Free Visitations by Jonas Saul

for lunch is soggy and mushy. I fish it out, take a bite and listen.
     
    Whenever I break to eat, I can almost hear the trees hatching their plan. A root stuck out in a nonchalant way, left exposed to trip me. A branch swinging back to swat my face. A dead tree knocked over to block my path. Whatever they devise, I can usually avoid it. As long as I hear them. As long as I listen. I’ve come to realize they fear me just as much as I fear them.
     
    I close my satchel, move the umbrella to my left side where I hook the handle into my rope and start back up the embankment. Within ten paces I’m in the clearing I saw earlier.
     
    There’s a shadow about a hundred yards up on the right. The area I’m looking at is an extension of an old forest. I would expect that’s the section of forest the Botanical Journal spoke of. Convinced the Honey-Locust I’m searching for will be in that copse of trees, I start walking.
     
    Halfway there I notice a barbed-wire fence. Every twenty yards or so I can see small metal signs going the length of the fence. The signs are facing the other way so I can’t read them.
     
    The fence is old. I approach an area that has been trampled down. It’s no more than two feet off the ground where I step over it.
     
    On the other side of the fence I turn and standing before me is a real Honey-Locust tree. I need to touch it to make sure it’s real. I smell it, feel it, and set a leaf on my tongue. I realize with the addition of the leaves of this tree to my collection, I have almost completed my legacy. My display of rare leaves will sit in botanical sections of museums for years to come.
     
    It takes no more than fifteen minutes to collect the leaf samples I want, gently placing them in the magazine papers I’d brought. I make sure they aren’t damaged by insects, disease or the environment. I also want ones attached to a small part of the twig with a lateral or terminal bud.
     
    It isn't even 2:00pm and I have found the tree I was looking for. Elated, I turn to the sky and yell. More like a baying. I’m not much into yelling. I try to do a fist pump, but it just shakes my arm too much.
     
    Before I step back over the barb-wire fence, I read a posted metal sign that says,
     
    “NO TRESPASSING. VIOLATORS WILL BE SHOT. ”
     
    I didn’t see a house. There isn't a farm close by, therefore no reason why I can't cross this fence and walk back the way I’d already come. Besides, I realize that I have trespassed the whole time so going back through would make no difference.
     
    I shrug my shoulders and make my way back across the clearing. I walk past the embankment where I’d had lunch and am halfway to my car when I hear movement.
     
    Of course the trees want to say something. I didn’t think I was going to get away that easy.
     
    I hop behind a dead trunk. I am being smart. Dead trees don’t talk. This one will provide shelter while the others talk, trying to figure a way to get me to give back what I have stolen from their forest.
     
    They don't though. Seve always triumphs. I pull out my bear spray. I want to be ready for anything they throw at me.
     
    A twig snaps. I press my back hard against the dead tree. I am less than an hour walk to my car. This is their last chance. I raise my hand to swipe at the sweat on my forehead. The hand that still held the bear spray, safety off, pauses in mid swipe.
     
    Cold steel touches my neck. I panic and freeze in the same moment. My heart slips and stutters.
     
    “You was supposed to read the signs.”
     
    Someone’s talking to me. This clear voice could never come from leaves. I look to the left as far as my eyes can go in their sockets. To look further, I would have to turn my head, I would have to move. The cold steel is pressing hard near my lower jaw, so hard I think my skin might break.
     
    I begin to understand. I get it. Everything comes to me like an epiphany. I am going to be shot for collecting leaves. The trees will finally