The Fence Between US

Dawn came thin and cold, the kind that slid under sleeves and settled into bone.

Ivy kept her hands steady anyway.

Milk rang soft against the bottom of the pail, a hollow, steady rhythm that grounded her more than prayer ever could. Warm foam gathered at the surface. The goat leaned into her knee, solid and alive.

"Easy, Dixie," She murmured.

Breath curled from both of them, pale wisps that rose and then vanished. Outside the shelter, the pasture lay brittle with frost. Fence wire moved in the wind, a dry metallic sound that she knew better than her own heartbeat.

She kept the same routine day by day.

Strain the milk, feed, and water the goats. Boil water for drinking. That hadn't always been necessary. Do the same routine tomorrow.

It was how she kept the fear in its place. Not gone but contained.

She finished with Dixie and set the pail aside. Flexed her stiff fingers. The sky had lightened to a pale gray. The day promised nothing different. No trucks would come up her driveway. No voices would carry from town. Ash Hollow was a name people used to remember something that didn't exist anymore.

Ivy rose and stepped out of the shelter, scanned the fence line more out of habit than anything.

That was when she saw it.

She knew every inch of that fence. Every sag, every splinter. One post had been leaning for weeks. Something she had meant to fix but hadn't made the time.

Now it stood straight.

Ivy didn't move. A coldness went through her but not from the weather. She then noticed a strip of paper tied where wire met wood.

A note.

Ivy didn't reach for it right away. She looked around past the fence and noticed him standing under a tree. He was too far for her to see his facial features.

Ivy stepped closer.

Her steps were measured and careful. The same way she would approach a skittish animal. One wrong move and everything would scatter.

The post was solid, she noticed when she got closer. Whoever had done it knew what they were doing.

She reached out with two fingers, steady despite the cold, and pulled the note from the fence.

The note was only folded once. Ivy hesitated. Opening it like crossing an invisible line. Not the fence, but something far more dangerous.

She took a breath and unfolded the paper.

I fixed the fence. Should hold in the wind. ---Wade

Just two sentences. No apology or questions.

Wade.

The name gave her a strange sensation in her chest.

She looked across the fence line again. He was still standing still under a tree. She knew he was watching her read it. Waiting for her reaction.

Her first instinct was to leave the note and walk away. Close the door on whatever this was before it started.

Being alone had kept her safe.

Her eyes went to the fixed post. He hadn't asked or crossed on her property.

He had fixed something that would have gotten worse if it stayed the way it was.

The wind shifted, and she smelled a faint smell of wood smoke. She breathed in and then let it out slowly.

Then she turned and went back inside the shelter.

Inside, everything was where it should be; tools hung on hooks on the wall. Cloths were folded on the shelf. The spare milk pail was rinsed and hung up to dry.

She set the note on the workbench and stared down at it.

Wade.

A name meant that she wasn't alone. A scary but hopeful presence.

She didn't like how his name made space in her thoughts.

Her gaze went to the small stack of scrap paper she used to track inventory. Careful numbers and records.

her hands hovered over it for a brief moment, then tore a piece off in one clean movement. She then picked up the stub of pencil and paused over the blank page.

What did she say to him?

Then she leaned down and printed a short message.

Thank you. I meant to get to it. ---Ivy

She looked down at it, considered writing more. Decided against it and folded it in half and then half again and walked back out into the cold.

The wind had picked up, dragging through her coat and pulling pieces of her hair lose from the rope she had used to tie it back.

She glanced over and noticed he was still there. Waiting. She reached the post and tucked the note on the same post that he had fixed.

She put her hand on the post for a moment and then stepped back. Then she looked over for a second to the man standing under the tree. Not long. She didn't want to make it seem she was inviting anything.

Ivy turned and walked to the shelter and went inside, not looking back.

-----

By afternoon, the frost had burned off, leaving the ground damp and dark under the sun. Ivy waited as long as she could to go back outside, but there was always something that needed done.

She told herself she was going to check on the goats. The little ones liked to test the lower wire. It was the only reason she was walking along the fence.

By the time she reached the fixed post, the sky was a pale blue with a few white clouds going past. The wind blew softly, bringing the smell of damp earth.

The note was gone.

Ivy stopped in front of the post and glanced at it and then around the other side of the wire. At first, she didn't see anything but open prairie and cottonwood trees in a line. He wasn't standing there.

