Snow light at dusk turns everything faintly blue, and a shoveled path across a front yard reads like a sentence written in it. C & D's Lawncare takes the walks seriously — the steps, the stretch out to the mailbox, the apron at the end of the drive where the plow leaves its ridge. Driveways get cleared, corners get salted, and the ice hiding under fresh powder gets broken up instead of covered over. Small mercies, but they are the ones that decide whether an older neighbor gets the mail that day. Centreville and the communities around it are on the route each time it falls.