The Buyer Came Early With A Deposit And My Borrowed Signature

On Saturday, I delivered the ice arch with Faisal beside me in the truck.

He spent the drive reading his phone. Above the road, the rock faces held thin shelves of snow.

"You can keep doing carvings after this," he said. "Little things. From a garage."

"I know how to work."

"I mean without all this responsibility."

I had checked both trailer hitches, the brake lights, and the temperature probes before he came downstairs.

At the lodge, Joelle greeted him warmly enough to keep the wedding moving.

"Morning, Faisal. Coffee's inside. Uzma, your load space is clear."

She had taped a clean copy of the setup plan beside the service door. I fitted the arch sections onto the base and checked the drain hose twice.

There was work I could still trust.

While guests arrived, Mara called.

"The buyer answered my notice," she said. "She says she already paid a $1,500 deposit. She also sent the consent document Faisal gave her."

"I haven't signed a sale consent."

"I understand. Come to your bay when you're finished. She wants to see the original titles. I'll join by phone."

Faisal looked over when I put my phone away.

"Who was that?"

"My lawyer."

He laughed once.

"For what? There isn't anything to fight over."

I watched meltwater find the small opening under the arch.

"Then this should be easy."

The buyer was waiting when we got back. Nina Cole owned a catering outfit on the plains. She had brought a truck, an empty binder, and a mechanic.

She looked at Faisal first.

"Your wife has the titles?"

"This is getting confused," he said.

I set my copies on the bench. The originals stayed with me in a closed document sleeve.

Nina compared the identification numbers to the trailers while her mechanic read them aloud.

Every number matched.

I had scrubbed those plates after muddy deliveries. I knew the bent edge on one and the scratched screw on the other. Seeing Nina write down the numbers felt strangely like hearing someone say my name correctly.

"You told me company assets," she said to Faisal.

"They are used by the company."

"That isn't what I asked."

Mara's voice came from my phone.

"Ms. Hashmi has not approved a sale. Please send any further purchase questions through me."

Nina took a page from her binder and handed it to me.

Owner Consent And Transfer Authority.

My name sat above a copy of my signature. It looked familiar because it was mine. I knew the long tail of the final letter.

But beneath it, half hidden by a white box, I could see three letters.

Les.

I pulled out the old trailer lease. My signature on its last page sat above the printed word Lessor.

The same tiny ink spot touched the first letter of my name on both pages.

"This came from our lease," I said.

Faisal reached for the consent sheet.

Nina pulled it back.

"I need that for my records."

"It's a draft," he said.

"You sent it to obtain a deposit," Mara said. "Preserve the original file and the messages that carried it."

Nina folded her hands over the binder.

"I want my $1,500 back. No sale."

"The deposit was nonrefundable," Faisal said.

Her mechanic stopped writing.

"For property you can't sell?"

Nobody raised a voice. I had imagined a scene with shouting, if I had imagined one at all. Instead, the room filled with the sound of Nina taking clear photographs of page corners.

Faisal finally said he would return her money on Monday.

She made him put that in writing.

After she left, he stood between me and the office stairs.

"You enjoyed embarrassing me."

"You used my signature."

"You signed the lease. You wanted them rented. What difference does a heading make?"

"You know the difference."

He looked at my phone, still connected to Mara.

"I'm done talking."

He went upstairs and shut the door.

Mara told me to leave the equipment in place while she sought an order. I took the originals and my work bag. That night I stayed in a small room Joelle had helped me find above a year-round guesthouse.

I paid the weekly rate myself: $420.

For the first time in years, nobody asked why my light was still on.

I spread the venue receipts on the desk. Nineteen completed jobs appeared in my logs across seven months. Payments confirmed so far had passed $40,000.

At ten, a message arrived from our company's bank.

My online access had been removed by the account administrator.

A second message followed from Faisal.

You Have Until Monday To Stop This, Or You'll Never Get Back Inside.