I waited, my hand still holding the cold handle of my car door. “I was getting some papers filed.”
“The records clerk is a sweet boy,” Thomas said, taking two steps closer until he was standing right beside my front fender. “But he doesn’t always understand the legalities of municipal zoning.”
“I was looking at the Elm Lane deed, Thomas,” I said.
He adjusted his watch strap again, his thumb sliding under the metal clasp. “That property is scheduled for county demolition in seven weeks. The structure is completely unsafe for anyone to be wandering through.”
“It wasn’t unsafe in 2006,” I said.
“We did everything we could to search that highway,” Thomas said, his voice dropping into a low, rumbling register that sounded like a warning. “But some things are gone, Margaret. If you keep pushing these local boys, someone is going to lose their livelihood.”
“Is that a threat to Walter?” I asked.
“I am telling you that the county has rules,” Thomas said, his face hardening as he turned back toward his sedan. “And some folders are best left in the drawer.”
He got back into his car and reversed just enough to let my Buick pass, but he did not turn toward the highway.
As I drove down the county road toward my house, the headlights of his black sedan appeared in my rearview mirror, staying exactly three car lengths behind me.
By ten the next morning, the town council room smelled of lemon wax and wet wool. I stood near the back row of folding chairs, my thumb rubbing the bare skin of my ring finger where the band used to sit.
At the mahogany podium, Mayor Thomas cleared his throat, his voice booming through the small PA system. He was holding a walnut plaque with a brass plate on the front.
“Oakhaven is built on people who stay,” Thomas said, his chest expanding under his gray suit coat. “For thirty years of service to our volunteer fire department, we present this to Arthur Vance.”
The small crowd of twelve local residents clapped, their palms making a flat, dry sound in the high-ceilinged room. Arthur, who walked with a heavy cane, began his slow journey up the center aisle.
