by Aly Sidgwick
The ship is moving slowly. By the time Mum is out of sight, the sea winds will have frozen my arm off. Time to break away …
I put both arms up and try to indicate I really am going now. I blow a kiss, and make an I’ll call you gesture, just in case she can see. Then I turn and enter the Stardust Lounge.
The bar is already filling with elderly couples, and at first I can’t pick Magnus out of the crowd. The floor judders as the ship changes direction, and for a moment the world becomes unsteady. I stumble and grab a handrail. Christ, if it’s like this the whole way I’ll be in trouble. My seasickness pills had better work.
Surely he hasn’t gone back to the cabin? I move to the middle of the room and hunt for his face. God, no. Not an argument. Not today. Then I see him by the cabaret stage, texting, and my worries melt away. As I approach his booth I glance round for girls my age, hoping to impress them with my uber-hot boyfriend, but to my dismay we are the youngest people in the room.
Magnus does not see me at first. In his striped sweater, he looks like a handsome spider. Mia Farrow cheekbones, and those heavy, twig-wristed hands. It strikes me for the hundredth time how ridiculously pale his skin is. I used to think I was pale before I met him, but my God … he’s on a whole new colour chart. In the light from the window, he looks almost blue. When he sees me he claps his hands together.
‘Right! Champagne!’
‘Aye aye, cap’n!’
I melt into his arms and clasp his face like it’s a priceless artefact. His skin stretches tightly around his jaw as I kiss him. Slightly weathered, as you’d expect from an up-north guy, or that might just be because he’s several years older than me. A few wrinkles are definitely setting in. But they’re good wrinkles. Laughter wrinkles. Part of me wishes I’d met him ten years ago – I’ve seen photographs of him aged twenty-five, and he looked like a fucking cherub – but in the end I’m just happy I met him at all.
On the pillar beside us there’s a poster advertising short breaks in Newcastle to Norwegians, and I almost laugh at the sight of it. That concept had seemed unreal at first. That anyone in their right mind would want to take a holiday on this side of the North Sea. Yet that’s exactly what Magnus was doing when we first met. A boys’ weekend he’d called it, and when he failed to introduce me to the pals he was with I felt a secret thrill to have him to myself.
‘Why Newcastle, though?’ I’d shouted over the music. ‘Why here?’
‘Alcohol,’ he’d replied, with relish, and I’d laughed, then shrugged. Apparently the cost of spirits was extortionate back home. My memory of that night is peppered with drunken blanks, but the parts I do recall were nothing short of magical. We’d shared a jug of margarita at the back of the rock bar, and even before he leaned close to perch the cocktail umbrella in my hair, I knew he was the one. ‘You have to let me paint you,’ I’d pleaded, and so we had exchanged numbers.
How long ago was that, now? Four months? Five? Thank God I got stuck in Newcastle after my degree. These last two years I’ve been cursing myself for choosing to study Fine Art. I mean, it’s not the easiest of disciplines to apply to the world of work and pretty much set me up for a life as a starving artist. But if I hadn’t been working in that coffee shop, I wouldn’t have been drinking in the bar across the street every weekend. I wouldn’t have been there when Magnus first walked in, and I wouldn’t be sitting in the Stardust Lounge with him now.
Magnus removes a ring from his large, delicate hand, pushes it onto mine, and gazes into my face. His eyes are richly, violently blue, and when he unleashes them on me it feels like a punch.
‘Mrs Brudvik,’ he murmurs, and though this will not become my name for several more months, I flush with delight. We’ve repeated this ritual over and over. More theatrical each time, as if trying to outdo the original proposal. Admittedly, that had not been the most fairytale of moments. There’d been no ring, for a start, and both of us were blazing drunk. On the end of Sunderland pier he’d chucked his fish and chips into the sea and blurted it out. ‘Fuck off,’ I’d said. ‘Not until you do it right.’ And we’d had a little fight about it. The next day, in his hotel room, he did it again and went down on both knees. Not one, but both! Maybe that’s how they do it in Norway, I don’t know. That time I said yes, but Magnus got angry because I laughed. And so on, with little imperfections each time. He must have proposed about nine times now, and shows no signs of stopping. But we both agree that that first time was the most romantic.
