Jonah turned fourteen the spring after that, and one Saturday he came inside from the yard and told me, almost offhand, that he'd watched Mr. Whitfield try to walk his own trash can down to the curb and nearly go down twice doing it.
The next morning, without asking me and without asking Arthur, Jonah pushed our mower across the street and cut through grass that had gotten so tall it was starting to seed.
He didn't ask for money. He didn't ask permission first, either — he told me afterward he'd been worried Arthur would say no if he asked, so he figured it was easier to just do it and let the old man object if he wanted to.
Arthur never objected.
Every single Saturday for four years after that, rain delaying it by a day here and there but never stopping it outright, Jonah crossed Hollowbrook Lane and mowed that lawn. Through July heat that made the mower's engine smell hot by the second pass, through October mornings cold enough that his breath showed in front of him, he was out there.
