Rudy Galvan, 62, retired Chicago public library archivist, leans against the dented passenger side of his 2008 Silverado, swiping chili grease off the cuff of his faded plaid flannel with a crumpled paper napkin. He’d avoided every town event since moving to Baldwin, Michigan eight months prior, still raw from 22 years of carrying a grudge so heavy it had chased him out of the city he’d lived in his whole life. His neighbor had begged him to enter his brisket chili in the annual cook-off, said he’d win by a mile, and Rudy had caved mostly to get the guy to stop knocking on his door at 8 a.m. on weekends. He sips his third Miller Lite, watches a group of teens race go-karts across the empty field at the edge of the fairgrounds, and considers bailing early.
A woman in cutoff denim shorts and a threadbare 1983 Stevie Nicks tour tee steps into his line of sight, holding a paper bowl of chili stacked high with shredded cheddar. She stops a foot away, squints, then grins, the corner of her mouth tugging up higher on one side. “Rudy Galvan, right? I’d know that scar on your left eyebrow anywhere. You got it fighting a guy who tried to steal a first edition Howlin’ Wolf record from the special collections room, remember?”
Rudy tenses so fast he almost spills his beer. He recognizes her instantly: Lila, his ex-wife Karen’s youngest cousin, the quiet kid who’d hung around the edges of every family barbecue, asking him questions about old books and blues records while everyone else got drunk and argued about football. The last time he’d seen her was his and Karen’s 10th anniversary party, three months before Karen left him for a 22-year-old library page who still lived with his parents. He’d not spoken to anyone tied to Karen’s family since, had blocked every one of them on social media, thrown out every photo that had even a hint of any of them in it. He almost turns to climb in his truck and leave, but she laughs, soft, and holds her hands up like she’s calming a spooked dog. “Relax. I haven’t talked to Karen in 12 years. She stole my long-haul trucker boyfriend right after she left you. I don’t exactly carry a torch for the woman.”
The tension drains out of his shoulders slow, like water out of a leaky hose. He nods, gestures to the empty spot on the tailgate next to him. She steps closer, close enough that he can smell coconut sunscreen and smoked paprika on her clothes, and when she reaches for the jar of dill pickles sitting on the truck’s bumper next to his boot, her upper arm brushes his bicep, warm through the thin flannel. She sits, crosses her legs, and her knee presses against his, no move to pull away. She’s 48 now, he calculates, gray streaks in her wavy dark hair, a small tattoo of a dog paw on her wrist, her hands calloused at the knuckles. She says she runs a dog grooming business in the next town over, has 12 rescue dogs of her own living in a converted barn behind her house.
He doesn’t realize he’s been talking for 45 minutes until the sun dips below the treeline, painting the sky pink and orange. She listens when he rants about the bureaucratic nonsense that made him retire early, when he talks about the crate of vintage matchbooks he’s collected since he was 16, when he admits he still sleeps with the radio tuned to the old blues station he listened to in college. She tells him she still has the mix CD he burned her back at that anniversary party, listens to it when she’s grooming aggressive dogs who don’t want anyone touching their paws. “You always saw people, y’know?” she says, holding his gaze steady, no look away when he meets her eyes. “Karen never saw anyone but herself. I told her that the day she moved out. She called me an idiot.”
His chest feels tight, half from the old anger he’s carried so long it’s become part of him, half from the warm buzz in his veins he hasn’t felt since he was in his 30s. He reaches into the truck’s center console, pulls out his tattered matchbook collection, and hands it to her. She flips through it slow, her fingers brushing his when she points out a matchbook from a long-shuttered Chicago blues bar she’d snuck into when she was 19. Her hand is cold from holding her iced tea, her nail polish chipped pale pink at the edges. Most of the cook-off crowd has left by now, the only sounds the crickets chirping in the grass and the faint hum of the food truck generators winding down.
She closes the matchbook, sets it on the tailgate next to her, and leans in a little closer, so their foreheads are almost touching. He can see flecks of gold in her dark brown eyes, can smell the mint gum she’s chewing. He doesn’t think, just lifts his hand, brushes a stray strand of hair off her face, his thumb brushing the soft skin of her cheek. She leans into the touch, no hesitation, and for the first time in 22 years, he doesn’t think about Karen, doesn’t think about the humiliation, doesn’t think about the grudge he’d promised himself he’d carry until he died.
She asks if he wants to get pie at the 24-hour diner three miles down the road, says they have the best peach pie east of the Mississippi. He nods, hops off the tailgate, holds his hand out to help her down. Her hand fits in his perfectly, calloused and warm, a little sticky from the chili sauce on her fingers. He locks the truck, shoves his keys in his jeans pocket, and they start walking toward the road, her shoulder brushing his every other step. The crickets are louder now, the sky darkening to deep purple, and he doesn’t feel the heavy weight of old anger sitting in his chest anymore.
