He took it obediently, like a child, and she led him out into the passage and back to his room, where he stretched out, still wrapped in the duvet. She dropped into the desk chair and pushed it closer to the bed so that she could reach out a hand to his head, stroking his hair while he recovered and his sobs subsided. Deep feelings welled up inside her. It had been in this same room that she had so often sat with her son, telling stories and singing songs as he went to sleep. Her Jonni had long stopped coming home to see her by the time he died, so she always felt that this was the place where she had said goodbye to him, sitting in the office chair he had been given as a confirmation present, stroking those pale, fine curls of his.

Omar’s hair was coarse and seemed to grow directly outwards from his scalp, and it was so black that it took on a blueish shade when sunlight from the living-room window fell on it. All the same, this coarse black tangle filled her heart with the tenderness that had come to her the day her son was born, and which had been snuffed out with his death two years ago.

Omar had brought her new life. He had woken her from her daze and reignited a desire to live, even if only to help him. She had helped him with shelter and protection. But he had helped her just as much.

43

18

Ísafold scratches at my window. Somehow she’s managed to clamber into the garden at the back of the house, even though she’s unsteady on her feet and can hardly speak.

In the afternoon she went to the beach with her friends. Then she called Mum and said she was staying at Abby’s place. But when I turn the key in the lock to let her in the back door, I can see she´s been out on the town. She’s wearing her gear for a night out in Newcastle, a see-through top and a skirt so short it shows her knickers. She’s lost her shoes somewhere, she says, just as she pukes on the kitchen floor.

I help her to my bed, as my room’s downstairs, because I’m not the one who’s afraid of the dark. There’s no chance of getting her up the stairs to her own bed without waking Mum and Dad. I tuck the bedclothes around her, and she croaks that she doesn’t feel well. I hope she doesn’t throw up in my bed.

I really want to leave the pool of vomit so she’ll have to clean it up herself in the morning, but I know how furious Mum and Dad will be if they know she’s been out drinking. They’ve told us we can’t touch booze until we’re seventeen.