The Heart Keeper Read online

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Iselin

  I must have fallen asleep on the kitchen table, slumped over a new drawing. The pinging sound of an email on the phone wakes me up. Kaia hasn’t been up in the night as much in the last two weeks, but she’s woken up twice so far tonight, leaving me with only scraps of sleep. Poor little one, she took a bad fall at school today and we had to go to A & E to get the deep cut above her eyebrow glued back together. All afternoon she was woozy and teary. I turn the phone over and squint at the screen; quite a few new likes on Instagram and an email from an address I don’t recognize.

  From: Alison Miller-Juul

  To: Iselin Berge

  Date: Sat, Feb 9, 2019, at 1:04 a.m.

  Subject: Enquiry

  Hi,

  I came across your illustrations on Instagram and thought they were very beautiful and special. Would it be possible to commission a couple for my home? I especially like your charcoal and calligraphy work featuring anatomical hearts. Could you email me some prices and information on how to proceed?

  Thank you,

  Alison Miller-Juul

  Another one! I almost want to wake Kaia and tell her that now, finally, we are getting somewhere. As Kaia has gone from strength to strength, I have found my mind clearing, as though it has been steeped in a thick fog for years and years. When I went to pick up the pencil, it would just hover there, above the page, not moving, because in my mind, I saw nothing. All the images and fantasies that had played out in my head from childhood, the need to draw that pulled me through my difficult teens, were just gone, replaced by an eerie, gray silence.

  I consider texting Noa, but then I remember she’s here, sleeping on the sofa bed. She’s playing several sets in Oslo this week, so we get to see her twice in one month. I flick the switch on the reading lamp in front of me and then I can make her out from where I’m sitting; she’s shrugged off the duvet, exposing the star tattoo on her ankle which matches mine. We got them together in Narvik when she turned sixteen and I was almost eighteen. She’s covering her face with one hand, another tattoo creeping out of her pajama sleeve. I find a new piece of drawing paper, sharpen the pencil into a perfect point, and then I begin to draw her. I try to capture the fragile curve of her back, the milky, unblemished skin, the soft hollow of her stomach and something of that uncompromising strength that defines Noa. I think of her when she was a little girl, when her name was still Nora Caroline Berge. She always possessed such a strong sense of self, even when we were children. She knew who she was, what she wanted, and where she was going, and sometimes, thinking back, it seems to me that she extended that determination to me, shaping me the way she wanted to, even though she is younger than me.

  We’re going to leave this shithole, me and you, she’d say, and I’d look around the quiet fjord-side village surrounded by barren mountains, listening to her voice, drawing pictures in my mind of all the places we would go. We’ll be artists, she’d say. We’ll always be together. We’ll live in Paris or London or New York, and we’ll be famous and everyone from home will read about us in magazines and wish they’d been nicer to us.

  Yeah, I’d say, because that was what I usually said to Noa’s grandiose plans. Our parents will be sorry, so fucking sorry. I’d always recoil a little bit, just thinking about them. Yeah, I said, they’ll be so fucking sorry. I wonder if they ever were.

  My pencil lingers on Noa’s wrist tattoo and I exaggerate it, adding intricate designs that aren’t really there. In the end, the Noa on paper is covered in tattoos, every last part of her face, even, and I smile at the thought that in this moment it is me defining her, not the other way around.

  Noa stirs and makes an abrupt, growly noise – a cross between a yawn and a cough, and then she sits up, blinking hard in the shaft of light from the kitchen. When she sees me sitting at the table watching her she stretches her arms out like a child would to its mother and I go to her. I don’t know what I would do without her; she is my sister, the only person really close to me besides Kaia, but sometimes my love for her is contaminated by envy and becomes too complicated. I pat her knobbly back, and draw in the familiar, sleepy scent of her. I’m glad I’m not here alone.

  ‘Hey, guess what?’ I say.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I got an email from another lady who wants to buy some drawings from me. Two, I think.’

  ‘Awesome! You must be Østerås’s most successful illustrator by now, big sis.’ Noa’s dark blue eyes shimmer with pride and excitement.

  ‘I know, right?’

