‘A huge, hideous, Nineties tribal design, eh?’ he says, looking at my upper arms. ‘Sure, I think that’d suit you nicely. I’ve only spent about twenty years regretting these.’

‘There was a time all the girls wanted one on their lower backs,’ I say.

Kristoffer laughs, he pulls out his tin of snus and puts a pouch just under his top lip; I use the boathook to pull out a length of line floating in the water.

‘You could have a life motto here,’ he says, tracing a finger along the small of my back, where a slight gap has appeared between my T-shirt and trousers. I can hear Olea behind the boathouse, I get up, and she and Mum and Stein and Marthe immediately appear. When we’re all huddled together on board and the mooring rope has been untied, Marthe takes the driving seat on the right-hand side and starts the engine.

‘Oh, Marthe,’ Mum shouts over the sound of the engine. ‘Have you learnt to take the boat out?’

Marthe looks happy, pleased with herself, she’s so proud that I have to look away. She does a good job, tackles the swells in such a way that I still feel the pleasant serenity of the water as it sprays and creates its own patterns and sounds and tiny waves, I remember it well from my childhood and it feels good to inwardly acknowledge that feeling again. I lean back over the side of the boat and stick my hand in the water, feel the resistance as Marthe speeds up across the water. The wind blows through our hair, Stein 79clings onto his stupid fedora hat and Mum asks him to just take it off, but he shakes his head, he wouldn’t wear his life jacket, either.