Be Still the Water

by Karen Emilson

  Signy has died? Why didn’t anyone tell me?

  Finally, a car comes up the drive. Solrun hurries out to stand on the stoop, wrapping her sweater tight to keep out the wind. Leaves swirl at her feet, break loose, and then dance across the walkway onto the grass.

  Solrun’s husband and Olafur get out and stretch their backs. Olafur went along because he was curious to see Freyja again—the ghost who so many of our family’s stories were built around. None of us except him saw it, her disappearance the dividing mark: before or after; just as everything later was remembered as prior to or following my accident.

  The passenger doors open. Lars and Freyja step out.

  Solrun’s eyes dance, filled with tears, as she brings her fingers to her chin. Freyja’s poise. Fine-boned and slim as ever, her platinum hair perfectly coifed in solid, wide curls away from her face. She is wearing a fine suit, silk blouse with matching shoes and handbag.

  Now I recognize her, this is my sister—the same woman who has been sitting diligently at my bedside. How many times has she come back to see us since this first visit years ago? Why don’t I remember?

  “Solrun,” Freyja sings over the car roof.

  The two meet on the grass, wrapping their arms around each other.

  “It’s so good to see you,” they both chime.

  Freyja pulls back, grabbing Solrun’s hands and they start laughing. Digging her heels into the grass, Freyja spins them around. Laughter fills the air as the men watch.

  “Oh, how I’ve missed you,” Freyja cries.

  I can’t stand it any longer and will my soul toward them and slip into their embrace. What an incredible sensation to feel their hearts beating on either side of mine.

  “Supper will be ready in an hour,” Solrun calls after the men, who are on their way to the barn to do the evening chores before dark.

  Still holding hands, my sisters walk quickly to the house to escape the wind that is starting to feel cool.

  I watch from the corner of the kitchen as they discuss pleasantries—the flight, weather and the farm—as Solrun darts from the cupboard to the table and stove, preparing the meal. Now an awkwardness that shouldn’t exist has developed between them. They are like two old friends trying to reconcile after a falling out, the reason long forgotten.

  The men come into the kitchen, pull out the chairs and sit down just like old times.

  Lars looks pleased with himself, that he has arranged this reunion.

  “You will stay the night,” Solrun says to Olafur. “Both the girls’ rooms are empty.”

  “No reason for me to go home now,” he says, a hint of sadness in his voice.

  “Dibs on who has to share a room with him,” Lars says. “I’ve done it before. He snores.”

  “I do not,” Olafur says.

  Freyja laughs.

  Lars points a thumb at Olafur. “Whoever snores the loudest has to milk the cow in the morning.”

  “What? You’ve forgotten how to already?”

  “Snore?”

  “No, milk the cow!”

  My heart sings to hear their banter. Where is Leifur, I wonder. He should be here for this.

  When supper is done, Solrun and Freyja leave the men in the kitchen to discuss farming and, with coffee in hand, move to the living room.

  “This is a lovely home,” Freyja says.

  “Lars tells me you live in a mansion.”

  “It’s just a house.” Freyja looks bright and happy. “I am fortunate,” she says. She stops in front of the family portrait, examines it for a long time. “Wonderful to see this again. Did my hair always look like that?”

  Solrun laughs. “Everybody said so.”

  Freyja resists the impulse to touch her curls. “Hair rollers, what a marvelous invention.”

  They sit on the couch and sip from their mugs. Freyja runs a well-manicured finger down the crease in her pants.

  “I never intended to stay away so long,” she says. “As soon as I realized running away was a mistake, I wrote a letter to Mama but she didn’t reply. So I wrote another.”

  For a moment I’m back in those hot, summer days. Solrun is only seven-years-old when Freyja disappears. The days following were sad, confusing.

  “When did you mail them?” says Solrun.

  “I sent the first at the end of June. The second in early August, right after the war started.”

  “Were you with Bjarni?”

