The first piece of furniture made at the new Works was a rocking chair.

Dad made it, with an eighteen-year-old apprentice called Lily Sorensen, who'd never touched a chisel before her first day. He showed her how to read the grain. How to find the chair hiding in the wood.

When it was finished, they carved their initials under the seat.

R.H. L.S. Haddon, Michigan.

I drove it to Mom and Dad's house that evening, in the back of Dad's truck, and put it on their porch.

People still ask me why I drive that old truck. I could buy any car I want.

This is why.

Dad bought it new in 1998, with the biggest bonus he ever got from the Works. He drove it to work every day for twenty years. It carried me to North Carolina with one bag. It carried my first nine-hundred-dollar table to Charlotte. It carried every piece of wood I owned for the first three years.

And it carried me home.

The heater only works on high. The tailgate's dented. Brett says it sounds like a lawnmower full of rocks.

But every time I turn the key, I remember where I came from.

And who taught me everything I know.