I twiddle the ring on my finger and smile because it is far, far too big for me. It’s made from tarnished silver, bent oval through repeated use, and to be fair it does look quite like a wedding band. I try it on my middle finger, then my thumb, but it fits neither.
‘For now,’ says Magnus. ‘Next time there’ll be a real one.’
Playfully, I push him. To our right, two elderly women are smiling.
‘On your honeymoon?’ asks the closest one in a broad Scottish accent.
Behind me, I hear Magnus stifle a snigger. British accents just tickle him that way. I’m amazed he can tell the difference when he can’t understand all the vocabulary. Apparently he has an accent himself, being from a northern town, though my grip of his language is so scant that I’d never have noticed.
‘Yes,’ replies Magnus, at the exact same time as I say, ‘No.’ We look at each other, and his deadpan face snaps back on.
‘No,’ I repeat, smiling at the woman. ‘Not yet.’
‘Holiday, then?’
‘No. Well, actually, I’m moving to Norway.’
‘Ohhh,’ say the two ladies, in unison, and the silent one makes a face. Mrs McBusybody grabs my hand and squeezes it, surprising me.
‘So brave,’ she says.
I laugh.
‘So he’s Norwegian, then?’ says the woman. Then, as if to a child, she dips her head and asks Magnus, ‘Do you understand any Eng-lish?’
‘To be sure, to be sure,’ quips Magnus, adopting the same dippy-headed posture.
‘That’s Irish,’ I whisper. He shrugs. The woman straightens up. I can’t tell if she is offended. The silent friend continues to smile.
‘So how did you two meet?’ McBusybody asks me, ignoring Magnus this time.
‘In Newcastle.’
‘You just met? In the street? And now you’re moving to …’ Gales of laughter overcome the two ladies. The silent one pipes up now – something about Viking plunderers – in a broad Geordie accent most Brits would have struggled to decipher, never mind Magnus. Hägar the Horrible is mentioned.
‘Yeah, that is what we Vikings do,’ says Magnus. He rolls his eyes. I giggle. Around us, people are starting to stare.
‘So then, when exactly were you planning on raping me?’ I ask Magnus, in my best little-girl-lost voice. The women stop, and for two full seconds you could have heard a pin drop.
‘Graaaarrrrr!’ roars Magnus, and sweeps me up in his arms, knocking down the menu cards and missing Geordiegran’s sherry glass by millimetres. Screaming, I kick my legs, and Magnus whirls me away across the bar.
‘Let’s get that champagne later,’ he says in my ear.
‘To be sure,’ I laugh as he kicks his way through the double doors. When I look back, McBusybody’s mouth is wide open.
#
The car ride from Bergen takes an entire day, and Magnus is in a bad mood from the off. This is something I’ve seen little of during our courtship, and I’ve yet to develop a strategy for dealing with it. First I try jokes, which barely raise a smile. Then I ask what’s wrong, and he says, ‘Nothing.’ I ask if it’s something I’ve done, and he shakes his head. ‘I’m tired,’ he says. ‘It’s a long drive.’ So in silence we cover the next hundred miles.
The scenery outside is straight out of a travel brochure. Rugged and snowy, and curiously similar to the north-west of Scotland, only cranked up to eleven. I gaze through the window as mountains and fjords and frozen waterfalls rush past. Long, round tunnels feed us through mountainsi
des, and dense evergreens converge periodically to blot out the sky. The farms we pass are wooden and painted in contrasting toy-town colours. Red and white. Yellow and grey. Blue and cream. Raging rivers hug the road, then snake away to the bottom of impossibly deep ravines. Along the way we meet pockets of bad weather, and each time we plunge into one, the outside world switches off. Magnus swears quietly at such junctures, using words I do not understand, and tightens his grip on the steering wheel.
‘Why the hurry?’ I ask at one point, and he doesn’t even bother to answer me.
An hour or so later he apologises. We park at a service station, he holds out his arms, and I climb across the cab into his embrace.
‘I just want to get us home,’ he says into the back of my neck, and to my relief there is kindness in his voice.
