by Karen Swan
Things had been easy between them. They had talked, even laughed, he had introduced her to various people from the village and it constantly surprised her to see not only how popular he was, but how fiercely loved too. Everyone slapped his shoulder that little bit harder, holding on to him that little bit longer, as though he was precious, rare. People had begun dancing too, but she and he had stood and watched from the sidelines, talking intently and trying not to look as embarrassed as they felt. It was the only time things had felt awkward between them. Personally, she wouldn’t have minded a dance, she felt in the mood to let go and buoyed up by the festive spirit here, but unlike Zac – who had been known to drop into a Caterpillar in the supermarket if the right song came on – it went without saying that Anders wasn’t a dancer; even with his friends, there was a reserve to him that felt bulletproof, nothing could infiltrate. The old version she had seen of him in his Instagram profile might have danced, but not this one.
She had swayed a little though, she had let her head feel heavy on her neck as she enjoyed the vibe. But then the noise had started to come in via her back pocket, a static that steadily drowned out the music. She had wanted to convey the night for what it was: a cosy, local Christmas party – nothing staged or aspirational, just an old-fashioned community celebration with children baking gingerbreads and decorating the tree, Abba in the background and old ladies sitting in chairs by the fire. So how had that somehow been construed as her cheating on Zac?
One comment had been all it took to trigger the landslide. ‘OMG see how he looks at her.’ It had been posted on the first video as she’d filmed Anders ladling the porridge; he’d only been in shot for a couple of seconds and for most of that he was scowling. What were these people seeing that she wasn’t? Clearly something, because plenty of others had taken up the cry too, wanting the details, demanding to know where Zac was, who ‘the hell this guy’ was, had they split?
It had killed the party dead, for them both. Anders’ easy good mood had faltered as the accusations had continued to flood her feed, visibly upsetting her, causing her to withdraw. And it only tainted things further when he was drawn into the virtual fray too; she regretted tagging his details, for no doubt some of the haters would target his page directly too and what if his girlfriend saw it? What would she think to see him drawn into this mess?
Bo had kept the troll’s comment from him. She felt shamed by it somehow. Not for Him the triplicate question marks and disembodied shock; no emojis or online emoting. Slut. It was a label. A judgement. A verdict – taking the smile from her face and the shine off her evening. She had asked to leave, both ruining his night and offending him in the process.
She stood back as he retrieved the key from under a rock by the wall and they walked into the quiet, dark house. The last embers of the fire in the sitting room cast a thin veil of flickering light across the floor and bled a little into the hall. She took off her coat and boots, watching his back as he moved into the kitchen.
‘Want a drink?’ he asked.
‘No, I’m fine,’ she mumbled, knowing she’d had enough. Possibly already too much. Aquavit and antibiotics didn’t mix. She went and stood by the kitchen door.
‘I meant like a coffee or cocoa,’ he said tersely, glancing back at her. ‘You should have something to warm you up again. It’s cold out there and you’re still not well.’
‘Are you my nurse now, as well as guide and bodyguard?’
He shot her an inscrutable look as he went over to the fridge and took out the milk.
‘What?’ she asked testily, the buzz from the schnapps suddenly an agitation; she felt upset. Angry. Humiliated. The online abuse was a virtual scream in her face and now he was being tricky with her? ‘Why do you always look at me like that?’
‘Like what?’
‘Like . . . I’m ridiculous.’
His brow creased further. ‘I don’t think that.’
‘It sure looks like you think that. Anytime you see me doing my job you give me this look of sort of . . . weary despair.’
‘Well, I’m sorry if it seems that way,’ he said, pouring the milk into a pan. ‘You are of course free to live and work however you want.’
‘But you don’t approve,’ she pushed.
He gave her a direct stare then. ‘Do you need me to?’
‘No,’ she said defiantly.
‘Exactly.’ He walked back to the fridge, returning the milk.
She watched him, feeling like he was trying to provoke her with his constant calmness; his lack of response to anything, ever, felt exaggerated. Unnatural. He took a jar of cocoa from the cupboard and heaped a couple of spoonfuls into two mugs, stirring the milk as it began to heat. There was such precision in his movements. Control. ‘Why are you so disapproving of me?’ she said again, pushing him for an answer, refusing to move on. ‘I want to know.’
