Priya laughed, and her internet came back up, and she made her deploy with eleven minutes to spare. That evening, she brought over a plate of samosas β "my mother's recipe, we're going to be those neighbors who bring food" β and Tomas, awake and bleary from his day-sleep, shook Daniel's hand and said, "I hear you two are the street's IT department."
"We're the street's everything department," Frank said. "It's a package deal."
Walking home that night, Daniel felt something he hadn't felt in years: the particular satisfaction of being the person who shows up. He'd been Priya that morning β desperate, red router lights, a deadline. And now he was Frank β the one who knew what to do.
"Full circle," Frank said quietly, as if reading his mind. "That's what this street does. It turns the helped into the helpers."
"When did you get philosophical?"
"I'm old. It's in the job description."
27
The journalist called on a Tuesday.
Her name was Rachel Okonkwo, and she wrote for a national magazine, and she'd heard the Sycamore Lane story from a friend of a friend of Captain Alvarez, and she wanted to write a book.
"A book," Daniel said, standing in his kitchen with the phone to his ear, while Frank β who'd come over for coffee and stayed for eavesdropping β made exaggerated faces.
"Not just the trial," Rachel said. "The whole thing. The feud, the cut lines, the friendship, the street. I think it's a story about what community actually means. I'd want to interview you, Mr. Delaney, Emma, David, Captain Alvarez β everyone."
Daniel covered the phone. "She wants to write a book about us."
Frank mouthed: Say no.
"Can I think about it?" Daniel said into the phone. "This is β it's our life. I need to talk to people."
"Of course. Take all the time you need."
He hung up. Frank was already shaking his head.
"Absolutely not," Frank said. "I know how this goes. They come in, they smile, they take notes, and then you're a character in somebody's book and they get the poles wrong."
"She seemed legitimate."
"They always seem legitimate. That's the job." Frank set down his mug with emphasis. "Margaret and I β we had a reporter come around once, back when I was still working. Some story about the ice storm, the crews. Nice young man. Wrote that I'd 'single-handedly restored power to three counties.' I was on a crew of forty. Forty! My foreman called me for a month."
Daniel laughed. "So that's a no?"
"It's a 'tell it right or don't tell it.'" Frank leaned forward. "If she writes it, she writes all of it. The feud. The tree. The six years I was a stubborn old fool. Not just the hero part. I wasn't a hero at the start, Daniel. I was the villain. If she skips that, it's a lie."
"That's fair," Daniel said slowly. "Actually β that's exactly what I'd want too. The whole thing or nothing."
"And the money," Frank said. "If there's money, it goes to Mercer House. I'm not profiting off β off any of this."
"Agreed."
They called Emma, who said, "A book? That's amazing. As long as she gets the wedding right. And the part where you cried during my vows."
"I did not cry during β"
"You absolutely did, Dad."
David, on speakerphone from Oregon, said, "Dad wants veto power over his dialogue, doesn't he."
"I want accuracy," Frank said stiffly.
"He wants veto power," David translated.
Captain Alvarez said, "Tell her I'll talk, but only if she understands that the task force was a team. No lone-hero nonsense."
Mrs. Hartley, at eighty-two, said, "Oh, how lovely. Will I be in it?"
"You'll be in it," Daniel promised.
So Rachel came to Sycamore Lane for three weeks in October. She rented the Hendersons' old house β Priya and Tomas sublet it to her while they visited family β and she did what good journalists do: she listened. She sat on porches. She drank coffee at 7 a.m. with Daniel and Frank. She went to Mercer House and talked to the veterans. She sat with Mrs. Hartley for an entire afternoon and came away with three notebooks full of street history that even Daniel hadn't known.
"Did you know," Rachel told Daniel one evening, "that Frank used to leave his porch light on all night after Margaret died? Mrs. Hartley says the whole street knew, and nobody mentioned it, and eventually David started calling every Sunday because someone told him about the light."
Daniel was quiet. "I didn't know that."
"There's a lot you don't know," Rachel said gently. "That's why I'm here."
The hardest interview was Frank's. He sat in his porch chair, arms crossed, and answered questions like a man defusing a bomb.
"Tell me about the morning you cut the lines."
"I've told this story a hundred times."
"Tell it once more. For the record."