Manny Ruiz, 53, makes his living restoring antique typewriters out of the sun-faded garage of his Portland bungalow. He’s lived there 18 years, and has skipped every single summer block party the neighborhood hosted since his wife died seven years prior. His flaw? He’s let the town’s quiet gossip about him being a reclusive widower turn into a self-fulfilling prophecy, avoiding any interaction that doesn’t involve a screwdriver, a can of typewriter oil, or a pick up order from the taco shop down the street. He only showed up this year because the 16-year-old kid next door begged him to bring his fully restored 1952 Royal Quiet De Luxe for the vintage pop up booth, promising a free six pack of his favorite lager as payment.
He’s leaning against an oak tree 20 feet from the booth, sipping the second beer, when she walks over. The air smells like charred bratwurst, cut Kentucky bluegrass, and the coconut sunscreen the teen girls slather on while they lay on towels by the slip n’ slide strung down the middle of the street. Tom Petty blares from a beat up bluetooth speaker propped on a folding table. He’s seen her before: Clara, the 33-year-old bookbinder who bought the house two doors down three months ago, the one the neighborhood gossips have been clucking about because she “wears too much linen and doesn’t own a bra” and “flirts with every man over 40 within a five block radius.”
She’s wearing that same faded white linen button down he’s seen her in while she watered her front yard lavender at 7 a.m. last week, the fabric thin enough that he can make out the faint outline of her nipples when a cool breeze blows off the nearby Willamette. Her fingers are smudged with indigo ink, same as his always are from reconditioning typewriter ribbons. She stops half a foot away from him, close enough that he can smell her perfume: sandalwood, tangerine, and a faint hint of the leather glue he recognizes from the few bookbinding supplies he’s ordered online over the years. She holds eye contact for three full beats, longer than any stranger has dared in years, before she nods at the typewriter on the booth table.
“Yours? I typed a note on it five minutes ago. Hits like a dream, even with the keys warm from sitting in the sun all afternoon. I’ve got a 1962 Royal I use for embossing book spines, but the shift key sticks so bad I’ve bruised my thumb twice this month trying to jam it down.” She leans in when she talks, her bare shoulder brushing his bicep by accident, and Manny tenses up for half a second before he realizes he doesn’t mind the contact. He glances over at the group of retired schoolteachers and construction workers on the other side of the booth, who are definitely pretending not to stare at the two of them. He can practically hear the gossip mill churning already: Widower Manny finally talking to that fast new girl. Disgust curls in his stomach for half a second, sharp and familiar, before it’s drowned out by the low hum of desire he hasn’t felt since before his wife got sick.
He shrugs, trying to play it cool. “Shift key’s an easy fix. Usually just gunked up with old oil or dust.” She grins, and there’s a smudge of cherry pie filling on the corner of her mouth that she licks off slow, never breaking eye contact. When she reaches out to tap the beer can in his hand, her knuckles brush his, deliberate this time. “I was gonna head back to my place early, before the pie eating contest gets too messy. Wanna come take a look at that Royal? I’ve got that cold hard cider you like from the taphouse downtown, too. Got a case last week.”
Manny freezes for half a second. He knows if he walks down that street with her, every person on the block will be talking about it by tomorrow morning. He thinks about the quiet, empty house waiting for him, the stack of broken typewriters on his workbench, the fact that he hasn’t had a conversation with someone who doesn’t ask him about shipping times in three weeks. He nods.
They walk slow down the sidewalk, and when they’re out of sight of the party, she links her pinky through his, light as a feather, and he doesn’t pull away. Her front porch smells like lavender and old paper. She unlocks the door, turns to him, and kisses him slow, her ink-stained hand curled around the back of his neck, and he can taste cherry pie and vanilla on her lips. He steps across the threshold, and she closes the door behind them.
