Page 3 of Entwined in Norway

The seven hours passed in what felt like the blink of an eye. With so much to see outside of the train, it was the least boring journey he’d ever had in his life. He’d especially loved it when they travelled through Voss, which was the Norwegian capital of winter sports. He already knew a little about that town, which was famous for turning out more Winter Olympians than anywhere else in the world. It was the biggest town they’d seen on the journey so far, and not all that far from Bergen.

Erik felt a pang for his old life. He’d been on the Canadian snowboarding team for over ten years with some career highlights that included winning gold at the Snowboard World Cup last year, a bronze medal in the last Winter Games and he’d been on target for a gold in the Winter Games the following year before it all ended. It was all over in the time it took for an off-piste skier to come from nowhere, make a jump onto the slope he was boarding and collide with him. Even before he’d known for sure the damage it had done to him, he knew it was over. And not just his career, but everything that went with it. All of his friends were also his teammates and they moved on without him. They had to, just like he’d had to when other people on the circuit had career-ending accidents. It could be a dangerous business, he knew that, but he’d always thought if an injury got the better of him it would have been a jump gone wrong, something he did. Somehow, it would have been easier to deal with if it had been his own fault.

But all that had brought him here. He had to hold that thought in his head to keep the melancholy away. And now that he thought about it, his mother had been right; he felt lighter being away from home. This was the first time he’d felt that surge of loss since he’d been in Norway. Okay, he’d been here twenty-four hours, not long at all, but at home it walked alongside him all the time.

As the train drew closer to Bergen, the skies grew greyer and drizzle speckled the train windows before they ducked into a series of tunnels. Bergen station itself was relatively small. It was one cavernous space with a few shops around the edge, including, bizarrely, a knitting shop. His mother would like that.

Again, being easy on himself, he’d booked a hotel right next to the station. This time it wasn’t a chain hotel, and there didn’t seem to be many of those in Bergen anyway. It was called the Grand Hotel Terminus and looked way fancier than Erik had expected for what he’d paid.

This time, there was no rolling vista to see from the window, just a soaring mountain with houses dotted across it. Erik was starving. He splashed some water on his face to freshen up and headed out straight away, taking his waterproof coat since it was raining.

Bergen had a completely different feel from Oslo. This part of town felt old. The small streets wound in different directions, the buildings lining them a higgledy-piggledy arrangement of mostly wooden-clad two-storey buildings painted in different colours. He found a pizza restaurant and ate, before returning to the hotel and sleeping, putting aside the excitement for the adventure to begin in earnest tomorrow.

The following morning, Erik knew where he wanted to go, and after some meandering around the unfamiliar streets, he ended up almost back where he’d started. The Bergen Public Library was on the opposite side of the station from his hotel. He laughed to himself when he realised, but then, it had been good to get a flavour of the city before he delved back indoors.

Thankfully, the librarian at the front desk spoke excellent English, like everyone else he’d encountered in Norway, and directed him to a computer terminal where he could browse through the local archives.

He took his coat off and hung it on the back of the chair, then pulled his document wallet from his backpack, laying it carefully on the table beside the keyboard. It was completely unnecessary. Apart from a handwritten letter, which was difficult to decipher, he knew the rest of it by heart. He was here to find the Larsen family. Larsen was a very common surname in Norway, and the research he’d attempted to do from Canada had been difficult because of that. But he was pretty certain that he’d narrowed down the correct family. If his research was correct, the Larsen family he was looking for owned a hotel on a small island in the fjord very close to here.

It took a few hours of searching, all the slower because he had to use an app on his phone to translate the text when he thought he might be on the right track, but eventually Erik found a newspaper article from April 1951 that corroborated the story he knew. It was accompanied by a grainy black-and-white photograph of two men, probably in their thirties, grinning at the camera with their arms around each other’s shoulders. “Mann fra Bergen redder uvitende livet til sin beste venn!” — “Bergen man unknowingly saves the life of his best friend!”

Erik took a photo of the article with his phone.

‘We can print anything of interest for you,’ the librarian called over.

His helpless look brought her over. She pressed a couple of keys. ‘It’ll be at the desk for you.’

‘Thank you.’

‘Family history?’

‘Yes. I think this guy is my great-grandfather,’ Erik said, pointing to the screen.

‘Both common surnames, though. You’ve done well if he’s the right person.’

But Erik had a feeling, and the more he looked at the photograph, the more he could see the family resemblance. Or thought he could.

Either way, tomorrow he was going to Strandgården. And that would tell him once and for all whether he was on the right track.

3

An evening with her nephew, Emil, was enough to remind Ida that she didn’t want to live on the island forever. Living there for a few weeks had been an enjoyable break and useful to be on hand all the time when everyone was learning the ropes of running the hotel, but she’d missed Emil. She’d even missed Fredrik. It had been fortunate that Fredrik hadn’t needed to be anywhere else for work in those few weeks, otherwise she wouldn’t have been able to do it. Although it was a tie being Fredrik’s backup person, because it was Emil, she was happy to do it.

After school, even though Emil was keen to play his video game, Ida wasn’t about to let that happen. As a single father, Fredrik resorted to that to entertain his son a lot, because he had to, or he’d get nothing done. But Ida had time, and she wanted to spend it doing something with Emil.

‘We’re going to make bread for dinner,’ she said.

‘We’re just having bread?’

‘Of course not. What do you want with it?’ She already knew what he was going to say. She’d planned this so he’d think it was his idea. That way he’d be keener on the whole thing.

‘Can we make crusty bread and fill it with soup?’ His eyes lit up. ‘Like me and Pappa had in Voss?’

‘That’s a great idea. Okay. You can make the bread, I’ll make the soup.’

He thought that was hilarious. ‘I can’t make the bread by myself!’ He was laughing so hard it was infectious, and Ida found herself laughing along with him. It was the first time in a while.

‘We’ll do it all together then.’