The Cold Song

by Linn Ullmann

  “I really liked her,” said Alma, who had taken the book from her father and was now flicking through it. “But these pictures don’t look like her at all—I mean even if she is a child here and I only knew her as an adult. She looked so different when she was with us.” She put down the book and looked at Amanda and Mikkel. “She was nice. She taught me to do my makeup, she taught me to do smoky eyes.” Alma fluttered her eyelids. “And I remember us dancing together. And she told me that she believed in God, and she told me that she used to play rock, paper, scissors with you.”

  Alma nodded to Mikkel and Mikkel nodded back.

  “Yes,” Siri said, “we need to talk. But first,” she said, with a wave of her hand, “won’t you have something to eat? Look. It’s all laid out. Help yourselves.”

  And Jon surveyed the table that Siri had set while he and the others had been looking at the book. The little girl stared up at him from the page. He grabbed a slice of bread, took a bite and swallowed. It was good. He said, “We only knew Milla for that one summer.” He turned to Amanda and Mikkel. “But maybe you could tell us a little bit about her. There’s so much we’ve wondered about. So much we don’t know.”

  “But we’ve wondered too,” Amanda said. “We have questions too. That’s why we’re here. We never heard from you, so I sent you messages. Although it’s not like me to send messages like that. It’s not who I am. It’s just that everything was so … nothing was any good. And I have so many questions. And Mikkel has so many questions. And we can’t seem to work this out. We can’t move on.”

  Siri looked at Alma, she looked at Jon and Liv, and she looked at the two who had just arrived, and she saw that they too had helped themselves to food, and then she said, “Couldn’t we just sit here for a while and have something to eat and talk about Milla? Why don’t we do that? Yes,” she said, placing both hands on the table. “Yes,” she said again. “I think that’s what we should do now.”

  LINN ULLMANN is an award-winning author, journalist, and literary critic. Her four novels have been published in more than fifteen languages, all of them critically acclaimed international best sellers: Before You Sleep, Stella Descending, Grace, and A Blessed Child. She lives in Oslo with her husband and children.

  BARBARA J. HAVELAND is a translator of fiction, poetry, and drama by leading Danish and Norwegian writers such as Peter Høeg, Jens Christian Grøndahl, Pia Juul, Morten Søndergaard, Øystein Lønn, Jan Kjærstad, and Merete Morken Andersen. She lives in Denmark.