Shoulder Season

by Jackie North

  “You should prepare enough coffee for two,” said Solvin, as if reading his mind. “It’s the least I can do for my rescuer.”

  This statement, said with a dry bite, seemed as though it was meant to be sarcastic, only Solvin didn’t quite have the heart for it. He was probably tired of the cane and the sling, which Ben now collected from the floor. He leaned the cane along the cushions in the couch, held out the sling, and thought about how he felt like he understood what Solvin was going through, even though they’d just met. Sometimes when a guy was hurting, he didn’t want too much help.

  “Can I help you put this back on?” Too late Ben realized how forward, how American, this sounded, offering help when none was asked for.

  “I should wear it,” said Solvin. “But it makes my neck itch.”

  “How long have you been wearing it, I mean—” Ben stopped himself. It was none of his business, really, but he wanted to know.

  “It was a car accident,” said the Solvin. “Nothing too terrible, fractured ankle and bumps and bruises, but I pinched nerves in my spine and couldn’t lift my arm, or lower it, and so—well, I’m tired of limping, and after four weeks, I’m tired of not working, and I’m just tired. I know physical therapy is supposed to help, but the woman there—she’s got mean hands.”

  “Four weeks?” asked Ben. “You got four weeks off work?”

  “Six, actually,” said Solvin, “but I’m already insane with nothing to do.”

  Ben did not remark upon this, as to express any more surprise than he already had might bring a round of Let’s Compare Health Care, and he wasn’t up for it. So he turned to the counter and got out two mugs and opened the packet of brown bread, which smelled as though it had been made that morning, and manfully opened the jar of honey.

  “Can I make you some toast?” asked Ben. “Sometimes it’s better not to take pain pills on an empty stomach.”

  “Takk fyrir,” said Solvin. “And if you could, bring the butter to go with the honey?”

  Nodding, Ben assembled the grounds in the French press, and just before he was about to lower the plunger, he pressed the lever on the toaster. He had all of this to a fine art; when the coffee was ready to pour, the toast would be melting with butter and honey. Perfection. When everything was ready, he wasn’t able to find a tray, so he brought everything over piecemeal. The pain pills seemed to have kicked in, for Solvin’s color was better and his eyes a little brighter, though he favored his left arm and kept it mostly by his side as he reached for the coffee.

  “Here’s the cream and sugar,” said Ben. “I didn’t know how much you’d want of what.”

  “Takk fyrir,” said Solvin. “You can sit down, you know.”

  “Takk fyrir,” said Ben as he sat down in the small brown leather chair kitty-corner from the couch, and he watched Solvin raise his eyebrows in amusement. “It’s all I know in Icelandic, apart from hello.”

  “Hello is hello everywhere you go,” said Solvin. He smiled, then took a sip of coffee. “Or hi, there’s always hi.”

  For a moment they drank their coffee together, and Ben watched as Solvin polished off three of the four slices of toast. He didn’t begrudge him any, as he knew for a fact pain pills made you want sweet things or, oddly, potatoes. Solvin relaxed against the back of the sofa, the lines in his face easing as the pills and the coffee and the sugar did their magic. Ben got up and cleared everything away and even wiped the crumbs from the table before he rinsed off the cloth in the sink. When he turned off the tap, he noticed the spout was dripping.

  “Hey,” said Ben. “You got a wrench or anything? Your sink is dripping, and I think if I just tightened it—or it could be the seal is old—” Ben stopped and shook his head. He liked fixing things. He had a degree in fixing things, but that didn’t mean anybody in Iceland would trust him with their plumbing.

  “There’s a little tool chest in that bottom drawer next to the stove,” said Solvin, relaxed enough, it seemed, to not mind the offer. His head was tipped back on the couch, with his eyes half-closed, as if he was on the verge of falling asleep, even with a near stranger in his apartment. “It’s been dripping since the accident, only I’ve been unable to tend to it.”

