There’s a tractor up ahead with a special attachment you probably wouldn’t see in many other corners of the world. The tractor is stabbing down sharp orange poles into the soft earth either side of the asphalt. Like slalom ski poles. Orange sticks with reflector stripes to stop people like me driving straight into an icy ditch when the white months arrive. Which they will. Soon.

Higher. No fog today but low clouds sit over the town like a malevolent breath from above.

There aren’t any vehicles close to where I parked that night. Just the white bike. That ghostly memorial to an anonymous fallen cyclist. A pedal bike spray-painted white and left on the side of the road for all eternity. A reminder to us all. A vision so stark we take a moment. Lose a breath. Rethink our priorities.

I pass a bus shelter with two teenage girls sitting side by side, each one wearing a bobble hat. Yellow and blue. I pass a cross on the opposite side of the road. Another memorial. With fresh flowers and a slice of pizza ejected from some truck window I don’t know when.

Visberg square is empty.

Apple trees creaking, an unoccupied bandstand, that giant bee rotating on top of Hive self-storage. The pizzeria owner is taking a crate of fresh tomatoes from a guy in a van. There’s a mobility scooter parked outside the pharmacy, small dog attached. But no pedestrians.

I drive on past Konsum and beyond the square. A barber shop with two chairs and two cylindrical glass jars full of bright-blue barbicide; the black combs inside like coral from some deep-sea trench. Two barbers, one in each chair. Zero customers. Two copies of the Gavrik Posten.

My GPS tells me I have reached my destination. Or rather, ‘Your destination, you have reached,’ because I downloaded a new Yoda SatNav package.

Number 36.

Grey-painted door. Grey-painted house.

I knock and the door immediately flies open.

‘Are you Tuva?’

Blonde woman, hair almost as fine as mine. Narrow shoulders, a large beauty spot above her upper lip. Tired eyes. A pained smile.

‘Yes, Mrs Persson. I’m so sorry for your loss.’

‘Come inside off the street.’

She’s wearing Nike Air Jordans. Either originals from the ’80s or reissues.

‘Coffee?’

‘Please.’

We sit down at her kitchen table. Four chairs. A rubber polka-dot cloth. Thermos. Plate of digestives.

‘Your colleague said you wanted a few words for the newspaper,’ she says. ‘About Arne.’

She puts her palm to her eyes. No sobbing or appreciable tears, but she is hiding her gaze and holding tight on the side of the table.

‘If you feel up to it. I wanted to give you a chance to say a few things. To remember Arne to the town.’