Yes, it was my childhood, it has to be. Abbe stopped talking about Omma once we’d buried her. Perhaps he talked about her to other people, but not to me. It was over, his if-it-wasn’t-for, and instead there was only reticence.

Back then I knew absolutely nothing about the Faroese Saga. Didn’t even know it existed. But Abbe thought I should, so he decided I did. We stood with our feet planted wide and knees slightly bent, pulling on our lines, slowly, towards the heart, and we agreed that yes, that’s what it said in the saga, and that there was a reason for it.

‘How did it go, again?’ I asked.

Abbe took pity. The fact was that when the Faroese Saga was written down, in what was then the newly Christian north, Mykines wasn’t at the end of Sørvágur fjord. The island migrated restlessly, placeless, until one day it settled at the fjord’s mouth. How it happened was a matter for debate. Some believed a fisherman had thrown bull’s dung onto the island when it came sailing past him out of the fog. That what pinned it down, as so often is the case, was bullshit. Others preferred the less scatological explanation that a giant had been trudging past with the island, stopped to rest by the fjord and then, when it was time to move on, decided he couldn’t be bothered to drag it any further. Others still, like Omma, believed the island wasn’t fastened to the ground at all, that it was sleeping, or at least pretending to. 160

‘Why would it do that?’

‘Your omma would say it was waiting.’

‘For what?’

‘That your omma wouldn’t say.’

Abbe died in the shower.

The bottle was gone, and one morning he floated off, that’s how I thought about it. They rang my mother. It was the home help who found him. His towel had been hanging ready, his clothes laid out. Now his blue cheek was lying in the hospital basement. His slightly waterdamaged face.

His hands looked big on the white sheet. We stood together. Then the Tarantula said goodbye and put his hand gently on my back, guiding me towards the door. Ma stayed where she was.

When Ma came out, I went inside and closed the door behind me. The room was large, with grey flooring and that cold hospital light. Abbe lay on a gurney. I glanced around for a chair, but it seemed more proper to stand.

I showed him the book before I began to read.