  With an odd feeling of contentment, considering he was still jet-lagged and not really sure what he was doing in Iceland other than to rebel against Alan, Ben fixed the drip with a little flick of the wrench. When he put the wrench away and stood up, he realized the phone in his jacket on the back of the brown leather chair was ringing. Without stopping to think who it might be (he was overseas, after all, and it could be an emergency), he answered it.

  It was Alan.

  “Fuck you, Ben,” said Alan at the top of his lungs and entirely without preamble. “Where the fuck did you go? I just talked to your friend at work, and he said you just up and left! Couldn’t come with me to Oktoberfest in Munich, but you can jet set around the world without even telling me?”

  “You cancelled my ticket,” said Ben, pushing his hair back from his face. At the sound of Alan’s voice, so shrill and passionate in its anger, all of Ben’s promises—about not getting into it, about staying calm, about how to walk away from a bad relationship—flew out the window and jetted to the moon. “You cancelled my ticket, so I didn’t have to pay you back. I had the money and I had the vacation time. What did you want me to do, sit in my apartment and twiddle my thumbs until you flew back to Colorado?”

  “Yes, that’s what I fucking wanted you to do!” shouted Alan. “Don’t you love me?”

  “You broke up with me, Alan,” said Ben.

  Too late he realized he was standing in Solvin’s apartment that, once soothing and homey, was now filled with the phone-sharpened sound of an alcoholic rage, which, when Ben considered it, could be present with or without the alcohol if Alan didn’t feel he’d gotten his own way. Trying not to look at Solvin, Ben turned away and held the phone close to his mouth.

  “You broke up with me, Alan,” said Ben again. “And look, the train is coming, I have to go. I’ll talk to you later, okay?”

  With a press of his thumb, Ben hung up the phone. His shoulders felt tight, and he almost couldn’t bear to turn around. But he needed to get his coat, and he needed to exit the apartment before he undid all the good he’d done by bringing Solvin his meds, fixing his leaking faucet, and answering his unspoken plea for help.

  “There is no train in Iceland,” said Solvin in very cool tones as he looked up at Ben.

  “I know that,” said Ben. “But he’s drunk, and when he’s drunk, he could go on and on—” Ben himself could have gone on and on to explain that he wasn’t a liar, and that, yes, Alan was his ex-boyfriend, but that was the way it always ended when he got into arguments with Alan, with each of them trying to out-explain the other. Which usually ended in Alan taking a swing at him like they were boxers in a ring. Also, while Iceland allowed gay marriage (he’d checked the website), that didn’t necessarily mean everybody in Iceland felt like-minded about the whole issue. “I’m sorry, I should go.”

  Before Solvin could answer, Ben snagged his jacket and let himself out, making sure to push the little silver button on the knob that would lock the door from the inside. It might be that Iceland had a fairly low crime rate, but there was no point in having Solvin taking a risk. Two quick steps later, he was at his own door as the rain slanted down beneath the eave while he struggled to pull out his key. It had gotten dark fairly quickly, and as he’d not turned on any lights or opened the curtains, when he shut and locked the front door behind him, he was in a pitch-black living room that, however small and sparsely furnished, had an unknown (or as yet unmemorized) arrangement of furniture and walls and little rugs on the floor.

  “Hand to the wall, Ben,” he told himself.

  The trick was to shuffle and feel at just about shoulder height for a light switch, which in Iceland could be shaped like they were in the States, or it could be something completely different. He’d not taken the time to look or
even think about it, just hadn’t. Luckily he came across a panel with two wide and easily toggled switches. He flipped them both and lit up the living room and the kitchen all at once. His luggage was still on the brown couch where he’d left it, and the heating must have been set on a timer, because he felt a waft of faintly warm air across the back of his neck, so he was able to take off his coat and scarf. Then he checked his watch.

  It was only a little before four. He knew about jet lag from his research; if he went to sleep now, he’d wake up at two in the morning and be unable to enjoy whatever fun things there were to do in Iceland. In that case, he might as well get a taxi back to the airport and go home. But then he would be sitting in his apartment back in Boulder twiddling his thumbs, waiting for Alan. Even if he did cancel the rest of his vacation and go back to work at the garage, he’d be, in essence, waiting for Alan. Waiting for the phone call or the knock on the door. Waiting for the same argument to begin again, for Alan’s criticisms and complaints to rain in a cloud above Ben’s head. At least in Iceland, the air was crisp and clear and Alan-less.

