Matt went to the shack’s west side and flipped the wheelbarrow over, taking care to stay away from any critters that may have been living underneath. He had plenty of experience with critters leaping at you when you least expect it. Last year, when he and Trent picked up the canoe from the bottom of the orchard, an ermine ran the length of the vessel and jumped off the bow towards Trent’s head. He’d screamed and dropped the canoe. It had landed on his foot. He’d screamed again. Over the years they’d found snakes in sneakers, weasels in the woodpile, bats in the shack, and mice nestled in boxes of pancake mix. Anything was a candidate for home, and the animals had no problem relocating.

The firewood smelled moldy and had a damp texture. Hard fire tonight, Matt thought as he lifted the quarter-cut logs into the wheelbarrow. As he did, something scurried off the pile, tiny feet pattering on birch bark. Maybe a mouse or weasel. Spiders fled the woodpile each time he removed a log. He’d grab an end, turning it in his hand and inspecting for spiders before grasping all the way.

Hidden in the middle of the woodpile was an axe—its blade protected from the elements by a sleeve made from birchbark and leather strips. Matt yanked the sleeve off, listening to the delicate sweep of the bark, then placed the axe into the wheelbarrow. He checked his pockets for a lighter and smiled as his fingers touched smooth plastic.

Satisfied with his firewood situation, Matt opened shack door and retrieved a copy of the Ironville Daily. He lifted a log on the wheelbarrow, placed the paper underneath, and returned the log. Then he pushed the rig up the path towards the old leaning post. His forearms flexed below his rolled-up checkered flannel, the wrist veins bulging like the broken granite country to the south.

Once at the post he parked the wheelbarrow next to the fire pit. Chunks of slate ringed the pit, hauled up from the Black by his father and Ron ten years ago. The thought of his father hand-picking those rocks out of the river and carrying them up here tightened his chest. He closed his eyes in an effort to shake the memory. There were so many here, a flood of them. He wondered if it was possible to wallow down memory lane and never come back.

He pictured his father trudging uphill from the Black, shirtless and red-faced, glistening rocks in his hands. The call of a crow from the aspen. The gentle roll of wind from the Huron’s. Grasshoppers buzzing in the tall, golden grass. The Yooper.

Miss you, Matt said to the landscape.