No Parking

by Valentine Wheeler

  She hurried on up the stairs, past the sounds, back to her apartment. That new cookbook from Jacob might be in her bedroom, and she’d need it if she was going to try the cherry tart recipe. Zeke would have to handle the customers for the moment—she needed a little break and a little peace.

  Someone honked in the distance, and Marianne automatically looked out the window. Down below her, pulling into a spot right beside the entrance to the bakery, was a big black BMW that Marianne recognized as a frequent parker in the lot. She knew that car. It always parked right outside the door to Rana’s shop for hours at a time, hogging one of the few precious spots big enough for an SUV. She hated that car.

  Marianne watched closely as the door to the SUV popped open, and a bald, stocky white man in a suit stepped out, glancing at his watch and pulling a briefcase from the seat beside him. He closed the door, locked the car with a quick tap of the button, and headed—

  Across the street. He barely paused in the crosswalk, hurrying to stand under the streetlight half a block down Main Street. And below, another car pulled in—this one a green hatchback—and two women in blouses and blazers followed suit. The first man shook the hand of each woman, clapping one on the shoulder as the other pulled out her phone. The woman in the red skirt—she looked familiar. Marianne squinted down. Was that Callie Fern? What in the world was the Chief of Police’s daughter doing parking in her lot? She certainly wasn’t stopping by the bakery or by the Cairo Grill—if Marianne remembered correctly from Anna’s school days, the girl was vegan and didn’t eat gluten. Not a lot she could eat at either place, though Marianne was trying to improve her allergen-friendly menu.

  As another two cars came around the corner and pulled into the driveway to the lot, Marianne’s stomach filled with a peculiar sinking feeling. She might have made an assumption that was not entirely correct. In fact, she might have been making assumptions for months. Could I really have been wrong about this the whole time?

  And then a vehicle pulled up, a white passenger van that glittered against the dirty snow, and the people whose cars were clogging her lot climbed in.

  Marianne raced down the steps, pulling her jacket on and shoving her feet into boots as she jumped in her car and started it up. As she pulled out of the parking lot, she could see the back of the van as it turned down Oak Street.

  “I hope the cops are sleeping in,” she muttered as she gunned the engine down Main Street to make the light.

  There was that van again, taking a left onto Milton Avenue. She followed it, merging a few cars back as it pulled onto the highway on-ramp. “Where are you going?” she asked aloud, trailing behind and feeling like some kind of TV private eye.

  The mystery van pulled off an exit later and pulled into the massive new complex that had gone up in Wilshire a few months previous, stopping in front of the CoffeeGuru sign. She knew the business. They had some kind of app for avoiding lines at coffee shops, or something like that. They’d been buying up land in Wilshire and, apparently, not converting any of it into parking. As she watched, another two vans pulled up, depositing more business-casual people in front of the door.

  Marianne pulled into a spot across from the building and watched the hip young people file in, taking a few quick photos on her phone. As the door shut behind Callie, she pulled up the emergency brake and slowly lowered her face until her forehead rested on the steering wheel. She hated being wrong, and she hated apologizing for it. She started the car back up and drove back to the bakery, slowly this time. This was some kind of work shuttle then from the center of town to the new building for the company. So she’d been blaming Rana these past few months for nothing. Marianne tried to press down the anxiety acid in her stomach.

  The lights were still out in Rana’s front window, and Marianne stopped at the door, unsure how to proceed. Finally, she knocked on the locked glass door, shivering a little in the chilly air. “Rana?” she called through the door. “Are you there? Can I talk to you?” Rana’s car had been in its usual spot in the lot—the lot which was now completely filled, despite only one store in the building being open and that one nearly empty—and Marianne had taken a moment to marvel at how the sight of that big silver hatchback used to fill her with simmering rage. Now it was a conflicted sight, evoking guilt, butterflies in her stomach, and a fondness that went deeper than she’d expected after knowing each other just one day. She knocked again and then shook her head. She was about to turn away and trudge back around the building when the light flicked on and the door swung open. Rana peered out, squinting in the sun. “Yes?” she said and then stiffened. “Oh. Ms. Windmere.”