  He should take a brisk shower, make a little something to eat, and try to stay awake until at least 8:00 p.m. Then he could collapse on his bed and figure out what to do in the morning. Thus decided, he went into the little kitchen and opened one of the yogurts (he’d filled out a little form on the website to have a few supplies laid in), and ate it standing up over the kitchen sink. After that he made some toast and put some butter on it and ate that as slowly as possible.

  He could have pulled up something on his phone to make a bit of noise, or put his earbuds in, but Iceland seemed to be the quiet, and it felt as though bringing in his American-style hustle-bustle would be rude somehow. So he finished up in silence, rinsed the cutlery and crockery, and puttered about, pretending he was more familiar with Icelandic radiators and bedside lamps than he was. At least there was enough hot water for his shower, a never-ending supply, in fact, and a place to arrange his razor and toothbrush and other toiletries for the morning. Who knew what he’d decide to do then?

  Looking at his watch again, he saw that it was seven forty-five, and with that, he gave himself a pass. Stripping down to his briefs and T-shirt, he debated turning up the heat but realized he was too tired to find the switch for that. With a quick walk around, he turned off all the lights except for the bedside lamp, and climbed into bed. For a moment he stared at the single light, whose glow made a cave of the room, and thought about the series of arguments that had set him on the path of going alone to Iceland. He sensed there was a peace to be found by being on his own, and if he gave himself a chance, he might find it, find enough of it to take it back home with him.

  Sighing, he reached to click off the light and snuggled down beneath the covers. The layers of sheet and blanket and comforter settled with an easy weight that suggested if he lay very still, he would fall asleep quite quickly. And in the morning, there would be Icelandic things to do. If he stayed. If.

  WHEN BEN woke up, there was a glow coming in through the bedroom curtain, giving a surreal urgency to the confusion he felt. Where was he? Oh, right, Iceland. He’d flown to Iceland after Alan punched him and broke up with him, and now here he was. Reaching for his phone, which he only now realized he’d forgotten to plug in, he looked with bleary eyes at the time. Ten fifteen in the morning. The effects of the fading jet lag announced themselves in a dry mouth, crunchy eyes, and a hungry stomach. Plus there was the question: should he stay or should he go home? The weird glow might be the sun struggling through the ever-present rain, so it might be a nice day to at least stroll about the town. If he was bored, then he could catch the next flight home, but at least he should try, now that he was here.

  It took him an hour to get ready, mostly because he kept peering out the curtains in the living room and in the bedroom. The sun was at a low angle, casting long shadows, but at least it wasn’t raining. He took another shower, and shaved, and used the tiny little blow dryer that he found in a drawer (no sense making a bad impression on the locals) and had some more toast and yogurt and a crisp apple, which surprised him, as he’d not considered Iceland a place known for growing fresh fruit.

  He’d plugged in his phone all the while, and when it was charged up, Ben stuck it in his back pocket, his wallet in his other back pocket, and his keys in his front pocket. After bundling up in his jacket for what he expected to be an Arctic cold, he heard a knock at the door.

  At first he thought it was Alan, who had flown into Reykjavik in an angry, jealous rage and somehow found Ben. Then the knock came again.

  “Ben?”

  It was Solvin.

  Thinking he could at least apologize for the rude phone call from Alan, Ben opened the door. There, in the glowy, gray-dappled sunshine, stood Solvin, tall and blond, looking more handsome than he had the day before, though there were still circles beneath his eyes. He had his cane in his right hand and his left arm was again in a sling, but for all that, he seemed better rested than he had the day before.

  “I thought I’d come and say hello and good morning,” said Solvin. Ben watched several emotions move across his face that he could not define, as Solvin seemed to be struggling with himself. “And to apologize for being rude yesterday.”

  “Rude?” asked Ben. He could not imagine what Solvin was talking about.

