We walked up and down the length of the northern edge of the property looking for a way out. Winter grasses knee high. We spooked a cottontail. No breaks in the fence.

One spot though was crushed by a fallen tree, felled so long ago the trunk was rotted. We held back limbs and with our feet crushed branches and vines entangled in the fencing. I pulled back once, my palm studded with thorns, then again with thorns lining the forefinger. We pushed up over the brambles and fence and were free, but no joy in the escape, now sweaty and drained of energy. We walked on comparing notes on what we’d endured these last two days. Domestic ducks with red faces met us at the edge of a pond, but we were listless and distracted. There was no place to go but in circles along sterile streets lined with brick houses. Then she said, lets cross the highway.

Cars and trucks roared before us, exhaling smoke. They were fast and hard to see. We darted across and without energy walked again.

I spied a bough laden with oranges hanging over a wood fence. The branch was in a public area above the sidewalk. She said, shall we have one? I reached for an orange radiating color in the sun. She chose one hung low from among the glossy green leaves. And we peeled the oranges as we walked on, and were refreshed and nourished and the talk grew more heated as we dropped bits of peel and spoke of the dark now decades past, compared stories of isolation and petty humiliations.

We crossed the highway to return to the place of our punishment, certain to receive more of the same. Our escape an impermanent one, even when we are hundreds of miles away from the site.

But then we shrugged, we laughed, bought hand lotion of hemp and coconut oil, each to give to the other. Two brown bottles of balm and wordless solidarity.