  ‘Issy, that’s awesome! I swear, I always knew this would happen. You just needed some confidence. The new stuff is so cool. I’ve never seen anything like it before.’

  I wish it was always like this – Noa and I, here together, my daughter sleeping in the next room, an apartment filled with drawings, in an anonymous suburb of the capital. We’ll leave this shithole, you and me. We’ll be artists and we’ll always be together…

  Sometimes it felt like I never had a choice, that my only option was to follow her on her journey from Nordland to Paris, from Nora Berge to DJ Noa, from determined outcast schoolgirl to tattooed it-girl and celebrated songwriter-DJ, but somewhere along the path I lost my own way. I sense it again now, folding out in front of me.

  ‘I drew you,’ I say, and show her the drawing.

  ‘Your hand sees me more clearly than your eyes,’ she says and laughs. I lie down beside her but can’t sleep. When Noa’s breath has dropped into the unmistakable steady rhythm of heavy sleep, I pull my phone out and reply to Alison Miller-Juul.

  From: Iselin Berge

  To: Alison Miller-Juul

  Date: Sat, Feb 9, 2019, at 01:49 a.m.

  Subject: Re Enquiry

  Hi,

  Thanks for getting in touch. I’m in my studio space in Majorstuen two days a week (Monday and Wednesday). If you’re able to come by to discuss further, that would be great. That way I can show you a selection of my work. The address is Trudvangveien 30.

  Best regards,

  Iselin Berge

  The reply comes almost immediately – Monday is perfect, it reads. I move closer to Noa, snuggling against her shoulder like when we were kids, and close my eyes.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Alison

  ‘I’m going to go and see Erica and the baby,’ I say, and Sindre looks up from where he’s sitting at his computer in the home office, face blank. ‘I haven’t seen her in a really long time. Since… well, since last summer.’

  ‘I didn’t know they’d had a baby.’

  ‘Yeah. Quite recently. A boy called Alvin.’

  ‘Tell her I said hi.’

  I nod. My eyes linger on my husband for a drawn-out moment, as if a part of me wants him to question me, or stop me somehow. He seems to just automatically believe that I would suddenly feel the urge to go visit an old friend. But why would he question me?

  This is a crazy thing to do. What would Sindre do if he knew where I was going? I imagine him holding me hard by the shoulders, like a naughty child, his gravelly voice booming in my ear: Are you completely fucking insane? But it isn’t as if Sindre isn’t crazy himself; shooting uncontrollably, concealing weapons, running for hours in the middle of the night, pursuing some woman. As if either of us could be anything but crazy. I shut the door softly behind me and, pulling my scarf tight around my neck, step outside. I’ve decided to walk to Iselin’s studio, though it is far and very cold outside. It’s all downhill into the city from our quiet neighborhood on the edge of the forest, and I think it might be good for me to physically tire myself before I arrive. My knees ache and I have a distant recollection of falling down, but I’m not sure I actually did.

  I start walking down Ullveien, but my legs feel weak. I stop for a moment and think about turning back toward the house, but then I decide to keep walking; I’d rather be out in the frosty air than shut up inside
. Besides, I don’t have to go to Iselin’s studio. I could just walk into town and get the T-bane back up – I haven’t yet done anything that isn’t entirely reversible.

  I take a deep breath and feel soothed by the sight of the tall spruce trees fringeing the road, branches laden with snow glinting in the sunlight. I haven’t taken anything today, though perhaps I should have, but in this moment I feel able to just walk and breathe without the tranquilizers. Either way, they are in my pocket and I close my hand hard around the little rattling box as I walk.

  Something happened in the time after I regained consciousness. The burning was gone. I had wanted it to be gone, of course, but I hadn’t anticipated the vast, cold space it would leave behind. It felt so good, to be suspended in that semi-conscious state, where memories and feelings and impressions layered over each other, where past and present could seamlessly co-exist. Moving around in my mind, the years blurred and the kids were big and small and then big again. I wish the doctors had never woken me up. I stop for a moment and try to focus on the burning; to conjure up the way it felt like constant corrosion in my stomach – sometimes unbearable and searing hot, other times harder to discern, but nevertheless a constant presence – but it really is gone.