  “Yes, I never thanked you for helping me,” said Solvin.

  “You did, you said takk fyrir, I heard you,” said Ben. “Hey, don’t worry about it, okay?”

  For a moment they stood there as the cool, sweet air swirled around Ben, waking him up the rest of the way and telling him in no uncertain terms he was not in Colorado anymore. Colorado had fresh air and blue skies, to be sure, but nothing like this, because behind it all was the realization he was so far north that the Arctic Circle was only a skip and a jump away. He’d never been out of the country before, so everything was new. Best of all, Alan was nowhere to be seen, and in front of him was the gentleman formerly known as the Icelandic god, currently known as Solvin, and looking a bit concerned about everything in spite of his apology and Ben’s easy acceptance of the same. So Ben tried again.

  “I was happy to help,” said Ben. “Besides, I got some great coffee out of the deal and a peek inside an Icelandic home.”

  “You think that’s an Icelandic home?” asked Solvin, but again, the sarcastic tones came out quite gently, like Solvin was trying to be edgy but was failing because he was just that nice of a guy. “It’s an apartment in Reykjavik, that’s what it is. I keep thinking I’ll move out of it and go live in France or someplace that isn’t Iceland, but I never do.”

  “Well, sure,” said Ben, thinking that he must be misunderstanding the problem. “You’ve got to live somewhere, right?”

  “Yes, I suppose I do,” Solvin said, nodding. “But all my friends have moved to the continent—but never mind that. You look like you’re dressed up. Were you going somewhere?”

  “I was going to take a stroll around and get something to eat. There was a brochure at the airport that said—”

  “No,” said Solvin. “Those brochures are bought and paid for by shysters just waiting to take tourists’ money. You don’t want to eat at any of those places. Let me take you out to lunch to make up for my behavior yesterday.”

  He took a step closer to Ben as if to assure Ben of his honest intentions. Ben didn’t move back as he normally would have had Solvin been Alan, because Alan liked to move in close when he was on the attack, either with something dramatic to sweep Ben off his feet or, more recently, something cutting about how Ben wasn’t behaving or dressing as he ought. This was a test to see what Solvin would do because, after all, Ben could take another step back, slam the door, and find the next flight out of Iceland.

  The single step was all Solvin took, however, and there was an earnest expression on his face that seemed to tell Ben that Solvin meant what he said, wanted to make up for his rude behavior that Ben totally could not reca
ll, and he seemed nice. Nice in a way that was a contrast to Alan and the guys he hung out with, who had front-row tickets to all the college football games and who wore all the right things and were bored by everything, who moved fast and talked fast. Alan had, for a good long year, seemed to want Ben with him and had encouraged Ben’s attempts to fit in. Ben wasn’t in college anymore and missed those days, so it had been fun. Way fun. Too fun. Now that was over, and in its place seemed to be a vast nothing that Ben had no idea how to fill. Hence Iceland. Which had created a situation where now he had Solvin on his doorstep offering to take him to lunch.

  “Okay,” said Ben. “But really, you don’t have anything to apologize for.”

  Ben patted his pockets to make sure he had everything, pushed the knob to lock the door, and stepped out into the watery sunshine.

  “Shall we get a taxi?” asked Ben. Alan had liked to get taxis, so Ben had gotten used to doing the same.

  “Oh no,” said Solvin. “This place is a five-minute walk away.”

  “Even with the cane?” asked Ben, feeling dubious about it.

  “I’m supposed to start walking on it more,” said Solvin. “If it’s too much, we can call a taxi, but for now, let’s walk.”

  They started out. Solvin slowly led the way along the wide sidewalk, and while it was easy to keep up with Solvin’s pace, Ben could sense the energy Solvin had and his desire to go faster. Up and down the tidy backstreet were other people out strolling, looking like tourists, or like locals with their canvas shopping bags bulging with produce. In fact, there were a lot of people walking, and only few cars drove along the street. The sun danced behind the puffy clouds that moved briskly across the blue sky, and when Ben and Solvin stepped out onto the main thoroughfare, a quick wind whisked past Ben’s ears.