Chapter 11: The Strip

I didn't take the notice down.

You can't take down a county notice. I'd looked it up at four in the morning.

So I left it where it was and stood next to it with my coffee, and I read it to every guest who came past the office.

By eight o'clock the whole strip knew.

The bait shop man came over the fence in his white boots.

The surf school couple came across the road with their dog.

The snow-cone lady came from the corner in her apron with a cooler on wheels, because she was open anyway.

They stood in the gravel and read the paper on my door.

"Unsafe structure," the bait shop man said. "That deck's held up forty people every Friday for eight years."

"It held up my wedding reception," said the surf school wife.

"It held up my brother," said the snow-cone lady. "And my brother's three hundred pounds."

"There's an inspection this morning," I said. "Ten o'clock. Their engineer."

"Their engineer," the bait shop man repeated, like a cuss word.

At ten o'clock exactly, a white SUV pulled into my lot.

A man in a pressed polo got out with a clipboard and a hard hat he didn't put on.

A young woman in a cream skirt suit got out of the passenger side.

I knew her without being told.

My mother had always liked her assistants in her own colors.

"We're here for the structural inspection," the assistant said. "You've received notice."

"I've received notice," I said. "Go ahead."

The engineer walked onto the back deck.

The strip followed him in a line.

So did the Ohio couple. So did the birders from room six. So did Nana, in her housecoat, with a lawn chair.

She unfolded it at the top of the stairs and sat down to watch.

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