September 22, 2026 · daily scene
The Fence Line
Given circumstances
- Character
- Landowner
- Setting
- Edge of your property, surveyor's stakes in the ground, late afternoon sun low and orange.
- The moment before
- You drove past and saw the stakes, got out of the truck, and walked the line. It's eight feet closer to your house than you thought.
- Scene partner
- Your neighbor of twelve years, standing on what you thought was your side
Direction
You're doing the math in real time—what this means for the barn, the fence you built, the land you thought you owned. Let the pauses do the work. This is someone recalculating their entire property.
Script
Those stakes weren't there yesterday.
NEIGHBORSurvey company came this morning. I'm putting up a fence.
A fence. On a line that cuts through the middle of my barn.
NEIGHBORIt's not your barn. Not according to the county.
I built that barn in 2006. You were at the raising. You brought your son and a case of beer and you stayed until the roof was on.
The property deed my father left me says the fence line is the creek. The creek is thirty yards that way. So either your survey's wrong, or every map I've looked at for fifteen years is.
NEIGHBORThe creek moved.
(beat)
Then we have a problem.
Written for Act It Up. Free to rehearse and perform for practice, classes and self-tapes.
Record this scene with a teleprompter and a scene partner who reads the other lines.
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