“He teach you that?”
“He made me do it till I swore at him.”
Gus laughed. It came out in a big white cloud.
I climbed up into the cab. The duct tape on the seat was cold through my jeans. Jim’s notebook was still on the dash where Gus had left it. I turned the key, and it coughed, and coughed, and caught.
I don’t plow like Jim did. I go slow and make extra passes. I backed up too far at the Lindgren place and took out a reflector stake. But by six-fifteen the whole circle was open in my headlights.
Then I started on driveways.
Hector first. When I came back up his drive the second time, he was standing in the doorway in his scrubs with a travel mug, and he put his hand flat on his chest and then pointed at me. He was out of there by six-forty.
