Buddy put me with Lonny on the orchard stretch. Forty hooks, the longest and dullest bit of the path, and nobody walks past it.
I found out much later — at the party, off Beamy's envelope — that Buddy did that on purpose and did it early, before the pairing got as far as the end of the line where the two of us were standing. Buddy never said. I do not think Buddy was ever going to say.
Lonny talked. I did not, for a while, and Lonny did not seem to mind, which is the only test that matters. Somewhere around hook four Lonny said "want to be friends?" and I said we already were, and I meant it, and it came out quite easily, which surprised both of us.