He looked at her squarely then, his too blue eyes boring into her. ‘. . . I simply do not understand why you would continue to put yourself in such a vulnerable position.’
‘I’m not vulnerable!’
‘You are being harassed by a man who once broke into your bedroom and you have just received countless insults and hate mail from strangers. I saw it happening, how it upset you. It is madness to put yourself through it.’
‘But it’s not, I’m used to it. It’s nothing. And he’s nothing. He’s not real.’
‘He’s real all right,’ Anders said with a worrying tone.
Bo stared at him as she felt her heart jack-knife. Why would he say that? Was he trying to frighten her? She felt hot tears press against her already hot eyes; her medication was wearing off. She needed to go to bed, she knew. And yet—
‘It must be so nice being you, Anders. Living a life where everything’s simple and stress-free, looking down on the rest of us. I mean, you’ve just got it all figured out, haven’t you? You’re a veritable saint – coming back here to look after your grandmother, living on muesli and hiking mountains by day, keeping a drawer for your hot girlfriend.’ His darting glance was like a warning, making her heart pound harder, but she couldn’t stop. ‘Admit it – that’s really why you’re upset. You think she’s going to see those comments and wonder if perhaps what all those people are saying about us is true. You’re not concerned about me being upset or vulnerable. You’re angry with me because I just made your life complicated, that worst of things.’
‘I’m not angry with you,’ he replied but she watched as he stared into the pan, stirring the milk with furious concentration. Her words were hitting their mark.
‘What’s your girlfriend’s name, anyway?’
He didn’t answer and Bo got the message instantly: she was off-limits.
‘Okay, then – why did you leave Oslo?’ There was provocation in the question, in her voice, and as his head whipped round, she saw she had a genuine response from him. Finally. She had seen the way he had frozen when the topic had come up earlier. Why was he so cagey about it? People left small villages for big cities all the time. They left the cities again too. What was the big deal? ‘If your girlfriend is still there, why did you come back here?’
He turned away again but she could see a pulse in his jaw now as he poured the milk carefully into the mugs before bringing it over to her. ‘Take this to bed with you. It’ll help settle your sleep.’
Settle her sleep? She looked incredulously at the mug he was holding out to her. ‘You’re not my mother.’
He stared back at her impassively, less than a foot away. He smelled of soap and . . . trees. Woodland. A smudge of engine grease. Suddenly he felt big, standing there, his masculinity and unspoken physical power a growing awareness between them. ‘No. But apparently she’d like me.’
Ordinarily, it was the kind of dry response that would at least elicit a glimmer of amusement in his eyes. But there was nothing. Contrary to appearances, she saw he was angry too; the very composition of him had changed, as though his muscles were made of stone.
‘Why won’t you answer my question?’ she demanded, refusing to let him wriggle off the hook, deploring how her stomach floored every time he turned his gaze to hers. She saw the way his eyes travelled over her face, as though trying to see beyond the skin, to understand her.
‘Because this isn’t about me.’
‘Yes it is,’ she said belligerently. ‘I asked you a question and I’d like an answer.’
‘No, you’re upset, a little bit drunk and you’d like an argument.’ He pressed the cup into her hand and walked past her with his own. ‘Turn the lights off when you come up.’
Chapter Sixteen
‘Baby, you’re back!’ Zac’s arms folded around her, his voice in her hair, even as the rotor blades still whirled. ‘I wasn’t expecting you till tonight at the earliest. Christ, I’ve missed you.’
Bo closed her eyes. She hadn’t been able to get out of the helicopter fast enough. If she had thought Anders had been surly before, he had taken it to a whole other level now, greeting her in the kitchen this morning with nothing more than a flick of his eyes. She had stood there momentarily, her ‘germy’ bedsheets rolled up in her arms as he had hunched over the paper, drinking coffee and eating toast, and the reluctant apology she had planned on giving had stuck in her throat; instead they had driven to the heliport in silence, flown over here in silence . . .
