Page 5

Everyone in the grange turned and stared at Sullivan.

Rows and rows of Oakwood Heights residents, many of them customers who’d eaten at Mirepoix, looked at her with mild horror.

Understandable since mud soaked her jeans up to the knees and the rain had turned her hair into slippery ringlets all falling in her eyes.

Sullivan had been on the roof when Miss Brenda had called up, her voice hoarse, Agnes’s nephew Patrick just sent her a text saying that Barb Preeters is at the association meeting, and she says they’re selling the Bois .

Sheer luck had saved Sullivan from breaking a leg in her haste to get down the fire escape.

Only then had Sullivan checked her watch.

She’d lost track of time, the threat of a roof collapsing on beloved Miss Brenda’s restaurant had distracted her.

It shouldn’t have mattered. The association vote was a formality.

The Bois had always been green space. The Oakwood Greenbelt Land Trust would be buying it in a few years. No one had talked about selling.

She’d been half an hour late when she started running toward the meeting. For once she wished she’d driven.

She’d tried to find her phone, hoping a glance at the agenda would show her that Agnus’s nephew Patrick was wrong about Barb Preeters. There was no way things could get lost in that game of telephone, right? But in fact, nothing had gotten lost.

Sullivan had searched frantically for the email with the meeting agenda on her phone.

The phone had kept slipping out of her muddy fingers, like a dream where you tried to run and you couldn’t.

But she finally got a hold of it and opened the attachment.

There was the usual approval of last month’s minutes and presentation of committee reports.

Following that was Taste the Love Land, discussion and questions followed by Vote to sell the Bois to Taste the Love Land Food Truck Paradise Inc.

She clicked the link to last month’s minutes.

Her hand shook and not just from the rain that had started falling but because the association was talking about selling the Bois, and no one had told her.

Not one of the customers who’d eaten at her restaurant had thought to mention it when they came in to celebrate their birthdays or anniversaries.

She’d stayed open on Christmas, Thanksgiving, and New Year’s to give people a place to celebrate, and no one had said, Isn’t Alice Sullivan raising money to make the Bois a permanent green space?

Shouldn’t we let her know the association is talking about selling?

She felt betrayed. Her grandfather’s dream, her peaceful backyard, the namesake land of her restaurant, and all the lobster mushrooms, yellow violets, baby racoons, and the rare tree snake.

She’d seen it only a few times, and every time had been magic.

Now all of that would be tilled under for a bunch of food trucks.

Sullivan was fit, but she hadn’t run like this since…

She’d never run like this. She’d run all the way from Miss Brenda’s biscuit restaurant in downtown Oakwood Heights to the grange.

She felt like someone had stabbed her in the side.

Now she was standing between flanks of folding chairs, the mild-mannered neighborhood members gaping at her. Sullivan doubled over, gasping.

“You can’t—” Her vision blurred from lack of oxygen or shock. “Sell the Bois.”

A long table had been set up in front of the board members’ seats. An extension cord trailed to one of the outlets. A portable induction burner sat on the table. In her oxygen-deprived state, it looked like an approximation of an altar with the board seated behind it like disciples.

“Ms. Sullivan.” The board chair’s voice cut through the haze.

“We were surprised you weren’t at the last few meetings.

We’ve discussed this extensively. The neighborhood is in favor.

” Sullivan’s mind reeled. She clenched her jaw, berating her own shortsightedness in choosing to attend the two Sunday evening She-Pack games instead of the association meetings.

She gripped her side and struggled to an upright position.

The hall’s high ceilings looked vacuous.

Night darkened the high windows. Suddenly the folding chairs and the board’s table stripped the grange of everything that had made it elegant and cozy.

This was just another industrial space where lots of people made bad decisions without thinking through the consequences. She just had to speak up and—

And then her mind cracked and she froze.

She had to be hallucinating, because Kia Jackson stood at the front of the room wearing flipped-up turquoise sunglasses and holding a pink spatula with a crepe draping off it like a Salvador Dalí clock.

She wasn’t the skinny kid she’d been in school, although she still wore the same ridiculous amount of color.

Bright green jeans. Yellow sneakers. A tight pink T-shirt.

She’d replaced her Afro puffs with a glorious Afro.

She still had the same luminous light brown skin, although she wore more makeup.

