LITMIR.BIZ

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was an annoying buzz in the room. If she didn’t stop it, it would wake up the baby.

      Lucy sat up in bed. She opened her eyes. Zoe was sleeping peacefully in her white wicker bassinet. She couldn’t find the hum.

      “Lucy, turn off the alarm.”

      “Unh.” She reached out and pressed the button. She flopped back on her pillow and felt herself slipping back in the warm cocoon of sleep. So easy to drift off, except for the tug of her conscience. She had to get the kids ready for school, and Bill off to work. She threw off the covers and sat up, groping for slippers and robe. Standing, she staggered slightly and caught her balance on the door frame.

      She crossed the hall to her eleven-year-old son’s room. Picking her way carefully across the dirty clothes and sports equipment that littered the floor, she gave his shoulder a shake. “Toby, it’s time to get up.”

      Next she stuck her head in Sara and Elizabeth’s room. “Good morning, girls,” she called. Elizabeth was nine, going on twenty-nine, and Sara was five.

      She went down the steep back stairs to the kitchen, made the coffee, and continued on into the downstairs bathroom. She splashed cold water on her face and looked in the mirror. Short black hair stuck out all over her head and there were bags under her eyes. She looked terrible. What did she expect? She’d been up most of the night with the baby. She brushed her teeth.

      Back in the kitchen, she poured herself a cup of coffee and sat down at the table, resting her head on her hands.

      “Mom, I need you to sign this.” Toby’s voice pulled her back to consciousness.

      “What is it?”

      “A pledge that you won’t abuse your body by taking any illegal drugs.”

      “No problem,” she mumbled, scribbling her name. “Got any speed, man?”

      “What?”

      “Nothing.” She took a long swallow of coffee.

      When she next opened her eyes, she saw Bill standing at the counter, dressed for work in a plaid flannel shirt and jeans, buttering a pile of toast.

      “Sara, that pink scrunchy is mine,” said Elizabeth.

      “No, it isn’t.” Sara’s voice started to climb the scale. “It’s mine!”

      “Let her wear it,” said Lucy.

      “That’s so unfair. You’re always siding with her.” Elizabeth stamped across the kitchen and plunked herself down on a chair.

      “What’s the matter with your eye?” asked Bill, setting a glass of orange juice in front of her.

      Lucy squinted suspiciously at Elizabeth. She reached out and ran a finger across her eyelid.

      “Eye shadow! Wash it off.”

      Elizabeth glared at her, then stomped off to the bathroom.

      “More coffee?” Bill had the pot ready.

      “Please. Intravenously.”

      “Mom, can you come to school tomorrow?” asked Sara. “Officer Barney is visiting our class.” Sara was in kindergarten, and she loved it. After watching Toby and Elizabeth go off to school every day, she was finally in school, too.

      “Sure,” said Lucy. She looked up as Elizabeth returned. “That looks much better.”

      “All the other girls wear makeup.”

      “Right.” Lucy heard the roar of the school bus engine, as it began the climb up Red Top Road. “You better get going. The bus will be here any minute.”

      The kids pushed and shoved, grabbing their backpacks and lunches, then clattered out, slamming the door behind them. Lucy picked herself up and started up the stairs, heading back to bed.

      “What the hell?” Bill was peering out the kitchen window, thoughtfully stroking his beard.

      Lucy joined him. “Oh, my God,” she groaned, spotting a huge old Chrysler Imperial turning into the driveway, narrowly missing a whiskey barrel planted with bronze chrysanthemums. “It’s Miss Tilley. What could she want so early in the morning?”

      “The old witch probably hasn’t been to bed yet,” said Bill. “Probably been riding her broomstick all night.”

      Stifling a yawn, Lucy opened the door. “Miss Tilley, what a nice surprise!”

      Like most everyone in Tinker’s Cove, Lucy didn’t dare address the old woman by her first name. Only a select group of her dearest friends referred to Julia Ward Howe Tilley, the former librarian of the Broadbrooks Free Library, as Julia.

      Casting a disapproving glance at Lucy, who found herself involuntarily buttoning up her ratty old velour robe, the old woman wasted no time getting to the point. “Bill, it was really you I came to see,” she said, baring her complete set of rather dingy original teeth in a ferocious smile.

      “Me?”

      “Sit down. I have something I want to discuss. You, too, Lucy.”

      Meekly, they obeyed, waiting while the old woman settled herself.

      “As you know,” she began, folding her knobby, arthritic hands together on the edge of the table, “I am a member of the Tinker’s Cove Historic District Commission. The chairman, in fact. Unfortunately, we have a vacancy now that Porter Lambkin has resigned. He has cancer and says his treatment will prevent him from attending meetings.” From Miss Tilley’s expression, it was clear she disapproved. In her eyes, sickness was usually nothing more than a convenient excuse for neglecting one’s duty.

      “I wouldn’t have expected it of him,” she fumed. “He’s left us in a terrible predicament.”

      “What do you mean?” asked Lucy.

      “Remember when the commission was created? It was supposed to protect the town from tasteless, rampant development. People saw what happened in Freeport, and wanted to make sure that could never happen here. They voted to designate almost all of the town as a historic district, and set up the commission to review all proposals for change within the district. No one who owns property within the district can make any changes without getting a certificate of appropriateness from the commission.”

      Lucy and Bill knew all about the commission, usually referred to in The Pennysaver as the TCHDC. More and more, however, people were calling it the “hysterical commission.” While most everyone agreed it was important to preserve the character of the town, they resented having to get official approval whenever they wanted to change the color of the front door.

      “I’ve been on the commission from the beginning, and so has Porter and Hancock Smith. You know Hancock—the president of the Historical Society. And then there was Kitty Slack and Gerald Asquith from the college. Gerald decided not to run for reelection, and, well, you know all about Kitty.”

      Lucy did. Only a few months had passed since Kitty, a wealthy widow, had jilted her faithful suitor Gerald Asquith and left town unexpectedly, accompanied by a silver fox of a time-share salesman.

      “Only three people were on the ballot for two seats, and one of them was Kitty. It was too late to get her name off the ballot so Jock Mulligan and Doug Durning really ran unopposed. We used to have a nice unanimous board, but those two apparently have a different agenda. They will approve anything. It didn’t matter while we had Porter, but now that he’s gone the commission has been stalemated. Our votes are always tied. We can’t even agree on a fifth member to fill in until elections next year. Then I thought of you, Bill.”

      He shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “Me?”

      “You.” Sitting with her back to the window, Miss Tilley’s white hair glowed angelically. Her blue eyes twinkled. She smiled sweetly. Anyone who didn’t know her would think she was a perfectly nice old lady.

      “It’s

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