“So what happens now?” I asked. My voice came out sharp.
Tyler looked at his clipboard. He didn’t want to say it.
“I have to issue a notice of violation,” he said. “Thirty days to bring the property into compliance.”
“Meaning what?”
“Meaning reduce the cultivated area to under a quarter acre. Or remove it.”
“Tear it out,” I said. “You’re saying he has to tear out half his garden.”
“Or apply for the special permit. But that takes about six months, and the complaint would stay open in the meantime, and the fines would…” He trailed off. “I’m sorry. I really am.”
“Thirty days,” Dad said quietly.
“Thirty days, sir.”
I stood up. I was shaking. I had the envelope with the lawyer’s name in my back pocket, and I could feel it there, burning.
I wanted to say a lot of things. I wanted to tell this kid with his clipboard that my father’s garden was older than he was. That my mother planted those strawberries. That this land had been in our family since before his grandparents were born.
