Rafe Holloway, 57, has restored 117 vintage motorcycles out of his cinder block Asheville shop since his wife left him 12 years prior. He’s stubborn to a fault, has avoided every event where he might run into his ex-wife or anyone related to her for a full decade, and hasn’t so much as flirted with a woman since the day she loaded her couch into a U-Haul and drove west. His only social outings are monthly bike club meetups and the occasional beer run, so when his riding buddy Javi dragged him to the downtown July beer fest, he’d planned to slip out after one cold IPA, no small talk, no hassle.
The air reeked of smoked bratwurst, citrus seltzer, and the faint sweet tang of honeysuckle climbing the brick buildings lining Main Street. Rafe leaned against a weathered wall, jacket slung over one shoulder, condensation dripping off his beer can onto his calloused left hand, when a group of drunk 20-somethings stumbled past, and someone bumped hard into his side. He turned to snap, and froze. It was Lila, his ex-wife’s youngest cousin. He hadn’t seen her since the week of his divorce, when she’d slipped a $20 into his hand and told him his ex was an idiot for leaving the only good guy in her family, then moved to Oregon for a forest service job.
She was 48 now, her dark hair streaked with a thin line of silver at the temple, wearing a faded floral sundress scuffed at the hem from hiking boots, the same vanilla lip balm she’d worn since she was 20 clinging to her smile. She stepped closer when another group of festival goers squeezed past, her bare shoulder brushing his bicep, and he caught the faint smell of coconut shampoo and pine sap. “You still have that permanent grease smudge under your left fingernail,” she said, nodding at his hand, holding eye contact so long he felt his ears warm up.
His first instinct was to leave. He’d spent 12 years drawing a hard line between his old life and his new one, and Lila was firmly on the wrong side of that line. If his ex found out they were even talking, she’d blow up half the mutual friends’ group chats, call Lila a traitor, call him every name she could think of. But then she laughed at a dumb joke he made about the time his ex tried to grill burgers and burned the patties so bad the smoke alarm went off for 20 minutes, and she reached out to touch his forearm, her fingers warm even through the thin cotton of his work shirt, and he didn’t step back.
They talked for an hour, the bluegrass band playing two blocks over bleeding through the hum of the crowd, as the sun dipped low and painted the sky pale pink and tangerine. She told him she’d moved back three months prior to care for her mom, who was recovering from a stroke, and she’d seen his posts on the local bike club’s Facebook page, the ones of that 1978 Kawasaki KZ650 he’d been restoring when he was married. She’d asked him about that bike once, back when she was 23, hanging out in his garage while the rest of the family fought over Thanksgiving dinner, and he’d spent an hour walking her through every part he’d replaced. “I always wondered if you finished it,” she said, shifting her weight so her hip brushed his, and he noticed the tiny motorcycle tattoo on her left ankle for the first time.
He hesitated for two full beats when she asked if he wanted to walk back to the shop so she could see it. Every stubborn, self-protective part of him screamed that this was a bad idea, that he was opening a door he’d nailed shut 12 years prior, that the drama wasn’t worth it. But then she tilted her head up at him, the golden light catching the flecks of green in her brown eyes, and he nodded.
The walk to the shop was three quiet blocks, their hands brushing twice as they walked, neither of them pulling away or apologizing. When he unlocked the roll up door, the familiar smell of motor oil and citrus cleaner wrapped around them, the Kawasaki sitting front and center on the lift, polished to a high shine. She stepped past him to lean in and look at the custom paint job, her back pressing against his chest for half a second, then turned her face up to his, her lips inches from his. He didn’t overthink it. He kissed her, his hand coming up to cup her jaw, the grease smudge on his fingernail brushing her cheek, and she kissed him back, her hands tangling in the hair at the nape of his neck.
An hour later, they were sitting on the frayed corduroy couch he kept in the back of the shop, sharing a cold root beer he’d stashed in the mini fridge for late work nights. She was tracing the thin scar across his right knuckle, the one he got when he crashed a bike on the Blue Ridge Parkway 15 years prior, and told him she’d had a crush on him since that Thanksgiving, when he’d snuck her a slice of pie after her mom told her she couldn’t have seconds. She said she didn’t care what her cousin thought, that she was 48 years old and didn’t answer to anyone but herself.
Rafe checked his phone, saw three missed texts from Javi asking where he’d gone, and deleted them without replying. For the first time in 12 years, he didn’t feel like he was just going through the motions, counting down the days until he could retire and ride his bike across the country alone. He reached over, tucked a stray strand of hair behind her ear, and told her he had a spare helmet in the closet if she wanted to ride up to the Parkway overlook for sunrise the next morning.