"A Day's Work"
by Eve Bunting

Student Edition
Unit 2, pp. 178–191

This Snapshot is a story that could really happen.
It is realistic fiction.

Francisco and his abuelo (grandfather) shivered in the early morning air. They were waiting to be chosen to work for the day. Trucks and vans drove by the parking lot.
Francisco's grandfather had just moved from Mexico. He came because Francisco's father had died, and Francisco and his mother were alone. Francisco was with his abuelo today to translate from Spanish into English for him.
A van marked "Benjamin's Gardening" drove up. Francisco ran to be first in line. He motioned toward his grandfather and showed Benjamin his excitement. He called, "You will get two for one."
Ben told Francisco and his abuelo to climb in the back. He would pay them $60 for their work, he said.
Abuelo, in Spanish, said that he didn't know a thing about gardening. He was a carpenter. But Francisco told him gardening is easy. When the van stopped, Ben said they were to weed a big bank of land. He would come back for them at 3:00 p.m.
Francisco pulled up a spiky plant and showed Abuelo. "Just do this," Francisco said. They left the flowers where they were. They worked fast and hard in the hot sun. They had the lunch and water Mama had packed. Francisco thought of how proud she would be. Sixty dollars could buy many things.
He and Abuelo finished pulling all of the weeds. They sat down to wait for Ben.
When he came, he looked at the bank and was shocked. He grew angry and slammed his cap against the van. They had pulled out the good plants and left the weeds!
Abuelo knew something was very wrong. He told Francisco with anger and sadness that the man had hired them on a lie. They knew nothing about gardening.
He told Francisco to tell Ben that they would come back the next day and do the job right. So Francisco told Ben what his grandfather had said. If they came early the plants would survive. They would replant them all and pull out the weeds they had left.
Ben said he would pick them up the next morning. Abuelo let Ben know they wouldn't accept money until they finished the job. And Ben told Francisco that he could use a good man for more than one day's work as a gardener.
Abuelo already knew the most important things about life, Ben said.

A Day's Work by Eve Bunting. Text copyright © 1994 by Eve Bunting. Reprinted by permission of Clarion Books/Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.

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