  “I’m sorry.” The words came out in a rush. “It’s not your customers. You were right.”

  “Hm.” Rana crossed her arms and leaned against the doorframe. “So, your customers weren’t as blameless as you thought.”

  “No!” Marianne shook her head, trying not to get annoyed. “No, see, that’s the thing. It’s not my customers either.”

  As if on cue, a white van drove by.

  Marianne pointed at the vehicle as it slowed and stopped. “It’s them.”

  Rana’s eyes widened. “What?”

  “It’s that building off the highway in Wilshire. You know the one, with the obnoxious windows that make seeing anything impossible when you drive by at sunset?”

  “Oh, I know it.”

  Marianne pulled out her phone, holding it out to show Rana the picture she’d taken of the van in front of the office building. “They’re doing some sort of shuttle service and using us as their free lot.”

  Rana leaned in to look, her shoulder pressing into Marianne’s.

  “Those cheats!” Rana huffed. “That is rude.” She smiled slightly, flicking her eyes to Marianne’s. “You look like a woman with a plan to fix this.”

  “You aren’t angry?”

  Rana pulled away, leaving Marianne cold. She glanced down the street, frustration and tiredness flickering over her face. “Marianne—” She shook her head. “I’m hurt that you assumed it was me. I’m annoyed you never bothered to visit my shop to ask. And I’m frustrated it’s taken us this long to figure out what the problem is. But angry? No. Not at you. I’m mostly tired.” She met Marianne’s eyes, a challenge in her gaze. “And I have a feeling you’re going to do something about this, aren’t you?”

  “I’m going to try.” Marianne smiled tentatively. “I’m not sure how to fix this. I have some ideas of where to start; that’s all.”

  “Well then. How can I help?”

  Marianne blinked. “You want to help?”

  Rana shrugged. “It’s my parking lot too. Believe me my customers aren’t any happier about the situation. I always believed it was your customers. If I can send these commuters on their way, it’s good for everyone.”

  “Well, what we need is a sign; I think.” said Marianne. Warmth had built in her stomach, relief mixing with anticipation. “Something like the one at the pharmacy. You know, Customer Parking Only, a note like that.”

  “Is that something we can buy? I suppose not, if we want it enforced.” Rana leaned forward, interested. “Who do we ask?”

  Marianne laughed. “I’m not sure, but we can figure it out. Give me a day.”

  “I’ll make us dinner tomorrow,” said Rana, a dimple appearing in her brown cheek as she smiled. “Meat pies and salad. And you can give me the update then.”

  Marianne smiled back, warm and delighted.

  Chapter Five

  Marianne Windmere was a woman on a mission.

  The first thing she needed to do was call city hall. She knew a few older members of the city council from back when Kevin was a councilor, back when they were married, but she hadn’t spoken to them in so long she thought it might be rude to ask for a favor out of the blue.

  So, she called the main number instead, following the menus to the parking clerk, who very politely informed her that his office only handled parking tickets, not parking rules. He suggested she c
all the police if people were parking illegally in her lot. That seemed extreme. Marianne tried not to get the police involved in anything she didn’t have to. Personally, the few she knew seemed like all-right guys, but power did strange things to people. Besides, she wasn’t sure if any crimes were being committed. It wasn’t as if the lot was marked private or anything. And a small part of her, the part that watched too much news late at night, wondered about the wisdom of bringing the police into a dispute that involved a recent Middle Eastern immigrant. It just gave her a bad feeling.

  Next, she tried Ray, who plowed the parking lot in the winter. He sounded apologetic. “I’m not sure who’d be in charge of that, hon,” he said. “Do you own the lot, or is it town property?”

  Marianne paused. Did she own it? She’d never thought about it. The store and the front walk, that was hers. But the lot? “If it isn’t town property, would you still have to plow it?”

