‘Well,’ she says. ‘We hadn’t been planning on bringing this up now. But Kristoffer and I have been talking about whether we might buy you out after a while, take on the cabin ourselves. What do you reckon?’

‘Ha.’

‘You could still visit us,’ Marthe says, as if this is something they’ve gone over in advance. ‘You can have right of use, or whatever they call it. But it would make a lot more sense for us to own the place now that there will be more of us.’

‘Did you know about this?’ I ask Mum.

‘Well, yes and no,’ Mum says, shaking her head. ‘Marthe told me they were thinking about it, but this was supposed to be a chance for us to get together and enjoy each other’s company,’ she says, looking over at Marthe.

Kristoffer gazes out over the fjord.

‘Just think about it,’ Marthe says, taking a sip of her alcohol-free beer.

‘Does it bother you that I’m here?’ I ask.

‘You’re not bothering anyone, Ida,’ Mum says. ‘But it might be a better model of ownership. For everyone involved.’

Marthe shakes her head vehemently.

‘We can talk about it another time,’ she says. ‘It wasn’t meant like that.’

‘We’re here to have a nice time,’ Mum says. ‘Let’s talk about this some other time.’

I have another glass of wine, I need to recover, compose myself, I smile and say that we can talk about it some other day, no stress. Mum will adore and play with Marthe’s children, they’ll spend their summers here together, Marthe 91will call Mum and ask if she fancies a trip to theirs, and they’ll sit here without me, I’m not here. I’ve known it all along, I think to myself, my hands are shaking, I have to sit on them so that nobody will notice, I’ve always known it, that things would go this way. I drink more, need to slow my breathing down. I’ll freeze my eggs in Sweden, everything will work itself out. Why hasn’t the doctor called me yet?

At around half-past ten, Mum says goodnight, Stein tells her that he’ll be up soon. Marthe doesn’t want to stay up any longer either, she stands up and bobs up and down on her heels for a while and looks at me before walking off, gazes at Kristoffer, it’s clear she wants to tell him not to drink any more. She doesn’t like to see me having a nice time with Kristoffer and Olea, I think to myself, and I feel a rush at the mere thought.

‘Don’t you fancy turning in too, Stein?’ I ask when Kristoffer has gone to the loo. ‘Mum might be getting lonely.’