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he’d lost something down there. I could see the night bugs pinging against the gas lamp, and Albert’s wheelchair was just outside the glow, leaned against the fender. There were other bugs—lightning—out near the river, as many as I could recall seeing that summer, and they flashed on quick and faded slow, and there was a gray mist creeping up into the yard from below. Across the water some kids were playing basketball in the dark. I couldn’t see the game, but I could hear the ball and the rattle of the chain, the shouts here and there.I went down and sat up on the engine with Albert. He was twelve years older than me and looked it that night. I cleared away some beer bottles to make a space. The oil in the pan made the air seem sweet and sharp, and I tipped the lantern in so he could see.
    He was scrubbing something down there in the dark with an old toothbrush, and he was really going at it. Like he was almost there, whatever he was working on. He had two fuel pumps—one new, one old—set up on the alternator, and his black hair, pulled back and waist long, sheened in the light.
    â€œThought I’d surprise you,” he said.
    â€œI don’t need any surprises.”
    He looked up at me. He had eyes the same color as his hair, and they were not yet drunk, like they usually were, this time of night.
    â€œYou’re not sure what you need,” he said.
    Maybe that was true. He’d sensed my mood, as he often did. I was believing I needed to hold on to whatever I still had, and I told him as much.
    â€œThat’s a road to ruin,” he said. He was smiling. There was always something about me that he found funny.
    â€œI could use one of those,” I said.
    â€œI’ve been working on a joke,” he said.
    â€œAll right,” I said. “I’m ready.”
    He handed me the new pump and turned the lantern up, traded the toothbrush for a wrench. I squinted in the brightness.
    â€œSo the farmer comes back in from the barn,” he said. “And he sees all these empty bottles on the table, and one of the cowboys looks up and says to him: ‘You got anything else? Seems like we’re even more thirsty now.’”
    I shook my head, but I laughed a little. I was nervous, I guess. “What was in the bottles?”
    â€œI’m working on that,” he said, and he caught what he was looking for with the wrench. I could hear it click into place. “You used to be the joke teller,” he said.
    â€œThose were kid’s jokes.”
    He tensed up, trying to get the bolt loose. “Okay, old man,” he said.
    We got that fuel pump in there eventually. We filled the oil back up, and then I caught him under the arms and eased him down into the chair. He wheeled around in the mud and helped himself into the driver’s seat. He’d done it plenty times before. The jeep was a convertible, though we didn’t have the top. Most important, it had hand controls. Ma had found it somewhere in Virginia, and it had gotten Albert around enough to hold a job delivering the paper. But that hadn’t lasted. There was always something breaking down.
    When he turned the key it started right up. A plume of blue-white smoke blew out from the back. I took his tools down from the engine and closed the hood. It was almost ten o’clock. The headlights switched on and lit up the stretch of dead grass, and a cat who’d been watching us from the driveway flattened itself against the gravel, then just as quick disappeared into the trees.
    So Albert was happy there behind the wheel, listening to the engine. Happy as I’d seen him in a while. He turned on the radio, set the seat back. The engine sounded like it was deciding between quitting and staying. I got the broom and set to sweeping out the seats. They were all full of leaves. I wondered if there might be a bird back there. I swept over and around my brother, and he was looking up at