MOTH IN THE SWITCHBOARD

The municipal switchboard closed on Friday. Nobody under thirty could remember using it, and the last telephone operator had been replaced by a voice that asked callers to press one for an apology.

But at dusk, while technicians stripped copper from the walls, a great moth descended from the rafters and settled over the final working jack. Its wings were patterned like old city maps. The operator's cap fit between its antennae.

"One final call," it told Nia, the apprentice who had stayed to box up pencils. "No charge. But you must decide who deserves to be heard."

Two lights blinked on the switchboard. One belonged to the lighthouse keeper who had disappeared with his island in a storm. The other belonged to Nia's grandmother, who had died with a recipe unfinished on the back of a grocery receipt. Both lines had been ringing for years.