I gaze up at a small oak tree that I’ve been watching for a while. It’s right on the edge of Ms. Markie’s property, and it died a few years ago. I pick up the limbs that fall off it every time we have a storm, but now it’s looking like it’s going to fall. It’s time to cut it down.
After I finish blowing the leaves out of the yard and off the porches, I get my chainsaw out and walk to the backyard. I cut a notch in the small tree and give it a shove. It does exactly what I expected it to do: it falls straight across the backyard. Now that it’s down, I have to get it out of the way. I look down at my watch. I never had lunch, and I’m starving. Ms. Markie always feeds me when I come to do her yard, so I know there will be food. I just need to finish this tree before I can get to it.
I cut the limbs off and drag them all to my trailer, stacking them at the front where the big mower doesn’t take up all the space. Then I go back and cut up the trunk and the bigger limbs, and I stack the wood from the old oak tree in a neat pile next to the backyard shed. By the time I’m done, I’ve worked up a sweat and my stomach is growling. I peel off my work gloves and toss them into the front seat of my Jeep, and I bend my head to smell my armpits. I can’t remember the last time I cared how I smelled. I work hard every day. I don’t have time to worry about how much I stink at the end of the day. If I’m going to quote a job or meet with a client, I plan it for early in the day, or on a weekend.
But right now, I care about how I smell. I lift my shirt again, sniffing it. I reek. I smell like last week’s sweat. I reach behind my seat and pull out a clean t-shirt, then I pull the dirty one over my head. And of course when I get the dirty shirt off, she walks up.
“Do you get naked for all your clients?” she asks. “Or just for my grandma?” Evie crosses her arms and smirks at me across the hood of my Jeep.
“Your grandma’s pretty special,” I say. I stand there with my shirt off, fluffing the clean one in front of me, unfolding it and snapping the wrinkles out. “One time this summer, when it was about a hundred and two degrees outside, I took my shirt off while I cleaned her gutters, and she came outside and took my picture.”
She lets out a laugh. “I know,” she says. “It’s still stuck to the fridge.”
Huh. I never saw it. “Was it a good picture?”
“Depends on if you like big beefy hunks who have tanned sweaty chests,” she says. Her neck gets a little splotchy as she says it.
“You think I’m a big beefy hunk?” I ask with a grin, suddenly feeling like I’m about ten feet tall.
“No, I think you just have a sweaty chest,” she tosses back. She jerks her thumb toward the backyard. “Thank you for taking that tree down for her. She’s been worried about it, since winter is coming.”
I shake my head. “She doesn’t have to worry about anything as long as I’m here.” And that’s the truth. I’d do just about anything for Ms. Markie. I’ve moved furniture, cleaned gutters, installed flooring, replaced broken windows, and I even dusted the tops of her kitchen cabinets because I didn’t want her to have to climb a ladder to do it herself.
“Well, thank you anyway,” she says. And she sounds so genuinely appreciative that it’s almost startling.
“You’re welcome,” I reply with a nod.
“Grandma said you should come in for dinner. She sent me to get you.”
I pull the clean t-shirt over my head and tuck it into my jeans. “I’ll be right there.” I get out my record book and make a record of my visit, just so I can keep up with the miles for my taxes. I don’t charge Ms. Markie to come and cut her grass. She’s family. If she even tried to pay me, I’d have to give it back. I’ve been cutting Ms. Markie’s grass since long before I had my own business. I started when I was about twelve and I’ve been doing it ever since. Although I must admit it’s a whole lot easier to do it with f
ancy equipment than it used to be when I used my dad’s old push mower. He’d made me buy that used push mower from him when he’d upgraded to a self-propelled model. I’d used it for three years, until I’d made enough money to buy a newer, and better, one. That was how I’d come by all my equipment. I used what I had until I could do better.
Before closing the door of my Jeep, I grab Ms. Markie’s apron, which I had washed and ironed, from the hook on the back window, so I can return it to her.
“I got some good news today,” I blurt out as I walk beside Evie to the front door.
“Do tell,” she says as she smiles at me.
“I got a big contract today.”
She tilts her head as her smile grows. “Really? Where at?”
“That new bottling plant down by the highway. They need somebody to do their grounds maintenance. I bid on it and I got it.”
“Wow, that sounds great. But…can you do all that by yourself?”
I shake my head. “I’ll have to hire at least a couple of people to help me, but it’ll be worth it.” This is my first commercial job and I’m happy as hell to have gotten it.
“Congratulations, Grady,” she says. “I’m really proud of you. You’ve become quite an entrepreneur.”
Ms. Markie has a plate of fresh biscuits on the table when I walk in the kitchen, so I go over and kiss her forehead, and then I wash my hands at the sink. Ms. Markie can’t stand dirty hands at her table. I walk to the pantry and hang Ms. Markie’s apron, the one I borrowed the day Evie and I had to go to the police station, on the little hook she has there so she can find it later.
“Grady just landed a big paying job,” Evie says. She jerks her thumb toward me. “He might be too busy to take care of your yard soon, Grandma.” She laughs and winks at me. And I am absolutely stunned at how beautiful she is when she does it. So stunned that I can barely take my eyes off her.
Ms. Markie scoffs. “I’m not worried about him abandoning me.” She picks up the plate of biscuits and holds it out toward me. I take two off the top, because I have two hands, and take a huge bite out of one of them. Ms. Markie makes the best homemade biscuits in Macon Hills. They’re even better than my mama’s, even though I’d never tell Mama that. At least not if I want to live another day. “He loves my cooking too much to quit on me.”
“True,” I say as I take a seat. Ms. Markie has made a pile of fat back, a pot of pinto beans, and she’s cut up a plate of the tiniest onion pieces I’ve ever seen to put on my pinto beans. I’ll have heartburn for a week, but it’ll be worth it.