  “I gave him the letters to mail,” she says. “I only realized later that was a mistake.”

  Freyja takes a mouthful of coffee and swallows hard. “Remember, Finn invited Bjarni to the ball tournament? Well, he came on the steamer that afternoon. He saw my argument with Stefan and was very sympathetic. He convinced me to go with him back to Winnipeg.”

  “But Freyja, why?”

  “I was embarrassed. Stefan had ended our relationship. Bensi saw me on the steamer, so I knew Pabbi would find out. I assumed that Stefan would be jealous and come looking for me.”

  Solrun is shocked. “Bensi didn’t tell us.”

  “In late July I realized I was expecting Stefan’s child and that Bjarni was in love with me,” she said. “He must have thrown out the letters. I wrote two more that fall, one to Stefan and one to Mother, telling them everything and asking for forgiveness. I wanted to come home to have the baby. I mailed those letters myself.”

  Solrun shakes her head sadly. “Mama didn’t receive a letter. I would have remembered that.”

  “Was Stefan carrying the mail then?” she says.

  “Stefan would never have kept you from us,” Solrun says.

  “You don’t know that for sure,” Freyja says. “I believed he didn’t want me or the baby so I never wrote again.”

  Freyja looks deep into her sister’s eyes. “After the baby was born I was so sad I didn’t go outside for months. It was the loneliest time of my life. I was glad to leave Winnipeg. British Columbia reminded Bjarni so much of Iceland, he said we should go there. Eventually I fell in love with him.”

  Solrun sighs. “If only you’d known how much you were missed,” she says. And then hesitating, “Asta nearly found you, but Bjarni said that you had died . . . you would never purposely deceive us like that, would you?”

  Freyja is adamant. “I had no idea until Lars told me.”

  They sit for a few moments, letting the details settle.

  “Tell me about the day Thora found you,” Solrun says.

  Freyja tilts her head and her eyes go to the ceiling. “Fifteen years ago, right before Mama died, I was in a restaurant in Vancouver. Thora recognized me. She said I should call Asta and handed me the phone number. When I called a few days later, the connection was very poor but I recognized Mother’s voice and I knew I needed to come home. I went straight to the hospital. Signy was so hostile, I caught the train home the next morning.”

  “I wished you’d waited for Asta,” Solrun says. “You knew how hasty Signy could be.”

  Freyja looks away and closes her eyes. She takes a deep breath. “I wasn’t ready to face any of you anyway, especially Asta. Thora told me all the pain I’d caused.”

  They sit quietly for a few moments. Solrun takes a sip from her mug. Freyja sets her cup down on the end table.

  “Lars tells us you have a family,” Solrun says.

  “We had a son together, and when he was five, Bjarni died from an aneurysm. I live in White Rock now and have four daughters with my husband Sigmar.”

  “Did you know that Asta went to Winnipeg and hired a private investigator to find you?”

  “Lars didn’t mention that,” she says, perplexed, then slowly nods. “Bjarni feared conscription so he changed his name after we moved. Finding us would have been impossible.”

  “It was. We told him to stop searching after Asta’s accident,” So
lrun says. “She stepped right in front of a car and spent months in hospital.”

  Freyja closes her eyes. “How is she?”

  “Asta lives at the care home now and may outlive us all.”

  “And Leifur?”

  “The doctor says his heart is enlarged, his lungs are filling with fluid. He doesn’t have much time.”

  CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE

  It is an old custom for the wisest to give way.

  —The Saga of Harald Hardrada

  The next morning after breakfast, while the men are doing chores, Freyja takes an envelope from her purse and places it on the table.

  “Olafur seems to be doing well,” she says. “Optimistic as ever.”

  Solrun hands her a towel. They stand at the sink wiping dishes. “It is hard for him now that Signy is gone.”

  “What was it?”

  “Cancer,” Solrun says. “Just like Mama. She was sick for five years.”

