Chapter Fifteen H: A Call from the Loading Dock
Evan found Claire beside the loading dock, where a forklift was refusing to start.
The operator had already checked the battery, and a line of deliveries waited behind the stalled machine.
Claire stood with a paper map of the hall spread across two crates.
She was directing drivers toward the side entrance so the obstruction would not delay the opening.
“Ruth Ellery remembers Dennis,” Evan said.
Claire held up a hand until a truck finished reversing.
“What did she remember?” she asked.
“He tried to stop the argument before the first festival collapsed.”
Claire folded the map slowly.
“I remember that too,” she said.
“I was standing beside the stage when my father told the sound technician to disconnect the microphone.
”
Evan asked why she had never said so publicly.
“Because I was nineteen and believed that protecting my father meant protecting everyone who depended on him,” Claire answered.
“Afterward, he told me the vendors would blame me if they learned I had assigned the stalls.”
She watched a delivery driver wheel a cart past them.
“I believed that part because I had actually made the assignments,” she continued.
“He never mentioned that he had given me two different lists.”
A woman in a reflective vest approached them with a problem at the west entrance.
The ramp was too narrow for a delivery cart carrying glass display cases.
Claire asked the driver to wait while she checked the alternate route.
Evan followed her around the building.
They found that the alternate door had been blocked by stacked folding chairs.
Claire called two volunteers, and the four of them moved the chairs into a storage room.
When the last cart passed safely through the doorway, Claire leaned against the wall.
“This is what should have happened the first time,” she said.
“Someone should have stopped, looked at the problem, and helped the people standing in front of them.”
Evan pointed toward the open door.
“You’re doing that now.”
Claire shook her head.
“That doesn’t change what happened then.”
“No,” Evan said.
“It changes what happens next.”
Her phone rang before she could answer.
The screen showed Nolan’s name.
Claire let it ring until the call ended.
A message appeared a moment later.
He wanted to know whether she had told the reporter about the two lists.
Claire showed Evan the screen.
“He isn’t asking whether the vendors are all right,” she said.
“He’s asking whether I made him look bad.”
She turned off the phone and returned to the hall.
Chapter Fifteen I: The Argument Outside
Nolan arrived just after noon, when the parking lot was full and the market had begun to feel successful.
He drove a dark sedan past the entrance twice before stopping near the loading dock.
Becca recognized the car and went to find Priya.
By the time Priya reached the entrance, Nolan was already arguing with a volunteer about access to the office.
“I organized the original event,” he said.
“You can’t lock me out of my own work.”
Priya stood between him and the doorway.
“The office is being used to coordinate today’s vendors,” she replied.
“You can speak to me outside.”
Nolan looked over her shoulder and saw Claire.
“You’ve been telling stories about me,” he said.
Claire stopped beside the door.
“I’ve been answering questions about the assignments,” she replied.
“Those aren’t the same thing.”
Nolan laughed and looked toward the customers.
“You always did like an audience.”
Becca stepped forward.
“She wasn’t the person who sent me into Evan’s basement,” she said.
Nolan’s smile vanished.
“You misunderstood an ordinary instruction.”
“You told me the festival banner was in a storage room,” Becca answered.
“You gave me a key that didn’t belong to you.”
Priya asked everyone to move away from the entrance so customers could pass.
Nolan refused and raised his voice.
“This whole event would have failed without my contacts.”
A vendor carrying a tray of baked bread stopped beside him.
“It nearly failed because people were given the same spaces,” she said.
Another vendor approached from the parking lot.
He asked whether Nolan was the man who had sold him a premium stall six years earlier.
Nolan said he did not remember.
“I remember you,” the vendor replied.
“You told me I could complain after the gates opened, but the gates never opened.”
The gathering crowd made Nolan step backward.
He looked toward Claire as though expecting her to rescue him.
Claire stayed beside Priya.
“You can explain your version to everyone who wants to hear it,” she said.
“But you don’t get to decide who is allowed to ask questions.”
Nolan glanced at the phones in several people’s hands.
He straightened his coat and announced that he would leave before the situation became disorderly.
Nobody blocked his path.
His car pulled away while the market continued behind them.
Priya waited until the sound of the engine faded.
“Now we need to finish opening the west aisle,” she said.
Becca picked up her clipboard.
Claire followed her inside.
The argument had not resolved the past, but it had failed to interrupt the present.
