On Friday morning, I woke to a lawn mower outside, a sound of order in the world, of adults taking care of things. A full week had passed since the night in the car. Mom had been working, and Marie and Ellen had mostly stayed in our room, Ellen resting and Marie sorting through her stuff and keeping an eye on how Ellen was. The rumble of the engine rose and fell while the sun moved to light the wall beside me. I could almost smell the cut grass. The machine reached a crescendo, and I heard the jolt when it hit a rock. It was outside my window. I sat up. Someone was cutting our lawn. For a moment I felt happy. I stepped across Ellen, who was sleeping on the lower trundle, and looked out the window. I could see the line the lawn mower had made past the window and down at the end of the driveway, where the quartz boulders could be seen whole again. I thought my mother must have organized it.

Downstairs in the kitchen Thomas was hunched over his cereal at the table. He had broad shoulders from swimming and looked older than sixteen. He’d been shaving for a year. We all stood around the sink and watched the first night he did it, Marie giving instructions.

“Fuck’s sake, Libby. Did you do this?”

“Do what?”

“GI Joe out there.” Thomas pushed the cereal away. “He’s a creep. I told you I was going to ask the Griffiths to borrow their lawn mower and just wheel it down. Why couldn’t you just wait?”

I went to the front door and looked out right as Wilson McVay passed. He was wearing jeans and had taken off his white T-shirt and slung it over his shoulder. He looked like one of those men in the Levi’s ads, rugged and beautiful. Except it was Wilson. He waved at me when he passed again, flashing a smile, and I felt sick. I went back into the kitchen.

“I have nothing to do with this. Has Mom gone to work already? Does she know?”

But Thomas slammed the plastic bowl and spoon into the sink and stamped up the stairs.

I ran up to Beatrice’s room and looked out the window over the driveway. Mr. McVay’s Buick was parked there, with the trunk open and a can of gasoline on the drive. A rake was leaning against the passenger door.

I went back into our bedroom.

“Marie. Marie, wake up.” I shook her.

“What? Shit, what time is it?” Marie rolled onto her side and leaned up on her elbow and yawned. “What?”

“Did you ask Wilson McVay to cut the grass?”

“No. Why?”

The sound of the lawn mower passed again, and Marie sat up fully and leaned against the wall.

“Whoa. Wilson is cutting our lawn?”