Seventeen Fathers

I was halfway through changing a lightbulb when the city inspector taped an eviction notice to the front door of Harbor House. The bulb slipped from my hand. It bounced once on the sidewalk and rolled under the bench where my father Eddie slept when the beds filled up. "Don't step on it," he called from the doorway. "I'm not going to step on it." "You're looking right at the notice. People miss things when they're looking at notices." I turned. Eddie was wearing his brown wool coat over his pajamas, his silver hair flattened on one side. He'd been awake since before sunrise, as usual. The notice fluttered against the glass behind him. Bright red letters announced that Harbor House must vacate the premises within twenty-one days. I read it once. Then again. "Is it real?" Eddie asked. I peeled one corner away from the door. The city seal was embossed in blue. Under it sat a signature from the building department, a case number, and a date. "It's real." "Then we'll have to move the soup kitchen." "They can't just close a shelter." He gave me a look. "They can if they own the building." I looked past him into the lobby. Twelve people had breakfast around the scratched tables. The front desk volunteer, Maribel, had paused with a tray of coffee cups in her hands. Behind her, the notice reflected faintly in the big window, as if the city had already put its signature on the room itself. Harbor House occupied an old three-story brick building on the edge of Greyhaven's waterfront. For years, it had been a hotel for sailors. Then a cannery office. Then, after my mother took a job in its kitchen, a shelter for anyone who had nowhere else to go. I had spent my childhood in those rooms. My mother, June, had worked nights and slept in a narrow apartment above the kitchen. When I was nine, she died after a sudden illness. The seventeen men who lived at Harbor House took turns making sure I ate breakfast, finished my homework, and didn't sneak down to the pier by myself. They weren't all there every day. Some left and came back. Some found work. Some lost it. One got an apartment and still showed up every Sunday to repair something. But all seventeen had called me their girl, and I had called every one of them Dad. I came back now as a housing advocate with a legal aid office, though Harbor House still felt more like home than anywhere I paid rent. "What does it say?" Maribel asked. I read the first paragraph aloud. The notice cited a pending transfer of ownership and a change in use. Harbor House's current nonprofit lease would end in three weeks. After that, the new owner could secure the building and begin demolition. "Who's buying it?" Eddie asked. I scanned the second page. "Northstar Renewal." A man at the end of the table muttered a curse. "Northstar is building those glass condos by the marina," I said. "They bought the old sail loft last spring." "Does it say anything about the shelter?" Maribel asked. "It says the building is no longer approved for overnight occupancy after the transfer date." Eddie leaned his shoulder against the doorway. "So they want us out before they knock it down." My phone buzzed. A message from Celia Brooks, my supervisor at Greyhaven Housing Aid. Celia: Don't discuss the Northstar matter with anyone until I call you. I stared at the screen. I had filed routine property searches for Celia's office, but I didn't know Northstar had anything to do with Harbor House. I typed back. Me: The notice is already posted. I'm here. What's going on? The typing dots appeared, vanished, returned. Celia: I'll explain at the office. I hated that answer. I also knew why she sent it. A legal aid advocate who represented the shelter couldn't work on a property file for the buyer. I had to know whether I'd crossed a line before I said another word. I folded the notice carefully and handed it to Maribel. "Don't take it down," I said. "Take pictures, including the whole door and the date stamp. Then make copies." "You know what it means?" "I know it means the city expects you to leave. I don't know yet whether they can make that happen." Eddie gave a quiet snort. "That's not much comfort." "No," I said. "It's not." The lobby door opened. Frank, who had been sleeping in his truck the last few months, came in with rain shining on his shoulders. He read the room before he read the notice. "What happened?" he asked. "Northstar's buying the building," I said. Frank went very still. He'd spent thirty years repairing boats along the harbor, and he knew all the property owners who wanted to turn the waterfront into a private view. "When?" "Three weeks." He looked at Eddie. Eddie looked at me. "Call the other dads," I said. "Tell them to come here tonight." Frank rubbed one hand over his beard. "All of them?" "If they can make it." Eddie's gaze stayed on the notice. "They'll come." I hoped he was right. I also hoped the building had some protection we could use. The problem was that hope, in my line of work, wasn't evidence. I took a picture of the red notice, then another of the city seal. Before I put my phone away, I noticed a second document tucked beneath the first. It was a photocopy of the shelter's lease termination, signed by Harbor House's executive director. The date at the bottom was two months old.