Rafe Marquez, 57, has restored 72 vintage campers in the eight years since his wife packed a duffel and drove off with a part-time ski instructor he’d once shared a beer with. He runs his shop out of a weathered barn ten miles outside Bend, Oregon, keeps his phone on silent 90% of the time, and avoids all local community events like they’re prescribed steroid shots that make his bad knee swell. The only reason he’s at the downtown summer street fair is his 22-year-old niece begged him to drive her in, said she wanted to hit the craft booths before she headed back to college in Corvallis.
He’s leaning against a dented metal trash can by the taco truck, picking at a paper plate of carnitas and silently counting down the minutes until he can beg off and go home, when the collision happens. He reaches for a jar of pickled jalapeños on the condiment stand at the exact same time a woman on the other side does. Their hands brush. The glass is cold against his knuckles, her palm is warm, calloused on the index finger like she spends hours stirring or twisting something with it. He yanks his hand back like he’s been burned, mumbles an apology, and she laughs. It’s not the high, performative giggle he remembers from bar dates back in his 20s. It’s rough, warm, a little snort at the end, like she doesn’t care if she sounds silly.