December 21st, 2021 – New York City, United States, Earth – 3:30 PM

Eleanor Vasquez has been living in that tree for six days.

"She went up Sunday morning," tells me Maria, her colleague from Save the Green—a movement sprouted here in Queens like stubborn dandelions through sidewalk cracks. "Just climbed right up with a sleeping bag and a week's worth of granola bars. Said she wasn't coming down until the mayor called off the removal."

Maria smiles with the particular pride reserved for watching someone you love do something magnificently brave—or stupid, depending on your point of view. The December wind cuts between us, carrying the smell of coming snow and exhaust fumes.

"And the police?" I ask, scribbling her statements in my notepad even though my phone is recording everything. Old habit. I've never gotten used to smartphones—they make me feel displaced, like I've skipped a decade somewhere. Which, in a way, I have.

"They came by Monday, told her she was trespassing. She told them the tree had been here before their grandparents were born, so if anyone was trespassing, it was them." Maria pulls her scarf tighter against the cold. "They haven't been back since."

Above us, perched where the massive oak's trunk splits into three, Eleanor Vasquez has made herself a nest of tarps and determination. Seventy-three years old, a former kindergarten teacher. She's lived in the neighborhood since 1962—though that's nothing compared to the tree she now calls home. The Alley Pond Giant has stood here for almost three centuries, according to the botanical surveys.

"Mrs. Vasquez?" I call up, my breath forming clouds in the frigid air. "I'm Ethan Sparrow from the Queens Community Gazette. We spoke on the phone?"

A face appears through the frost-brittle leaves, weathered but alert. "You're late, Mr. Sparrow."

"The subway was delayed. Can we talk?"

"I don't know—can you climb?"

I look down at my pressed khakis, wrapped inside a black belt, and my leather shoes, chosen for their professional appearance rather than their grip. Then at Maria, who shrugs as if to say: ‘That's Eleanor for you.’

"Give me a minute," I say, and start searching for a handhold.

I can't explain why I decided to climb. An elderly woman camping in a tree doesn't exactly scream front-page material. My editor, Cheryl, certainly won't think so—we're only covering this story to meet our year-end quota for environmental content, fulfilling the Gazette's sustainability pledge. There’s no reason for this story to exist. But the tree exists, ancient and stubborn. And so does Eleanor.

Maybe I just want to see if I still remember how to climb.

By the time I reach her makeshift platform, my jacket has a tear in the elbow, and my hands are raw from bark. The cold has worked through my skin, leaving my fingers stiff and clumsy. Eleanor watches my graceless arrival with the patient amusement of someone who's spent a lifetime watching children struggle, yet succeed. 

"Bit different from phone interviews, isn't it?"

"Bit different, yes." I settle myself carefully on a thick branch, hyperaware of the thirty-foot drop. The December wind cuts through my jacket, making everything feel more precarious. "I'm more of a solid-ground person, myself, to be honest."

"But you came up anyway." She studies me with chestnut-brown eyes that seem right at home here among the branches. "Feels good, doesn't it? To be part of something as old as this?"

Part of something. The words sit strangely in my mind, like clothes that belong to someone else—Molly loves those, unlike me. You'll never catch that girl wearing something that hasn't been worn before, something without history.

But when was the last time I felt part of anything? The words lodge in my chest like a splinter.

Not at the Gazette, where I write filler pieces about community board meetings and new restaurant openings, each article blurring into the next. Not in the bars I stopped frequenting years ago, tired of explaining why I couldn't stay late, why I have to get home to my teenage sister. 

Maybe only with her… For her. In our small Queens apartment, where I've learned to cook family dinners for two, to sign permission slips with hands that were too young for the responsibility.

"The view is nice," I say instead, pulling out my notepad.

One hour later, I’m back on the subway, munching on a granola bar—a farewell gift from the tree lady. “Keep fighting the good fight!” she told me after we concluded the interview. She told me stories about rallies, and festivals, about children and parents. About her late daughter. 

“Do you have any kids?” she asks, watching a crow building a nest on a nearby branch. I nodded, not sure why. Well, I do—guess it’s complicated. 

“Charish them, love them with all your heart. They are the most beautiful thing in existence—but beauty is fragile. One blink… and it’s gone. And then you learn you'll give everything to touch beauty once again.”

Crumbs of a granola bar fall as I get up and exit the train, leaving behind my interview with the lady in the tree.

As I walk back into the frostbitten afternoon sunlight, my phone buzzes against my thigh.

> Hey girl! Already ditched the office lol are we still on for tonight? 

> Don’t make me drag you out by your ginger hairrr!

Lin. She’s been independently directing my social life—what little exists of it—since she cornered me at the office three years ago and declared my ”Untapped party girl potential” a personal affront to her existence. She’s been filming video content for the Queens Community Gazette while taking on side projects as a documentary filmmaker. But unlike me, she knows when to turn her camera off. Then she’s just Lin: loud, relentless, and somehow convinced that what I need is more nights in bars where the music is loud enough to drown thoughts in liquor.

I should’ve said no. I already said yes last week in a moment of weakness, but I should text back with an excuse. Molly was sick. I have that deadline. The apartment needs… something.

But Lin’s the only person who will ever ask—three years of friendship disguised as gentle bullying, of her showing up at my desk with coffee and the “hot topics”, of covering for me when I had to leave early for Molly’s parent-teacher conference so I could hear about how my sister misses half her classes. She’s earned the right to extract me from my self-imposed isolation. Occasionally.

> I have dinner with my Molls first, so afterwards.

The response comes before I even pocket my phone. I swear, Lin spends half her time on earth texting. 

> awwww say hi to the brat for me. 