  They stare out the window over the sink at the grass covered in morning frost.

  “Signy told me I broke Pabbi’s heart,” Freyja says.

  Solrun continues washing, placing plates in the drainer.

  “Do you think Pabbi would have accepted the baby?” Freyja asks.

  Solrun thinks for a moment. “Of course he would have. But you had no way of knowing it then. I understand why you were afraid.”

  “I always believed Stefan loved me. That he didn’t write back . . . it changed the way I felt about everything.”

  When the dishes are done, they sit together at the table. Freyja’s hands are trembling as she opens the envelope and pulls out the first photo.

  Solrun takes it.

  It isn’t a snapshot of a little boy, but of a family standing in the driveway alongside a Buick. The man is smiling at the camera, a cigarette in the corner of his mouth. His wife is admiring him, while two adolescent girls squint into the sun. A boy about five-years-old stands on the trunk, one hand resting on his hip, the other on top of his father’s head.

  “Oh my goodness.” Solrun laughs. “He looks so much like Leifur.”

  Freyja beams. “That is his name. He owns a fleet of trawlers and a fish packing plant along the coast.” She admires the photo for a few moments after Solrun hands it back to her.

  “Why did he keep you away from us?” Solrun asks, leaning forward. “How could you fall in love with someone who’d do that to you? Why didn’t you come home after he died, or at least write?”

  Freyja shrinks a bit in the chair. “I was angry and hurt. And ashamed, I suppose. I felt like an outcast so all I could do was put my family first and the past out of my mind.”

  She hands Solrun the next photo. “This is Ella. Of all the girls, she looks most like my husband.”

  “A handsome man.”

  The next is of a middle-aged couple surrounded by young adults and two babies. Freyja points to each of her children and grandchildren, stating their names and occupations. Then she hands Solrun the next photo. “This is Asta.”

  “Asta,” Solrun repeats.

  “I didn’t name her right away. I waited to see if she had Amma’s eyes.”

  This photo has been professionally taken, in a studio. It’s the sort that would be enlarged and mounted on an office wall. The woman is wearing a dark gray suit jacket and the ruffle on her blouse delicately touches the bottom of her chin. She stares seriously into the camera, lips parted ever so slightly. She has deep blue eyes and thick eyebrows.

  Even though my namesake isn’t smiling, there is the trace of a dimple on her left cheek.

  “Asta is a partner in my husband’s firm. One of the first women to practice law in B.C. She is married, has two teenaged sons. Smart as a whip. Takes on all the firm’s hard luck cases and wins most of them.”

  Solrun chuckles as she sets the photo off to the side. She gets up to put a pan of cinnamon buns in the oven. When she sits back down, Freyja hands her another photo.

  “Solrun Elizabeth,” she says proudly. “A little you. She and her husband have a fruit farm in the Okanagan Valley. Three sons, two daughters.”

  “If you were so angry with us—”

  “Why did I name them after you? I didn’t stop loving you all.”

  Freyja pulls out the last photo but holds it to her chest for a few moments, eyes sparkling with pride. “This is my baby, Bjorg.”

  This photo was taken in an art gallery. There are large windows in the background, paintings on the wall. Bjorg is standing in front of a pottery display. The room is filled with light and it shines on her smiling face. She has the same delicate features and white hair as her mother.

  “Bjorg was a surprise,” Freyja says. “I was forty-nine when she was born. Didn’t think I’d get my little artist, but along she came.”

  Stefan’s child is missing from the story and the photos but Solrun does not ask.

  Leifur is already dressed and sitting on a chair in his room at the Lundi hospital. His elbows rest on the arms, knarled fingers entwine above his lap. He is freshly shaved and his hair is combed neatly in place. The years have stamped a permanent sadness on his face that pains me to see, but there is still fire in his eyes. He has exasperated the nurse by getting out of bed, but doesn’t care. Sigrid is beside him reading aloud from Lögberg-Heimskringla.

