"How hard can it be?"
Very. The answer is very.
The first weed I grab comes up too easily. I stumble backward, a handful of leaves in my fist and the root still in the ground.
Diesel makes a sound.
The second weed fights back. I pull. It pulls. I brace my feet and yank with everything I have, and the thing snaps in half, sending me onto my ass in the dirt.
This time the sound is definitely a laugh—low and rough, rusty from disuse.
"Shut up."
"Didn't say anything."
"You were thinking it." I push myself up, brushing dirt off the borrowed jeans. "Show me the right way, then."
He hesitates. Even in the dark, I can see him weighing it—distance, touch, all the ways this could go wrong.
Then he moves toward me.
"You're grabbing too high." He doesn't look at me. "Get down at the base. Where it meets the dirt."
He crouches next to one of the remaining weeds. Even crouching, he's enormous—a shadow against shadows, hands dwarfing the plant.
"See? Base." He wraps his fingers around the stem right where it emerges from the soil. "Then you don't pull. You twist and lift. Loosens the roots."
He demonstrates. The weed comes up clean.
"Twist and lift," I repeat.
I crouch next to the nearest weed, grab the base, and twist.
Nothing.
"Harder."
I twist harder. The stem bends but doesn't give.
"Your grip's wrong." He's behind me now—I didn't hear him move, but I don't flinch. "Here."
His hands cover mine.
I stop breathing.
They engulf my fingers completely, repositioning them with a gentleness that doesn't match his size. I feel him shift behind me—slow, careful—keeping his chest away from my bad shoulder.
He noticed. He remembered.
"Like this," he says, and his voice has dropped. Rougher now. "Thumb here. Fingers here. Then twist."
The heat of him at my back. Not touching—he's too careful for that—but close enough that warmth bleeds through the henley he's been wearing all day. His breath stirs my hair.
His hands tighten over mine. We twist together. The weed comes up, roots and all.
Neither of us moves.
I should say something. Make a joke. Break whatever this is.
