Chapter 5

On Wednesday morning, the survey crew marked the boundaries. I sat in my folding chair with coffee in one hand and my fishing rod leaning against the other armrest. Neighbors slowed as they passed; most read the signs and kept going. Marcus Webb, who lived four doors down, stopped, read the sign top to bottom, and said, "You did the right thing, Paul."That same afternoon, I heard tires stop hard by the road. Phyllis stood at the entrance, staring at the sign like it was written in a language she refused to accept. Then she marched to my front door and knocked with the urgency of someone who had already decided she was winning the argument.When I opened the door, she said, "You have no right to put those signs there. That is HOA common property. Remove them immediately or I'll initiate formal proceedings."I stepped aside and invited her in. On my dining room table were three documents: a notarized copy of the recorded deed, the county recorder's confirmation page, and a printed screenshot of the public assessor's database showing APN 2847 in my name.I handed her the confirmation page. "This is the recorded deed, Mrs. Harrington, filed 12 days ago. Publicly searchable since last Thursday."She read it once, set it down, picked it up again. I watched her read my name in the owner field the second time, and I watched something shift in her face—the moment a person realizes the ground they were standing on was never solid. Then she turned and walked out without another word.Two days later, she escalated. A post appeared on the neighborhood community board warning about a "suspicious property seizure" at the lake. It never used my name, but everyone knew who it was about. It described bad-faith exploitation of legal loopholes and a coordinated attempt to privatize community space. The photos she posted were carefully cropped to exclude the parcel number and the ownership line; all you saw were the words "Private Property" in large white letters, framed to look hostile rather than lawful.The neighborhood reacted exactly how she wanted: people worried about losing access, some repeated her claims, and others knocked on doors spreading her version in person. One unsigned note appeared under my front door. It said: Give the lake back to the community. I folded it carefully and put it in the same drawer as the original fine.

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HOA Fined Me $550 For Fishing — So I Legally Bought The Lake And Banned Them!