CHAPTER 8: THE SHORELINE HOLDS
The silence that settled over the cove as the CAT 320’s engine died was heavy, thick with the smell of hot iron, wet clay, and cooling diesel exhaust.
Jesse didn’t move away from the machine right away. He stood by the steel track, his dark work sneakers planted on the crushed stone, watching the winched SUV disappear over the crest of the access road behind the county lowboy. The amber strobes reflected off the pines one last time before fading into the dusk, leaving only the steady, rhythmic lap of Lake Oconee against the newly shored mud bank.
Ten feet away, Brenda Hollings remained on the low concrete curb near her driveway apron. Her hands rested limp in her lap, her mud-streaked pink top drying into a crusty red shell in the cooling evening breeze. She stared at the yellow slip of paper Deputy Miller had left on her knees, her shoulders slumped, the sharp, entitlement-driven posture completely drained out of her frame.
Deputy Miller closed the trunk of his cruiser with a solid metallic latch. He walked over to where Jesse stood, stepping around the three-ton concrete retaining block that now pinned the base of the pine slope.
“Flatbed’s taking her vehicle straight to the impound in Eatonton,” Miller said, taking off his hat and wiping his brow with the back of his wrist. “County road crew’s dropping two loads of surge stone at the top of the ramp to seal the upper approach until Monday morning.”
Jesse nodded slowly, his thumb rubbing a spot of dried grease off the cuff of his leather glove. “And the seventy-eight survey pin?”
“Staying right where your bucket uncovered it,” Miller replied, pointing his flashlight down at the yellow steel rod embedded in the red clay. “I notified the public works director on my radio. County surveyor will be out at dawn to stake the entire easement line from the bridge to the state park boundary. Nobody’s putting up private gates down here again.”
Brenda stirred slightly at the sound of Miller’s voice, looking up through tangled hair. Her voice was raspy, stripped of its loud authority. “My grandfather cleared this timber in fifty-two, Thomas. You know what this shoreline used to look like before the dam went in.”
Jesse turned his head toward her. His voice was quiet, lacking malice, carrying only the weight of twenty years on heavy equipment. “Your grandfather cleared timber on land he was paid for, Brenda. The water doesn’t care who cleared the trees. The county line is where the survey pin sits.”
She didn’t argue. She pushed herself up off the concrete curb, her mud-caked shoes making a heavy scraping sound on the gravel, and began the long, slow walk up her driveway toward her house, leaving the torn 1984 paper fluttering in the mud behind her.
Up on the timber guardrail, the three park visitors began heading back toward their truck. The man in the yellow poncho paused, looking down at Jesse. “Good job with that bucket, pal,” he called out. “Would’ve hated to see that ramp closed all weekend.”
Jesse offered a short, single-nod gesture, but didn’t speak. He reached up, grabbed the cab door frame, and hauled himself back onto the bottom step to perform his end-of-shift walkaround. He checked the track tension, inspected the main boom cylinders for hydraulic weeping, and unhooked the heavy safety chains from the rear frame.
Miller walked over to his cruiser, opening the driver’s door. “Need a ride up to the main shop, Jesse? Or are you staging the rig here overnight?”
“I’m staying until the stone truck drops the gravel,” Jesse said, taking a shop rag from his back pocket and wiping down the bucket teeth. “Got to make sure the grade is level before the morning tide rolls in.”
“Fair enough,” Miller said, turning his key in the ignition. The cruiser’s engine purred to life, its headlights cutting a long, bright beam through the lingering mist along the access lane. “See you at the depot, Vance.”
“Take it easy, Deputy.”
Jesse watched the cruiser’s red taillights climb the hill and disappear beyond the tree line. Left alone on the bank, the only sound was the steady hum of the lake against the fresh stone and the cooling ping of the excavator’s exhaust manifold.
He walked over to the edge of the bank, where the rusted wire corner post sat half-buried in the wild blackberry vines. He reached down, grabbed the bent aluminum tag that Brenda’s father had wired to the wood forty years ago, and pulled it free with a sharp jerk. He tossed it into the back of his work truck alongside his grease gun and timber blocks.
He walked back to the water’s edge, stood on the fresh gravel ramp, and looked out over the dark, open water of the lake. The access road was open. The shoreline line was drawn. And the dirt was right where it belonged.