‘I feel like I’ve been gone for months,’ she mumbled into his shoulder, feeling so relieved to be back with him that she wanted to cry. He rocked her from side to side, his arms so tight around her that it felt almost difficult to breathe and she blinked, only able to see the sky above his shoulder, the tops of the trees. When he released her, she dropped her bag from her shoulder, looking around at the small ledge that had briefly become home. She felt a stab almost of pain at inhaling its wild beauty again – so unmodernized, untouched; the purity of it was almost too much to bear. Its jagged and dramatic sharp edges had been temporarily softened and rounded by the now regular snowfall. The day was beautifully clear, a pink dawn rising to clear skies and she felt like she was up with the eagles on this rocky perch again, surrounded only by trees and water, the sky within fingertip distance.
In the cabin, she glimpsed movement behind the dark windows and then a face – Anna waving, a white towel wrapped around her, bright in the gloom. ‘What the—?’ she muttered, just as the door opened and Lenny walked out – or rather, swaggered. ‘Oh. It’s like that, is it?’ she murmured to Zac as he came over to them both.
‘It’s so like that,’ Zac murmured back.
Dammit. With the events of the past few days, her intended warning to him about the perils of mixing business and pleasure had completely left her head.
‘Our wanderer returns!’ Lenny said, stopping just in front of them. His grey jeans were just about falling off his hips and there was a coffee stain on his sweater; he looked unkempt and like he was deliberately growing a beard. ‘How you feeling, Bo?’
‘Better,’ she smiled as he hugged her hard, his arms constricting around her like boas. She pulled back stiffly.
‘We missed you. It wasn’t the same here without you.’
He was being kind but Bo knew that wasn’t true: she had seen their stories yesterday; she had heard him tell Anna he’d ‘make her the new Bo’. ‘Thanks. The drugs have well and truly kicked in now and it’s good to be back. I’m looking forward to a little normality at last.’
‘Well, I can help with that,’ Zac said, grabbing her in his arms again and swooping her down into a dramatic lunge and kissing her passionately, before returning her to upright again so suddenly that her hair flew over her face. She gave a surprised laugh. ‘Consider normal service resumed.’
She tried to push all the blonde back from her face. ‘Did I miss much?’
‘Oh you know – a gorge here, a waterfall there. Just the usual.’
Bo supposed it was usual – when other people were off sick, they missed meetings; she missed mountaineering. ‘It’s been looking good on Stories though.’
‘Yeah?’ Zac asked, kissing the top of her head and stroking her hair back, gazing down at her as though she was heaven-sent. ‘You been keeping up?’
‘Of course. It wasn’t like there was much else to do.’
‘So then I take it you’re aware the trolls have been out in force?’ Lenny asked with his usual bluntness. ‘The internet is convinced you two have broken up.’
‘I know,’ she said, drooping slightly. ‘And, for the record, I blame you.’
Lenny looked defensive. ‘Me? Why?’
She glanced across at the cabin before she hissed, ‘For featuring Anna so heavily in the Stories.’
‘But we couldn’t exactly keep her out,’ Zac frowned. ‘She was there.’
‘Yes, but she’s been in almost all the footage – and she’s supposed to be behind the scenes?’ She hadn’t meant the comment to come out quite so pointedly. ‘If people don’t know where I am and all they’re seeing is her . . . what are they supposed to think? And she does giggle a lot.’
‘You sound jealous, Bo,’ Lenny smirked. ‘What’s wrong? Don’t you like Anna taking all your attention?’
‘It’s not that,’ she said defiantly. ‘But I don’t need my feed being spammed with three million cries of #SaveBo #teamBo.’
‘Well, to be fair, you didn’t exactly help things either by cheerleading for Bond’s new fan club last night.’ Zac jerked his head down towards the helicopter where Anders was jumping out.
‘I wasn’t cheerleading,’ she gasped, irritated by the mere suggestion. ‘I went to a traditional Norwegian Christmas party with a local and was sharing some of its customs with our followers – because that’s what we do. That is the point, isn’t it? Authentic experiences?’
Zac pulled a face. ‘Ye-a-h, but like you said, it’s also about how it reads.’
