Wednesday, September 24, 7:20 AM, my phone buzzed in the walk-in cooler at Fenner's.
I was counting provolone.
It was an email from Kendra to Hector Salinas.
She'd copied me.
Subject: Delay from previous treasurer
Hi Hector! So sorry for the wait.
Our previous treasurer is holding up club payments during the transition.
We'll have it sorted soon.
Go Hornets! 🏈
I read it twice, my breath fogging in the cold.
She'd copied me so I'd know he'd read it.
The fan in the walk-in rattled over my head.
My fingers had gone white around the phone.
I typed a reply to all.
Then I deleted it.
Arguing in an email was how she wanted it.
Hector had never dealt with Kendra before this summer.
He'd dealt with me for nine seasons.
Nine seasons of warm-ups, shipped on time and paid on time by district check.
But a vendor in Lima doesn't know who's family and who's lying.
He knows who emailed him last.
The week before, Owen had told me what the guys were saying in the locker room.
"No uniforms for homecoming."
"Because of somebody's mom."
He hadn't said whose.
He hadn't had to.
I finished the provolone.
Then I asked my manager for the afternoon.
At 3:45 PM I parked outside Tri-County Team Sports in Lima, between a muffler shop and a church.
A bell rang on the door.
A heat press hissed in the back.
Hector came out wiping his hands on a towel.
"Tess."
"I figured you'd come."
"I got her email."
"So did I."
He walked me past the press to a steel shelf on the back wall.
Sixty sets sat bagged in plastic and stacked in columns.
Gold numbers on navy mesh.
The bag on top of the nearest stack said 39.
Owen's number.
I didn't touch it.
"That your kid?" Hector said.
"Senior."
"He kicks."
"Last homecoming he gets."
Hector looked at the bag a while.
"Then it ought to be on him."
"It ought to be paid for first."
"That's what I'm here about."
"They've been done since August," Hector said.
"Pants, jerseys, all of it."
"Waiting on a check."
He pulled a bag forward to show me the collar tag.
"She asked could I put a Big Rod's patch on the warm-ups."
"I asked who's paying for patches."
"What did she say?"
"She said she'd get back to me."
He shrugged.
"She didn't."
I took the portal printout from my purse and unfolded it on his cutting table.
I'd carried it six weeks.
The creases had gone soft.
"I'm not here to tell you what she did," I said.
"I'm here to show you what the district has."
I put my finger on the line.
New Uniforms Drive — deposits to date: $0.00
"The district hasn't received a dollar from her drive."
"That's as of August."
Hector read it.
He read the balance above it.
"Eighteen thousand in the fund," he said.
"That's the stand."
"Nine years of hot dogs."
"And she wants that to pay me?"
"She hasn't told me what she wants to pay you with."
"Has she told you?"
He looked at me a long time.
Then he took his phone out of his shirt pocket.
He didn't unlock it.
He just held it.
"She texted me about the money."
"After I called you, I asked her in writing."
"Like you said."
"I keep my texts."
"What did she say?"
He put the phone back in his pocket and snapped the flap shut.
"I don't read people's texts to people."
"Okay."
"I've got a business, Tess."
"I've got a whole county that buys from me."
"I understand."
"I'm not asking you to show me."
"Check it yourself, Hector."
"Don't take my word for it."
"Read what she wrote you."
"Then read my printout."
"Then decide who's holding up your check."
He didn't answer.
He folded the towel in quarters and set it on the press.
"You sound like a bookkeeper," he said.
"I count cash for a living."
The heat press hissed again.
"Her post says uniforms by homecoming," I said.
"Homecoming's October tenth."
"Bring the phone to homecoming."
"Bring the invoice."
"Why?"
"Because that's where she'll be."
"Her and everybody who paid her."
He thought about it.
"I'll come to get paid."
"That's all."
"That's all I'm asking."
"No payment, no shipment."
"Same as always."
He walked to the counter and pulled a sheet out of a wire tray.
Invoice #4471
60 game sets @ $181.00 — $10,860.00
Dated 7/25/25 — Net 30
"Sixty-one days," he said.
He pressed a rubber stamp into a red ink pad.
October third was nine days away.
He brought the stamp down hard, twice, so it took.
PAST DUE: 31 DAYS. SHIPMENT HELD.