The August air hangs thick with salt and melted butter when Ronan Hale drags himself to the annual Stonington lobster bake, already mentally counting down the 45 minutes he’s obligated to stay before he can sneak back to his shop and finish restoring a 1790 survey of Mount Desert Island. Ronan is 57, an antique map restorer who’s spent 8 years walling himself off from casual connection after his wife left him for a charter boat captain, convinced anyone who strikes up a conversation with him only wants a free appraisal of the dusty old papers they dug up in their attic. He’s wearing the same faded red flannel he’s had for 12 years, his fingers crusted with the wheat paste he uses to mend torn vellum, a permanent kink in his neck from hunching over light tables 10 hours a day. He grabs an IPA from the cooler, claims the far end of a splintered picnic table, and avoids eye contact with every neighbor who waves.
He’s 12 minutes from his escape window when someone drops onto the bench next to him, close enough that the edge of their denim jacket brushes his sleeve. He tenses, ready to parrot the “I don’t do free appraisals at social events” line he’s perfected over the last half decade, until he looks over. It’s the woman who opened the used bookstore three blocks from his shop two months prior, the one he’s watched through his front window carrying boxes of poetry collections in the rain, her auburn hair streaked with sun bleach, a silver hoop earring in her left nostril. She’s holding a can of black cherry hard seltzer, her nail polish chipped navy, and she holds his eye contact two beats longer than casual politeness requires, no fake smile, no obvious agenda. “I’m Jules,” she says, holding out a hand. Her palm is calloused at the fingertips, like she turns a lot of book pages, lifts a lot of boxes. He shakes it, his own hand rough from sanding old map frames, and he’s surprised when she doesn’t flinch at the dried paste crusted on his knuckles.
He waits for the ask about the old map someone’s grandma left them, but it doesn’t come. She complains about the town’s terrible internet, the way seagulls keep stealing the blueberry scones from her bookstore’s front counter, the weirdly large number of people who try to sell her beat up copies of 50 Shades of Grey for store credit. He snorts into his beer, tells her about the guy who brought in a napkin with a doodle of Bar Harbor drawn on it in 1987, swearing it was a rare original survey worth five figures. She laughs, a low, throaty sound that cuts through the noise of kids screaming and grills sizzling, and she leans in when he talks, her shoulder pressing lightly against his, like she actually cares what he has to say. He’s acutely aware of every point of contact, the heat of her arm through his flannel, the way her hair smells like lavender and sea spray when the wind shifts. When he reaches for his beer at the same time she reaches for a bag of salt and vinegar chips, their hands knock together, and he fumbles his can, a few drops of IPA splashing onto her light wash jeans. He apologizes, fumbling for a napkin, but she waves him off, dabbing at the spot with the hem of her jacket. “Relax,” she says. “I’ve had worse spilled on me at bachelorette parties. You’re fine.”
The sun dips below the pine trees as the bake winds down, and Jules nods toward the rocky path leading down to the beach. “Heard the bioluminescence is insane this week,” she says. “Wanna go check it out? I’ve been meaning to go, but I don’t wanna walk down there alone after dark.” He almost says no. Almost makes up an excuse about a map he has to finish for a client in Portland, due first thing Monday. But then she tilts her head, and her eyes are warm, no game playing, no hidden ask, and he finds himself nodding before he can overthink it. The sand is cool through the holes in his scuffed work boots when they reach the shore, and every step they take sends ripples of bright, neon blue glowing out from under their feet. Jules laughs, kicking a small wave toward him, the spray glowing bright as it hits his jeans. He grabs a handful of wet sand and tosses it at her, missing completely, hitting a half-buried driftwood log instead. She steps closer, so close he can feel the heat off her cheeks, and brushes a stray pine needle off his collar, her fingers lingering on the edge of his flannel for half a second before she pulls away. He doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t make a joke to break the tension. Just stands there, watching the bioluminescence flicker in the waves behind her, the string lights from the bake glinting off her hoop earring.
They sit on the driftwood log for an hour, talking about the adventure novels she read as a kid, the first map he ever restored, a tattered 1950 road map of Maine he found in his dad’s truck when he was 12. She tells him she left Boston after her ex-husband left her for a 28 year old paralegal, wanted a place where no one knew her name, where she could sell old books and not have to make small talk with people she didn’t like. He tells her he hasn’t let anyone into his shop after hours in 7 years, hasn’t even considered going on a date since his wife left. When they walk back up to the parking lot, she stops next to her beat up Subaru, pulls a crumpled piece of paper out of her jacket pocket: the corner of a 1922 nautical chart of Penobscot Bay, tucked in the back of a first edition Moby Dick she bought at an estate sale last month. “I don’t expect a free appraisal,” she says, holding it out to him. “I’ll pay your normal rate. And if you’re not busy tomorrow night, I make a pretty mean meatloaf. You can come over, look at the full chart, eat. No strings.” He laughs, takes the piece of paper, tucks it into his flannel pocket. “Meatloaf sounds good,” he says. She types his number into her phone, her thumb brushing his knuckles when she hands it to him to put his name in. He drives home with the windows down, the salt air blowing through his hair, the crumpled piece of chart digging lightly into his chest through his pocket. When he pulls into his driveway, he doesn’t rush to lock the front door behind him the second he steps inside.
