By two o'clock on a July afternoon the thunderheads stack up south of town, and everybody working outside in Waycross starts watching the sky and doing the math. Carter's Southeastern Landscaping LLC plans the day around that — mowing and edging while the ground is dry, then bed work, mulch and hedge trimming under whatever shade is left once the rain has moved through. An hour later the steam is coming off the asphalt and the grass has grown a little more, seemingly out of spite. The good part is standing at the curb afterward and seeing bed lines cut sharp against fresh mulch, the whole yard reading as one deliberate thing.