Javi Mendez, 52, has built custom fishing rods out of a cinder block shop on the edge of Murrells Inlet for eight years, ever since he sold the charter boat he ran with his late wife, Lila, after she lost her fight with ovarian cancer. His biggest flaw, one his niece chews him out for every other Sunday dinner, is that he’ll use any excuse to avoid crowds, any small talk, any chance that someone might see him as anything other than the quiet guy who can carve a cork handle so smooth it feels like polished stone. He only agreed to come to the local fire department’s annual oyster roast because the crew pulled him and Lila off their boat mid-Nor’easter 12 years back, and he still owed them.
He’s leaning against a splintered pine picnic table, half-watching a group of teens play cornhole, when it happens. The ground under the tent is uneven, cinder blocks propping up the poles, and the woman carrying a paper plate stacked with hushpuppies and a sweating cup of sweet tea catches her boot on one of the loose blocks, stumbling directly into his side. Half her tea sloshes onto the sleeve of his faded Carhartt jacket, the one still caked with epoxy from the rod he was wrapping that morning.
She’s already apologizing before he can even react, leaning in close enough that he can smell her perfume, sandalwood and clementine, nothing like the lavender Lila wore for 22 years. She dabs at the wet spot on his sleeve with a crumpled paper napkin, her knuckles brushing his forearm for half a second, and when she looks up at him, her hazel eyes flecked with gold hold his gaze longer than casual politeness dictates. She introduces herself as Clara, the new part-time librarian who moved into the old cottage three blocks from his shop back in June. He’s seen her walking her beagle past his storefront a handful of times, always had the stupid, out-of-place thought that she looked like the kind of woman who’d scold him for forgetting his library card, but he’d never stopped to talk.
They fall into conversation easier than he expected. She mentions she stopped in his shop window the week before, noticed the sea glass inlay he does on the rod butts, asked if he sources it local. Most people only ask him how much his rods cost, if they can catch a 10-pound redfish on them, so the question catches him off guard. He finds himself telling her about the time Lila brought home a milk crate full of seafoam green sea glass she found on a barrier island, how he’s been using it for custom orders ever since. Halfway through the story, he feels that familiar twist of guilt in his gut, like he’s doing something wrong, talking about Lila to a stranger that makes his palms sweat a little. He tries to make an excuse to leave, says he has a rod to finish before morning, but she nods toward the dark stretch of water past the oyster beds and asks if he’s seen the bioluminescence that’s been rolling in with the high tide all week. The local Facebook group is blowing up with photos, she says, and she hasn’t had a chance to walk down to the public dock to check it out yet.
He says yes before he can talk himself out of it. The dock is half a mile down the dirt road, string lights from the roast fading behind them, the only sound the crash of waves and the distant croak of frogs in the marsh. She steps close to him when a small wave splashes over the dock edge, her shoulder pressing firm against his, and he can feel the warmth of her through both their jackets. She kicks a foot over the edge of the dock, and the water lights up bright, electric blue, thousands of tiny plankton glowing like scattered stars trailing off the tip of her boot. She laughs, soft and low, and turns to look at him, and this time she doesn’t look away when his eyes drop to her mouth for half a second.
He admits he hasn’t talked to anyone this long, this easy, since Lila died. She nods, says she gets it, spent three years after her divorce only talking to her beagle and the people who checked out mystery novels at the library, thought she’d never want to make small talk with a stranger ever again. The guilt that’s been sitting heavy in his chest all night softens, a little, like someone let the air out of an overinflated tire. He doesn’t pull back when she brushes a fleck of oyster shell off his jaw, her fingers cold from holding her iced tea, leaving a tingle on his skin that lingers long after she pulls her hand away.
They stay on the dock for 40 more minutes, watching the bioluminescence swirl when fish dart under the surface, talking about the banned book display she’s putting up at the library next month, the 12-foot marlin he and Lila caught on their 10th anniversary, how her beagle steals socks out of her laundry basket every chance he gets. When they walk back to the parking lot, the oyster roast is winding down, most people already packing up their coolers. He asks if she wants to come by his shop the next afternoon, says he has a piece of amber sea glass that’s the exact same shade as the gold flecks in her eyes, he can show her how he sets the inlay if she wants.
She says yes, scribbles her phone number on the back of a crumpled library receipt for a Louis L’Amour western she checked out last week, tucks it into the breast pocket of his Carhartt jacket, her fingers brushing the edge of his old wedding band, which he still wears on a chain around his neck under his shirt. He watches her climb into her beat-up Subaru, waves when she honks as she pulls out of the parking lot. He pulls the receipt out of his pocket, runs his thumb over the smudged ink of her number, the corner sticky with sweet tea. The cheap light beer he’s been holding for an hour is warm now, flat, but he doesn’t even think to throw it away.
