Rico Marquez is 52, makes his living restoring vintage outboard motors out of a cinder block shop on the edge of Lake Lanier, and has held a grudge against Marnie Cole for 17 days straight. He’d heard from the kid who runs the ice house that Marnie, the new owner of the bait shop three slips down, called the city on the three unregistered work trailers parked between their properties, and he’d avoided her like she carried a case of boat rot ever since, even crossing the street to the opposite sidewalk when he saw her loading minnows into coolers at 6 a.m.
He’s only at the tiki bar tonight because his old high school buddy begged him to join their trivia team, and he’d lost a bet on the Braves game last week so he couldn’t say no. The bar smells like fried pickles and salt air, the jukebox spitting out a slow Tom Petty track that hums through the sticky linoleum under his work boots. He’s halfway through his second frosty mug of Pabst when someone slides onto the stool next to him, the edge of their frayed denim jacket brushing the bare forearm he’s got sticking out of his rolled-up plaid flannel. He looks over, ready to grumble about personal space, and it’s Marnie.
She’s got a smudge of fish blood on her left wrist, her dark hair pulled back in a messy braid streaked with a single strand of silver at the temple, and she smells like coconut sunscreen and lake water instead of the flowery perfume his ex-wife used to douse herself in. She smirks when she sees him, nods at the grease crusted under his fingernails. “Heard you’ve been calling me the dock Karen to anyone who’ll listen.” Her voice is low, rough like she spends half her day yelling over outboard motors herself.
Rico tenses, ready to snap back about the trailers, but she holds up a hand before he can speak. “Those trailers had 12 gallons of leaking old motor oil sitting in their beds. The city inspector was already driving the lot last month, would’ve fined every shop on the dock $1200 apiece if I didn’t flag the issue first and get us a 30 day grace period to clean it up. You’re welcome, by the way.”
He blinks. No one told him that. He shifts awkwardly on his stool, the edge of his beer mug clinking against her margarita glass when he moves his arm, cool glass meeting cool glass. He mumbles an apology, and she laughs, the sound bright enough to cut through the noise of the bar patrons yelling over a football replay on the TV above the bar. She offers to buy him a shot to make up for the bad blood, and he agrees before he can talk himself out of it.
They end up on the same trivia team, and Rico’s surprised to find she knows just as much about 1970s muscle cars and old country music as he does, even beats him to the answer about the first mass-produced outboard motor when the question pops up. Their team wins by three points, and when the bartender drops off the $50 bar tab prize, she shoves half of it into his flannel pocket, her cool silver rings brushing his chest through the thin fabric. She holds eye contact longer than she needs to, the hazel flecks in her brown eyes catching the neon light from the bar sign.
He’s spent the last 8 years convincing himself he likes being alone, that no one worth keeping wants to put up with his 12 hour work days and his habit of leaving half-restored motors on the front porch of his small cottage. He’s halfway to making an excuse to leave, to go home and sand the carburetor on the 1957 Evinrude he’s been working on for three months, when she leans in close enough that he can taste the lime from her margarita on her breath.
“I stop by your shop after work sometimes,” she says, quiet enough no one else can hear. “That Evinrude you’ve got hung up on the rack? I’ve been wanting to ask if you’d show me how you’re rebuilding the fuel line. My dad had the exact same one when I was a kid.”
Rico’s throat goes dry. He’s never let anyone watch him work, not since his ex left, saying he cared more about rusted old motors than he did about her. He doesn’t say anything for a beat, and she starts to pull back, like she’s ready to apologize for overstepping. He reaches out, his calloused fingers wrapping gently around her wrist, right above the smudge of fish blood. “I’m there at 7 a.m. tomorrow. Don’t be late.”
He walks her to her beat up pickup truck when the bar closes, the wooden dock planks creaking under their boots, the moon hanging low over the lake so the water glows silver. When she opens the driver’s side door, she turns, leans in, and kisses him slow, no rush, her hand resting on the side of his face where he’s got a faint scar from a motor backfiring when he was 22. He doesn’t pull away, doesn’t make a dumb joke to ruin the moment, just kisses her back, the salt from the air on her lips.
When she pulls away, she tosses him a pack of spearmint gum, the exact kind he chews when he’s working, he’s got a whole box of it on his workbench. “I noticed you go through a pack a week,” she says, grinning, before she climbs into the truck and pulls out of the parking lot, waving out the window.
He tucks the gum into his flannel pocket, leans against a weathered piling, and laughs for the first time in months without forcing it.
