Chapters (92)
- Cover
- Also by Alex Dahl
- Title Page
- Copyright
- Dedication
- Contents
- Epigraph
- Prologue
- Part I
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10
- 11
- 12
- 13
- 14
- 15
- 16
- 17
- 18
- 19
- 20
- 21
- 22
- 23
- 24
- 25
- 26
- 27
- 28
- 29
- 30
- 31
- 32
- 33
- 34
- 35
- 36
- 37
- 38
- 39
- 40
- 41
- 42
- 43
- 44
- Part II
- 45
- 46
- 47
- 48
- 49
- 50
- 51
- 52
- 53
- 54
- 55
- 56
- 57
- 58
- 59
- 60
- Part III
- 61
- 62
- 63
- 64
- 65
- 66
- 67
- 68
- 69
- 70
- 71
- 72
- 73
- 74
- 75
- 76
- Epilogue
- Five months later
- Acknowledgements
- About the Author
- An Invitation from the Publisher
Kristina stares hard at Elisabeth for several long moments, and it occurs to Elisabeth that her friend doesn’t recognize this Elisabeth who answers back and challenges her after so many years of being a downtrodden mess, pathetically grateful for the smallest of charities. I did it for you, she thinks. Now I’m going to put me first. Perhaps Kristina senses how serious she is, and how steely her resolve is, because she subtly changes her approach. Kristina begins to cry again, and doesn’t attempt to wipe away the tears that run down her face and hover at her chin before dropping onto her jeans.
‘I’m sorry,’ she whispers. ‘What you’ve told me is obviously a very big shock. I think I just need to process this.’
‘Of course.’
‘Elisabeth, could you please do something for me? Could you please hold off a little bit before speaking about this? Just so I get a chance to really take it on board. I think that’s only fair – this does primarily affect me.’
‘Okay.’
‘Just a little while, okay? Can you promise me that? Of course you deserve to speak your truth and I can only imagine how hard it must have been to hold all of this for so long to protect me. I was just thinking that maybe you and I could do some processing exercises together at the weekend when you come to ours. Eirik is away again. It could be really healing for both of us.’
‘Really? Uh. Are you sure you still want me to come?’
‘Of course, Elisabeth. This doesn’t change anything at all. But please just promise me that for now, you and I will work through this together, just the two of us, in the first instance.’
Elisabeth nods, and returns her gaze to the water, but the sun has disappeared behind a cloud and the pretty deep blues of the sea have turned steely gray and obscure.
65
Kristina
He stands on a chair positioned underneath the window and scrapes furiously at the mouth of the tunnel, dislodging big lumps of snow that come crashing into the cabin. The slash of blue sky grows wider, casting a patch of brilliant sunshine on the floorboards. He whoops like a kid. I can’t help but laugh. I watch his look of triumph as he judges the tunnel wide enough for him to pass through, and he instantly clambers onto the chair and hauls himself onto the window ledge. My husband disappears through the hole and sticks his head back down into it from the top.