He shook his father’s limp hand and blinked a couple of times when he saw how sluggish he was. Then he turned toward his mother and kissed her dutifully on the cheek. Over her shoulder he flashed a comforting smile to Vera.

‘Hi, little sister,’ he said.

He took both her hands in his.

‘I’ll drive you home,’ he said cheerfully. ‘You first, then Mother.’

Although he said it very casually, a charged mood immediately spread between them and their mother. The only sound was their father’s wheezing breaths. He was asleep again. Out in the hall, visitors filed past.

Their mother put on her hat with an insulted look on her face.

‘I would have liked to have stopped in and seen Asger and the children,’ she said. ‘I don’t need to rush home to those empty rooms.’

‘Well, of course,’ boomed Villy, for a second resembling a little boy, despite his nearly fifty years. ‘It’s just that I have to get back to the others. I left right in the middle of things –’

He scratched his head and avoided Vera’s eyes.

‘Mother has to go home to the parakeet. It would be a pity otherwise. Ruffy isn’t used to being left alone.’

The three of them turned and looked at the man in the bed, as if they had nearly forgotten him. He returned their disconcerted stares with a faint hint of the strength he could have mustered in a long forgotten time, when faced with something completely trivial. Then he shut his eyes again, and the wheezing in his chest continued. The stream of visitors was ebbing away, and the nurse appeared again in the door.

‘Visiting hours are over,’ she said sharply.

‘Fine, fine,’ said their mother pitifully, and her head shook more than usual.

‘I’ll go along – since Villy wants it that way – who knows how long he’ll be with us –’

She stuck her hand under her powerful son’s helpful bent arm, and he looked back at Vera as they made their way to the elevator.

They smiled at one another, relieved.

The Little Shoes

Helene woke early in the morning, feeling that her entire life was one big failure. She had lost control over it. She attributed this paralyzing and depressing state to a variety of totally different causes, like when an animal gets caught in a trap and searches for a way out first in one corner, then in another. But every day ended with one convincing reason – the only convincing reason she had – namely, that she had absolutely no control over her surroundings, and that it wasn’t in her power to change anything about her life, or to change the people who had made it a failure.