“If it won’t start, you have to pull the choke out,” Herb says pointing at the black knob to the right of the steering wheel. “Pull it out, it starts, you push it back in. Got it?”
Laney looks at her arthritic hands gripped around the steering wheel of the mower.
“Got it?” Herb asks again.
Laney nods. Herb stands beside the mower leaning over as much as he can so he is shoulder to shoulder with her. He bends over and touches the pedal on the right foothold of the mower.
“I need to make sure you’re gettin’ all this. Gonna be start’n her up in a moment. This makes it go forward’n if you move your foot back,” Herb says, gently grabbing Laney’s brown gardening boot and sliding her foot back, exposing an underside pedal, “you press this’n it goes in reverse.”
Laney watches Herb circle around the front of the mower, silhouetted in the doorway of the shed against the late morning light. A silhouette once tall, broad shouldered and powerful now warped, still tall but hunched by time and gravity. Herb points to the pedal on the left side of the mower.
“Go ahead’n push that one down,” Herb says.
Laney places her left boot on the pedal and pushes down.
“Keep pushin’ til it locks.”
Laney pushes but it won’t lock. She feels a strain in the back of her knee and lets up.
“You gotta push it down hard for it to lock.”
“It hurts.”
“Well,” Herb removes his John Deer cap with the meshed back and scratches the scalp under his gray hair. “You gotta be able to lock the brake, Hun. Look, scoot your backside up the seat, use your weight. You ain’t no spring chicken no more, Hun, you’re gonna hurt yourself.”
Laney pushes down on the lever again scooting her butt to the edge of the seat to put all her weight on her leg. It locks.
“That’s it, smarter not harder,” Herb says. He points at a yellow pull lever left of the steering wheel. “Pull that to unlock it.”
Laney stares at Herb, he looks at her, to the yellow lever, and back at her, “Go ahead’n pull it.”
Laney pulls the lever and the pedal pops back to its original position.
“That’s your basic controls,” Herb says. “We’ve opened the hood, checked the oil level, gas level’n we’re gonna go ahead’n start’er up.”
Laney is glad the shed is cool, the air coming through the door of the shed is brisk. An old season is giving way to a new one. The shed smells of clean lumber. She turns the key, the mower sputters and dies.
“Don’t forget your choke, Hun,” Herb says.
Laney pulls out the black choke knob, it extends exposing the skinny metal bar. She turns the key and the mower sputters, catches, and revs higher and higher, the deafening roar echoes off the walls of the shed. Herb shouts over the high-pitched roar of the mower and pushes the choke back in.
“You gotta push it in quick,” says Herb.
The engine calms, then purrs. Laney smells gas and oil.
“Alright, now you’re off. Meet you 'round front of the house,” he says waving her on.
Laney waits for Herb to leave the shed, but he stays, continuing to wave her forward. She pushes down on the pedal with her right boot, but she pushes down too fast. The mower lurches forward out of the shed. The sunlight slams onto her as she struggles to keep her butt on the seat. She can hear Herb yelling but cannot make out what he is saying and does not care. She is panicked trying to make the wild gas-powered beast behave. Laney gains control of the mower just in time for her to steer clear of the blue 1987 pick-up truck with paint flaking away revealing the red brown rust underneath. Herb catches up with her and has her stop completely. He struggles to catch his breath. There is a deep sweet smell of dying leaves on the breeze.
“Gently on the pedal now, Hun,” Herb says.
Laney pushes gently, a slight lurch, then steadily along the side of the house in the grass beside the flower bed below the off-white siding. Herb walks beside her. He’s swimming in the button up plaid shirt he used to fill out. They reach the front yard and Herb shows her where to park right alongside the driveway. He points at another lever.
“You’re gonna have to use some muscle with this’n,” Herb says.
He grabs the lever and pulls sideways, then down so it moves down the numbered notches. The mower deck lowers to the desired number and Herb pushes it sideways into the corresponding notch.
“Scooch forward’n use your weight.”
“Can’t that just stay where it needs to be to mow?”
“Not if you’re gonna take it into that shed. This mower needs to come up to here,” Herb says as he points to the highest number.
Laney feels the free weight of the mower deck as she raises and lowers it. Her muscles burn as she pulls the lever into the notch.
“This’n starts those blades turnin’,” Herb says as he points to another lever.
The mower deck shoots out the blades of grass, dead leaves crunch and thinly spread over the lawn. Herb stands with his hands on the back of his hips, his arms bent. She steps down on the pedal moving herself forward nice and slow. She looks back to see the line she made in the grass. Looking ahead and across the road, Laney sees a combine harvesting a soybean field.
Laney thinks ahead to when the trees have buds on the branches and the farmers till the field across the road; the plow kicking up dust and a flock of seagulls following it, plucking worms from the upturned earth. She can hear someone yell over the roar of the mower. She looks back. Herb is gone.
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