I must look like some card-carrying member of the lunatic fringe! Crazy old lady. Crazy old lady, they’ll whisper as I walk down the street.
Normally, I take my respectability for granted. My clients and friends treat me as a person of integrity. Now, however, sitting alone, chained to this tree, the memory of Robyn’s words stung me. I probably did look ridiculous.
It would be worth being called names if I could save the trees. But soon, Tamlin would return to arrest me and my beloved trees were going to come crashing down. Forces much more powerful than my good intentions were obviously in gear here.
So get out. Get away. While you still can.
I rested against the tree and tried to think. Tiredness pulled me into sleep and after a while, I jerked awake. At the edge of the park, a woman hurried by, pushing a baby in a pram with one hand and holding on to a preschooler in the other. The woman was frowning and I could hear whispers between her and the older child. It was starting. Humiliation swept through me.
The child had some sort of costume on and I remembered seeing somewhere a notice for a spring pageant. Yanking herself free, the child bounded towards me, stopping dead in her tracks in front of me. Her little homemade cellophane wings trembled uncertainly on the paper chest band that held them to her body. On the wings were blobs of sun yellow and jello orange, obviously her own work.
The child was supposed to be a butterfly, but with her cherubic face and big, believer eyes, she looked more like an angel. Uncertainly her tongue wet her lips and she caught her lower one in her teeth. Her fear was palpable, yet she held her ground.
“Its all right,” I said gently. “I won’t hurt you.”
“Mommy says you’re gonna save the trees being chopped.”
I looked into the little girl’s face. It was as open as the future. “I’m going to try.”
She clapped her hands together gleefully, threw her head back and looked up. We were so close that I could see the reflection of the trees in her eyes.
Then, her mission complete, the girl skipped back to her mother, wings flapping. At the edge of the park, she turned and waved exuberantly, as if saying goodbye to her very best friend. Thoughtfully, the mother raised her hand and waved as well.
“Starting a fan club?”
“Madge! Where have you been? I thought…” My eyes sought Madge’s to reestablish the camaraderie of a few hours ago, but Madge was studying her fingernails.
“Got Smedly,” she reported matter-of-factly. “Finally. He says you don’t have a leg to stand on. Legally, anyway.” She bit at a nail.
I searched Madge’s face. Something wasn’t right.
“You’re not going to believe this,” Madge said flatly, still not looking at me.
“Believe what?”
“Who owns this land. Who’s developing it …”
Madge’s glance finally swung towards me and our eyes locked. For a moment, neither of us spoke.
“Boyd!”
Madge grinned. Then, as if remembering something, the smile faded. “I went to see him. He definitely wants you out of here.” She snickered. “Which is putting it mildly.” Making her lips like the knot on the end of a balloon, she filled her mouth with air so her cheeks bulged. Then she blew the air out noisily. “He wanted you arrested right away, but I asked him to wait.” She looked at me, and seeing no reaction, carried on. “He wants to settle this peacefully.”
I frowned. There was an uncomfortable twitch in my stomach.
Madge rolled her eyes at my doubt. “This is his land, you know. He did buy it.” She looked away from me. “He showed me the plans for the condominiums. They’re not so bad. He’s only going to take down the trees he has to. The minimum.”
“The minimum! How can you support him killing any of them? We’ve known these trees all our lives.” I stared at Madge incredulously. “You’re a tree person, too.” I wanted to shake her, wake her out of her trance.
She dropped her hands to her sides. “I don’t like this. You don’t like this, but, believe it or not, Boyd isn’t thrilled about taking these trees down either. However, as he says, you can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs. And he’s promised me he’s going to plant more. In fact, he even offered to let you organize the landscaping.”
My fury sizzled. “Come on! Co-opt the opposition. That’s the oldest trick in the book. He must think I’m an idiot.” The red heat in my stomach rose up and spewed into words. “You tell Boyd to go screw himself – if you’re not doing that for him already.”
Madge’s slap was sharp and painful, but nothing compared to the anguish I was feeling inside. We looked at each other with astonished repentance, then fell into each other’s arms.
“I deserved that,” I said, my voice low.
“No, I shouldn’t have.”
I tried to explain. “I’m on totally new ground here. I want to stand up for what I believe in, but it’s so hard…”
Madge was suddenly optimistic. “Look, how about we unchain you and I take you out for dinner? We’ll brainstorm possibilities. There must be some other way to put the brakes on this thing.”
The thick, spicy smell of garlic linguine filled my nose. We’d go to Giorgio’s. I’d sit in one of those sumptuous wing-back chairs. Over a long drink, we’d come up with another plan.
“I need to stay here.”
“Jessie, there’s nothing more you can do.”
“You may be right. But I have to stay until the end of it. I wouldn’t feel good otherwise.”
Madge stared at me as if she were seeing me for the first time. After a while, she nodded and said, “You sure you don’t want me to send Smedly over?”
I shook my head. Lawyers helped people with their legal rights. I had no legal rights.
The two of us stood awkwardly, neither speaking. Finally she said, “Well, I guess I’d better be off. I have a thousand things I need to do today.” Her voice was brittle with brightness. “I’ll come by later and see how you’re doing.” She turned reluctantly. At the edge of the park she called, “Good luck!” Then, as if to make up for her abandonment, she blew me a kiss.
Resentfully, I watched her go. Why couldn’t she have stayed and fought it out with me? She’d grown up with these trees too. Suddenly the burden of what I was doing weighed down on me. It wasn’t fair. If Madge didn’t care, why should I?
Go home. Before you get yourself in worse trouble.
Left alone, my thoughts pushed each other around. Despite the free-for-all going on in my head, my body settled itself resolutely against the tree. Although it didn’t make sense to me, my body seemed to know something, seemed to have some wisdom that was navigating me through the slums of my thinking to some inner path of rightness. My instinct told me that if I abandoned this knowing, all would be lost.
You’d be proud of me, Rudi. You always told me to trust my body and here I am doing it.
I smiled, thinking back on my time in therapy. “Move out of the smaller knowing into the bigger knowing,” she used to tell me. I now knew fully what she had meant.
I was staying. Straining against the chain, I scanned the park for Tamlin but could see no sign of him. I relaxed back against the tree. He was going to show up when he was going to show up. There