The service station is minuscule and has little on sale besides hot dogs and petrol. I look carefully at the shelf behind the counter. Apart from sweets and packets of crisps, there is absolutely nothing I can eat.
‘You’re in the wrong place to be vegetarian,’ says Magnus as he stuffs a hot dog into his face, and it is hard to stop myself growling at him. I stare at the hot dogs, wishing desperately that they were tofu dogs, and suddenly this monstrous idea wells up in me, that I should eat one anyway. Like the Katherine standing in this cabin in the absolute back of beyond is not the same person as Geordie Katherine. British, northern Katherine, with a lifetime of personal ethics under her belt. A horrible chill goes through me, and for a moment I feel endlessly blank and lost. Like I’ve forgotten who I am.
A hand touches my face, and I jump.
‘You okay?’ asks Magnus. He looks concerned.
I smile weakly.
‘Maybe you can eat some potato chips,’ he says. ‘It’s a long way to the next station.’
‘Okay.’ I nod, and clear my throat in an effort to pull myself together. With cold-cramped fingers I open my handbag and extract the envelope containing my newly converted kroner. It looks like play money. So colourful.
‘Jada, så ska vi ta oss en …’ starts Magnus.
‘No! I can do this.’
He holds his hands up. The clerk leans expectantly on the counter.
‘Goddag. Jeg vill ha … en … salt-skruer … takk skal du … uh … please?’
The clerk replies with a torrent of unfamiliar words. I blush deeply. But I must have done something right, because he takes down the right packet from the shelf and holds out a hand for the money. I give him a hundred-kroner note. What’s that? Ten pounds? Jesus. Beside me, Magnus is laughing.
‘Fuck off!’ I hiss. But he squeezes my arm and says, ‘Actually that was not so bad.’
The clerk quips something to Magnus as he gives me my change, but I’m too embarrassed to ask what he said. Magnus buys me a chocolate bar called Plopp as a joke and a cup of strong black coffee for us to share. We guzzle this down in the front of the van, and Magnus kisses the tip of my nose. Then, in slightly better spirits, we continue our journey.
#
By the time Magnus shakes me awake, I feel like I have slept for a hundred years.
‘Wake up, sleeping beauty.’ He says this gently yet firmly.
‘What time is it?’ I slur.
‘Half over nine.’
I peer through the windscreen at the black sky. Each time I exhale, it makes the air opaque.
‘Come on,’ he says. ‘I have to take the van back.’
I allow Magnus to lift me down from the cab. Even though I have his arm to lean on, I slip and slam down hard onto both knees. Stunned, I notice the thickness of the ice beneath me. I’ve never seen anything like it. Magnus opens the back of the van, and with barely a pause for breath, we ferry my belongings onto the road. Magnus helps me transfer them into the communal stair of the building behind us. Then he gives me the house keys and gets back in the van.
‘Go to settle in,’ he tells me. ‘When I get back, I will help move your things up.’
‘What? We can’t leave it there! Someone’ll … It might get … It’s …’
‘Folks are good here. No one will steal it.’
‘Are you kidding?’
‘Don’t worry,’ says Magnus. ‘I will be back soon.’ He pecks me on the lips, closes the door and roars away. I watch until the van is a speck.
8
Friday.
Today I have a meetin’ with Joyce. They said I had to, if I wanted to get out of the crisis room. The other thing I have to do is stay inside the house from now on. There wasn’t much choice really.
The first thing Joyce brings up is the lullaby, an’ actually that doesn’t surprise me one bit, now I know for sure she’s no better than the newspaper men. I tell Joyce – as I told all the others – that I don’t want to talk about it. I don’t tell her why not, but basically iss cos I’m ashamed. My failures are mine. Not entertainment for them. It embarrasses me now when they talk about the lullaby, cos it reminds me how loopy I was when they first brought me here. People are always draggin’ that around. Pokin’ me with it, tellin’ me things I used to say an’ do. Most of it, I don’t remember for myself. But iss embarrassin’ anyway. I hate it. I’m not playin’.
The conversation goes somethin’ like this.
