I knocked the loose brick out and put my flashlight into that walled-off little pocket beside the flue and looked at what was tucked in there, and I climbed down …

I sweep chimneys, and cleaning an old flue in Coeur d’Alene my brush hit something solid off to the side — a section of brick patched into the body of the chimney, walling off a hollow Read More

I folded the paper back, and I set the knife down, because for a man who labeled his salt and pepper shakers, the one box old Mr. Harper left blank …

I appraise and run estate auctions, and old Mr. Harper near Lubbock had labeled every single box in his house except one — that one was blank, and sealed up tight Read More

I drew it out into the light of the stove and unwrapped that old flannel shirt of his, and I sat right down on the woodpile by the hearth, because …

The first cold night in my grandpa house, the one he left me when he passed, I lit the old wood stove — it would not draw, and reaching into the firebox I found a loose brick Read More

I worked it out of the gap and unwrapped that little yellow blanket, my daughter warm against my chest, and I sat down right there on the nursery floor, because …

I pulled the old family cradle down out of the storage shed to put my own baby girl to sleep in it, out here in Abilene — the loose bottom slats had something tucked between them Read More

I tipped the guitar and shook the thing out of the sound hole into my palm and unfolded the yellowed paper it was wrapped in, and I had to lay …

I brought my dad old guitar down from the attic to teach my boy to play — changing the rusted strings, my fingers found something tucked inside the body of it Read More

And I lay there flat on my belly in that dirt looking at it in the beam of my light, and I could not make myself crawl back out, because …

Eighteen years I have been crawling under other folks houses — this call was a sweet old lady near Hokes Bluff, and wedged in her drain line was something grease does not put there Read More

I worked it loose and pulled it up into the daylight coming through the basement window, and I stepped back from it, because it was not the thing twenty-two years …

I got called out to clear a backed-up sewer line in an old house here in Grand Junction — thirty feet down, wedged under the basement slab, was something that does not go in a sewer Read More

He peeled a corner of the plastic back, and he looked up at me, and I reached for my phone, because for one second my mind went the ugly way …

I run a little coin laundry here in Presque Isle — when the repairman took a banging front-loader apart, he pulled something wired to the frame behind the drum Read More

I reached in and worked it out and unwrapped the towel, standing there in that torn-up room, and I had to sit down on the edge of that bare mattress, …

I clean rooms at a motel out on the interstate here in Yuma — the vent in room 8 was whistling, and when I took the cover off, something was jammed back in the duct Read More

I put my flashlight up to the opening and looked into the space behind it, and I set my screwdriver down real slow, because it was not what twenty years …

A young couple hired me to update the wiring in an old house here in Wheeling — down in the basement was a junction box with no wires running to it at all Read More