19 April 2026, Freewriters Community Daily Writing Prompt Day 3078: not so hot now
That moment when you realize your political strategy is not so hot now … Supervisor Bruce Franklin realized this moment as he and his fellow county supervisors watched Mayor Donald Lee Garner Jr. of Big Loft, VA – the county seat of Lofton County – calmly, confidently walk in.
This glorified bean counter was never supposed to be mayor, nursing a bad but politcally perfect marriage for the county bigwigs', depressed, drinking, but still high-functional in his work – very much so, because he still had the ability to control his drinking to get stuff done. Most people didn't even know he had a problem – so it was easy to put him into the succession for mayor, third in line. He would just be a functionary – no big deal, right?
But, lightning struck, politically – the mayor and vice mayor were caught on tape backing up the police corruption that would have led to mass murder if Ironwood Hamilton in Tinyville, VA hadn't figured it out and organized to stop it. That left Donald Lee Garner Jr. suddenly mayor, just as his marriage was dissolving. Kind of a bad time to be doing more than clocking in and clocking out.
But it was that Lee part … he moved back home with the Lees-of-the-mountain and found his strength again … and beside all that, Donald Lee Garner Sr. was also in city government, and perfectly incorruptible. Put those two core elements together in one man and end his alcohol use, and he might just get much stronger than expected.
Supervisor Franklin had watched it happen but stayed with the line of the more complacent of his fellows: they figured the mayor would revert to glorified bean counter and treated him as such. The first sign this was a mistake was how easily he had shaken his wife and her entire family loose – gotten his wife arrested and charged for the assault she made on him, had the rest of the family caught up on the various corrupt things they were doing.
Side note: the mayor's Lee cousin was “The Angel of Death,” Col. H.F. Lee, who had gone from captain of cold case to captain of Special Investigations and the Blue Ridge Precinct, and had been acting chief – though unofficially – since the aftermath of Hurricane Justicia. So, Mayor Garner had some backup in terms of finding old corruption. He was not using it as much as he could, but his wife's family had found out that, in the end, you need to have Grant somewhere in your name to be swatting at any Lee in Virginia and go unscathed!
The board of supervisors had no Grants either – in fact, no one had named their son Grant in Lofton County since 1865! Not that it really made a difference: Donald Lee Garner Jr. simply was no glorified bean counter, and the complacent supervisors had simply been wrong. He had emerged as the single most powerful politician in Lofton County after two hurricanes had shown the rest of county government up. Previous to this, the county board of supervisors had considered the mayor's office as secondary to the county seat that they held. That was over.
“Gentlemen, I do insist that we start on time – even with preparation for the previous hurricane, the affairs of this city require that I not divide my attention for too long.”
Nine men flinched – the complacent set – but made no retort as the head of the country board flushed with rage, but looked at the clock and picked up his gavel to call the meeting to order. In the chamber, Col. Henry “Light-Horse” Lee of Revolutionary War fame looked down in silent encouragement … but in profile, he also seemed to sit in the chamber itself, back in his power … from the side view, one at last knew the strength of the man one was dealing with in Donald Lee Garner Jr., the man who started as a glorified bean counter and got to the top of Lofton County, VA. The world had again turned upside down.