Chapter 1: The Mailbox Was Already Burning
“Karen… what are you doing?”
Daniel Mercer heard the question before he saw the fire.
He came through his front door carrying a small red fire extinguisher and stopped cold.
At the curb, his mailbox was burning.
Not blazing out of control, but burning enough that orange flames curled around the front edge and black smoke drifted into the cool October air. Halloween decorations glowed from nearly every house on the street. Children in costumes moved from porch to porch, their parents following behind.
And standing beside Daniel’s mailbox was Karen Whitmore.
She was holding a long metal barbecue lighter.
Karen froze when she saw him.
For one second, the confidence disappeared from her face.
Then it returned.
She lifted her chin and pointed toward the mailbox as though Daniel were the one who had done something wrong.
“Your mailbox was ruining Halloween,” she snapped. “I was fixing it.”
Daniel stared at her.
“You set my mailbox on fire.”
“It was an ugly decoration.”
“It was my mailbox.”
Karen folded her arms.
“I live here too.”
Daniel didn’t waste another second arguing.
He pulled the pin from the extinguisher and discharged it toward the flames. White foam swallowed the fire, covering the blackened metal and dripping onto the pavement.
Several children stopped walking.
Parents turned.
Nobody said anything.
The neighborhood had gone strangely quiet around them.
Karen looked from face to face and seemed to realize that the darkness and Halloween noise she had counted on were no longer protecting her. If anything, the orange lights, bright costumes, and crowded sidewalks had made her impossible to miss.
Daniel opened the mailbox door.
Inside, among several envelopes, was a small photograph.
His breath caught.
It was a picture of his wife, Elaine.
She had died eleven months earlier.
Daniel had placed that photograph inside the mailbox because it had been the last picture Elaine had ever taken with him before her illness worsened. It was never supposed to be left there permanently. He simply hadn’t been ready to put it away.
The fire had blackened one corner.
Daniel looked down at the mailbox.
The paint had peeled away in several places.
Beneath it, another name had appeared.
MARGARET WHITMORE.
Daniel slowly looked at Karen.
“You knew whose mailbox this was.”
Karen’s expression changed.
Only slightly.
But enough.
She didn’t answer.
Daniel had lived in the house for nearly twenty years. He had never seen that name before.
Karen had.
And apparently, she had known exactly what was underneath the paint.
Before Daniel could ask another question, Karen turned and walked toward her house.
But Daniel didn’t follow her.
He was staring at the photograph in his hand.
On the back, written in Elaine’s handwriting, were six words:
Ask Margaret what happened before we moved.
Daniel had never seen those words before.
And suddenly, the burned mailbox was no longer just about Halloween.
