Chapter 4: The Treasurer
By Monday, half my street had stopped waving.
The Lindqvists across the road pulled their kids inside when I got the mail. Somebody left a note under my windshield wiper, printed, unsigned. IT WAS JUST A TREE. DROP IT. At the grocery store, a woman I’d taught in tenth grade told me her husband had to pick up an extra shift to cover “my lawsuit.”
My lawsuit. That’s what it was called now.
I’ll be honest about what I felt, because it wasn’t only anger. It was guilt. Briar Glen held its HOA election in June. Eleven people voted. I wasn’t one of them. I’d been at a graduation party. I’d thought, it’s just the HOA, who cares. Sheryl won by four votes.
So I sat at my kitchen table and seriously thought about calling Nadia and telling her to drop the HOA from the letter. Eat the cost. Go after Sheryl alone, or not at all.
On Sunday night, somebody knocked.
It was Dennis Okoro from the end of the cul-de-sac. Forty-nine, gray V-neck sweater, heavy black glasses, an accountant who did the HOA’s books because nobody else would. I’d met him maybe four times. He was holding a manila folder against his chest like a shield.
“I’m sorry to bother you,” he said. “I’m the treasurer. I need to show you something, and I need you to not tell anyone yet.”
We sat at my table. He opened the folder.
“First thing,” he said. “There was no board vote on that assessment. There are five of us on the board. I’m one of them. Nobody asked me. Nobody asked Marcy, the secretary. Sheryl wrote the letter, signed it, and mailed it.”
“Can she do that?”
“No.” He slid a bank statement across. “Second thing. This is the HOA’s reserve account. That’s the money we save for repaving and the pool roof.”
He pointed at a line, highlighted in yellow.
Keller Tree & Stump — $3,800.00.
“She paid them with our money,” Dennis said quietly. “Your neighbors’ money. And there’s a board resolution in the file authorizing the payment. It has my signature on it. And Marcy’s.”
He looked up at me.
“I’ve never seen it before in my life.”
I didn’t say anything for a moment. I was thinking about Gus Keller on the phone, saying your signature. About how easy it must have gotten for her, the third time.
“Third thing,” Dennis said. He took out one more letter. “I called the insurance company myself. Our policy covers board members who make honest mistakes doing HOA business. It does not cover a president who acts outside her authority, forges documents, and cuts down a tree on private property. Fraud’s an exclusion. That’s why they denied it.”
“So the assessment,” I said slowly, “is real. Somebody does have to pay.”
“Right now, the HOA is on the hook, and the HOA is everybody.” Dennis closed the folder. “Unless the HOA turns around and goes after the person who actually did it.”
“Can it?”
“Our bylaws say twenty percent of homeowners can call a special meeting. Remove an officer. Authorize legal action.” He reached into the folder one more time and pulled out a petition. Signatures down both sides of the page. “I’ve got thirty-one. I need you to come Thursday. And I need you to bring that video.”
The Briar Glen clubhouse holds about sixty people if you take out the ping-pong table. On Thursday night, they took out the ping-pong table.
Every folding chair was full. People stood along the back wall under the faded pool rules. Gloria sat in the front row in her church coat. I sat in the second.
Sheryl came in last, in the pink vest, with her clipboard, and took her seat at the folding table at the front like nothing in the world was wrong. She tapped the microphone. It squealed.
“I want to start,” she said, “by addressing the rumors.”
She looked right at me.
“Last July, Laurel Hayes stood in her own front yard and told me she was sick of that tree and wanted it gone. She asked me to arrange it through the HOA so she wouldn’t have to deal with it. I did her a favor.” Her voice cracked, beautifully. “And now she’s suing all of you to get rich off it. She’s a liar, and I’m sorry you’re the ones paying for it.”
Sixty heads turned toward me.
I stood up. My legs were shaking, but my hand wasn’t.
I held up my phone.
“Sheryl,” I said, “want everyone to hear what you told the crew?”