  I pass Holmenkollen station and stand a while looking up at the ski jump, its nimble glass-and-metal body reflecting the sun. Some Asian tourists stand around in the slushy snow in their tennis shoes, chattering and half-heartedly photographing the famous structure before getting back on their tour bus. I’m about to walk on when I pick out a small black figure toward the top of the jump, inching toward the cabin. It’s Monday morning, and they do train here throughout the winter. What might they be like, those moments spent hanging suspended above the drop, clutching the metallic railing on either side, before letting go and hurtling down the in-run? What makes people do such things? I wait for a bit and sure enough, the figure slides down fast before arching smoothly through the sky, and for a moment it is as though I am him, as though it’s me flying high above the city glittering through a haze of smog far below in the valley; fast, cold air tearing at my face. He lands, broad skis slamming down onto densely prepped snow, arms shooting from his sides to above his head, as if applauding his own perfect flight.

  I start walking again, faster now, and it isn’t until I reach Slemdal station further down the hillside that I realize my mistake. I’ve never walked this way before, and in the car I would have known to avoid it – Holmenkollen Montessori Klubb. Amalie’s old nursery. How will I bear the chatter of other people’s children, the sight of little busy bodies rushing around in the snow, encumbered by snow suits? I listen out for voices, but the air is almost entirely silent, save for the distant whirr from the ring road. Rounding the corner, I’m relieved to see that all the children are inside, and I stand by the fence, looking at the myriad footprints in the empty playground, trying to calm my hammering heart. If Amalie hadn’t left me, she wouldn’t still be here – she’d have started at the school further up the road. I turn around and can just about make out the large yellow school building in between the trees.

  She’s in there, I whisper to myself. She’s in there, practicing letters with a carefully held pen, crossing ‘t’s and dotting ‘i’s. She’s in there, the new green-and-purple Mummitroll backpack leaning against her desk. She’s smiling to herself because she’s finally at school, in the bright and airy classroom overlooking the tennis court, at the double desk next to Charlotte Bern, whose freckled, gentle face she’s known her whole life, after so many months of thinking and talking about it non-stop. She’s in there.

  It’s easier to keep walking when I tell myself this.

  At Majorstuen, all the snow has melted, and I sit at Baker Hansen with a cappuccino, watching the half-empty number 20 bus churn slowly through brown slush. I’m early, and despite the long walk, I feel restless and deeply anxious. This is a crazy thing to do. Crazy and dangerous. But since that night at the lake and in the blurred weeks since, I have become convinced that owning a couple of Iselin’s drawings will bring me some comfort, giving me a connection to the recipient. Perhaps I could somehow find a way to ask her about her daughter, if she’s noticed any changes that can’t be ascribed to the surgery or the recovery. No, I tell myself, stop now. I’ll buy the drawings, and then I will stop.

  I check my phone and there’s a text message from Sindre, reading Be careful walking, it’s icy out there, I love you. My thoughts return to Amalie at her school desk, messy hair swept back from her face in a high ponytail, eyebrows scrunched in concentration, sharp new pencil held tight, little smile lurking, my heart – undone. I stand up, leaving the cappuccino untouched. I’m ready. I walk past Majorstuen station as if in a daze, turn left after the library and down a quiet residential street. I repeat the quote from Iselin’s Facebook cover photo over and over in my mind as I bring my finger to the doorbell at number 30, which has a new white name sticker reading Studio Isberg. Hearts are wild creatures, that’s why our ribs are cages… I press two fingers to my chest just above my breast, and the rapid throb of my heart is indeed like the scramble of a beast.

  *

  I’m buzzed in, and walk up two flights of stairs, where a woman is waiting in the open doorway. She’s more beautiful than I anticipated from her photos, with translucent, pale skin and big, carefully made-up eyes, a flick of black eyeliner sweeping upwards at the corners of her eyes. Her hair, which was brown in the pictures, is now dyed a punchy, icy blonde and piled up high on her head. She smiles widely at me.

