He had been unable to pull it out without driving onto the lawn.
He looked back at the HOA president.
“I have photographs from six forty-three this morning.”
She waved one hand.
“He was parked temporarily.”
“For three hours.”
“He was visiting.”
“Who?”
The HOA president hesitated.
Then pointed toward the house two doors down.
“A friend.”
The homeowner looked toward the house.
The owner was away for the week.
He knew because he had agreed to collect her mail.
He returned his gaze to the HOA president.
“Try again.”
Her jaw tightened.
Her son muttered:
“I was meeting somebody.”
The homeowner looked toward him.
“At six forty-three in the morning?”
The son crossed his arms.
“Not your business.”
“It became my business when your car blocked my property.”
The tow operator resumed winching.
The coupe moved farther up.
The son lunged toward the flatbed.
“Stop!”
The operator released the control immediately.
“Sir, stay clear of the equipment.”
“That’s my car.”
“Yes.”
“You can’t take it.”
The tow operator nodded toward the homeowner.
“He documented private-property obstruction and provided proof of occupancy.”
The HOA president stepped between them.
“No.”
She pulled a page from the green folder.
“This section of curb and drive approach is covered by association easement authority.”
The homeowner looked at the paper.
He had seen it before.
Twice.
The first time she had emailed it to him after he objected to landscaping contractors leaving equipment partly inside his driveway.
The second time she cited it after her son began parking there.
The document did not say what she claimed.
It granted the HOA access to a narrow utility strip along the front edge of properties for maintenance of communal drainage and landscaping features.
It did not convert private driveways into community parking.
The homeowner asked:
“Did you bring the parcel survey too?”
She smiled coldly.
“I do not need one.”
“I do.”
He reached into a transparent document sleeve resting on the hood of his truck.
The recorded parcel map was inside.
He held it up.
“Driveway boundary begins here.”
He pointed toward a small brass survey marker at the pavement edge.
“And ends here.”
Another marker.
“The association easement crosses eighteen inches of the landscaped strip beside it.”
“Not the driveway.”
She barely glanced at the map.
“You are interpreting that incorrectly.”
“No.”
“I paid a surveyor.”
She laughed.
“You paid somebody to tell you what you wanted to hear.”
The homeowner’s expression remained still.
Behind the HOA president, her son whispered:
“Mom, just get the car down.”