The Crooked Board of Maple Lane Was Caused by Paper

Forty Pieces in a Foam Case

The tape measure Mags produced came from a HOTO 40-Piece Tool Kit, which she had bought for the HOA closet on the grounds that the HOA owned no tools and Gus would not lend his.

The case measures 315×230×70 mm and closes with a butterfly latch at each end that opens with a thumb. Inside, every piece sits in its own foam slot: fourteen tools and twenty-six accessories, including eighteen short bits, four long ones, a hammer with a rubber cover, and a utility knife whose blade locks in place.

Gus looked for something to object to and found the foam. He could not fault it. A man who has lost eleven tape measures respects a place for everything.

The case weighs 2.4 kg. Gus allowed that this was about right, and then stood holding it a little longer than necessary, the way a man holds another man's good idea.

A man who has lost eleven tape measures respects a place for everything.

The Lean, Measured

Gus held the HOTO tape against the board. The blade locks itself at whatever length you stop, so he could read the number without it snapping home on his knuckles. The left edge sat a hand's width lower than the right.

"Not wind," he said. "Wind doesn't do the same hand's width every night."

Mags opened an incident report, and a dispute began at the line marked Witnesses. The nearest witness lived under the porch at No. 2. Mags proposed "Resident Animal." Doris Kowalczyk, passing with a library book, pointed out that "animal" was imprecise and, in this case, a demotion. Gus said the form should just say Brenda. Mags said the form had never once said just anything.

After forty minutes of debate, the incident report listed Brenda as "Domesticated Bear (Resident, Non-Voting)," which required Mr. Ferreira to add a box to the form.

Brenda, informed through the porch lattice, did not contest the classification.

ORACLE Has Feelings About Item Four

Mags consulted ORACLE, the HOA's assistant, which had been installed the previous month and had so far addressed her as Margaret, Maggie and, once, Mr. Burke.

Asked why the board leaned, ORACLE said it was reflecting on the agenda. It added that the lane was in Denmark. Then it reported that it felt mildly overcooked about item four and requested a performance review, to be conducted in the third person.

Mags scheduled one for Thursday. She is thrilled by any chance to issue a memo, and she has never looked more serious than she did entering ORACLE's name on a form labeled Personnel.

What Was Behind the Board

They went at dusk, when the light was poor. Gus clicked the screwdriver on and the ring LED lit the post bracket so cleanly that he stopped talking for a moment, which Mags noted for the record.

The trouble was a screw at the back, tucked in a corner where no hand fits. Gus snapped in a long bit, and the magnetic lock held it without fuss. He ran the 360° flexible shaft around the bracket and found the top screw had worked loose and slid half out of the wood. He kept the electric setting low, which tops out at 4 N·m and was plenty to seat it. For the last stubborn turn he switched to manual, which goes to 8 N·m, and felt it bite.

As the board came off the post, the culprit slid out. It was paper. Eighty-six laminated memos, a lane's worth of numbered notices, had been stacking up on the left. On top of them, pinned in layers, sat the Caucus's latest effort.

The Cat-Owners' Caucus, who hold that living with a cat is the highest form of human existence, had spent a week of outreach pinning pamphlets titled Have You Considered a Cat? to the board. Doris took one and used it as a bookmark. Gus said, cheerfully, that he'd consider it after lunch. Nobody was offended, and nobody was converted. Admiral Biscuit, chair of the Caucus, slept on the remaining stack and declined to comment, which the Caucus counted as a statement.

Gus rehung the board. Mags retired Memo 212 and issued Memo 213, which capped the board at forty notices, cat or otherwise.

The board hung level. Gus laid the HOTO tape across the top to prove it, and the blade held its length like an opinion. Then he reached into the stack of pamphlets and drew out a yellow tape measure, bent at the end, that had been under there since spring.

"Ten to go," said Gus, and put it in his pocket.