Rudy Gallegos, 62, retired U.S. Forest Service fire spotter, leaned against the cinder block exterior of the Taos VFW, sweat beading at his hairline under the brim of his faded fire crew cap. He’d spent eight years avoiding all local community events after his wife Linda passed from a stroke in 2015, convinced any small joy he allowed himself would be a betrayal of the 34 years they’d spent together, but his neighbor had practically dragged him out the door that morning, saying if he holed up in his cabin one more chile roast season he’d turn into a dust-covered cactus himself. The air smelled like burnt mesquite and charred green chile, the tumbling roaster clanging loud enough to drown out the mariachi playing off a beat-up portable speaker by the bar, and the Modelo in his hand was so cold the condensation was dripping down his wrist onto the frayed cuff of his fire-resistant jacket.
He turned to grab a napkin off the folding table stacked with paper plates and pint bags for roasted chile, and his shoulder slammed into someone half a foot shorter than him, the contents of their own beer sloshing over the rim onto his boot. He started to apologize, then stopped. The woman in front of him was wearing faded high-waisted Wranglers, a tooled leather belt strung with chile ristras, and a silver squash blossom necklace he swore he’d seen somewhere before, her dark hair streaked with gray pulled back in a braid, her calloused hands dusted with chile seeds. She laughed, loud and rough, the same laugh he’d heard echoing through a fire spotter tower 14 years prior, when they’d gotten stuck for 12 hours during a thunderstorm on the Gila National Forest, sharing a single pack of peanut butter crackers while lightning struck the pine trees 100 yards away. It was Elena Mendez, who’d been a temporary spotter that season, who’d moved away shortly after to get married in Colorado.
They both reached for the same stack of napkins at the same time, their fingers brushing, and Rudy felt the rough callus on her index finger, the same one he had from gripping binoculars for 8 hour shifts, and a jolt shot up his arm that had nothing to do with the cold beer. He’d spent so long shutting out every possible advance, every friendly conversation that felt like it could lead somewhere, that his first instinct was to step back, mumble an excuse, and drive back to his empty cabin. But Elena leaned in closer, her shoulder pressing into his bicep for three full seconds so she could yell over the racket of the roaster, and he caught the faint scent of lavender lotion mixed with roasted chile on her shirt, and his feet wouldn’t move. She told him she’d moved back to Taos three months prior, after her husband died of pancreatic cancer, to take over her dad’s feed store on the edge of town, and she’d asked around about him a few times, heard he was still holed up in that cabin off the high road, never talking to anyone.
He could feel the eyes of a few of his old fire crew buddies on them from across the parking lot, Joe Romero winking and nudging the guy next to him, and Rudy’s face heated up, equal parts embarrassed and weirdly thrilled, like he was sneaking around behind Linda’s back even though he knew she’d have told him years ago to stop moping and talk to the nice woman who liked peanut butter crackers as much as he did. He found himself leaning against the hood of his beat-up 2008 Ford F150 with her for an hour, passing a bag of roasted chile back and forth, taking bites of the spicy pods, his eyes watering so bad he had to wipe them with the back of his hand, Elena laughing every time he coughed. She told him she’d finally bought that accordion she’d rambled about in the tower all those years ago, still couldn’t play a single full song without messing up the chords, and he told her about the tabby cat he’d adopted last year that kept knocking over his binoculars on the kitchen table.
When the sun started to dip below the Sangre de Cristos, painting the sky pink and orange, Elena twisted the silver turquoise ring on her thumb, the same nervous tic she’d had back in the tower, and asked him if he wanted to come over to her place later. She had a pot of posole simmering on the stove, she said, and enough cold beer to last through three hours of terrible accordion playing, if he was patient enough to listen. Rudy’s throat went tight, and he almost said no, almost made up an excuse about needing to get home to feed the cat, almost ran back to the safe, quiet loneliness he’d built for himself. But then she smiled, the corners of her hazel eyes crinkling, and he thought of Linda’s voice in his head, telling him he didn’t have to be lonely just because she was gone. He said yes.
He loaded three bags of roasted chile into the bed of his truck, and she told him she’d follow him to his cabin first so he could drop off his haul and feed his cat, that she’d wait in the driveway while he ran inside. He pulled into his dirt driveway 10 minutes later, Mabel rubbing against his ankles when he walked in the door, and he grabbed the old crumpled photo he kept in his nightstand, the one of him and Elena in the spotter tower in 2009, both of them grinning with peanut butter on their cheeks, to tuck into his jacket pocket. He filled Mabel’s food bowl, locked the front door, and walked back out to the driveway, where Elena was leaning against the hood of her Subaru, holding a cold beer she’d brought for him, the last of the sunset gilding the edges of her braid.
