Shuddering hard I built up a small fire. My iced-up fingers fumbled the last match, but the kindling caught.
The thin, reluctant smoke shifted in the frigid air.
I pulled a battered paperback from my jacket’s inside pocket. Earlier, in my distant warm kitchen, I’d read a story about a fire that wouldn’t light, and a man that froze stiff.
I paused momentarily, and then, with gritted teeth, I burned the whole book.