  ‘Hi. You must be Alison,’ she says in English, and I don’t bother offering to speak Norwegian, though my Norwegian is as good as her English, if not better. ‘I’m really happy you could stop by. I always think it’s best to see these kinds of illustrations in person, they just don’t photograph that well.’ I follow her through what looks like someone’s apartment, which is filled with books and artwork.

  ‘Is this your home?’ I ask, my voice emerging as a hoarse croak. I try to imagine this young woman at the sick child’s bedside, praying, praying, that her daughter would receive a new heart. Someone else’s heart.

  ‘No, this is my sister’s friend’s apartment. She’s gone to Bali for the winter, and I’m just temporarily using the studio space here. I mostly work from home, but my daughter has just started school and I wanted to get out more. It’s great to have a space where I can meet with potential buyers.’ Iselin shows me into a big white space I’m guessing would have been the apartment’s master bedroom. It looks out onto a wide, square backyard covered by thick snow, but I imagine it in the summer, bustling with people from all the apartments overlooking it, drinking beer and cooking together on big barbecues. I let my eyes travel around the room, taking in Alison’s illustrations, which cover almost every surface. I feel her eyes on me expectantly, but just then, a thin voice from another room rings out.

  ‘Mamma,’ it says. ‘Come, Mamma!’ My heart drops in my chest, and the burning flares up again, a hot, searing sensation spreading out in my stomach. Iselin looks at me apologetically, eyes wide and startled when she sees the look on my face. I try to smile, but my face won’t comply, so I look down at my feet.

  ‘Sorry. Will you excuse me for a moment? My daughter’s home from school today; she’s had a bit of an accident.’

  ‘Of course,’ I say, using all my strength to keep my voice from shaking. She’s here. ‘Poor thing.’ Iselin leaves the room, and I can hear her whispering in the next room, and the little girl’s voice rising and falling. My eyes are stinging with hot tears. What am I doing here? What the hell was I thinking, finding this woman and her child online and striking up contact with them? It’s beyond crazy. I eye the door and decide to quietly slip out – I can end this craziness, right now, and that is exactly what I need to do. But just then, Iselin returns, trailed by a little girl partially hiding behind her mother.

  ‘Hi,’ I say, and Kaia peeks out from behind Iselin, a flash of cool blue eyes, before I look a
way.

  ‘This is Kaia,’ says Iselin. ‘She wanted to say hi. She was really excited that someone was coming, you’re actually the first, uh, customer to come here, so…’

  ‘Oh,’ I say. ‘Hi, Kaia.’ I extend my hand but my face flushes hot and my mind is burning white, like if one looks at the sun for too long. The little girl steps forward to take it and I have to swallow hard several times before I’m able to lower my eyes and fully look at her. I needn’t have worried; I feel nothing. She’s unremarkable. Shorter than I’d have imagined a seven-year-old to be. She has a big cut above her right eyebrow, dressed with surgical tape, blueing at the edges.

  ‘I know you,’ says Kaia, and my mouth drops open. I glance at Iselin, whose face looks a little bit flushed.

  ‘No, Kaia, you’ve not met Alison before. Remember, I told you, she’s come here to look at my drawings. She found them online.’

  ‘Yeah, but I know you,’ she says again, and looking into her eyes, I feel it too; I do know her, and it is as though a powerful current passes between us. I fight the urge to reach for her, to pull the child close, feeling the beat of her heart against my chest.

  ‘I… I was on TV,’ I say. ‘I wrote a book. Uh, maybe you saw me there.’ Kaia stares at me, then turns around and walks over to a little easel by the window, which I hadn’t noticed. I’m struck by the un-childlike way she moves; she walks like an adult, with poise and control, unlike Amalie, who’d half-dance and hop about.

  ‘Look,’ she says, pointing to the drawing she’s working on. ‘I draw, too.’ Kaia is clearly talented, and the drawing she points to could be the work of an adult. A little girl stands on the edge of a cliff, dark hair whipped up by the wind, and she’s stretching out her hand to a big black bird about to land on it. In its claws it holds a shiny red heart. I turn away from it, careful to avoid Iselin’s eyes. I really need to leave, now; my head hurts and my heart is pounding.