Joyce: We have such a grand time in the ladies’ choir, Katherine. You should join us sometime.
Me: [No reply.]
Joyce: You like singing, don’t you? Do you remember the words to your nursery rhyme?
Me: No. [Yes.]
Joyce: That’s a shame. I’d have liked to hear you sing it for me. Do you think you might remember if you tried?
Me: No. I don’t like singin’.
Joyce: All right. Maybe we could talk for a bit instead. Do you mind if we talk about holidays?
Me: Okay.
Joyce: Where do you think you would go, if you could go on holiday? Aaaanywhere in the world. Somewhere hot and sunny, or cold and snowy, or maybe a boating holiday? What do you think you’d like best?
Me: I dunno.
Joyce: Do you like boats? Would that be a nice holiday? Or maybe that’d be too boring?
Me: Dunno. Don’t care.
Joyce: When I was wee, my daddy had a boat. We’d sail all around the islands, and spot birds, and catch fish. Sometimes we’d sail so far we weren’t even in Scotland any more. Doesn’t that sound exciting?
Me: I guess.
Joyce: Would you like to go for a boat trip, Katherine? That’d be a nice day out, wouldn’t it? We could arrange that with the—
Me: No.
Joyce: We could phone the nice folks up at the fish—
Me: No.
Joyce: We could all go. The scenery round Loch Oscaig is lovely this time of—
Me: You go then. I’m not goin’.
[Joyce clamps her mouth into a line an’ looks down. Her eyes grow small as she reads her notes. For a minute, she doesn’t speak. Then the smile snaps back on, an’ she looks up.]
Joyce: We could take a boat to Skye. Go visit Rhona.
[I meet her eye, but just for a moment. A surge of emotion flushes my face.]
Me: What about the bridge? There’s a bridge, you know.
Joyce: Yes, but it’d be so much nicer to—
Me: I’m thirsty. Can I have a drink of water?
Joyce: [Pauses. Then, irritated:] Yes. Yes. Of course …
#
Joyce ends up all angry, but it doesn’t matter. I’ve done what they want, an’ now they have to let me go. I climb the staircase in the dark, slippin’ my hand easily up the polished rail. On the landin’ I walk slowly, hopin’ to bump into Mary. There’s a blue glow from the skylight, which is good cos I can see the way to my room without turnin’ the light on. Mary’s door is across from mine, but tonight there’s no strip of light under it. I stand outside an’ listen. Nothin’. Jus’ some clinkin’ from the kitchen downstairs. I walk to my room, hit the light switch an’ sit on the bed. The clock says ten past eleven. Eleven. Twelve. Thirteen. I w
atch the quick hand whizz. Each second tappin’ my heart like a hammer. Iss not till I peel back the covers that I find the heather. Jus’ a handful, tied up with grass, but it smells amazin’. I clutch it to my chin an’ crawl under the covers. Bless Mary. She might be the only friend I’ve got left.
#
Saturday.
Iss cold in the conservat’ry. For breakfast I have two slices of toast spread with blackcurrant jam. The moor is callin’ me like crazy, an’ iss harder to ignore than usual. In the afternoon I hang round the back porch, but whenever I get close to the door, a member of staff comes to whisk me away. Later on, I notice someone’s taken the key out of the lock.
Mr Duff doesn’t come today. Instead, we have an extra-long gramophone time. Mrs Laird hasn’t brought enough records for that, so we have to play each one twice. I’m not in the mood to join in, so I go an’ sit by the window. If Rhona was here now she’d say, ‘What’s up mopey chops? Come and dance!’ An’ for her, I would. But Rhona isn’t here. Was I wrong to say no to the boat trip? It’d shut Joyce up for a while. But I don’t believe they’d go to so much trouble without a reason. No, it feels like a trap. They think I came to the loch on a boat. That I fell off it, or escaped off it, or was thrown. I know they think that, an’ I know they’re dyin’ to know for sure. Maybe they think I’ll remember stuff if they stick me on another boat. Of course! That’s it. What if the newspaper men are there, all watchin’? Waitin’ for me to snap. No … No … Is a boat trip worth the risk? I mean, it might be true … I might get to see Rhona, but …
