Rafe Mendez, 53, has spent the last eight years holed up in his converted bait shack off Florida’s Panhandle coast, restoring vintage outboard motors for clients scattered across the Gulf. His only consistent social interaction is swapping parts stories with his high school buddy Jeb, who dragged him to the annual town oyster roast that crisp October evening with a threat: no show, no access to the rare 1957 Johnson carburetor Jeb had dug up at a junkyard in Mississippi. Rafe showed up in grease-stained work boots and a faded orange flannel, three days of stubble on his jaw, and planted himself against a longleaf pine far from the crowd, planning to nurse two cheap beers and slip out before anyone could corner him to ask about his ex-wife, who’d left him for a younger realtor back in 2015. His biggest flaw, he’d admit if he ever talked about himself, is that he’d let the town’s idle gossip shrink his world down to his workbench and a stack of old Jimmy Buffett bootlegs.
He was halfway through his second beer when he spotted Elara Voss, the 49-year-old who ran the Cajun po’boy truck that parked two blocks from his shop every Tuesday and Thursday. He’d ordered a roast beef po’boy with extra hot sauce from her every week for six months, never lingering longer than 30 seconds, never meeting her eye for more than a beat. He knew the rules: her ex was the county sheriff, a petty, bitter man who still drove past her truck twice a day to glower at any man who stopped longer than five minutes. The whole town treated her like taboo, like talking to her was a one-way ticket to a speeding ticket or a random inspection of your business permits. Rafe had avoided her on purpose, not because he cared about the sheriff, but because he’d gotten too comfortable hiding from any kind of attention, good or bad.
She was carrying a tray of her famous jalapeno oyster dip, weaving through the crowd, when a kid chasing a golden retriever cut her off. She tripped over a stacked cooler of craft beer, stumbling straight into Rafe’s chest. He dropped his beer cup, plastic clattering on the pine needles, and grabbed her by the waist to keep her from landing in the pile of oyster shells at his feet. The tray tilted, a dollop of creamy, green dip splattering on his flannel sleeve. She laughed, warm and throaty, and swiped at the mess with a crumpled napkin, her forearm brushing the stubble on his neck as she leaned in. Her thumb brushed the faint, silvery scar on his left pec, the one he’d gotten three years prior when a 1960s Evinrude backfired on his workbench. He felt heat climb up his neck, a sensation he hadn’t felt since he was a teenager sneaking into the drive-in with his first girlfriend.
She didn’t pull away when he steadied her, her shoulder pressed to his, the smell of coconut sunscreen, fried green tomatoes, and a faint hint of bourbon wrapping around him. She said she’d watched him working on motors through the open bay door of his shop dozens of times, wondered how he got 60-year-old engines to purr like they were brand new. He found himself talking, rambling even, about the 1957 Johnson he was finishing up for a charter captain out of Mobile, the way the old carburetors needed to be tuned by hand, no digital tools could get the mix right. She leaned in closer, her knee brushing his, listening like what he had to say mattered, not like he was just the weird hermit who fixed boat motors.
He glanced over her shoulder halfway through the story, and spotted the sheriff leaning against a black F-150 20 feet away, jaw clenched so tight his cheek muscles bulged, staring right at them. Rafe tensed, half ready to mumble an excuse and bolt back to his shop, hide from the drama, go back to his quiet, boring life. Then Elara noticed the direction he was looking, turned, and rolled her eyes so hard her whole head tilted. She laced her fingers through his, her palm calloused from kneading sourdough for her po’boy buns, warm even in the cool autumn wind, and squeezed.
“Wanna get out of here?” she said, loud enough that a few people nearby glanced over, loud enough that the sheriff definitely heard. “I got a six pack of Abita Amber in my truck, and I wanna see that 1957 Johnson you’re talking about.”
Rafe didn’t hesitate. He nodded, let her pull him through the crowd, past the table of oysters, past the sheriff who was now stalking toward them, and out to the dirt road that led to his shop. The salt wind off the bay blew strands of her dark hair loose, tangling in the gold hoops she wore, and he squeezed her hand back, no longer caring if the sheriff followed, no longer caring what the town gossips would say by Monday morning.
They reached his shop 10 minutes later, and he flipped on the string lights he’d strung above the workbench, illuminating the half-restored motor sitting on sawhorses, the stacks of part catalogs, the old radio playing a 1978 Buffett bootleg he’d recorded off the radio as a kid. She set the six pack down on the counter, hopped up on the edge of the workbench, and smiled up at him, her dark eyes glinting in the warm light. He reached out, brushed a loose strand of hair off her face, his thumb brushing the soft curve of her cheek. The distant sound of the oyster roast’s cover band drifted through the open bay door, mixing with the soft crash of waves against the dock 50 feet away. She popped the cap off the first beer, held it out to him, and her knee brushed his hip as he stepped closer to take it.
