My Mother Recognized My Fake Fiance From an Autumn Night Five Years Ago
“That’ll be eighteen dollars and fifty cents,” the clerk said as he took the box from my hand at the register.
I pulled a twenty-dollar bill from my purse and laid it on the counter, watching him count out the silver coins for my change.
“You want the screws for an oak frame or pine?” he asked, pausing with his hand over the bag.
“Oak,” I said. “The door is old.”
He dropped four long steel screws into the bag and folded the top twice.
“That’ll hold,” he said.
I took the bag and walked back out into the afternoon light, the brass lock heavy against my hip as I walked.
The shadow of the maple tree outside my window had reached the opposite side of the street by the time I finished setting the new strike plate into the doorframe.
The wood had been dry and tough, requiring me to use the hand drill twice to clear the old holes before the steel screws would take.
I swept the small pile of curly oak shavings into my palm and threw them into the wastebasket by the sink.
