Rash said he would be around the northern ridge. So I went to the trees and walked north until the trunks thinned out, and there he was. Then he was walking, and I was walking after him, the way you follow someone through a crowd when you are not sure you are welcome.

He stopped to work. I stopped a few steps away.

I told him I had found him, near enough, and that I was going to try his advice right there, if he did not mind the company. Then I picked a tree and stepped into the swing. Legs, not arms. Let the axe fall.

It is still not easy. Two logs this time, not four. But my wrists stayed quiet, and the second one came down cleaner than anything I cut before.

When I looked up he was already moving off through the trees.

That was fine. For a few minutes, we worked the same forest side by side.