm, and holds it out to her. Their fingers brush when she takes it, and this time, he laces his through hers, loose, no rush, while the fireworks burst loud and bright above the treeline.
