Elias Voss, 53, makes his living restoring vintage campers out of a cinder block shop on the edge of Franklin, North Carolina. His biggest flaw, if you ask the few people who know him well, is that he’s spent the seven years since his wife left convinced any romantic connection past 50 is just a minefield of unspoken expectations and small-town gossip, so he’s turned down every set-up, every flirty advance from the regulars at the corner bar, every offered pie from the widows down his street. He’d rather get grease under his nails than risk having his heart dragged through the town rumor mill again.
He’s manning a tiny booth at the annual summer street fair when he sees her. It’s 94 degrees, the air thick with the smell of fried oreos and charcoal, and he’s sweating through the shoulder of his faded Carhartt shirt, wiping grease off his hands on the leg of his jeans every two minutes. The only draw of the booth is the beat-up 1972 International Scout he pulled out of a barn last month, polished up enough to turn heads, and he’s spent the last three hours turning away casual gawkers who want joyrides instead of actual restoration work.
Mara Hale moved into the rental next to his house three weeks prior. She’s the town’s new head librarian, 41, and he’d snapped at her the second day she was there, when she knocked on his door holding a pitcher of lemonade while he was hauling a 300-pound rusted camper frame up his driveway. He’d assumed she was just another nosy local looking for dirt on the reclusive camper guy, so he’d grumbled a no thank you and shut the door in her face. He’d felt guilty about it later, but he’d avoided her ever since, crossing the street if he saw her walking her border collie at dawn, pretending he didn’t see her wave when she pulled out of her driveway.
She walks up to the booth now, barefoot, her flowy white linen dress sticking to the small of her back from the heat, coconut sunscreen drifting off her skin. She leans in over the fender of the Scout to get a look at the hand-restored dashboard, her shoulder brushing his bicep by accident, and he freezes. He hasn’t been that close to a woman who isn’t a grocery store cashier in six years.
“Nice work,” she says, her voice low, not loud enough for the group of retirees gawking at the camper 10 feet away to hear. “I saw it parked outside your shop last week. I’ve got my dad’s old 1968 F100 sitting in my garage, tailgate’s rusted through. Was hoping you might take a look at it.”
He’s about to say no, like he does every side job that isn’t a camper restoration, when she holds up a mason jar full of dill pickles, the brine glinting in the sun. “Brought a bribe. I make them myself. Heard you turn down almost everyone who asks for favors.”
He smirks, reaches for the jar, and their fingers brush when he takes it. Her skin is cool, even in the swelter, and he feels a jolt go up his arm he hasn’t felt since he was 20, sneaking into his high school girlfriend’s backseat after football games. He hesitates, his brain screaming no, messy, everyone in this town talks, everyone thinks she’s still married to that guy from the hardware store, the one everyone whispers about who screamed at her at the grocery store last month.
She must read the look on his face, because she leans a little closer, her hair brushing his forearm, and lowers her voice even more. “Filed for divorce three weeks ago. Nobody knows yet. Didn’t want the gossip mill blowing up before the papers are signed.”
The fair announcer blares over the speakers that the fireworks show starts in five minutes, and the crowd around the booth starts moving en masse toward the field at the end of Main Street. She grabs his wrist, her fingers wrapping tight around the sun-warmed skin, and tugs him behind the Scout, out of view of the passing crowd.
The first firework goes off, bright pink, painting the underside of the oak trees above them pink, and he can hear the crowd cheer from the field. She’s looking up at him, hazel eyes flecked with gold, a tiny scar above her left eyebrow, and she says she’s noticed him leaving cat food on the porch of the old widow down the street every Sunday, noticed him stopping to help the high school kids push their broken down truck out of the road last week, knows he’s not half as gruff as he pretends to be.
He doesn’t think, just leans in, his hand brushing the soft linen at her waist, and kisses her. She tastes like cherry lollipop and lime seltzer, and she kisses him back, one hand coming up to rest on the side of his neck, her thumb brushing the stubble on his jaw. The fireworks boom overhead, loud enough that no one can hear the small gasp she makes when he pulls her a little closer, and no one can see them, hidden behind the big metal frame of the Scout, the smoke from the fireworks drifting over them in thin, sweet-smelling clouds.
When the last firework fades, the crowd cheers so loud it echoes off the storefronts up the street, and they pull apart, both grinning like teenagers who just snuck past their parents. He fumbles in his pocket for a business card, scribbles his cell number on the back in grease pen, and tucks it into the pocket of her dress, his fingers brushing the soft skin of her hip when he does.
“Clear my schedule Saturday,” he says. “Bring the truck over. We’ll look at the tailgate. I’ll even make coffee.”
She winks, tugs the card out of her pocket to glance at it, then turns to walk toward the crowd, glancing over her shoulder once to wave before she disappears between a group of kids carrying cotton candy. He stands there for a minute, holding the jar of pickles against his chest, sweat dripping down the back of his neck, and laughs when a small kid runs past, slamming into his leg without apologizing. He tucks the pickles under his arm, turns back to his booth, and starts folding up the folding table, already mentally rearranging his work schedule for the week to make room for the truck, already looking forward to the sound of her boots on his shop’s concrete floor Saturday morning.
