The guy in a hard hat tilted his head so far that his hat nearly fell off. “Is that so?”
Graham knew better than to argue with one of the lower-rung guys hired to rip up the earth. They were working for a paycheck to buy food for their families. They had rent to payand health insurance to take care of. They either didn’t know or didn’t care that such anti-environmental and pro-capitalistic efforts would have a lasting effect on their island home. They didn’t know that the Nantucket they’d grown up with, the Nantucket that supported their livelihoods, would one day be gone if they didn’t take care of it.
“You should really unlock that,” the guy said, eyeing the handcuffs.
“I already threw the key in the sound,” Graham said.
The guy tossed up his hands. “You’re making my job a whole lot harder, you know?”
“Ben, you gotta call the cops,” another said.
“Threw the key in the ocean?” the guy called Ben muttered. “You must be the biggest idiot on the planet.”
“I’m standing up for Nantucket Island,” Graham told him. “I’m standing up for my island home.”
After that, the clouds opened up and dunked them with more springtime rain than even Graham had expected. It was cold, and his drenched clothes chilled him to the bone. The construction workers took refuge in their trucks, eating sandwiches they’d probably meant to save for lunchtime and looking at their phones. Graham tried his best to look formidable and strong, chin raised, seeming not to be bothered by the rain at all. It was important; he’d told his wife of his pro-environmental antics, his protests, and his strenuous efforts to save the world. If I didn’t do it, who would?
He hadn’t meant to think of his wife already this morning. He hadn’t meant to make himself so sad so early on in his protest. Now, her image floated in his mind’s eye: wide green eyes, a mischievous smile, long fingers, and messy curls. Hannah hadn’t always been able to travel with him to various pro-environmentalist protests or global discussions about how to better the world’s climate footprint, but she’d supportedhim from their home in Chicago, sharing social media posts, promoting his messages, and calling him when she could. Because he wanted to talk the talk and walk the walk, he never flew, which often made for incredibly long travels—boats across the Atlantic and bus and train journeys that meant hours and hours of thinking.
Should he have been at home in Chicago with Hannah instead?
Had he wasted his time? Nobody else cared about the environment, anyway.
No! Graham snapped at himself. It wasn’t healthy to drop into the menacing cycle of depression, of thinking nothing he’d done was worthwhile.
The rain stopped a few minutes later, but the winds came and whipped around him, snapping at his coat and his dark hair. Three police cars arrived, which seemed like overkill but also proof of the dramatic amount of funds backing the current luxury hotel construction project. Graham kept a neutral expression on his face and watched as four cops stepped through the mud and sand to get to him. He knew two of them from his high school days in Nantucket. The other two were strangers.
“Is that Graham Ellis?” The red-headed female police officer smiled with surprise.
“Hi, Natalie,” he said, remembering her as the stuck-up seventeen-year-old in his history class.
“The famous Graham Ellis?” A cop he didn’t recognize feigned disbelief.
Natalie’s eyes glinted as though she’d caught a dangerous animal in a trap. “I read about you,” she said to Graham. “I read you did this kind of stuff. But I never imagined you’d do it here.”
“Here is where I should have been doing it the entire time,” Graham offered. “Nantucket is my home, and over-construction and tourism are ruining its delicate microbiome.”
“What’s a microbiome, exactly?” one of the cops asked. “You always hear this word tossed around, but it doesn’t feel like it means anything.”
Graham wasn’t sure if the cop was messing with him or not, so he answered honestly, “A microbiome is a…”
“I know what it is,” the cop spat, although Graham was genuinely sure he did not know.
“All right.” Graham offered his kindest smile, remembering what Hannah had always said: be considerate, don’t insult them, and remind them that you’re there because you love the same things they love—their world, their natural environment, the sky and the sea and the soil.
“We’re going to have to cut you off and arrest you,” Natalie said. “But you know that, I guess.”
“Not my first rodeo.” Graham shrugged.
“We don’t have the right equipment yet,” Natalie explained, her hands on her hips as she scanned the faces of the construction workers. “It’ll be an hour or two. Maybe three. Nobody wants to work anymore.”
“I have all day. I have more than that,” Graham said. “In fact, I’d like to stay out here till the press takes notice, writes think pieces about it, and gets the islanders angry. I want someone, anyone, to care at least half as much as I do. And then we can have a conversation about it. We can build from there.”
Natalie’s cheek twitched. The other three cops went back to their vehicles to make calls to the office and eat things they’d packed away in brown paper bags. They didn’t care about Graham anymore.
“You know islanders won’t get angry about it,” she said. “More tourism means more money for them. We live and die by the cash brought in during the summer. Another luxury hotel means a better life for our children, our elderly parents, our…”
“Don’t you remember what it was like to grow up here?” Graham asked gently.
