Chapter 28: The Barn and the Matchmaker
The fire crackled and settled, the conversation flowing around me in warm, familiar currents. Allan's thumb traced lazy circles on the back of my hand, and I let myself sink into the comfort of it, the ring a warm weight against my palm. Ellis was mid-story, something about a drugged raccoon and a trash can that had the whole circle in stitches. Allan was laughing, his head tilted back, the firelight catching the line of his jaw.
Dana leaned toward me, her voice low enough to cut through the noise. "Hey, can you show me the truck? The one you and Allan have been working on? I've heard so much about it I feel like I already know it, but I've never actually seen it."
"Sure," I said, and I meant it. The barn had become a kind of sanctuary, the smell of grease and old wood familiar in a way that soothed something in me. I squeezed Allan's hand and leaned in to press a kiss to his cheek. "Be right back."
He barely registered it, too deep in the raccoon story, but his hand found mine and squeezed before letting go. I stood, and Dana followed, grabbing two fresh beers from the cooler on her way past. The screen door banged behind us as we stepped into the yard, the fire's warmth falling away, replaced by the sharp cool of the autumn night.
The barn loomed dark against the stars. I pulled the door open, the old hinges groaning, and fumbled for the light switch. A single bulb flickered to life overhead, casting a harsh yellow glow across the space. And there she was.
The Ford sat in the center of the barn like a sleeping beast. The faded turquoise paint was still rough in places, but the rust had been ground down and primed, the dents hammered out. The new carburetor gleamed in the light, and the fresh fuel lines ran neat and clean from the tank to the engine block. The windshield was still cracked, the seat still worn, but the engine was whole, waiting, patient.
"Whoa," Dana breathed. She stepped forward, her beer forgotten in her hand. "This is it? This is the one?"
"This is her," I said, and I couldn't keep the pride out of my voice. I ran my hand along the fender, feeling the cool metal under my palm. "She was under a tarp when I got here. Flat tires, cracked windshield, engine full of rust. Allan said she'd been sitting for twenty years."
"And you brought her back."
"We brought her back." I walked around the front, tracing the line of the hood. "The carburetor was the hardest part. I rebuilt it from memory. My father was a mechanic. He had a shop when I was growing up, and I spent every summer in it, handing him wrenches and learning how things fit together." The words came easily now, worn smooth by repetition, and underneath them a truth that still hummed in my bones. "This truck feels like him. Like that shop."
Dana was quiet for a moment, her eyes tracking over the engine. "That's beautiful," she said softly. "That you can carry him with you like that. In your hands."
I looked at her, at the way the light caught the auburn in her hair. "It's the only way I know how."
She grinned and handed me a beer, popping her own open with a crisp hiss. I took a long pull, the cold bitterness sharp on my tongue, and leaned against the workbench. The old wood creaked under me, and the smell of grease and sawdust and dust settled around us like a familiar blanket.
"So," I said, "Ellis seems nice."
Dana made a noncommittal sound, taking a sip of her beer. "He's great. One of the best deputies we've got. Always first in for the early shift, never complains, even when Dispatch routes him somewhere in the middle of nowhere for a noise complaint at two in the morning."
"He came to the party," I said. "Brought the firewood."
"He does stuff like that." She shook her head, a fond smile tugging at her lips. "Last month, I pulled a double and was falling asleep at my desk, and he showed up with a coffee and a bagel from the diner. He knew I'd been there since five in the morning and hadn't eaten. He didn't even make a thing of it. Just set it on the desk and said, 'Fuel for the engine.'"
"Sounds like a good guy."
"He's the best." She took another sip of her beer. "There was this one time, I had a flat tire in the station parking lot after my shift, and I was so tired I just sat there staring at it, and he came out and changed it for me. Didn't ask, didn't wait. Just did it."
"That's not what I mean," I said.
The words hung in the air between us. Dana's eyes went a little wide, and her hand paused, the beer halfway to her lips.
"What do you mean?" she asked, and there was a careful edge to her voice.
"I mean, do you like him? Like, like him."
She stared at me. The barn was quiet, just the hum of the single bulb and the distant crackle of the fire pit outside. Her cheeks went through a slow, visible progression, from normal to pink to deep, furious red. She opened her mouth, closed it, opened it again.
"Sabrina," she said, her voice high and strange. "I've worked with him for three years. He's a coworker. He's my friend. He's..."
She trailed off. The blush deepened, crawling up her neck to the tips of her ears. She set her beer down on the workbench with a clunk and pressed both hands to her flaming cheeks.
"Oh no," she whispered.
I bit my lip, trying to hold back the grin threatening to split my face. "Oh no?"
"I think I might." She stared at the truck, her eyes unfocused. "I think I might like like him. I mean, I've always noticed him, but I never, I never let myself think about it. He's a coworker. You don't think about coworkers that way. You don't."
"And yet," I said.
"And yet," she echoed, and her blush deepened even further, if that was possible. She let out a strangled laugh, muffled by her hands. "Oh, God. I've been standing next to him in the break room for three years. I've been brainstorming with him about noise complaint paperwork. I've been shooting the breeze with him at the station and telling myself it was just friendly, and it wasn't, it was never just friendly. It was the bagels. It was the flat tires. It was the way he always knows when I've had a bad day and leaves a Snickers on my desk. Snickers, Sabrina. He knows my favorite candy."
I was grinning so wide my cheeks ached. "He sounds like a keeper."
"He's going to keep me," she said, her voice strangled, "when he runs me over with his patrol car out of pure embarrassment, because I'm going to walk into the station tomorrow and not be able to look him in the eye for a single second."
"Or," I said, "you could do something about it."
She lowered her hands, her eyes going suspicious. "What kind of something?"
"I don't know." I shrugged, casual, like I hadn't been turning the thought over in my mind like a smooth stone. "You could ask him to get coffee. Or you could show up at the station with a bagel of your own. Or you could, I don't know, mention that you've got plans for the weekend and see if he asks about them."
"That's a first step," she said slowly. "That's, like, a real first step."
"It's a good first step."
"You think he even sees me that way?" She looked down at herself, at her jeans and windbreaker and the beer in her hand. "I'm just the dispatch girl. I'm the voice on the radio telling him which address to go to. I'm not..."
"Dana," I said firmly. "Any man who brings you coffee when you've been working since five in the morning sees you that way. He might not know it yet. But he will."
She stared at me, and then a slow smile spread across her face, tentative at first, then bright. "Yeah?" she said. "You think?"
"I know." I picked up my beer and clinked it against hers. "You've got this."
She laughed, a genuine, surprised sound that echoed off the barn walls. "Look at me. I came out here to look at a truck and I'm leaving with a love plan." She shook her head, wiping a tear from the corner of her eye. "You're dangerous, Sabrina Parker."
"Only when it comes to matchmaking." I grinned. "And carbs."
She laughed again, and we stood there in the warm glow of the bulb, the truck patient and gleaming beside us. Outside, the fire crackled and someone whooped, and somewhere in the darkness, Ellis's voice carried, calling something about a marshmallow dare. I watched Dana's head turn toward the sound, her face soft in the light, and I thought about how it felt to hear a name and feel your heart tilt toward it.
I knew that feeling. I wore it on my finger.
"We should get back before they send a search party," I said.
"Yeah." She drained the rest of her beer and set the bottle on the workbench. "Thanks, Sabrina. For the truck. And for the other thing."
"Anytime." I followed her to the barn door, flicking off the light behind us, the Ford disappearing back into the dark. "And Dana?"
She paused, hand on the door frame.
"Snickers is a sign," I said. "He's already halfway there."
She laughed, bright and warm, and pushed the door open into the night.