Then movement came out of the corner of her left eye.

he stood near the edge of the higher ground. He was still too far to see his face clearly. Arms hung loose at his sides.

Ivy shifted her weight. She could still leave and go back into the shelter. it wasn't too late. She shifted her boots again but stayed where she was.

He walked closer one step at a time, stopping far enough back to leave several feet between them.

His eyes were blue. That is the first thing she noticed about him.

Next, she noticed that he was taller than her by quite a bit.

"I got your note."

His voice carried over easy the distance.

Ivy didn't answer right away. Hearing his voice did something to her. Writing on paper was one thing. This was something else entirely.

Wade.

It fit the voice.

She lifted her chin and looked at him.

"I was going to fix it."

Her voice sounded different. Unfamiliar from lack of use.

A pause went between them before he spoke again.

"I know."

"You've got a loose stretch down that way."

he nodded his head towards the right.

"lower wire. Something has been pushing against it."

Ivy frowned and turned her head that way, eyes squinting like she could see that far.

There isn't."

"Happened this morning," he said back.

Ivy's jaw tightened.

He just didn't happen to see it. He had been looking.

Anger came up sudden and sharp and then settled down just as quickly. He hasn't crossed the fence. Still left space between them as they talked.

"You always check your neighbors' fences?"

It came out softer than she intended.

"No."

His answer was immediate.

A beat.

"You are my only neighbor. Have been for a long time."

Ivy stood still for a moment. The wind shifted again, and it brought the faint scent of smoke again over the rise.

Her gaze went to the fixed post in front of her. The brace and tightened wire.

She looked back up, and he was still standing there, not moving.

"Ok," she said mostly to herself than to him.

After a moment.

" I will see to it."

"Alright."

No offer to fix it this time.

She nodded and turned her boots, pressing into the softened dirt, and started down the fence line without looking back.

When she got to the spot in the fence he was talking about. The lower wire had been pushed loose. Fresh little hoof prints told the rest of the story.

She crouched down to start the work. Pull, twist, secure. the routine work grounded her. Settled her after the note and conversation at the fixed post this morning.

but when she finished, she stood up and her eyes went across the fence. She could see the shape of him. Watching her.

Ivy looked over at him for a minute longer. Then turned and walked back to the shelter.

----

The mornings and days went back to the same routine. Mornings came early and cold to milk her goats; next came goats impatient at the gate, impatient to be fed. Afternoons spent making goat cheese and checking off things on her list. Recording everything.

Still, she found herself glancing over the fence for movement or checking the repaired fence post for notes. Nothing.

Until, three mornings later, she glanced at the post and noticed a cloth bundle wrapped around the wire. It could have been easy to miss if you weren't paying attention.

Ivy was.

She stood still for a moment and gazed across the fence out of habit. She didn't see anyone standing by the cottonwood tree.

Ivy stepped closer and grabbed the small cloth bundle. Turned in her hand a couple of times before opening it.

She looked down and could not believe what she was seeing.

Seeds.

Different sized and colors in a small pile in the middle of the cloth.

Something that was hard to come by anymore. She picked up one and rolled it between her fingers. Her chest felt tight.

Ivy put the seed back in the pile and looked up to gaze across the fence once more. No movement anywhere.

He had left them and gone, or was he far enough back to not be seen.

Seeds meant planning for the future. Planning to stay.

She folded the cloth around the seeds and went back to her shelter. She set it on the table and looked down at them for a moment.

This wasn't a gift but an offer to trade. That's all it was.

She went to the small fridge across the room and pulled out a cloth wrapped bundle of goat cheese. She opened it and smelled the fresh thyme that was pressed into the block before wrapping it in a clean cloth.

Was it too much? Too little?

Before she changed her mind, she turned and went out the door to the fence. She tied the bundle at the post, her hands lingering a moment before stepping back. Her eyes lifted and went across the fence. He was there. Closer than before. Ivy didn't speak. Neither did he. The wind drifted between them, and she smelled not wood smoke this time but something savory, something cooking.

After a minute, Wade nodded and turned and walked away.

----

The mornings didn't seem so empty anymore. There was still work to be done, but she found herself pausing to look at the fence to see if anything was left or across the field beyond.

She told herself it was just a habit. Something new to her routine.

That morning, the wind had an extra chill. The kind that meant the weather was changing. The goats felt it too. They were more restless at the gate for feeding time. Dixie was shifting and pressing close to her knee before she finished putting milk in the pail.

