Rafi Najjar, 57, has built custom fly rods out of his cinder block workshop outside Asheville for 22 years. He’d skipped every local community event for the last three, ever since his wife left him for a real estate agent from Charlotte and half the town decided he must have cheated first, no evidence needed. The only reason he showed up to the fire department chili cookoff that Saturday was that his old fishing buddy, the deputy chief, owed him a hundred and fifty bucks for a custom rod he’d built for the chief’s retirement, and refused to Venmo it, insisted Rafi had to come pick it up in person, free beer included.
He was leaned up against the industrial beer cooler, boots crunching loose gravel, half listening to a group of retirees argue about trout limits, when she reached past him for a black cherry seltzer. Her knuckles brushed the back of his hand, cold from holding his IPA, and he flinched first, then looked up. It was Clara Voss, his ex-wife’s younger cousin, the one who’d moved up to run the horse rescue outside of town four years prior, the one he’d gone out of his way to avoid even when he was married, because one smile from her had always made his chest feel tight, like he was holding his breath too long on a deep wade.
She smelled like pine and horse shampoo and cinnamon gum, and she didn’t pull her hand away right away, just held his gaze, one corner of her mouth ticked up like she knew exactly what he was thinking. “Thought you were hiding out in your workshop forever,” she said, and her voice was lower than he remembered, rough from yelling across pastures at spooked thoroughbreds. He grunted, took a sip of beer, tried to ignore the way his throat felt tight. She was off limits. Always had been. Even if his ex had left him, even if the entire town already talked about him like he was a ghost, hooking up with his ex’s cousin was the kind of drama he’d spent three years running from.
He made a vague noise about needing to find the deputy chief, but she stepped closer, close enough that he could feel the heat off her flannel shirt through his own, and shook her head. “He left 20 minutes ago. Told me to give you this.” She pulled a folded stack of cash out of her jacket pocket, held it out, and when he reached for it, she closed her fingers around his wrist, her palm rough with calluses from mucking stalls and braiding reins. “He also said you owe me a beer for doing his dirty work.”
The bluegrass band on the small stage off to the side struck up a slow fiddle tune, and the crowd around them drifted toward the dance floor, leaving them half hidden by the shadow of the cooler. He knew he should say no. Knew that if anyone saw them talking longer than 10 seconds, the gossip mill would spin so fast it’d catch fire. But he also hadn’t talked to anyone who didn’t want to buy a fly rod or ask for fishing advice in three months, and she was looking at him like she didn’t believe any of the garbage people said about him, like she saw the guy who spent three days carving a custom rod handle for a 12 year old kid with cerebral palsy last spring, not the guy everyone said cheated on his wife.
He nodded, grabbed another IPA from the cooler, and followed her out to the edge of the field, where no one could see them. They talked for an hour, first about the rescue horses, then about the fly rod he’d built for the chief, then about how stupid the town gossip was, how she’d yelled at his ex for spreading lies about him at a family dinner six months prior. Every time she laughed, she leaned in a little closer, her shoulder brushing his, and when a gust of wind blew her hair into his face, he reached up to brush it away, his fingers grazing her cheek, and she didn’t pull back.
He didn’t invite her back to his workshop. She asked. Said she’d never seen how someone builds a fly rod from scratch, wanted to see the bamboo blanks he kept stacked against the wall. The drive back to his place was quiet, the radio playing old Johnny Cash, and when they pulled into the gravel driveway, he noticed the porch light was on, the one he’d forgotten to turn off that morning, glowing gold against the darkening pines.
Inside the workshop, the air smelled like linseed oil and cedar shavings. He showed her the half-finished rod for the chief, the handle carved from curly maple, the guide wraps tied with silk thread the color of trout bellies. She ran her finger along the smooth bamboo blank, and when he reached over to point out the grain pattern, their hands overlapped, and this time he didn’t flinch, didn’t pull away. He turned to look at her, and she was already leaning in, her lips soft against his, no hurry, no awkward fumbling, like they’d both been waiting for this for years.
They didn’t rush anything. Spent an hour just sitting on the old leather couch in the corner of the workshop, kissing, talking, her legs across his lap, his hand on her knee, calluses catching on the frayed hem of her jeans. She told him she was moving to Wyoming next week, taking a job training wild mustangs for a reservation outside of Jackson Hole, didn’t plan on coming back to North Carolina anytime soon. He didn’t say anything at first, just ran his thumb along the back of her hand, thinking about how he’d spent the last three years scared to leave his property for anything other than fishing runs or supply runs, scared of what people would say.
The next morning, the sun was coming through the workshop windows, gilding the stacks of bamboo blanks, and he made coffee in the old percolator he kept on the workbench, black, the way she liked it. She was sitting on the edge of the workbench, twirling a spool of silk thread between her fingers, and she asked if he wanted to come visit her in Wyoming next fall, when the elk were rutting, when the streams were full of cutthroat trout. He didn’t hesitate. He’d already booked a one way ticket for mid September two nights before, when he’d looked up her horse rescue’s Instagram page on a drunk whim, half convinced he’d never have the guts to reach out.
He reached across the workbench, laced his calloused fingers through hers, and slid the extra plane ticket he’d already printed for the September trip across the scarred wood.
