At exactly 1:45 a.m., the low, guttural rumble of a diesel engine vibrated through the damp air. I was already waiting on my side of the creek, standing next to my massive Caterpillar 320 excavator. Through the fog on the HOA's side, the dim orange running lights of Tommy Mitchell's convoy appeared.
Tommy hadn't just brought a tow truck; he had brought a Liebherr LTM mobile crane, a specialized piece of equipment designed to lift concrete highway barriers and steel girders. Accompanying him was a flatbed semi-truck driven by his foreman, a grizzled guy named Chuck. They parked right on Sycamore Drive, the crane's massive outriggers extending over the pristine asphalt, locking the machine into place just inches from Brenda's brand-new wrought iron gate.
I waded across the freezing creek one last time, hauling a heavy waterproof bag of tools. When I climbed up the muddy bank on the HOA side, Tommy was already out of the cab, sipping from a thermos and eyeing the heavy iron gate.
"I got to hand it to you, Artie," Tommy whispered, his breath pluming in the cold air. "When you told me the plan, I thought you were crazy. But seeing this... they really boxed you in. That gate is anchored deep."
"We aren't touching the gate, Tommy," I reminded him, pulling out a heavy battery-powered grinder and an oxy-acetylene torch. "Not a single scratch on their property. Officer Jenkins made that very clear. We are just doing some late-night structural maintenance on my side of the property line."
Tommy grinned. "Right. Maintenance. Let's get to work before the neighborhood watch wakes up."
The bridge was essentially a massive steel skeleton: two primary I-beams stretching forty feet across the ravine, overlaid with thick, pressure-treated timber planks. To move it, we had to dismantle it into pieces.
For the next two hours, we worked in calculated silence. Chuck and I used heavy impact wrenches to unbolt the timber decking. Every time a massive plank came loose, we hooked it to the crane's rigging. Tommy, operating the Liebherr with surgical precision, hoisted the heavy wood silently into the air, swung it over the creek, and gently lowered it onto my property.
By 4:00 a.m., the timber decking was entirely gone. All that remained were the two massive steel I-beams resting on the concrete abutments. The wrought iron gate now hovered over a skeleton.
"All right, here's the tricky part," I muttered into my radio. "I need to cut the anchor bolts on the abutments. When I do, these girders are going to want to shift. You need to hold the tension perfectly."
"I got you, Artie," Tommy radioed back. "Tension is locked. Make the cuts."
I crawled under the bridge structure, dangling directly over the rushing water of the creek, and sparked the oxy-acetylene torch. I had to drape a heavy welding blanket over myself to hide the bright blue and orange sparks from glaring through the fog and waking up Brenda Carmichael, whose house sat blindly on the hill above us.