  Ray laughed. “I’ve been plowing your lot every storm for the last thirty years like I do every other lot in the town center. I got no idea which ones I’m technically supposed to do anymore.” Marianne heard a truck starting up in the background. “But that’s probably where you’ve got to start. Maybe the Assessor?”

  She should have thought of that. If anyone would know what she owned, it’d be the people in charge of taxing her on it. She flipped through the town report until she found a number for them and dialed it. The woman who picked up didn’t seem thrilled to be getting a call.

  “Hi, this is Marianne Windmere,” said Marianne. “I’m trying to find some information.”

  “What kind of information?”

  “I want to know who owns my parking lot.”

  “What’s the address?”

  “121A Main Street in Swanley.”

  Silence on the line.

  “Hello?”

  “Windmere Bakery?” The woman sounded a little annoyed. “Don’t you have your deed?”

  “My deed? Um…” Marianne looked around the office. The taxes from the last fifteen years and all her purchase orders and her reports were filed in the big metal filing cabinets by the door, but she knew there wasn’t anything that predated her running the business in there. Upstairs in her apartment’s unheated storeroom sat her father’s old wooden filing cabinet, stuffed to the brim with barely organized piles and folders of mingled personal and business records. She’d been meaning to clean the office out for years, to send some of the more interesting pages and photos to Anna, the only one of her kids with any interest in the family history. She figured that would be a good place to start.

  Papers rustled on the other end of the phone, interspersed with clacking. “The last survey I have on the property is from—huh.”

  “What?” Marianne didn’t like the sound of that huh.

  “The last survey I’m seeing for 121 Main Street is 1964,” said the woman. A note of surprise colored her voice. “If we haven’t done a survey since, we’ll need your deed to initiate a new one.”

  “What if I can’t find it?”

  “If you can’t find it, you can’t prove ownership, and for a property that’s been unsold this long, you may have a problem.”

  “My family has run this business for over a century in the same exact spot!” Marianne protested. “And my father sold part of the property in 1968. Surely there are records of that, at least, somewhere at city hall?”

  “Sorry, we don’t do that sort of research here,” she said. “You’d need to file an application for a record search.” She didn’t sound sorry. Not for the first time, Marianne wished Swanley was one of those hip modern suburbs with online websites and stuff. Not that she’d know how to use them if they did. But maybe her son Jacob could have helped.

  “I thought you had some kind of records database or something?”

  The woman huffed, a little more sympathetic, perhaps, now that she knew Marianne wasn’t going to be so easily put off. “Ma’am, when something is bought or sold, we have a record of it. If the sale happened before the 1980s, it’s not in the database. We haven’t digitized so far back, and many of the records were lost in the flood in ’92, or the fire in ’76. So no, there’s no information we can find here.”

  “What about tax records? Don’t you know how much to charge me for?”

  “We have the value of your property. We don’t have specific property boundary information.” In the background, Marianne heard another phone ringing. “If you can bring us a deed, we can give you more information.”

  Marianne sensed she wasn’t going to get any better answer. “Well, I guess I’ll look around,” she said, doubtfully.

  “You have a nice day.” She hung up with a click.

  “You too,” said Marianne into the empty receiver. She glanced up at the clock and grimaced. She’d spent the whole afternoon, from closing time at four to nearly six thirty, on useless calls. Rana would be wondering where she was.

  Her heart lightened a little at the thought, though she fought the hope down. It was better to keep things friendly between them. What was she doing, flirting with strangers at her age and having awkward morning afters? She’d never even done that in her twenties. One night of kissing, and she was acting like a teenager. Besides, she had to admit, at least to herself, that she could use a friend who hadn’t known her when she and Kevin were married. Everyone else in town knew her as either Daniel’s youngest daughter or Kevin’s ex-wife. They each had their own opinions about why Marianne and Kevin’s marriage hadn’t worked. In a town of less than six thousand, most of whom had been born within ten miles of each other, nobody had any private business. Gossip didn’t require a forty-minute drive to the movie theater in Framingham—it was free.

