Dry oak leaves crunched hard under our heavy soles with every step.

“Grandpa put up his first ground blind just past that big fallen birch,” I whispered, pointing my small flashlight into the dark brush.

Dale stopped short, his boots silent on the frost.

“That’d give you a clean look at the edge of the cornfield down below.”

“It does,” I said.

“He spent thirty opening mornings sitting against that very oak.”

“He let my uncle hunt this hill back in ’94,” Dale said after a long silence.