It faces west, just as it always has—toward the bay, the pines, and the slow hush of Clearwater Lake. The chair is empty now, but not forgotten. Once, it creaked beneath a man who knew this place by heart. He watched loons dive and clouds unravel. Counted stars. Nodded at passing moose like neighbors. Maybe he spoke to no one. Maybe he said everything without a word.

Now the sky burns green above the glassy water, and the rocking chair waits in silence. No hands grip its arms. No boots rest near its legs. But it holds memory in its curve—the kind of memory that flickers in starlight and lingers in wood grain.

He may be gone. But the wilderness he loved still shows up every night, just in case he returns to sit and watch the aurora one last time.