  Her phone rang, the cheerful little ringtone Anna had programmed for herself, and Marianne smiled as she answered. “Hi, sweetie.”

  “Hey, Mom.” Anna sounded a little out of breath like she’d been hurrying down a flight of stairs or something. Marianne repressed her maternal instinct to ask her if she had her inhaler and to remind her to sit down and rest if she needed it. “You busy?”

  “Never too busy for my girl. Everything all right?”

  “Oh, yeah. I wanted to see how you were doing. Dad said you were having some trouble with the property.”

  “He did, did he?”

  “And he figured that if you wouldn’t let him help, you might want to talk to me about it.”

  “Why’s that?”

  Anna sighed. “Come on, Mom. He wants to be useful. You know that. He wants to help.”

  Marianne gathered the papers from the day’s work and filed them and then shrugged on her jacket. She was only walking a few dozen feet around the building, but the weather promised a cold night ahead. “I know, sweetie. But I’ve got it handled.”

  “Are you sure? I’ve designed some pretty neat parking structures, you know.”

  Marianne smiled. “My little I. M. Pei.”

  “I’d prefer to go with Frank Lloyd Wright, at least. I try not to use much concrete. Brutalism’s a little out of vogue, Mom.”

  “You’re better than either of them.” Marianne opened the front door and shivered, tucking her jacket closer around her.

  “Are you on your way somewhere? I hear wind.”

  “Dinner with a friend,” said Marianne. “But I can talk as long as you like.”

  “Oh, no. I won’t keep you! But let me know if I can help.”

  “I will. Love you, sweetie.”

  “Love you, too, Mom, and I’m glad you’re getting out and about. It’s not good for you to stay in the bakery all the time.”

  “You sound like my mother now. Good night.”

  There was a smile in Anna’s voice. “Night.”

  Marianne hung the phone up and stuffed it in her pocket, tucking the bag of pastries under her arm a little tighter as she fought the wind and slush to the front door of Rana’s restaurant. Now that she thought about it a little more, it was odd she’d never been in here, no
t since Rana had taken over from that really terrible sub shop that had been there previously. And before that, the pasta bar, then the chopped salads, the noodle place, the stationery store, the fried chicken—she hadn’t realized quite how often the space had turned over, all the jokes about its curse aside. But Rana’s front windows were warm and welcoming, a lone customer sitting at the bar—she had a bar, brilliant—and Rana behind the counter, wiping down her work surfaces with a damp cloth.

  Marianne pushed open the door and stepped inside, letting the warmth of the restaurant shake the chill from her fingers. For a moment, her stomach clenched with anxiety. She didn’t know this woman much at all. Had Rana really forgiven her their argument so easily?

  Rana looked up and smiled. “Took you long enough,” she said. “Everything all right?”

  The customer turned around. “Marianne!” Ray had a giant plate of meat in front of him, garnished with a few cucumbers. Marianne winced internally for his stents. His vegetarian nurse of a wife wouldn’t be thrilled he was downing a pound of lamb this late in the evening. He looked so guilty—the same face his German Shepherd made when she got caught in the compost again—that Marianne decided she wouldn’t tell on him. She gave him a smile.

  “Hey, Ray. Long day?”

  He hesitated, watching her for a moment to see if she’d say anything and then shrugged. “Oh, just the usual. Wanted to come out and try Rana’s shawarma though. I heard it was great.”

  “And?”

  He grinned. “I’ll be back even if I have to bribe you not to tell Kathy.”

  Marianne laughed. “Hey, none of my business what you tell your wife, Ray.” She turned to Rana. “Hi.”

  Rana tucked her long hair behind an ear. “Hi.”

  Ray glanced from one to the other and pushed himself up with a groan. “Rana, could I grab a box for this? I’m gonna put it in my work fridge for lunch tomorrow. High time I got out of here, I think.”

  “You’re welcome to stay,” said Rana. “I’m closing for customers, but I’m open for friends.”