Chapter 1 - The Orange X
“They're cutting it down Friday,” Cynthia Blake announced, as if she were telling me when the trash would be collected.
An orange X had been sprayed across the trunk of our mulberry tree. My seventeen-year-old daughter, Ellie, stood barefoot behind me with a bowl of cereal, staring at the mark. The tree had shaded our back porch since she was a baby. Her father planted it the spring we moved into Creekbend Estates. He'd been dead five years.
“Who gave you permission to come into my yard?” I asked.
Cynthia adjusted the lanyard that held her HOA access badge. She wore white sneakers without a speck of dirt on them. Beside her stood a young man in a landscaping shirt, clutching a roll of orange marking tape.
“We notified you twice, Nora.”
“You sent me two emails saying someone complained about berries.”
“And you didn't respond.”
“I did. I asked for a meeting.”
“The matter was reviewed.”
“By whom?”
Cynthia's eyes moved toward Ellie. “Perhaps this isn't a conversation to have in front of a child.”
Ellie put the cereal bowl on the porch rail. “I'm seventeen. Also, that's my dad's tree.”
The landscaper crouched, examining the roots where they lifted a row of bricks. His name patch read OWEN. He didn't mark anything else.
“It's a shared-path safety issue,” Cynthia said. “Your branches hang over the walking trail. The fruit makes the pavement slippery. Residents deserve a safe neighborhood.”
The path ran behind our fence, with a narrow strip of common ground separating it from our yard. I'd swept fallen berries off the pavement three times that week. I'd even asked the board where to put a collection bucket. Nobody answered.
“Prune what's over the path,” I said. “Get a professional to tell us what's safe. Don't destroy the whole tree.”
“We're past that.”
Owen stood. “Ms. Blake, I need to see the property-line markers before any work inside the fence.”
Cynthia waved him quiet. “The association's authority is in the declaration.”
“Then show me the part,” I said.
She held out a fluorescent notice. REMOVE NONCOMPLIANT TREE BY FRIDAY, 5 P.M. Beneath that was a line threatening continuing fines if I failed to comply. It didn't mention a hearing, an arborist, or anyone who had actually looked at the trunk.
Ellie reached for the paper, then stopped herself. That was how her dad used to reach for things: slowly, giving himself a second to think.
Cynthia turned for the gate. “The board has to set an example.”
After they left, Ellie ran her fingers over the rough bark. Under the orange paint, almost hidden, were the little lines her father had carved for her height every birthday. She found the one marked ELLIE 10 and rubbed it with her thumb.
“I can wash this off,” I said.
“No.” Her voice came out too sharp. “I want her to have to look at what she did.”
May you like
At the end of the path, Owen was still standing beside his truck. He glanced at our fence, then at the paper in my hand. Before he drove away, he called, “Ask them for the actual work order, ma'am. Not just the notice.”
Cynthia had said the decision was already made. Owen sounded as though he wasn't sure anybody had made it legally at all.
