I did nothing to label them. They were in my garden, on my property, entirely legal, entirely mine. I remounted the trail camera. I went about my life. And then came the evening of August 9th.
The evening of August 9th. I was inside watching television at approximately 9:15 p.m. when the trail camera notification came through to my phone. I had set it to send an alert when triggered. I looked at the notification, motion detected. I put down my remote control.
I went to the kitchen window. I could see in the low light of the summer evening Gary Hutchins on his step ladder leaning over my fence, reaching into the raised bed closest to the fence line. I watched him select several fruits. From this distance and in this light, they looked red and small and round, exactly like cherry tomatoes. He descended his ladder.
He went inside. I sat down. I waited. 14 minutes later, I know because I was watching the clock, I heard it. A sound from Gary's yard that I can only describe as involuntary.
Not a scream exactly, more of a surprised escalating vocalization that started as a sharp exhale and built into something that might generously be called an extended expression of distress. Then I heard his back door open. Then his garden hose, he turned it on, and I could hear the water running, which suggested he was trying to cool his mouth. This does not work with capsaicin, which is oil-based and not water-soluble, but Gary did not know that. The hose ran for several minutes.
Then there was a period of what I can only describe as active suffering audible through the fence of the kind that confirmed Gary had eaten at least one and possibly more of my Carolina Reapers under the impression that they were cherry tomatoes. Frances texted me from next door, "Is that Gary?" I texted back, "Yes." She texted, "Outstanding." I went to bed at my normal time.
I slept very well. In the morning, I went out to my garden and I tended my plants and I had coffee in the sunshine and I felt, for the first time in 6 years of living next to Gary Hutchins, something very close to complete peace. But the story does not end there. Because Gary, rather than reflecting quietly on what had happened and perhaps reconsidering his relationship with other people's gardens, decided to escalate. And escalating to someone who has been patiently planning for a year is almost always a mistake.
What Gary did next, what the HOA got involved with, what Frances did at the community meeting, and the moment when Gary finally understood exactly what had happened and why, all of that is in part two. Quick version, I'm Ellen Parsons, retired biology teacher. My neighbor Gary Hutchins had been stealing fruit from my garden for 5 years, strawberries, tomatoes, 47 peaches taken in one night. I got trail camera evidence. I researched the hottest pepper on Earth, the Carolina Reaper, 2.2 million Scoville units, looks exactly like a cherry tomato when ripe.