Rafe Calderon, 53, makes his living sanding rust out of 1960s travel trailers and reupholstering their dinette cushions in sunflower print or vintage plaid, per client request. He’s lived outside Flagstaff for seven years, ever since his ex-wife packed her favorite ceramic mugs and moved to Portland with a guy who sold SaaS tools, and he’s avoided every local community event for six of those years, out of a mix of dislike for small talk and lingering embarrassment that everyone in town knows he got left for a guy who wears Lululemon to business meetings. He only showed up to the fire department’s summer fundraiser cookout because the crew put out a brush fire that crept onto his property last April, and he owed them more than a cash donation.
He’s leaned against the dented metal beer cooler, picking charred skin off an overcooked bratwurst, when he spots her. She’s leaning against the picnic table next to the fire chief, laughing so hard she snorts, holding a paper plate piled high with potato salad, and he recognizes the mole above her left eyebrow first, the same one she had when she was 12, tagging along on his and his ex’s 10th anniversary camping trip, begging him to teach her to skip rocks on the lake. He freezes mid-bite, mustard dribbling down his wrist, because the last time he saw her she had pigtails dyed hot pink and was wearing a Hannah Montana t-shirt, and now she’s wearing cut-off jean shorts and a forest service uniform shirt, sun streaks in her dark hair, a silver hoop through her left nostril.
She spots him a second later, her smile widening, and she walks over before he can duck behind the cooler. “Rafe? No way. I thought that was you when I saw your name on the fire risk property list last month.” She holds out a hand, and when he takes it her palm is calloused, warm, the kind of calluses you get from swinging a Pulaski and clearing brush, not the ones he has from sanding metal. He fumbles for something to say, his throat tight, because part of him still sees the kid who stole his s’mores supplies that camping trip, and part of him is hyper aware of how close she’s standing, the scent of pine and vanilla lip balm rolling off her, the way her knee brushes his when she sits down on the cooler next to him.
They talk for 45 minutes, the noise of the cookout fading into background static. She tells him she’s the new part-time fire prevention tech for the district, moved up from Phoenix three months prior, hasn’t spoken to his ex in two years, not since she told her aunt she thought ditching Rafe for a guy who collected vintage teacups was a garbage call. He tells her about the 1964 Airstream he’s restoring for a couple from Tucson, the way the previous owner had let a family of raccoons live in it for three years. She leans in when he talks, her elbow brushing his bicep every time she reaches for her seltzer, her dark eyes locked on his, no awkward look away, no polite nod while she scans the crowd for someone more interesting. He feels off kilter, like he’s standing on a sloped roof, half scared he’ll fall, half curious what it would feel like to let go.
The sky opens up halfway through his story about the raccoons, fat warm raindrops splattering the asphalt, and everyone scrambles to load folding tables and coolers into pickup trucks. He offers her a ride back to her cabin, which is ten minutes down the road from his shop, and she climbs into his beat up F150, her hair dripping onto the seat cover, the rain hitting the roof so hard it drowns out the old Johnny Cash tape he has playing. He reaches behind the seat to grab a frayed towel for her, and his hand brushes the side of her neck, soft and warm, and she doesn’t flinch, just tilts her head up to look at him, her eyelashes clumped with rain. “I always thought you were too good for her, you know,” she says, quiet enough that he almost doesn’t hear it over the rain. “Even when I was 12.”
He freezes, his hand still hovering an inch from her face, his chest tight with a weird mix of guilt and want, like he’s doing something wrong, like he’s taking advantage, even though he knows she’s 41, even though he knows she’s not that kid anymore. She leans in before he can say anything, kissing him slow, her lips soft, tasting like cherry seltzer and the yellow mustard they both slathered on their brats. He kisses her back for two, three seconds, then pulls back, shaking his head. “This is weird,” he says, his voice rough. “I knew you when you were in middle school.” She laughs, quiet, wiping a drop of rain off his jaw with her thumb. “I haven’t been in middle school in 29 years, Rafe. You don’t owe my aunt a damn thing. And I’ve been thinking about kissing you since I saw your name on that property list.”
He drives her to her cabin, doesn’t go inside that night, but they exchange numbers, and he sits in his truck in the driveway for ten minutes after she goes in, staring at her contact photo in his phone, a picture of her holding a baby deer she rescued on a trail last month. He wakes up at 6 a.m. the next day, already half expecting it to be a weird dream, but there’s a text from her sent 10 minutes prior, asking if he’s open to a student who brings glazed donuts and doesn’t know how to use a sander. He texts back a thumbs up, and 20 minutes later she’s walking through the door of his shop, holding a box of donuts, a pair of worn work boots on her feet. He grabs an extra pair of canvas work gloves off the hook by the door, and when he hands them to her their fingers brush, warm and familiar, no awkwardness, no lingering guilt.
