‘Why? Why should I make him worry about something that’s never going to happen? It’s not like I’m going to be able to keep . . .’

The words she doesn’t say suddenly make her walls crumble. Make everything she can’t bear to feel, doesn’t dare to think, come crashing down on her. With a whimper, she doubles over as sobs rack her body. Clings to the edge of the rough worktable until her legs buckle. Sinks into a squat as wave after wave of cramping anxiety surges through her and everything she has forced down resurfaces.

The only thing left is the realisation.

I can’t.

Marike has stopped laughing. Kneeling in front of Karen, she mutely wipes her tears with her shirtsleeves. Then she’s behind her and around her, like a protective shell, with her stomach against Karen’s back, her arms wrapped around her, anchoring her to the ground while grief rips through her.

They stay like that for fifteen minutes. Or maybe an hour, until she’s all cried out. She just doesn’t know. Then Marike’s voice cuts through the chaos. And Karen can hear both her effort to find the right words in Doggerian and the love behind them.

‘I don’t think you have a choice.’

*

Maybe I should tell him, she thinks that evening as she turns into the steep driveway in front of her house in Langevik. And fix that damn pothole, she adds when the car jolts so hard her head almost hits the ceiling. Regardless of what I choose to do, I should tell him. Marike’s right.

They had talked for hours. Left the studio even though it was pouring outside and walked down to the harbour, along the piers towards the deep-water port. Had sat down on a bench by the long-term car park and watched the Esbjerg ferry dock from under their umbrellas. They had studied the long lines of tired travellers through the terminal’s large windows, had seen the bow door open and cars slowly disembark, had heard the rattling of wheelie bags approaching, the beeping of cars being unlocked.

Then, capitulating to the suddenly torrential downpour that was washing away any dreams of summer in April, they had stood up and walked back. And talked some more.

About age, about risks. Every kind of risk. About the things they’d read, seen, heard could go wrong. Or not. About Marike’s grandmother, who had been fifty-one when she had her last one. They’d talked about the fact that people would talk, have opinions, stick their noses in. People who felt they knew best. And about bloody biology, which doesn’t give a toss what people might say.

They had talked about what Ursula Lek had said when Karen had mumbled that it was impossible, unnatural. That it shouldn’t have been able to happen.