Kia dropped her spatula on the pan. Then Kia was running toward Sullivan. The gathering turned their heads as one.

“Whaaaat?” Kia reached Sullivan and almost threw her arms around her but stopped. “Oh my god, I didn’t know you’d be here.” Kia held her arms open waiting for her hug. “Chef Sullivan! Still trying to make up your point six percent? You look amazing.”

“What are you doing here, Kia?” Sullivan kept her arms crossed and body guarded.

“I’m… buying… the Bois.” Kia went from confident to hopeful to hurt. “To put in food trucks?” It came out as a question. “Who’s ready to be gourmazed!”

“No.” This isn’t real. Sullivan was in a dream. Kia Jackson was buying the Bois? Had Sullivan conjured her out of the pages of American Fare ? Sullivan could hear the room around her. She needed to text Nina. You’re a lawyer. You have to stop this.

Sullivan shook the imaginary cobwebs out of her head.

She noticed a screen standing to one side of the board members, lit up with a splashy photo gallery of gaudy food trucks.

She glanced from the board members’ faces, back to Kia’s stunned expression.

But then another feeling washed through the mix of confusion and anger that had taken over her mind and body: nostalgia.

Sullivan breathed in the familiar scent of coconut and chocolate floating like a spring breeze around Kia’s hair.

How could someone who had once been her comrade be capable of such betrayal?

How could Kia Jackson be the person behind Taste the Love Land.

What a cheesy name! Sullivan took in the whole scene of conspirators.

The board. The audience sitting silent and unmoving, uncomfortable with the tension in the air.

“Please sit down, Ms. Sullivan,” one of the board members said.

“You are not paving over the Bois so you can sell elephant ears and fried grease and… and… and kratom!” Sullivan said to Kia, her voice trembling with a mix of shock and defiance.

Kia had the audacity to look genuinely wounded. No hug? her face seemed to say.

“The Bois is not for sale,” Sullivan barked.

“Ms. Sullivan, you are disrupting our meeting and being disrespectful to Ms. Jackson. Those are not Oakwood Heights values.”

Sullivan half sat, half fell into an aisle chair.

Kia looked like she might tear up. Her brows were raised in surprise, and she stifled a shuddered breath from fully escaping.

“Land held by the Oakwood Heights Neighborhood Association can be sold at auction to the most competitive bid—barring a claim by a legacy landowner—after discussion at an association meeting and a vote,” the board chair said.

“I’m a legacy land owner!” Sullivan’s voice soared in panic.

Aubrey, her ex, always made her redo the video if Sullivan squealed.

You are sexy, stylish, masc-of-center , Aubrey had complained.

Please stay on brand. Sullivan tried to lower her voice, but it came out in a squeak.

“My great-great-grandfather signed the original charter. Our family has owned land here since the beginning.”

On a normal day, that fact made Sullivan profoundly uncomfortable.

Her family had not owned land since the beginning .

Nations of people had lived on this land for thousands of years before Jedidiah Marius Sullivan planted his first survey stake.

That was all the more reason to protect the Bois. It wasn’t theirs to sell.

“I claim it. I’m a legacy holder. I claim it!” Sullivan said.

Kia stood in the aisle a few feet from where Sullivan had fallen into a folding chair.

Kia bowed her head, as if to hide reddened cheeks.

Her shoulders slumped and her arms dangled.

For a second, Sullivan felt sorry for her.

Was Kia really a developer now? Was this one of a dozen properties, or was this purchase a first?

And how awkward to run up to someone to hug them in front of an audience only to be rebuffed, especially when you were giving a business pitch.

That was up there with the classic naked-in-public dream, except no one was mad at you in the naked-in-public dream.

No one was shooting daggers at you with their eyes, which Sullivan was doing.

It was the only weapon she had right now.

“Ms. Sullivan, are you able to pay for the land in full by the end of the month following clause 12a in the charter?” The board chair’s question hung heavily in the air.

“I… no…”

Sullivan felt everyone’s eyes on her, their faces a sea of curiosity. How could they go along with this?

“You had ample time to raise objections to the sale.”

“We know the Bois was important to your grandfather. We contacted you, Sullivan,” one of the board members said. “We sent you several letters asking if you’d like to attend a meeting?”

She vaguely remembered letters with the Oakwood Heights Neighborhood Association logo and return address.

