Elias Voss, 52, made his living restoring antique typewriters out of his cramped Portland garage, his knuckles perpetually smudged with ink and fine machine oil, his jeans dotted with rust spots from parts he stuffed in his back pocket. His biggest flaw, if you asked the HOA president who’d badgered him into attending the summer block party, was that he’d turned reclusive after his divorce 8 years prior, turning down every invitation to trivia nights, potlucks, even the annual neighborhood golf scramble, convinced any casual connection would only end up messy, more trouble than temporary warmth was worth. He’d planned to stay 10 minutes, tops: grab a cheeseburger off the grill, thank the HOA lady, slip back to his garage where a 1950s Hermes 3000 waited for a new ribbon spool.
That plan died the second a woman carrying a tray of churros tripped over a toddler’s scooter at his feet. He caught her by the elbow before she face-planted into the grass, the tray teetering for half a second before she steadied it, a burst of cinnamon and coconut sunscreen hitting his nose before she looked up at him. She was Marisol, the new next-door neighbor who’d moved in three weeks prior, the one he’d only seen through his kitchen window hauling potted fiddle leaf figs into her house at 7 a.m. on weekdays. Her hand brushed his when she passed him a churro as a thank you, her palm warm and calloused, and he didn’t pull away fast enough for his own liking.
They ended up leaning against the fence at the edge of the party, the noise of kids screaming and a portable speaker playing 90s country fading into background static as they talked. He told her about the typewriter business, the way old keys stuck if they weren’t oiled just right, the clients who sent him machines that belonged to dead parents or old lovers, looking to get them working again to type letters or wedding vows. She told him she ran a small native plant nursery out of her backyard, that she used a beat-up 1968 Royal Quiet De Luxe to write care instructions for her customers, that the shift key had stuck a month prior and she hadn’t been able to find anyone who knew how to fix it. He offered to look at it before he could stop himself, then immediately cringed, already mentally drafting an excuse to back out.
When the party died down an hour later, she showed up on his porch with the typewriter tucked under one arm and a six pack of hazy IPA in the other, and he couldn’t turn her away. They sat on his weathered porch steps, the typewriter open on his lap as he prodded at the stuck shift key, her sitting so close their shoulders bumped every time she leaned in to watch him work. He could hear crickets chirping in the bushes between their yards, smell leftover charcoal from the block party grill, feel the heat of her arm through the thin cotton of his flannel shirt. He caught a smudge of cinnamon sugar on her lower lip when she turned to ask him a question about the typewriter’s internal springs, and for 10 full seconds he fought the urge to wipe it off, warring between 8 years of self-imposed isolation screaming at him to keep his distance and quiet, unfamiliar warmth pulling him closer.
He wiped the sugar off before he could overthink it. Her skin was soft under his thumb, and she didn’t flinch, didn’t pull away, just held his wrist for half a second, her fingers light around his bone, before she smiled and looked back at the typewriter. He fixed the stuck key five minutes later, popped a fresh piece of cream cardstock into the roller, typed one short line, and slid the machine over to her. The line read, “The best repairs are never the ones you plan for.” She laughed, a low, warm sound that made his chest feel tight, and told him she was making carnitas tacos the next night, if he wanted to come over. He said yes before he could talk himself out of it.
She left a few minutes later, the typewriter tucked under her arm, waving over her shoulder as she walked to her house. He stayed on the porch for another 20 minutes, sipping the last of the IPA she’d left, the faint taste of cinnamon sugar still on his thumb. He tucked the half-eaten churro she’d pressed into his hand before she left into his jacket pocket for later, already counting down the hours until he could smell her coconut sunscreen again over cilantro and lime.
