Skyler tilted her head. It made a soft feathering sound against the edge of her composure. "I'm sorry?"
"No, you won't put me down for anything. I'm not part of Lakeview Serenity. This land isn't deeded to the HOA. I checked. Twice."
"Technically," she tasted the word, "technically, you're not. But this cove has always been treated as a communal shoreline. We like to think of your parcel as an honorary zone."
"Honorary zones don't exist," I said. "Kind of like calorie-free donuts."
I picked up the warped board and laid it across the joists. She watched me, nostrils flaring at the audacity of manual labor being prioritized over her schedule. The lake threw sunlight back at us in sheets. A loon laughed somewhere; it sounded personal.
"Look," Skyler said, softening her tone by exactly two degrees, "we're reasonable people. We want you to feel welcome. We do weddings here, baptisms, sunset potlucks—"
"On your property," I said, "not mine."
"Community spirit means sharing."
"Community spirit also means cleaning," I said. "I picked up twelve beer cans and half a hot dog from under my deck yesterday. If that's your spirit, you need an exorcist."
The pen stopped clicking. Her mouth made a thin white line. She checked the clipboard, then angled it so I couldn't see the page. Absolutely nothing on earth makes people more territorial than paper they brought to your house.
"Perhaps we got off on the wrong foot," she said. "How about this: leave your gate open on weekends so everyone has lake access without walking the long way around. We'll even put a small donation box by the dock."
I laughed. Couldn't help it. "You want me to unlock my property so strangers can march through, and I get a tip jar for damages?"
"It would really boost morale," Skyler said, eyebrows knitting like twin caterpillars. "We've had a rough season with compliance. If new residents model participation—"
"I'm not a new resident. I'm a private one."
Her sunglasses flashed a perfect reflection of me: 6'2", weather-beaten, T-shirt stained with sap, a pry bar that used to be a crow's favorite perch.
She took a breath, probably counting to ten in Roman numerals. "Benjamin," she said with infinite patience that had an expiration date, "no one wants to be difficult. But if you insist on closing off a historically accessible shoreline, it creates friction. Complaints, meetings, citations."