Dad spends the whole of June in bed wearing sunglasses. He bangs his foot against the bars of the hospital bed – bang, bang, bang – so that even my room vibrates. When I peer in from the door and ask what the matter is, Dad replies, ‘I can’t feel my toes!’

And bang, the metal clatters again.

‘What’s happening to my feet?’ Dad asks. He stares at me as if he doesn’t know I’m his little girl.

I take the quilt off Dad’s feet and have a look.

‘There’s nothing there,’ I say.

‘What? They’re not there?’ Dad’s all worked up now. He presses his hands against his face, starts rubbing: his whole forehead moves up and down, as if the skin on his face were loose.

‘Can’t you see my toes?’ he asks through the gaps between his fingers.

‘No, I mean they look normal.’

‘What?’

‘Your feet look normal.’

‘Can you pinch them?’ Dad asks.

Dad’s toes are ugly and lumpy, with hair here and there, and I don’t really want to touch them. The skin underneath is thick. It peels off in dry, white strips. The nails are yellow, especially on his big toes.

I pinch them anyway. I hold one toe at a time between my thumb and index finger and squeeze. I start with the left big toe and carry on to the smaller ones, then I do the same with the right foot. Finally, I do rain going pitter-patter on Dad’s soles and he calms down.

‘Thank you, Saara,’ Dad says, pulling his feet under the quilt.

Bang, bang, bang: the same knocking against the wall.

‘My toes! Somebody do something!’ Dad shouts in his room.

This time Dad’s sitting up. He’s curled up on the edge of the bed, knees tucked under his chin, holding his toes.

‘They’re falling off,’ Dad says. ‘Have I caught a cold or what?’

‘What do you mean?’ I ask.

‘My toes are falling off,’ Dad answers.

‘Can I have a look?’

Dad shakes his head, clutching his toes more tightly. There’s nothing unusual-looking about his feet: no bleeding, at least.

‘Shall I pinch them?’ I ask, though really, I just want to go away.

Dad shakes his head.

‘I’m going,’ I say, and I head back to my own room.

Then Auntie Annu comes upstairs.

‘Come on, Pekka, now, really…’ she mutters, going into Dad’s room.