‘I can’t face sitting outside,’ Marthe says. ‘It’s too chilly.’ I pretend not to hear her, take three plates out of the cupboard and carry them out to the garden table. It’s a common topic of conversation whenever we’re here, and Marthe tends to be the one to get her way, especially if Mum’s here with us, Marthe has a headache or stomach ache or any number of other aches and pains, and Mum says we have to take that into account, obviously we do. I feel a little giddy doing the opposite, taking a superior tone: ‘No, let’s sit outside, Kristoffer and I want to sit outside.’ Marthe leaves the table three times over dinner, first to fetch a coat and then a pair of wool socks and eventually a blanket that she wraps herself up in, sitting in her garden chair with her arms crossed, determined to make a point.

‘It’s not that cold, Marthe,’ I say.

‘You’ve got no idea how cold I am,’ Marthe says.

The meat is a little overdone, Kristoffer isn’t totally happy with it even though Marthe and I tell him it’s great, Marthe says she needs her meat to be well done anyway, 54he knows that; Kristoffer tops up his wine glass three times while we’re eating.

‘Take it easy,’ Marthe says.

‘I am taking it easy,’ Kristoffer says. ‘This is how you take it easy on holiday.’

He still drinks more than Marthe would like, but not as much as he used to. When they’d just moved in together, Kristoffer would often pass out at an after-party and forget to let her know, and a few times he’d stumbled home at around five in the morning, so drunk that he fell over in the hallway. Marthe was quiet whenever she called me to tell me these things. I could tell that she wanted to hear me say that it would all blow over, that she wasn’t staking everything on the wrong man.

‘You can’t put up with that,’ I told her, I gave her nothing, even though I liked Kristoffer more than any of her other boyfriends.

‘Think about when you have children, imagine him carrying on like that,’ I said, I felt hot and spoke more loudly and briskly than usual. ‘It’s unacceptable, Marthe.’

‘You don’t need to get so bloody worked up about it,’ Marthe said.

‘I’m getting worked up on your behalf,’ I said. ‘You can’t let him treat you that way. I’d have walked out. Then and there.’

‘It’s not that simple,’ Marthe said, louder now. ‘You’d know that if you’d ever been in a proper relationship yourself, that you have to take people other than yourself into consideration.’ 55

‘Don’t I have proper relationships?’ I asked her.

‘You don’t, Ida,’ Marthe replied.