The plume of smoke on the mainland. The concern in Hedda’s face. The urgency in her voice. “Cal, you have to see this.”

Fear beginning to take hold.

I was on my feet, running. Hedda turned, moved out of my way, touched my hand as I passed, followed me in. There was Vee, fighting her way through the people, and next to Vee was Elsa.

“My daughter,” I said to the couple beside me. They moved to let me pass. I reached out. Vee grasped my hand. I pulled her toward me.

New images on the screen.

A girl sheltering by the water’s edge, a man waving desperately from the water. In the downdraft from the helicopter the fjord frothed and turned.

We crowded around the bar, every face staring up at the screen.

“Lyden,” said Elsa. Sound.

The barman nodded and turned up the volume.

Pictures from TVZ. A sundress of kingfisher-blue. A shooting on an island near Oslo.

I saw the terror in Vee’s eyes.

“Licia,” she said.

I stood outside the restaurant, eyes fixed on the water, phone in hand. I could not look at Elsa or Vee, though I could feel their eyes on me, willing Licia to pick up.

A click. Licia’s voice.

Can’t speak now.

Funny.

Almost.

Punch line to a horrific cosmic joke.

Five

That dread silence.

Farther along the coast bonfires lit up the fjord. Here the pyres remained unlit. The sun was down now, the air cold.

We stood on the mainland opposite Garden Island, watching as the boats came in.

A hundred of us, maybe more, looking out across the fjord, waiting for our children to return, barely daring to speak. From time to time a hand sought out a hand, a body leaned toward another. Whispered words, furtive almost. But mostly I remember the silence.

In my hand I held the form that we had filled out:

Name: Alicia Curtis

Height: 5′ 6″

Age: 15

Skin color: white (pale)

Hair: blond

Clothes: blue dress (kingfisher, sequined). Silver dragonfly bangle. Converse sneakers?

Identifying marks: none

Elsa had crossed out the height, had rewritten it in centimeters:

Height: 167.5 cm

As if that might make the difference.

I leaned toward Elsa.

“Focus on New Year in Whistler,” I whispered. “Focus on Licia coming back.”

Heavy winds had been forecast in Whistler that New Year’s morning, but it was lunchtime and the storm had not come.

I tried to hand Licia her phone.

“No need, Dad.” She smiled, dropped her skis to the snow, stepped into them, began fish-boning up the slope. Vee was waiting by the lift, arms crossing and uncrossing, tiny and impatient in her helmet and her stormproof one-piece. They were skiing without us for the first time, drunk on the excitement of it. Licia was the better skier, fearless, skillful, and fast.

“Licia!” I shouted after her. “Phone!”