Rafe Mendez, 52, vintage outboard motor restorer, had skipped the Cedar Key annual fish fry every year since his 2015 divorce, mostly to avoid running into his ex-wife’s side of the family. He only showed up this year because the organizer begged him to donate a restored 1968 Evinrude for the raffle, the kind of motor that still runs smoother than any new plastic model off the shelf. He’d planned to drop it off, grab a plate of catfish, and bolt before anyone recognized him, but the second he rounded the corner of the beer tent, he locked eyes with Clara Marquez.
She was leaning against a splintered pine picnic table, one boot propped on the lower rung, a frosty can of IPA in one hand, the other wiping a smudge of barbecue sauce off her cheek. Her auburn hair was streaked with more gray than he remembered, tied back in a loose braid that slipped over one shoulder, and she was wearing a faded fishing shirt that had clearly seen more time on the water than in a closet. She held his gaze for three full beats, longer than anyone else would have dared, then lifted her beer in a lazy toast. He’d known her since he was 26, when he married her cousin, and for 20 years he’d made a point of not looking at her too long, not laughing too hard at her dry, sharp jokes, not noticing the way her dimple popped when she smirked. It felt like a rule he’d made up for himself, even when no one else was paying attention.
He hesitated for ten seconds, half considering turning and walking straight back to his truck, but his feet carried him over anyway. The gravel crunched under his work boots, the bluegrass band on the stage behind them wailed a cover of a Johnny Cash song he’d loved since he was a kid, and the air smelled like fried corn, catfish, and salt off the Gulf. When he got within arm’s reach, she reached out without asking, plucked a hush puppy off his paper plate, and their fingers brushed. He felt the rough callus on the pad of her thumb, from the pottery she’d been making since they were kids, and a jolt ran up his arm that had nothing to do with the static off the plastic plate. He cursed himself under his breath, angry that he was even reacting this way, that a random touch from a woman he’d known half his life was making his pulse jump like he was 17 again.
She teased him for burning the Thanksgiving turkey in 2017, the year he’d spent three days working on a motor for a charter captain and forgot to set the oven timer, and he laughed so hard he snort-laughed, something he hadn’t done since before the divorce. She told him she’d moved back to town two months prior, bought the little cottage on the bayou that her grandma used to own, was teaching pottery classes out of the garage. He told her about the 1972 Mercury he was restoring for his 16-year-old grandson, how the kid had saved up every cent of his lawn mowing money to buy it broken. They talked for 45 minutes, standing so close their shoulders brushed every time one of them shifted, and every time she looked up at him, her dark eyes glinted like she knew exactly what he was thinking, like she was amused by how hard he was trying to pretend he wasn’t interested.
When the raffle drawing started and the crowd pushed closer to the stage, she nodded her head toward the parking lot and said, “You wanna show me that Evinrude you were bragging about? I’ve been looking for a motor for my old canoe.” He didn’t even hesitate, just nodded and led the way to his workshop half a mile down the road, the windows cracked on his truck so the salt air blew through, the radio playing old outlaw country. When they pulled into the gravel driveway of his shop, he flipped on the overhead lights, and the polished aluminum of the half-restored motors glinted under the fluorescent bulbs, the air smelling like gasoline, WD-40, and the pine cleaner he used on the workbenches.
She walked over to the 1968 Evinrude sitting on the stand by the door, ran her hand slow along the polished casing, and her shoulder pressed against his when he stepped up next to her to point out the custom carburetor he’d machined himself. “I had a crush on you for 18 years, you know,” she said, soft enough that only he could hear, and he froze for half a second, every thought in his head going blank. He’d spent so long telling himself this was wrong, that getting involved with his ex-wife’s cousin was the kind of messy, stupid mistake he didn’t make, that the line between disgust at his own impulse and sharp, hot desire blurred so fast he couldn’t tell them apart. He turned to look at her, and she was so close he could smell the coconut sunscreen she wore, the beer on her breath, the hint of clay under her nails. He kissed her before he could talk himself out of it, her hand coming up to cup the side of his face, callus rough against his stubble, and he didn’t pull away.
They sat on the edge of his workbench an hour later, sharing a cold beer he’d stashed in the mini fridge under the counter, watching the sun sink pink and orange over the bayou through the open garage door. She traced the thin, pale scar on his forearm from the time a motor backfired on him three years prior, her touch light, and he didn’t flinch away. When a heron lifted off the marsh across the road, she leaned her head against his shoulder, and he wrapped his arm around her waist, his calloused palm warm against the bare skin of her back under her thin cotton shirt.