"Alright," she murmured, steadying her with her knee. "I know."

By the time she finished milking and setting the pail aside, the wind had picked up and was pulling at everything that wasn't tied down.

A storm was coming.

She finished straining the milk and doing the rest of her routine quickly.

She was going past the fence when she saw him there. Closer than ever before.

"You will want to bring them in early," Wade said.

Ivy's gaze sharpened. " I always do."

He nodded. " The wind is shifting faster today."

She clinched her teeth.

"I have handled worse."

"I know."

The wind grabbed her coat, pushed a strand of hair across her cheek. She didn't brush it back.

"You don't know anything about how I run things."

" I know that your herd bunches when the weather turns," Wade said. " and you check everything twice when it does."

Ivy's hands curled at her side.

"You have been watching me?"

"Yes."

The honesty surprised her. No excuses or apology.

She felt her throat tighten.

"You shouldn't."

"Yeah, I know."

The wind rose, harder now. Somewhere down the fence line, a loose section of wire hit sharp and fast.

Neither of them moved.

" I have never crossed the fence." Wade said. "You know that."

Ivy did.

The wind pushed harder and colder now. The goats bleated behind her restlessly.

She turned her head to the shelter and her work. Something she can control. When she turned back, he was still there. Watching her.

"Brink them in before dusk," he finally said.

she held his gaze for a moment.

"I will."

Wade gave a single nod and then stepped back and turned away.

Ivy watched him until she couldn't see him anymore. Only then did she turn and make her way back to her shelter.

The goats needed to be brought in. The storm wouldn't wait. But she thought about what he had said. he knew her routine. he had been watching her. Ivy didn't tell him to stop.

----

The wind hit harder before dusk settled.

The goats became more restless. They were pressing closer, ears pinned back.

"Easy," she said, guiding them to the shelter. "Come on."

A big gust went through the pasture. Bending the fence line down low, the wire stretched tight from the strain.

Ivy's head snapped up.

To the section she had fixed. It wasn't leaning this time. The lower wire had pulled loose entirely. It was sagging enough to panic. The space was big enough for a small animal to get through.

"Damn," She breathed out.

Another gust tore across the field.

There was no time. Ivy moved faster now, guiding the herd towards the shelter. Her voice was steady even though the wind pulled at her hard.

"Easy now...go on."

One by one, they moved through the doorway, hooves striking wood, bodies crowding together in the small space.

All but two.

The youngest balked, running sideways to the down fence.

"No...hey..."

Ivy grabbed the collar of the other one and pushed it inside the shelter and quickly closed the door.

The wind howled.

The wire dragged across the ground.

And then---a shape cut across the field.

Wade.

He didn't slow at the fence. Didn't hesitate.

He stepped over the wire like it had never been there.

"Go left," he called already moving towards the goat.

Ivy didn't even question it. Didn't tell him to stop. She turned and ran.

Wade moved steady and sure. Cutting wide, driving the goat around before it could slip through the fence.

"Go on, now," He said low.

The goat veered toward Ivy.

Together, they moved the small animal around towards the shelter, closing it and them inside the shelter before the wind slammed hard against the wood.

Ivy let out a breath and leaned against the door for a moment. The goats shifted around her, bleating loudly.

They were safe.

She then realized---

Wade was still there.

He stood a few feet away, breath visible in the cool air. He was close enough she could see the lines around his blue eyes. His broad shoulders underneath his jacket.

"Are you alright?" he asked quietly.

Ivy nodded, pushing off from the door.

"Yeah."

"The fence needs fixed," She said, turning like she could see it past the wall.

"Yeah."

The wind continued to howl outside.

"The storm will get worse before it settles," he said.

" I know."

A long pause

Then--

"Tomorrow we fix it," his voice is steady. "Together."

Ivy looked at him.

It wasn't just about the fence. She heard it in his voice.

She took a deep breath and nodded.

"Together."

The goats shifted suddenly and pushed hard against her legs, knocking her off balance. Her arms flung out to try and stay upright when suddenly two strong arms came around her.

Ivy looked up and held his gaze.

"You alright?" He whispered.

Ivy nodded, but didn't say anything. it had been so long that she had felt human touch. It felt good to be held.

Outside, the storm raged.

Inside, he just held her That was enough for now.