Chapter 21
David Scrapalski was a twenty-eight-year-old bio-tech lab specialist, originally from Pittsburgh, who lived on Kittrell Drive in north Raleigh. His modest one-and-a-half story abode was in Anderson Heights, an older neighborhood that had begun to gentrify. It was flush with mature oak trees and young professionals. There was even a nice little park across the street where he often jogged. He really liked the area and didn’t see himself moving again.
David owned a 2011 white Ford Focus, the model with a normal trunk – not the hatchback version. It was a nice little sedan. It got decent gas mileage and was easy to maneuver and park in the city. He liked it. He washed it weekly and waxed it when he couldn’t remember the last time he waxed it. He was going to keep this car for at least ten years, he told himself.
Hurricane-strength storms rarely make direct hits on Raleigh. However, tropical storms seem to pass over the Triangle area every few years. On that last Monday in June – the 25th – a nasty one did just that.
Tropical Storm Dorn unloaded five inches of rain in eighteen hours on the Raleigh area. Every creek in the city had flooded to some degree. Crabtree Creek jumped its banks as everyone in the Capital City knew it would. It became a giant debris flow.
David’s house was up on a hill, so flooding was not an issue for his property. However, the storm packed 50 MPH sustained winds with gusts over 65 MPH. By 9:30 PM the wind was whipping the trees. At 11:11 PM he had no power.
The temperature in his house was a comfortable 70°F when the electricity went out, and it was mild outside, too. Thus, David wasn’t too concerned about cooling. He was able to fall asleep by midnight, his usual workweek time. The wind hissed like a nefarious serpent throughout the night, waking him up occasionally. Some dogs howled; one yelped.
At 7:30 in the morning he walked out to retrieve The News & Observer, the Raleigh daily newspaper. A very distressing sight greeted him. The partially diseased sycamore tree in his neighbor’s yard had come down. One of its medium-size branches had crashed onto the trunk of his Ford Focus during the stormy night. The rest of the car looked ok. There was just a nasty series of dents and gouges in the middle of the trunk door.
He opened the dinged trunk and checked the hinges; they were ok. It appeared that the only body piece he needed to replace was the trunk door. He then took a picture of the damaged trunk door for his insurance company.
David went back inside his house. The kitchen light was on. He warmed up a bagel and made some coffee, and settled over his laptop in the den.
He found his insurance company’s website. He e-mailed them a claim with an attached photo of the trunk damage. He wondered if his trunk was still water-tight. The trunk will leak now. I wonder how long it will take for them to compensate me. Well, I don’t want to wait around.
He began to look online for a white 2011 Ford Focus trunk door, first checking the auto salvage yards in Wake County. Nothing, just a lot of hatchbacks. Drats! He widened his search area to 100 miles. Still nothing. Someone around here has to have this part. It’s not like it’s as rare as gold.
He scratched his forehead. Was that a dried-up zit or a scab? When he increased the search area to a radius of 150 miles, he got a hit. A parts yard in Wilmington had one. He wrote down Shipyard Boulevard Auto Salvage with the address and phone number. I’ll call them from work to verify that they have it. If they do, I’ll go down Friday morning.
David went back outside. The neighbor had already removed and diced up the fallen sycamore tree with a chainsaw. He apologized profusely to David. David just told him that these acts of God happen and that the insurance companies would sort it out.
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At 1:05 PM David stepped out of the GroPhirst nano-organic lab in Research Triangle Park, a few miles southeast of Durham, and called Shipyard Boulevard Auto Salvage in Wilmington. The sun was hot and bright.
“Hello, this is Gerald.”
“Is this Shipyard Boulevard Auto Salvage?” David cautiously asked to make sure he had the right number.
“You’ve got him.” So, he is it.
“Excellent. Say, would you have a trunk door for a white 2011 Ford Focus? The sedan model with a real trunk – not the hatchback.”
“Hold on a sec and I’ll check,” Gerald replied as he depressed some keys on his computer keyboard.
“Sure, no rush.” David heard him clicking away. It was hot outside. He looked for a shady spot. Where is a mature healthy oak tree when you need one in the ‘City of Oaks’?
“Oh yeah, I’ve got it,” Gerald suddenly announced. “That car just came in the other day. How could I forget that car? The right and rear body parts are ok, but the left and front sides are shot.”
“Can you hold it for me ‘til Friday?”
“You got it. When can we expect you?”
“Oh, I should be there by 9:00 AM.”
“That’s fine. My assistant will be here at that time.”
“Do I need to give you a deposit to hold it?”
“No, you seem genuinely interested in it. Just come on down and get it before five in the afternoon.”
“Thank you, sir.” David ended the call. So, I’m going to the coast for the weekend. I’ve heard of medical vacations. I guess this will be an auto-part vacation. It’s about time I took a day off. I can’t remember the last time I took any time off. I’m becoming a work-eat-sleep-work robot. This will be just what the doctor ordered.