The Atlantic is only about fifteen miles east of here, close enough that a winter storm can never quite make up its mind — rain on the beaches, wet snow at Freehold, and the line between them wandering all night. Century Landscape watches that line for a living. When the storm commits, the trucks go out and the driveways, lots and walkways get opened, salted where they need it, and checked again if the wind keeps drifting them shut. There is a particular quiet to a plowed driveway at five in the morning, steam coming off the asphalt, the whole street still buried. Getting somebody out of their house and onto the road on time is the entire point of the work.