> ill text you the address but I SWEAR TO GOD if you ghost me again i’m opening some gay ass app and invite guys to your apartment catfishing as you xoxo

> Your profile will say: “the carpet matches the drapes” 

I can’t help the small smile that tugs at my mouth. Lin attacks through text the same way she approaches everything else—full frontal assault, laced with honey.

I shove the phone back in. Tonight. Drinks with Lin at whatever new place she’s discovered, where she’ll introduce me to twenty people whose names I’ll forget by the time of the second drink is poured. 

One of them will be a guy with the clear intention of setting me up with him. It's become her mission. ‘You can't let one man ruin dick for you forever," she'd said, with her typical brand of subtlety.

"Oh my gosh, you HAVE to meet my bestie Ethan," she'll say—half screaming, trying to match the volume of the club. Then, she'll gently shove me in his general direction like one who’s trying to teach a toddler to swim.

“Hi, I’m Brad—or Cameron, or Eduardo" he’ll probably say, reaching for a firm handshake. 

“Ethan, nice to meet,” I’ll shout as I reach back with my hand and avoid his gaze, shifting my focus instead to a non-threatening invisible space between his lips and neckline.

"Where are you from?" he'll ask, detecting my accent even with the music surrounding us. 

"Da'edge!" I'll say, releasing his hand, and he'll echo the word back to me, usually while mispronouncing it. 

"The Edge? Of what?" he'll probably say, releasing that small chuckle men do when they think they're being charming.

You see? That's why I hate clubs. 

I'll then try to explain—well, lie, to be frank—"It's in Europe!" and he'll ask something about it: "How is it? Should I visit? How's the scene there?" and I'll most certainly blubber something along the lines of "There was a disaster, I escaped when I was young!" which is usually the midpoint where Lin will see me struggling and steer the conversation with drinks and a shallow subject to chew upon.

"I LOVE THIS SONG!" she'll scream, grabbing Brad-Cameron-Eduardo's arm, and he'll join her on the dancefloor while I'll watch from the sidelines, holding my whiskey sour like a life preserver.

I'll stay for exactly one more drink, make my excuses about Molly needing something, and leave before anyone can protest. Lin will text me angry emojis on my way home, but she'll still invite me next time.

Same as always. Same as the last dozen times, she’s convinced me to “live a little, Ethan, Jesus Christ.”

The December wind picks up as I remove a small splinter of ancient oak from my jacket. Tonight, drinks. But first, movie and dinner with Molly. Time to go home.

Another train ride, a short walk, and I'm climbing the stairs to our small apartment in Jackson Heights, overlooking the steel spines of the 7 train. The building smells like it always does—someone's cooking on the second floor, marijuana seeping from 4B, that persistent damp that management swears isn't mold. As I reach the third floor, I can already hear the music pulsing through our door—not quite loud enough for neighbors to complain, but close. She's gotten good at finding that line.

My key turns with its familiar stick-and-click, and the muffled music becomes a stream as I enter our humble abode.

Ten tonnes may fall,
down from the fallen sky,
Onto the other side,
My heart may break, don't look the other way
Don't look the other way

I peel off layers—jacket, scarf, shoes—and stop myself, with no small effort, from deflating into the couch. Its gravitational pull is strong after a day of walking around. Instead, I drink a glass of apple cider and steel myself for the walk to her room.

Fools may rise - all fall in their time,
Burning with the forest fires
And all we want is to feel like all we got,
Didn't cost us everything,
Even if we never win.

I knock on her door—one, two, three times, our old pattern from when she was little and needed warning before I entered her domain. The door swings open and the music, uncontained, finally pours through with the full might of a river breaking its dam. And she appears, her locks of fiery auburn hair heralding her arrival a moment before her dark-blue eyes meet mine. She looks tired—her usual self.

Who am I on the other side?
You were mine on the other side.

"Cool song, turn it down?" I say, leaning against the door frame, surveying her room. It's a hovel—papers everywhere, canvases stacked against walls, clothes in piles that might be clean or dirty or some quantum state between. She was always a painter. I still remember how she defiled our old home with wall drawings. Fortunately for my security deposit, no sane New York landlord would ever allow that kind of creative expression, so she's had to settle for paper and canvas. Though I've caught her eyeing the walls sometimes, fingers twitching like she's holding invisible brushes.

"Fuck off," she says automatically, already turning back to her laptop to lower the volume. The sudden quiet feels incredible. It’s nice to be able to hear oneself inside one's own home.

"How's work?" she adds as she collapses back onto her unmade bed. I follow, lying next to her on top of the covers, both of us staring at the ceiling she's covered with glow-in-the-dark stars. Not randomly placed—they form actual constellations. She researched them.

"Interviewed a lady who staged a sit-in up a tree in Alley Pond," I answer, hearing her smile forming before I even finish the sentence.

"How did you interview her? Did you climb the tree?" She asks, turning to look at me, propping her head on her hand. There's paint under her fingernails—cerulean blue, cadmium red. The expensive stuff I pretend not to know she shoplifts.

"Of course I did, went all the way up. I'm a real fucking journalist." I say, and we both laugh. 

I don't ask about her day—because we both know I won't like the answer. But I can guess she skipped school again and went to the NYC Public Library in Manhattan. That's how she usually spends her weeks now—writing in notebooks I'm not allowed to read, drawing scenes I recognize but pretend not to, researching things that make her eyes go distant and dark.

We have our silent agreement: I won't bother her about school if she maintains a C average, and she won't complain when I start sending her portfolio to art schools come summer. A careful balance between what I think she needs and what she thinks she needs.

"So," I say, still staring at her fake stars, "pizza or Chinese for dinner?"

"Chinese. Your olives ruin the pizza even on my side."