It's 9AM
On Friday, I must mow.
It’s not my favorite task to do.
I’m not a suburban dad who likes to spend time trimming and edging and shaping.
It’s just not my thing.
The first thing I did when we moved into this house was spread clover across the side and back yard.
Clover feeds rabbits and deer and even though suburban sprawl is sprawling all around us, there is still wildlife.
And they come to my yard to feast.
The downside of going back to a more natural native grasses and flowers is that when the weather hits fifty or above, and the sun shines, everything blooms.
False spring is upon us and the fields of clover are growing tall.
Which puts me into the first full week of February with an hour blocked out in garage time to do mower maintenance.
Sure, I could hire someone to do it.
The mowing, the trimming, and the whole caboodle.
But I am of the mindset of using it as meditation, and after all, it’s just an hour to do front and back and another hour to run the weedeater across the edges.
I might not even have to eat the weeds, because of the aforementioned false spring.
Winter will come again.
We were promised an early spring by the fat rat in Pennsylvania, but the Farmer’s Almanac said wet and cold and lots of snow.
We had a week of it.
I suspect another is coming.
Hiding on the horizon, ready to ride an atmospheric river in and dump six white inches all over the landscape.
I could wait for it.
Let the grass grow a little longer, let it linger and allow Mother Nature to crop it at her will and leisure.
Or nip it now and see what happens later.
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Plus keep reading below for an exclusive excerpt:
“Amigo,” said Brill. “I’m sorry for what the world has taught you.”
The man duct taped to the chair glared at him.
He tried to speak, but the words couldn’t get past the wad in his mouth.
“I know,” Brill shook his head. “You want to curse, you want to pretend that you are tough. A bad man created from bad circumstances.”
He leaned over and snapped open a six inch folding blade. He sliced the fabric of the man’s designer jeans and kept the blade moving all the way to the toe of his sock.
Then he lifted the tip and sliced along the other side.
He removed the sock and folded up the flaps of the jeans.
“Did they teach you how to resist torture in your military training?” Brill asked.
He held up the blade on the edge of his knee so the man could see it.
“Or are you a street soldier? Trained in the school of hard knocks?”
The man screamed behind the gag again.
Perhaps it was a denial, or even a shout of defiance.
Brill sighed.
“Doesn’t matter. You think torture starts with punches. Beatings meant to break the spirit and break the will. It might work, but like I said, you’re a tough guy. Tough guys can take a lot of hard knocks.”
He leaned down again and slipped the tip of the blade into the man’s leg above his ankle.
Blood drizzled down the exposed flesh as the man strapped to the chair bucked and screamed.
“I’m going to deglove your foot,” said Brill. “Do you know this word? I don’t know what it is in Spanish, sorry.”
He held up a hand and demonstrated with the knife.
“I’m going to pull the skin off your foot, like a glove.”
He had to wait for the muffled shrieking to stop after a moment.
“It’s going to save a lot of time,” he said. “Time we don’t have. And if you don’t tell me where she is when I’ve done that, I’m going to do it for the other foot. Then your right hand. Then your left. But I think you’ll tell me before that.”
Brill shifted forward and pressed the tip of the blade into the leaking wound that already existed.
“Or we can skip to the part where you answer me, and keep your pound of flesh.”
He tapped the skin on the man’s shin and stared at him, letting him look into the dark black eyes.
The sicario flinched.
He couldn’t be blamed.
Almost everyone did.
He made a sound behind the gag again.
Not a scream, but a high pitched groan of surrender.
And then he talked.
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