She’d assumed they were just the usual flyer they sent around advertising holiday gatherings or alerting people to new parking regulations.

She’d recycled them without opening them.

Besides the bank and the IRS, who sent important documents through the mail?

“You knew I was setting up the Greenbelt Trust. I thought I had more time. You could have called me.” Tears roughened Sullivan’s voice. “You ate at my restaurant, and you didn’t mention… no one warned me.”

“Please continue,” the board chair said to Kia. “We apologize for this interruption.”

“We’ll talk… wait for me afterward?” Kia whispered to Sullivan.

Sullivan was not going to wait for her, but she sensed that Kia would stand there looking down on her until she said yes. She gave a noncommittal nod.

Kia walked back to the front of the room and continued her speech.

Sullivan half listened as Kia cleared her throat and resumed cooking and returned to her speech. Kia verbally stumbled.

“I was staying. Uh, saying. Um, at Taste the, um, Love Land,” she began, her voice strained, “we believe in the power of food to bring people together. Our f-food truck pod will feature food. Of course it would. Obvs.” She laughed nervously.

“Um, um. It will be a culinary destitution. Destination.” The color drained from Kia’s face as a crepe slid off her spatula, landing with a wet slap on the pan.

But Sullivan couldn’t feel sorry for Kia.

Kia was buying the Bois. Sullivan’s front porch looked out on the Bois.

Mirepoix’s outdoor seating bordered the Bois.

But more importantly, pileated woodpeckers tapped the old trees for bugs, and racoons gazed down from the branches at night.

She had to do something. What? Beg Kia? We were friends.

But they weren’t exactly. She should have looked Kia up. Stayed in touch. Don’t do this.

“Wait. Hold everything.” A man’s calm, reassuring voice spoke from the back of the room. “Kia Jackson is not buying the Bois.”

Sullivan whirled around.

Three white men in boxy, black suits had entered the room.

“I’m afraid you’ve left out one provision of the land trust charter.” One of the men walked to the front of the room, positioning himself in front of Kia.

He represented the Nature Conservancy. Greenpeace. The Sierra Club. He was there to save them. Sullivan hoped.

“We’re here on behalf of Mega Eats Corporation.” The man spread his hands in a welcoming gesture. “This meeting is to establish the highest bidder, right? Provided no legacy landowner claims their right to purchase land. Any legacy landowners here?”

“I am.” Sullivan dropped her head in her hands.

Sullivan felt sick. Blood was leaving her extremities to protect her vital organs.

“You can buy it at fair market rate. No bidding war,” the man said, as though he was delivering good news. “You have a week to put the funds in escrow. Are you going to buy?”

Sullivan’s fundraising hadn’t raised half the cost of the Bois. If she sold Mirepoix and her house, she still couldn’t make it.

“I can’t.” Sullivan choked out.

“The charter requires that after you vote to sell, you must sell to a legacy landowner first. If there is no legacy landowner, you must sell to the highest bidder,” the man continued, speaking to the crowd.

“Clause 14b. To maximize the benefit to the neighborhood, and to eliminate the risk of cronyism. We’ve been looking at the Oakwood Heights neighborhood for a while.

Did you know there isn’t an insta-dining option within a quarter of a mile of Oakwood Heights? ”

“We don’t want a Mega Eats. We want Kia,” someone yelled.

“We want the food trucks.”

“We get to decide who buys.”

“And,” the Mega Eats rep said as though no one had spoken, “we can probably get Portland to put in a dedicated off-ramp. You’ll just pull off the freeway, pick up a Family Mega Pack, and be home.”

Kia had the audacity to turn to Sullivan as though Sullivan should save her. For a second, the bit of Sullivan’s heart that wasn’t raging broke a little. She’d always wanted to beat Kia; she’d never wanted Kia to lose.

“I can up my bid,” Kia called out.

“Whatever you bid, Mega Eats will add twenty percent.”

“We didn’t advertise this sale publicly,” someone said. “How did you find out?”

“ You didn’t, but she did.” The man stepped aside so everyone could get a good look at Kia.

“Mega Eats would never have heard about it except that Ms. Jackson is an influencer. Isn’t that right, Ms. Jackson?

We wouldn’t have heard about the sale except you’ve been live streaming about it for a week. ”