Sunrise Farms (III)

            “Weed.”
            “Weed.”
            “Weed.”
            After each time he said “weed”, Blake added a number in his head.
            “Weed.” 4,214.
            “Weed.” 4,215.
            Each night he carefully entered his day’s total into a small notebook, totaling as he went. In three years at Sunrise Farms, he had pulled a little over nine million weeds. It was his self-imposed penance; only when he had pulled ten million little plants out of the soil would he allow himself to return home and enroll in the last class he needed to earn his high school diploma. He combed through a zucchini plant. Soon, now.
            “Weed.” 4,528.