Ray Garza, 61, retired CBP K9 handler, leans his hip against the rickety metal table holding his chili pot, one boot propped on the lower crossbar. The air in the small South Texas community park hums: kids screaming on the rusted swing set, a guy in a cowboy hat yelling about brisket prices, the sharp, warm smell of cumin and mesquite smoke curling through every open space. He’s only here because his neighbor bet him fifty bucks he wouldn’t enter the annual cookoff, and Ray never turns down a bet, even when he hates crowds. His left forearm, crisscrossed with a thin pale scar from a 2018 bust where his K9 partner took a knife meant for him, itches when a group of teen girls walks past, giggling. He scratches at it, staring at the slow bubble of his chili, already mentally calculating how fast he can pack up and go home before anyone tries to make small talk about his retirement.
He spots her before she spots him. Lena Mendez, 52, Maria’s second cousin, just moved back to town last month to care for her dad after his stroke. She’s wearing cutoff denim shorts that show a faint constellation of freckles on her thighs, a faded 2019 Willie Nelson tour tee, scuffed cowgirl boots caked in red dirt from her dad’s ranch. She’s carrying a paper plate stacked with cornbread, laughing as a toddler shoves a fistful of cheese puffs into her own hair, and when she turns her head and meets his eyes, her smile softens, shifts into something that makes the back of his neck go warm. She starts walking over, no hesitation, and Ray’s throat goes dry. He hasn’t talked to her since Maria’s funeral, hasn’t let himself think about her, not really, because she’s family, because the quiet spark they’d had even when Maria was alive felt like a secret he wasn’t allowed to keep.