Elio Marquez, 52, has spent 22 years crisscrossing west Texas in a dented silver F-150 as a minor league scout for the Texas Rangers. His biggest flaw? He holds grudges like they’re signed minor league contracts, locked away for decades no matter how irrelevant they get. The oldest of the bunch dates back to 1989, when his high school prom date stood him up outside the gym, no call, no note, vanished from town two weeks later. He’d told himself for 33 years she’d bailed for the star quarterback, and he’d carried that sharp little chip on his shoulder through two marriages, a missed kid’s high school graduation, and a recent mild heart arrhythmia that had his doctor ordering him to slow down on backroad drives and cheap gas station energy drinks.
He pulls into the VFW parking lot outside San Angelo on a sticky Thursday evening, the scent of fried catfish and charcoal hooking him before he even cuts the engine. He’s in town to scout a 17-year-old left-handed pitcher with a 94 mph fastball, and he’s sick of eating taquitos out of a gas station warmer. He grabs a paper plate piled high with catfish, hushpuppies, and coleslaw, grabs a cold Shiner Bock, and drops onto the end of a splintered picnic table half in shadow under a live oak.
Cicadas scream so loud they almost drown out the old country cover band playing by the pavilion. He’s halfway through his first bite of fish when he sees her. Lorna Hale. Same honey-brown eyes, same gap between her two front teeth, her dark hair streaked with silver now, pulled back in a braid. She’s wearing worn jeans, a county extension agent polo, and work boots caked with red dirt. His jaw tightens. He considers grabbing his plate and bailing, but she spots him before he can move, her face lighting up like she just found a $20 bill in an old coat pocket.
She walks over fast, her boots thudding on the asphalt, and leans in for a quick hug before he can protest. Her hand brushes his bare forearm when she pulls back, calloused from planting test plots, and he smells lavender soap and fried okra on her clothes. “Elio Marquez? I thought that was your truck out front. I still recognize that stupid Rangers sticker on the back window,” she says, sliding onto the bench next to him without asking, her knee pressing lightly against his under the table. He tenses at first, then relaxes, just a little. The grudge is still there, sharp at the edges, but it’s harder to hold onto when she’s stealing a hushpuppy off his plate like she used to between algebra classes.
They make awkward small talk first—she’s been the county ag agent for 18 years, widowed three years back when her husband died in a farming accident, he tells her about the scouting, the arrhythmia, his daughter who’s now a nurse in Austin. Finally, he can’t hold it back anymore. “You know, I waited two hours for you outside prom that night. Thought you’d bailed for Jeff Duncan.”
She freezes mid-sip of her sweet tea, her eyes going wide. “Oh my god. Elio, my mom had a stroke that afternoon. We had to life-flight her to Lubbock, we didn’t have a landline, I didn’t have your number memorized. My aunt moved me to Oklahoma two weeks later to live with her while my mom recovered, I never got a chance to tell you. I kept your old rookie league baseball card in my wallet for 10 years, for crying out loud.”
The air goes quiet for a second, the grudge in his chest dissolving so fast he almost feels lightheaded. He’s carried that stupid, pointless anger for half his life, and it was never even real. He laughs, a rough, surprised sound, and she laughs too, leaning into his shoulder for a second before pulling back, her hand resting on his arm for a beat longer than necessary.
The band shifts to a slow George Strait deep cut, the kind they used to listen to in his beat-up Camaro after football games. She tilts her head up at him, her lashes long, the corner of her mouth tugged up in a half-smile. “You still dance as bad as you did back then?”
He snorts, pushing himself up from the bench, holding a hand out to her. His doctor told him to avoid unnecessary excitement, but he figures one slow dance won’t kill him. She takes his hand, her palm warm against his, and he pulls her close, one hand resting light on her waist, the other holding her hand up by his shoulder. They sway slow, off-beat, not caring that half the VFW regulars are glancing over at them. Her head rests on his chest for a minute, and he can feel the steady beat of her heart through her polo, matching his own. When she tilts her head back up to look at him, their faces are inches apart, he can taste the sweet tea on her breath, feel the heat of her cheek against his.
They don’t kiss right there, not in front of half the town. They finish the dance, walk back to the table, and finish their beer, talking until the band packs up and the VFW volunteers start stacking the picnic tables. She offers to drive him out to the pitcher’s family ranch the next morning—she’s close with the kid’s grandma, can make the introduction easier than him showing up cold. He agrees, no hesitation.
He walks her to her beat-up Ford Ranger, and when she gets to the driver’s side door, she leans in, pressing a slow, soft kiss to his cheek. Her coral lipstick leaves a faint mark on his skin, warm where her lips touched. “Don’t be late tomorrow,” she says, climbing into her truck and waving as she pulls out of the parking lot.
He stands there for a minute, the cool night air on his face, before he gets in his own truck. He glances in the rearview mirror, touches the faint lipstick mark on his cheek, and grins. He turns the key, pulls out of the lot, and drives toward his motel, already listening for the first hint of sunrise over the flat west Texas horizon.