  “Hi, big brother, how are you?” Lars says as he steps in the room. “I brought someone to see you.”

  “Good,” Leifur says. “I would be disappointed if it was only you.”

  His eyes are on the door. Freyja and Solrun are giggling out of sight.

  I can hardly wait to see the look on his face.

  But Olafur comes in next.

  “Not you again,” Leifur says.

  “What? And miss the family reunion? Not a chance.”

  Sigrid folds the paper.

  Solrun steps inside with a pan concealed behind her back.

  “I smell cinnamon buns,” Leifur says.

  She slowly reveals what she’s brought and pulls back the cloth. “Only if you’ve been good. I will have to ask the nurse first.”

  “You’d better ask Sigrid instead,” he says, bringing a fist up to muffle the cough that erupts into a fit of slow, heavy barks. He shakes his head, disgusted with himself.

  Solrun waits, pretending not to notice any of it. “What have you done to annoy her now?”

  “Drum roll, please.” Olafur bangs his hands on the table top.

  With that, Freyja steps in, eyes glistening.

  “Come here you,” Leifur says softly, pushing himself up to his full height.

  Freyja moves across the room in an instant, tears running loose now. She falls into his open arms. She closes her eyes.

  And it seems as if time has stopped. The moment is so tender, so anticipated.

  “Oh Leifur, it is so good to see you.”

  “You too,” he whispers.

  She releases her hold on him and backs up, wiping tears quickly away. “You always were the handsome one.”

  “I wish everyone would stop reminding me,” Lars says.

  “How do you think I feel?” Olafur chimes. “Even you are better looking than me.”

  Everyone laughs.

  “Who wants a cinnamon bun?”

  Mother and Pabbi would be so happy to see them all right now.

  Olafur clears his throat. “I only wish Signy were here. Don’t anyone be angry with her. She cried as hard as you all when Freyja disappeared. The only way she could stop herself was to get mad. She died regretting what she’d done.”

  “He is right,” Solrun says softly. “Signy told me, too.”

  “Actually I am the one to blame for this reunion taking so long,” Leifur says, slowly lowering himself into the chair, setting the napkin on the table beside him. “I wasn’t thinking clear
ly. All those wet years, I feared we’d lose the farm, and the turmoil with Asta—to start looking for you again, well—”

  “No,” Freyja says. “This is my fault. I am so very sorry.”

  Silence washes into the room and Freyja whispers to Solrun, “These are delicious.” She turns back to Leifur. “I hear you ran a successful fish buying company before you sold out.”

  “For about twenty years.” Leifur is wheezing now. “I would have lost the farm without it.”

  “Where is Asta?” Freyja asks, licking her fingers. She finishes the last of the bun. “I was expecting her to be here.”

  I am thinking the same thing. Where am I? Why aren’t I with my family?

  Solrun turns her wrist to look at her watch. “She is in the care home,” she says. “Let’s you and I go see.”

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR

  The fire seems hottest to a burned man.

  —Grettir’s Saga

  I wish I could reach out to touch them, but all I can do in this place between worlds is follow curiously as Solrun and Freyja leave the hospital wing, stopping briefly at the nurse’s station.

  “We are going to visit Asta,” Solrun says to the nurse on duty. She pushes open the steel door that separates the hospital from the care home. She says in a low voice to Freyja, “The staff are very good to her.”

  They follow the hallway, passing rooms on both sides. All is quiet except for the click of their heels on the polished tile floor and the rumble of a voice at the end of the hall that becomes louder at they approach. Turning into the large common room, they pause at the entrance.

  There are white-haired women and baldheaded men wearing robes crumpled in wheelchairs, staring into their laps around the tables. Others not as infirm watch attentively. A few visitors sit on leather chairs against the wall. They are all listening to me. I stand in the middle of the floor, holding my scrapbook, my reading glasses halfway down my nose. My voice is strong and heavy with emphasis.