We made three budgets. One assumed the John Deere passed its remaining tests and helped us work the spring acreage. The second assumed it could handle lighter tasks but needed additional repairs before serious field work. The third assumed it could not be used at all that season, in which case Grandma would negotiate a temporary arrangement with the Atwoods and lease a portion of the hay ground. None of the plans made us rich. But having three options meant one broken piece of equipment no longer had the power to end every conversation.
James reviewed the budgets when he visited in February. He came with a folder of agricultural contacts and stayed long enough to help Grandma make sense of two different offers from buyers interested in the summer hay. One wanted to pay less but would handle collection. The other offered a better price if we could mow, bale, and stack to his schedule. Mr. Atwood advised us to account for fuel and the cost of borrowing or hiring the additional equipment we did not own. Our farm could not afford to confuse gross sales with actual money left after a job.
I listened from the kitchen table, using a calculator for arithmetic that would have made me roll my eyes in school. Every number was connected to something visible: a load of fuel, a bale of hay, a field of grass, a property-tax installment due in summer. I had spent months thinking that bringing the tractor back to life was the goal. Now I understood that the goal was making the farm function well enough that Grandma had choices next year.
At the end of the meeting James asked me what I thought. I showed him the three budgets and explained which one frightened me most. He nodded and said fear was sometimes useful when it reminded a person to prepare for an outcome they didn't want. Then he asked if I'd been attending my regular classes and finishing my assignments. I groaned, and Grandma laughed for the first time that afternoon.
School remained school no matter how often adults in town called me the tractor kid. The lessons continued. I still had spelling tests, projects, and days when I lost my lunch money and had to explain it to Mrs. Calder. Lucas Fenner eventually came to see the John Deere on a Saturday afternoon with his father, who worked at a local tire shop. Lucas stared at the restored engine for a long time, then asked a series of questions so earnestly that I forgot he'd ever made fun of me.
"I said something stupid back in November," he admitted while the adults inspected a tire. "About your farm."
"Yeah," I said.
He scuffed his shoe against the shed floor. "I didn't know what was going on."
"You could have asked," I answered.
He nodded. After a moment he offered to help sort the unlabeled nuts and bolts we'd inherited from Grandpa's workshop. I told him we already had labels for most of them, but he could help organize the tools if he wanted. We spent an hour arranging sockets, spanners, and the little drawers of washers by size. It was an ordinary Saturday afternoon, and by the end neither of us mentioned the old joke again.