‘Some folks might definitely have interpreted you and him as flirting,’ Lenny said.
‘We were not flirting!’ Bo said hotly. ‘Don’t be so ridiculous!’ She looked at Zac. ‘You don’t think that, do you?’
‘No, of course I don’t. Len, leave it, stop stirring the shit-stick,’ Zac said, shaking his head. ‘It doesn’t matter anyway. She’s back now. People will see the truth soon enough.’
Lenny gave a careless shrug. ‘Hey, whatever – on the plus side, all this are-they, aren’t-they is playing well with the fans. We’re up to 9.6 now and engagement is up to 52 per cent, which is unheard of. They’re loving the drama. Keep ’em hanging a bit longer and let them speculate, I say. Hell, you could even mock a big fight, a little break-up, if you want.’
‘No!’ Bo snapped, appalled by the very suggestion. ‘I’ve been gone for three days. Since when did our lives become a soap opera?’
‘I completely agree,’ Zac said soothingly, looking down at her with a sombre expression on his face. ‘I’m just glad you’re back. I was worried about you.’
‘Why?’
Zac jerked his head towards Anders still down at the helicopter, lifting out bags. ‘Well, he’s hardly Mr Sociable, let’s face it,’ he scoffed, speaking in a low voice. ‘I thought he might bore you to death. Christ, he’s barely said a word on our expeditions, has he, Len? Literally won’t volunteer any sort of conversation. It’s as though talking somehow pains him.’
Lenny guffawed. ‘Yeah.’
Bo forced a smile, not liking this turn of conversation either, and yet unable to deny the truth in their words. ‘Well it was fine,’ she said placidly. ‘He was . . .’ She shrugged, remembering his kindness when she’d been ill, his easy conversation at dinner and at the party, his brusque comments yesterday morning and his stonewalling in the kitchen last night. ‘Fine.’
‘Fine?’ Lenny echoed, looking between her and Zac before giving a shrug. ‘Well then, that’s great. It was fine,’ he said sarcastically. ‘I guess we were worried out of our minds about you staying with a silent stranger for no reason.’
The sound of creaking
snow made them all turn to see Anders coming up in long-legged strides, a couple of bags from the grocer’s in one hand and two gas canisters in the other. His eyes met hers for just a fraction of a second; it was only a glance but it felt like a shove, their ‘argument’ last night (could it even be called that?) like a wall between them.
She swallowed hard as he passed. Why exactly had she been so agitated with him last night? He had been right – she had been drunk (her head this morning had told her that) and she had been rattled by the haters’ comments. But why had she taken it out on him? Why did his opinion on her choices even matter to her? And why was it so hard now to say sorry?
‘Morning, mate,’ Zac said brightly, tipping his head in greeting. ‘Thanks for bringing her back safe and sound.’
Bo knew this was the moment to say it – to chime in with her thanks too and to acknowledge what he had done for her; but like the apology she also owed him, it blocked her throat like rocks in a landslide.
As he walked by, Anders simply nodded in reply.
‘Rude bastard,’ Zac muttered under his breath as Bo stood on in dejected silence. Anders strode ahead and as her eyes followed him, Bo suddenly saw Signy sitting at her window, observing. Bo turned away, feeling miserable, feeling guilty, but this time she found Lenny watching her too.
Always there were all these people, watching. Watching, watching. Wanting something from her.
‘You okay, Bo?’ Lenny asked, looking at her quizzically. ‘You still look kinda peaky.’
‘Do I?’
‘You’re sure you’re well enough to be back here? You don’t want to spend another night in town?’
She scowled again. ‘Are you trying to get rid of me, Lenny?’ He probably wanted to make a star of Anna again for another day.
‘Of course not. I’m just worried about you is all.’
‘Well I’m fine.’
‘Come on, let’s get you in from the cold,’ Zac said, picking up her bag, and the three of them followed in Anders’ footsteps up the path between the cabins. But where he turned right, they turned left into theirs and as they passed by, she could hear Signy’s voice, stern again, and Anders’ – low and agreeable – coming from around the corner outside their door. They were going out already?
