Free The Year Money Grew on Trees by Aaron Hawkins

and the tractor moving slowly forward. He was shouting triumphantly and turning onto the dirt road in front of our houses. Very quickly, he seemed to lose his nerve. I think he realized that he didn't know how to stop. He swerved toward our house, and the tractor rammed into the '64 Barracuda my dad had parked out front. Luckily it wasn't in working condition. The tractor sputtered to a stop, and Sam jumped off, his eyes wide.
    There was some mild swearing from my dad and uncle. Then my uncle started laughing, probably because none of his cars were hit. My aunt kept repeating, "I knew this was going to happen." Surprisingly, our dads agreed to show Amy and me how to drive the tractor after that, including shifting into all the gears. I think they must have felt a little guilty. By the time it got dark, we could start it, back it up, and make all kinds of turns. There was something thrilling about going down a road in third gear at ten miles per hour, the wind not exactly blowing in your hair, but at least whispering in it.
    ***
    Monday afternoon we drove the tractor and wagon into the orchard for the first time, barely missing trees as we pulled into the first row. We loaded up one and a half piles of pruned branches into the wagon, drove them out to the desolate land, and pushed them off next to some sun-bleached mounds of branches that looked
like they had been there for twenty years. After two or three rows, Amy and I had gotten pretty good at turning around trees and avoiding ditches. When it got dark, we left the tractor in the orchard for the night and headed home.
    When we tried to start it the next day, it wouldn't turn over. We tried every combination of choke and throttle we could think of, but nothing seemed to work. Uncle David arrived home from work before my dad, and we begged him to come help us get the engine started again. After a few attempts of his own, he jumped off the bouncy metal seat.
    "I was afraid of this," he said in disgust.
    "What?" Amy and I said at the same time with worried voices.
    "This thing has a weird problem that we've never been able to figure out." He looked in the gas tank. "Yep. She's got plenty of gas," he said, shaking his head. He looked at me, then at Amy, then back at me. "Okay, Jackson, watch carefully. I'm going to show you what you have to do if this happens." He went to the side of the tractor where the engine was exposed and loosened a screw that was holding a flexible hose line in place. He pulled the end of the hose out from where it was connected and turned back to me.
    "I don't know why, but the gas line gets clogged every so often. There must be dirt or something in it. You have
to suck on this end until the line gets clear and the gas comes out." He held the line out to me. I backed up and shook my head.
    "If you're going to use the tractor, you have to be able to keep it running."
    I looked around. My cousins were staring at me with their eyes bugging out, watching to see if I would take the hose. I really wanted to say no, but I knew I couldn't ask anyone else to do it.
    "All right," I said weakly.
    I put the hose in my mouth. It tasted like a terrible combination of rubber, oil, and dirt. I closed my eyes and sucked. Suddenly my mouth filled up with a burning, awful-tasting liquid. I dropped the hose and spit. Bending over, I kept spitting to try and get the taste out of my mouth. I wanted to throw up.
    When I looked up again, my uncle was putting the hose back into position.
    "Very good," he said, "now just stick it back in and screw it tight."
    "Is swallowing gas bad for you?" I gasped between spits.
    "Oh, probably. It hasn't killed me yet," he said without much concern. Amy, Sam, and Michael looked down on me with sympathetic eyes. Amy tried the tractor again, and it started right up.
    "Thanks, Daddy," she called.
    ***
    My mouth tasted like gas for the next two days. We made good progress on the branches, though, especially on Saturday when Lisa and Jennifer