Rafe Mendez, 62, retired Cleveland storm drain inspector, only agreed to show up to the fire department taco fundraiser because his next-door neighbor banged on his garage door at 4 p.m. and refused to leave until he said yes. He’d spent the whole day sanding the gas tank of his half-restored 1982 Honda CB750, nails crusted with clear coat and rust, and planned on spending the evening eating frozen meatloaf and watching old westerns alone, like he did most nights. He’d kept his walls up solid since his wife Lydia died of ovarian cancer eight years prior, turned down every invite to block parties, potlucks, even the local fishing club’s annual trip, convinced any new connection would only end in the same sharp, hollow grief he still felt when he found her old coffee mug in the back of the cabinet.
He stood off to the edge of the parking lot, holding a grease-stained paper plate with two carnitas tacos and a lukewarm Modelo in a flimsy plastic cup, wearing his faded oil-stained Carhartt jacket even though the April air was warm enough for short sleeves. The tacos were from the same truck that used to park outside the public works yard back in the 90s, he had to admit they tasted exactly like he remembered, salty and spicy with a hit of lime that stung the corners of his mouth. He was just about to slip out early when he heard a snort-laugh from ten feet away, loud enough to cut through the chatter of kids chasing each other and the fire crew swapping stories about the latest kitchen fire they’d responded to.
He looked over, and his chest tightened. The woman was 58 or so, curly gray hair pulled back in a messy braid, faded denim overalls caked with garden dirt at the cuffs, bare arms freckled all the way up to her shoulders. She was listening to the fire marshal tell a joke, leaning against a chain link fence, and when she laughed again she threw her head back, showing a small silver hoop through her left nostril. Rafe laughed too, a quiet huff he thought no one heard, but she turned her head right then, locked eyes with him, and grinned.
He froze, tried to look away like he’d been staring at the fireworks display the crew was setting up behind her, but she pushed off the fence and walked straight over. She smelled like lavender hand lotion and turned earth, the same rich damp scent he remembered from the community garden down the street he’d walked past a hundred times but never visited. “You’re the guy who left a bag of heirloom tomato plants on my porch last May, right?” she said, stopping so close their elbows were almost touching. “I grew those, they were the best tomatoes I’ve ever had. Tasted like summer before air conditioning.”
Rafe’s throat went dry. He’d had way too many seedlings from the plants he grew in his back porch planters, left them on the closest porch he saw with empty garden beds, didn’t even know who lived there. He nodded, fumbled for a second with his taco so some of the pork fell onto the plate. “Uh. Yeah. Had too many. Didn’t want ‘em to go to waste.”
She held out a hand, calloused at the palms, dirt still under her fingernails. “Elara. I run the community garden. I’ve seen you out in your garage working on those bikes through the fence. You make a hell of a lot more noise on Saturday mornings than the old guy who used to live there did.” She winked, and Rafe felt his face heat up, something light and fizzy in his chest he hadn’t felt since he was 20 and taking Lydia to drive-in movies on his old bike.
They stood there for 20 minutes, talking, Elara leaning against the fence next to him, their elbows brushing every time she reached for a napkin or he lifted his beer to his mouth. He told her about the 2007 flash flood he’d pulled two teenagers out of, about the weirdest thing he’d ever found in a storm drain: a full size porcelain toilet, still bolted to a piece of subfloor. She told him about the guy who kept stealing zucchini from the community garden, left a dozen homemade chocolate chip cookies on the gate last week as an apology. Rafe fought the pull of it the whole time, a quiet voice in his head yelling that he was being stupid, that getting close to anyone would only hurt, that he was betraying Lydia by even enjoying talking to another woman. But every time Elara laughed, that snorty, unselfconscious laugh, the voice got quieter.
The first firework went off then, a burst of red over the roof of the fire station, making the kids in the crowd scream in delight. A stray spark drifted right toward Elara’s braid, and Rafe reached out without thinking, swatting it away before it could catch, his palm brushing the top of her curly hair for half a second longer than he needed to. She turned to him, her eyes glowing gold from the next firework that exploded above them, and she didn’t step back, didn’t pull away.
Rafe took a deep breath, ignored the voice in his head screaming to run. “I’ve got that CB750 halfway apart in my garage. Got a case of cold Modelo in the fridge too. Wanna come see it? I can show you how to change the oil if you want, my wife always wanted to learn but never got around to it.” He held his breath, waiting for her to say no, waiting for her to think he was a weird old creep hitting on her at a fundraiser.
Elara smiled, slipped her hand into his, her palm calloused and warm against his. “Lead the way. I’ve been bugging my brother to teach me for years, he always said girls don’t belong in a garage.”
They walked down the sidewalk toward his house, the sound of fireworks fading behind them, their shoulders bumping every few steps, Rafe’s calloused work hand tangled with hers, the taste of lime and carnitas still sharp on his tongue. When they turned onto his street, he could see the light he left on in the garage glowing through the window, and for the first time in eight years, he didn’t feel like rushing to be alone.
