It had been there ever since.
I walked carefully down the hill. It was easy to see where it had all happened. The grass was about three inches high going down the side of the hill, then jumped up to about five. At that point, the ground was torn up where the mower had dug in as it rolled.
I stood a moment, one foot ahead of the other for balance, looking down at the place where my father had taken his last breath. Where that last breath had been crushed out of him. I felt a lump forming in my throat. Then I went down the rest of the way to the machine.
I didn’t know whether I’d be able to get it back to the barn. The accident might have damaged the engine. When it was flipped over, it was possible all the gas had drained out of the tank. The battery might very well be dead.
Tentatively, I swung a leg over and dropped my butt in the seat. It felt odd, sitting there, knowing I was the first person in this seat since my father. The key was still in the ignition, set to OFF. I went to raise the blade housing, which you put into the down position only when you are actually cutting grass, but it was already up.
I put the choke on full, slid the throttle all the way up, and turned the key.
The engine coughed a couple of times and black smoke puffed out of the exhaust. The damn thing roared to life. I brought the choke back down, eased off the throttle, pushed in the clutch, and dropped the machine into its lowest gear to get it back up the hill.
I held my breath the whole time I was making the climb.
Once I’d crested the hill I drove the tractor to the barn, parked it inside, slid the door shut behind me, and went back into the house.
THOMAS was downstairs, all set to go, at ten. Wearing a blue plaid shirt, olive-colored pants, black shoes, white socks, and a windbreaker the color of a traffic cone.
“Where did you get that jacket?” I asked. “You get a job as a crossing guard?”
“No,” he said blankly. “You know I wouldn’t want a job like that. I don’t like being around little kids.”
“It was a bad joke. Where did you get that?”
“One time, Dad let me go to Walmart to buy some map books, and I saw it on sale. He got it for me.”
“It’s bright,” I said.
“Are you ready to go?”
“We’re a little ahead of schedule,” I said.
“I think we should go.”
“Okay.” I grabbed my own, less fluorescent, sport coat and slipped it on.
We stepped out onto the porch and I locked the front door behind me. I thought Thomas might stand there a moment, to take it all in. There was a cool breeze, but the sun was shining. It was a beautiful day. But Thomas made a beeline for the Audi and yanked on the passenger door handle a couple of times.
“It’s locked,” he said.
“Give me a second.” I dug the remote from my pocket, aimed, and pressed. Thomas got in, put on his seat belt, and watched me impatiently as I came around the car, got in, did up my own belt, and keyed the ignition. The dashboard screen that allowed the driver to monitor dozens of the vehicle’s functions, including the GPS, came to life.
“Okay, how it works is—”
“I can figure it out,” Thomas said. He started turning knobs, touching the screen. “So if I want to enter in an address—”
“You see that thing there? You just—”
“I got it. You put in the city first, right?” I watched him type in “McLean.”
“What are you doing?” Dr. Grigorin’s office was in Promise Falls.
“I want to see what directions it gives for McLean, Virginia,” he said.
“Why the hell would we go to Virginia?” I asked. “That’s hundreds of miles away. The doctor’s ten minutes. Virginia would take us all day.”
“I don’t actually want to go there. I don’t have an appointment or anything. I wanted to see if it would give us the best route.” He studied the screen a moment longer, appeared to get frustrated, and said, “Fine, I’ll enter in the coordinates for the doctor’s office. It’s 2654 Pennington, suite 304.”
“You don’t have to enter the suite number. We’re not mailing her something. We’re driving there.”
Thomas stopped examining the system long enough to look at me. “Do you think I’m stupid?”
The question, coming from anyone else, would have been sarcastic, or confrontational. But Thomas’s tone suggested he was really asking.
“No,” I said. “I don’t. I’m sorry if I came across that way.”
“You think I dress stupid. I could tell. You were making fun of my coat. And now you think I’m too stupid to figure this out.”
“No—I mean, okay, the coat is a bit bright. But I don’t think you’re stupid. You seem to be able to intuit these things almost instantly. Go ahead. Put in the doctor’s address.”
He entered it, waited a couple of seconds for the nav system to figure things out.
“Proceed to the highlighted route,” the car’s computer said.
“That’s Maria,” I said, heading the car down the driveway.
“What?”