Chapter 13 - Patch or Permit
The contractor showed up at eight thirty with a clipboard and a respirator hanging around his neck. His truck said Miller & Sons Remodeling in faded blue letters. I had made coffee and wiped the kitchen counter three times before he knocked, and Daniel stood by the bedroom door with the plastic sheeting we'd taped over the broken plaster the night before.
"Vanessa Miller?" he asked, and I nodded. "You said you found a hidden chase behind drywall?"
Daniel pulled the plastic back. Dust still hung in the cold air coming off the plaster. The narrow black metal door was still locked, and behind it the passage we'd left closed after the sheriff's photos. Daniel had left the tool rack in the hall.
The contractor, Ray, didn't say anything at first. He put on his respirator, clicked on a work light, and ducked his head through the doorway after Daniel unlocked it. I stayed in the bedroom with Lily's nightlight still plugged in behind the wardrobe we'd shoved to the center of the room. I could hear him breathing through the mask.
"How long's this been closed up?" he called out.
"Since we bought the house three years ago," Daniel said. "Maybe longer. Before us too."
Ray ran his light along the walls inside. The passage was only about three feet wide, raw studs on one side, the back of our drywall on the other. I watched his beam catch something dark and speckled near the base of the studs.
He crouched. "You've got mold. See that?" He didn't touch it, just pointed. "Black, with the white fuzz. No vapor barrier, no ventilation. Drywall was trapping moisture against the framing. This whole cavity's been sweating for years."
My throat tightened. Lily had been sleeping ten feet from that.
"Is it dangerous?" I asked.
"For a kid with allergies? Yeah, you don't want her breathing this," he said. He stood and lifted the light higher. "And that's not all. Look here."
He traced the light up to where a cloth-wrapped wire ran along the top plate, spliced with yellow wire nuts into newer Romex. The old cloth was frayed.
"That's knob-and-tube," he said. "Original to the house, probably 1940s. Someone spliced it illegally to add power to this space. No junction box, no permit. If that shorts inside a closed wall with mold and dry wood, you got a fire you won't see till it's through the ceiling."
Daniel stepped closer, his hand tightening on the door frame. I saw his jaw work.
"I didn't know it was like this," he said quietly, not to Ray, to me.
Ray backed out into the bedroom and pulled his respirator down. He flipped open his clipboard.
"So you got two options," he said, his voice normal again. He looked between us. "Option one, I pull a permit. We demo the rest of the drywall around the door, remediate the mold properly, kill that illegal splice, reframe, insulate right, hang new drywall, tape and texture to match your beige. County inspection, all legal. You're looking at around four to five grand, maybe a week and a half with drying time."
He turned the page.
"Option two, you don't want to spend that. I can patch the plaster, mud it, you push the wardrobe back, pretend you never saw it. Four hundred bucks. But I'm not signing off on that wire. And legally I gotta tell you, if you cover known mold and a fire hazard without fixing it, your insurance could deny a claim. And if you sell later without disclosure, you're liable."
The room was quiet except for the hum of his work light still on in the passage. Daniel stared at the dark doorway, then at the mold, then at me.
"We'd talked about using savings for the deck this spring," he said.
I didn't answer right away. I looked at the tool rack, at the hammer still sitting there. I thought about the night before, the sheriff's photos, Daniel saying "put it back how it was" and now this.
Daniel exhaled and rubbed the back of his neck. "We do the permit," he said. "The real fix. I'll pull from savings. The deck can wait."
He said it without looking at Ray first, looking at me to see if I'd believe him. Three weeks ago he would have pushed that wardrobe back himself and called it done.
"You're sure?" I asked.
"Yeah," he said. "I'm sure. I don't want Lily near that, and I don't want us covering something again. Not after yesterday."
Ray nodded and wrote something down. "Smart call. I'll file the permit tomorrow morning. We can start demo Monday, as long as you keep that plastic up and keep your daughter out of here. I'll need access to the attic to kill that circuit properly."
I felt my shoulders drop a little. "Monday works. How long will we be out of the bedroom?"
"You can sleep in there, just not with the passage open," Ray said. "Once we contain it, it's fine. I'll email the estimate tonight for you both to sign."
Daniel reached out and shook Ray's hand. "Thank you for being straight with us."
After Ray left, Daniel taped the plastic back over the broken wall himself, sealing the edges tighter this time. He wrote DO NOT OPEN - MOLD on it with a black marker, big enough that Lily would ask.
I stood behind him and watched his hands work. They weren't shaking now.
"We'll have to tell the savings plan is changed," I said.
May you like
"We will," he said, smoothing the last piece of tape. "Together. No more off-record stuff."
He didn't push the wardrobe back. He left it in the middle of the room, blocking nothing, showing exactly what had been hidden.
