For several months, every meeting ran longer than anybody wanted. People asked questions about invoices they had never previously seen. They argued about reserve funding and playground repairs and whether a common-area walkway needed replacement. Sometimes the arguments were tedious. Sometimes nobody agreed.
I loved them.
The point of a functioning association wasn't that everyone became pleasant. The point was that disagreement no longer required permission from one woman with a clipboard.
The legal proceedings moved on a different schedule. Federal investigators examined the payments routed through interstate banks and the communications associated with the vendor arrangements. State investigators reviewed the alleged falsification of association records, the harassment complaints, and the truck vandalism. Civil claims concerning discriminatory enforcement and the assessments proceeded through their own channels.
There were months when almost nothing happened publicly. Lawyers filed motions. Auditors answered questions. Investigators requested more documents. Victoria retained counsel and denied several allegations. She was entitled to challenge the evidence against her, and the fact that my neighbors disliked her didn't settle any of those questions.
In the meantime, the viral video kept circulating. A few strangers recognized my name at the supermarket. One person stopped me in a parking lot to ask whether the truck had been repaired. Another wanted to know whether I had deliberately made Victoria attack a government vehicle.
I learned to answer carefully. "I didn't make her do anything. She came to my driveway with a crowbar."
Maria disliked the attention even more than I did. Her office received inquiries from people who assumed she had personally ordered the arrest, and she had to repeat that she had recused herself from the Willowbrook matters. The independent prosecutors confirmed their own responsibilities through the channels appropriate to those cases.
One evening, while we were walking after dinner, Maria stopped beside the community pond and told me she had considered whether our relationship made her job harder than she could reasonably ask either of us to tolerate.
"Is that your way of breaking up with me?" I asked, trying to make a joke before I understood how serious she was.
"No. It's my way of being honest before you have to ask twice."
We sat on a bench while the light faded. She told me about the criticism, the conflict reviews, and the disappointment of knowing some people would always believe she had helped me because I was her boyfriend. I told her I had considered selling the house again because the whole experience had reminded me too much of the life I had left behind after my divorce.
"You don't owe Willowbrook the rest of your life," she said.
"I know. But I finally have neighbors who look at one another instead of waiting for somebody to report them. I'd hate to leave just as that starts."
Maria leaned into me. "Then stay because you want to. Not because you need to prove you can outlast Victoria."