Page 21 of Fibre and Ink

“This is private property. What are you doing here?” I demanded, letting my voice get rougher.

One of the suits, the blond one, stepped towards me. He had dark glasses on so I couldn’t see his eyes. “I believe this fence demarcates the edge of the farm, sir. This lane is public land.”

I positioned myself so the sun was behind me, making them squint.

“You’re close enough. What are you doing out here with measuring tapes and the like?”

“That’s none of your concern,” another of the men said.

“It is. My alpaca graze in these fields and the reason my family purchased this land, multiple generations ago, was for the quiet. If you’re planning on building a road or something out here, I need to know about it.”

One of the other men coughed. “We’ll be on our way.”

The group turned to go. “Can I see some ID?” I demanded. If they were government agents they’d have to show identification, right?

The men ignored me and walked off.

There was little I hated as much as feeling helpless, and as they walked away that’s exactly how I felt.

I turned to Aster to see he had his phone out and was filming them. Maybe that was what prompted them to leave, not me questioning them. Either way I was glad to see them walking off, towards Lakeside Drive where their car was.

“That was weird, right?”

Aster nodded. “Real weird.”

I climbed over the fence to stand where the suits had stood and looked around for any kind of clue for what they could have been up to.

There spray paint marks on the grass in two places, within a foot of my fence.

“They’ve made some kind of mark here...” I called out to Aster.

He was beside me in a second, filming and then snapping pictures of the whole area.

“That’s a bad sign, right?” Aster frowned.

“Yeah. I don’t feel good about this at all. Why are they here at the end of the day? Why didn’t they have reflective vests or anything? Why didn’t they tell me what they were doing?”

“Because they’re hoping they can get it started before anyone notices.” Aster sighed and tucked his phone in the back pocket of his shorts. “But I got some good pictures of them, I can put them online...” He sucked his lip. “Maybe I’ll put them all over social media, see if anyone recognizes any of them.”

“Yeah. In the meantime, I’ll move the herd into the barn.” I climbed back over the fence. “I don’t want them getting spooked.”

“Okay. I’ll get dinner started. I think I saw stuff I can use to make a pizza.”

“Sounds great. Thanks Aster.”

Aster walked back towards the farmhouse and I opened the gate.

If they were planning on building something out here, something that would drain and pollute the lake water, it would severely impact the entire community.

The lake was used for swimming, diving, kayaking, fishing, and all kinds of activities. We were a small town, we needed places like that for gathering together, for recreation. If that lake got polluted where would people go to swim? To fish?

I turned back, looking at the mountains rising up over my farm. People hiked trails up there, set up campsites. Then there were the wild animals, the flora and fauna that flourished in the untamed wilderness. If there was a huge building pumping out smog and sound, lots of species would suffer.

Humanity needs wild spaces, places where we can be in untouched nature and make peace with our own place in the biome.

Poeple from big cities, people who worked in offices, they forgot all of that. They forgot they, too, are animals.

The idea of losing the wild spaces closest to me ached in my chest like I’d been punched.