Russell Pritchard, 62, custom cedar canoe builder and retired industrial arts teacher from Aitkin, Minnesota, had spent four years perfecting the art of vanishing from small town social events before anyone could corner him with a casserole and a list of their single cousins. His biggest flaw, as his only friend Ted liked to point out, was that he’d let grief turn him into a professional grump, convinced any joy after his wife Elaine’s passing was a betrayal. He’d showed up to the fire department’s annual pig roast only because Ted had threatened to dump pine sap on his latest canoe hull if he bailed, and he’d parked his beat-up 1998 Ford F-150 at the far edge of the field, far enough to bolt before fireworks if the noise and sideways glances got too much.
He leaned against the truck’s hood, half a can of Grain Belt in one hand and a crumpled napkin of pulled pork in the other, when lavender and burnt marshmallow drifted past, followed by a voice: “Mind if I steal one of those pork rinds? The snack table ran out ten minutes ago.”
He looked up. She was 58, maybe, silver hair pulled back in a messy braid, ink stains smudged across her left thumb, her denim jacket cuff dotted with cat hair. He recognized her as Mara, the new librarian who’d moved to town three months prior from Chicago, fresh off a divorce the local gossip mill had chewed over for two weeks. He’d never talked to her, deliberately avoided the library since she started, scared someone would try to set them up. He nodded, nudging the unopened pork rind bag he’d stashed on the hood toward her. Their knuckles brushed when she reached for it, a jolt he hadn’t felt in years, rough calluses from 30 years of sanding canoe hulls catching on the soft skin of her wrist.
She leaned against the truck next to him, close enough he could feel heat off her shoulder through his worn flannel, and made a face when she bit into a pork rind. “These are worse than I remember,” she laughed, the sound crinkling the corners of her hazel eyes, and he smiled back before he could stop himself. They talked for 20 minutes: about the fire department’s terrible potato salad, the flock of geese that had taken over the lake by his workshop, the box of old industrial arts lesson plans she’d found in the library’s basement the week prior, donated by the high school when they cleared out his old classroom after he retired. He tensed when she mentioned the plans, embarrassed at the dumb canoe doodles he’d scrawled in the margins, the notes he’d written about which kid was scared of the table saw, but she said the doodles were her favorite part, that she’d stared at them for an hour wondering who’d drawn them.
He could feel stares from across the field, knew Mrs. Henderson from the Main Street diner was nudging her friend and whispering, that the gossip mill would be working overtime by Sunday morning. Part of him wanted to make an excuse, climb in his truck, drive home, lock himself in his workshop where no one could bother him, where he didn’t have to feel the twist of guilt in his chest for talking to another woman, for enjoying it. But the quieter part of him, the part that had been asleep for four years, wanted to stay, wanted to hear more about the senior book club she ran, wanted to know if she’d ever been out on the lake in a cedar canoe.
The first firework went off then, a burst of red lighting up the sky, and a group of kids running past to get a better spot slammed into Mara’s side. She stumbled, falling against him, her hand landing lightly on his thigh, and he froze. He could feel the warmth of her palm through his worn jeans, her quiet laugh mixing with the boom of the next firework, and when he looked down at her, she wasn’t looking at the sky. She was looking at him, her eyes soft, and he didn’t overthink it. He laced his fingers through hers, the ink stain on her thumb rubbing against the rough skin of his knuckle, and didn’t let go.
They sat on his tailgate through the rest of the fireworks, not talking much, shoulders pressed together, hands linked. When the last firework faded and the crowd dispersed, he walked her to her beat-up 2012 Subaru, backseat stacked full of library books and a cat carrier. She asked if he’d teach a three-week canoe building workshop for teens at the library, he said yes without hesitation, then added he could pick her up at 9 a.m. the next day for coffee to hash out plans. She grinned, leaned in, kissed his cheek, the spot where her lips touched warm even after she pulled away. She climbed in her car, rolled down the window, waved as she pulled out of the field. He stood there, holding the half-empty pork rind bag, watching her taillights fade around the bend, and when he took a sip of his now-warm beer, it tasted better than any he’d had in four years.
