Ronan O’Malley, 62, retired Puget Sound ferry captain, was hunched over a bin of sun-warmed wild blackberries at the Port Angeles Saturday market when a woman’s elbow knocked his faded Coast Guard ball cap askew. He straightened up, ready to grumble about people watching where they’re going, and froze. It was Marnie Hale. His ex-wife’s college roommate, the woman he’d blamed for 18 years for spilling the details of that overnight halibut trip with his female deckhand, the lie that had ended his 22-year marriage. He’d not seen her since the day he’d loaded his dresser into a U-Haul and driven away from their old Tacoma house.
The thick, sweet smell of fresh cut basil from the next stall wrapped around them, the distant twang of a local bluegrass band cutting through the hum of market chatter. Marnie’s hair was streaked with more silver than he remembered, cut short in a messy bob that stuck up a little at the crown, like she’d run her fingers through it a dozen times that morning. She was wearing worn denim overalls over a white tank top, sun freckles dark across her shoulders, and when she realized who he was, her lips parted in a shocked half-smile.
He was ready to turn and walk away, old anger bubbling up sharp and hot, before she held up a hand, quick, like she was calming a spooked dog. “Before you storm off, I never told her about that trip,” she said, no preamble, like she’d been waiting 18 years to say it. “She found the receipt for the coastal motel in your work email when she logged onto your laptop to print a recipe. She lied and said I told her because she didn’t want to admit she’d been snooping through your messages for three months, convinced you were cheating. I tried to tell her she was wrong. She didn’t listen.”
Ronan blinked, the anger draining out of him so fast he felt lightheaded. He’d carried that grudge for almost two decades, turned down every invite to group events she was at, badmouthed her to any mutual friend who’d listen, and it had all been for nothing. He leaned against the wooden stall post, crossing his arms over his sunburnt forearms, and huffed a rough, disbelieving laugh. “You’re shitting me.”
“Cross my heart,” she said, drawing an X over her chest with one finger, her nail polish chipped a pale mint green. “I moved up here three months ago to work part time at the town library. I kept an eye out for you, figured you’d be around. Heard you retired from the ferry system last year, train rescue hounds for the shelter out of your place.”
They ended up at the dive bar three blocks down the street, sharing a plate of greasy cheese curds and drinking cold draft IPA, the air inside thick with the smell of fried food and old cigarette smoke. She slid into the booth next to him instead of across, their knees brushing every time she shifted to grab a curd or sip her beer, and he didn’t move away. She held his gaze when she told him she’d always thought he got a raw deal, that she’d had a stupid, useless crush on him back when he was married, but she’d never said a word because he was off limits, and she’d never been the kind of woman to cross that line.
When he reached for his beer at the same time she did, their hands brushed, her fingers cold from the frosted pint glass, calloused at the tips from the community garden plot she tended. He didn’t pull his hand away, and for a beat, they just sat there, the noise of the bar fading out, her dark eyes fixed on his. He could smell her lavender shampoo mixed with the faint, familiar tang of cheap menthol cigarettes, the same brand he’d smoked since he was 19.
He walked her to her beat up Subaru in the market parking lot when they left, the sun dipping low over the Strait of Juan de Fuca, painting the sky pink and orange. She paused by her driver’s side door, leaning in a little, her shoulder brushing his, and told him she was renting the cottage two miles down the road from his place, that a stray hound dog had been hanging around her porch for a week, skittish around strangers. Would he come take a look tomorrow afternoon?
He agreed, no hesitation. She smiled, and before he could overthink it, he leaned down and kissed her, slow, no rush, the faint taste of IPA and blackberry pie she’d eaten for dessert on her lips. She kissed him back, her hand curling around the back of his neck, the short silver hairs there prickling under her palm.
He got in his truck after she drove off, the half flat of blackberries he’d bought sitting on the passenger seat next to a jar of honey he’d harvested from his backyard beehives the week before, a bag of extra dog treats tucked in the center console. He flipped on his turn signal at the end of the road, already mentally rearranging his morning schedule so he could stop and pick up a pack of her favorite menthols on the way over tomorrow.
