When I got back Harsvold was by the window, typing. It was best not to disturb him. Between my bags at the hydrangeas someone had left a plumped sack of petals, meant as a pillow. It could only have been Espen I thought.

I lay amidst the scents and watched the motionless sun. Was it still today or tomorrow or some other day after tomorrow? It seemed so long now since my arrival. I did not close my eyes. 

Harsvold shook me. When I finally looked around, he handed me a bowl of coffee with serinakaker. The sequoias had been sourced. There was much to be done: finding a suitable location on the strand, soil tests, preparation of ground, building support gantries etc. He had made a list of coordinates for planting sites. I was to get ‘the local idiot’ Espen to take me to them and make notes.

Harsvold wanted to say something else. To help him I said. ‘Matis asked me to walk with her after the meeting. I met Athene.’

Harsvold nodded and clasped his hands. 

‘Okay. Good.’ He said. ‘She’s a crackpot. Not Athene, the mother I mean.’

Espen was waiting by the side of the grand barn. I thanked him for the pillow. He told me he was certainly no expert but the head sorely needed comfort after all the thinking it had to do, except that is for empty heads for which there was no pillow suitable. 

He guided me over rocks and dunes onto a long grassy strand above the beach. Since where we stood was slightly elevated, I told him it was a perfect spot for the sequoias. We dug out soil samples along the strand and found several areas with fertile soil. Wiping down our shovels, Espen shook his blonde curly hair.

‘What?’ I said.

‘I know little about sequoias. Mightn’t they be happier amongst their fellow trees in a forest?’

Harsvold liked the site I’d selected. He felt the soil samples and placed them in ziplock bags. I wrote emails to suppliers and organised diggers and timber support frames for the gantries. 

On my pillow beneath the hydrangeas, things came to mind not as a dream. 

Penelope was standing at graduation. She seemed to approve of what I was doing on Sommarøy. Athene sang to my parents on their wedding day. Calderwood was the minister. Harsvold gave me wedding rings and a bouquet. Mother didn’t smoke. Espen carried them away on white horses.

I sat up with the smell of coffee. Harsvold had brought over freshly made serinakaker. I ate them all quickly.

‘I don’t know if I am sleeping or awake or in-between or something else.’ I said.

‘Soon you won’t fret about that.’ Harsvold said flicking through his notebook. ‘Do you remember I spoke about Kavli at the meeting?’

‘Yes. Radio bursts from the sun.’

‘FRBs’ He said. ‘I would like you to accompany me. There’s much to learn there. Also we can visit the deep lake, Hornindalsvatnet.  And-‘ Harvold looked beyond the line of hydrangeas. ‘Why don’t you ask Athene if she would like to join us?’

I went to the cottage where Matis and Athene were picking herbs. I ate some. They were moist and dry. When I spoke about Kavli, Matis said.

‘If Athene goes you must be by her side. She will feel uncomfortable amongst the demon-scientists. She will need a friend.’

‘Of course.’ I said. ‘Would you like to go to the strand where the sequoias will be?’

Matis led the way on her buggy. Athene and I walked side by side. When she spoke her voice was no louder than breath.

‘I have never left Sommarøy.’

‘Really?’

‘What will be there in Kavli?’

‘I think there’s a radar station and an Institute for Neuro-Science.’ I said.

‘What does neuro do?’

‘I think they study the inside of our heads.’ I tried to say that in a light hearted way but Athene did not smile.

‘What if they don’t find anything?’

‘What? Inside our heads?’ 

‘I don’t want anyone looking.’ She said.

‘Don’t worry.’ I said. ‘We can enjoy swimming in lake Hornindalsvatnet afterwards.’

When we reached the location for the sequoias Matis nodded.

‘From great wooden limbs we shall climb inside the sun.’

‘Climb inside the sun?’ I said.

‘In everything there is an inside.’ She said. ‘Even for that ring you wear around your neck.’

She waited to see if I would respond then sped along the strand. 

‘Goodbye until Kavli.’ Athene said before following her.

Harsvold told Athene and I the Institute in Trondheim was many, many miles away. We began our journey by ferry then drove alongside pitted wetlands on narrow tracks. 

Kavli was warm but not as sunny as Sommarøy. 

Men with beards like Harsvold demonstrated the radio telescope. Whilst Harsvold was breathing excitedly at the FRBs, I could hear only crackling like old ethernet. We were escorted to a windowless research building where a scientist explained the supra chiasmatic nucleus and other developments in neuroscience. Athene stared at her shoes.

When the meetings at the Institute finished we made our way to Hornindalsvatnet. The water was dark and still. A sign read – 

Dypeste innsjø i Europa. 

Harsvold laughed at my pronunciation. ‘The deepest.’ He said.

I linked arms with Athene to jump from the jetty then we swam backstroke making the water splash with our feet. We dried ourselves on the mossy bank. Harsvold brought out strawberries and bread. Black-headed gulls were roosting along the shoreline. At dusk we longed for the sun of Sommarøy. Harsvold drove fast, his face white with thought. Athene slept across my chest. I kissed her head every village we passed through.

Weeks must surely must have passed without the sun coming up or going down. I worked on the sequoias project managing the men as they dug trenches and built gantries for the heavy saplings. Athene brought me cloudy lemonade then sat watching us. Espen would often sit beside her. And I felt content as I lay upon my perfumed pillow.

When the sequoias arrived the town prepared a ceremony. To keep peace it was agreed Harsvold should speak followed by Matis. A fiddle band was assembled to play during the moment of planting. Harsvold climbed onto the gantry.

‘I have recently returned from Kavli Institute where I saw many great advances. Our circadian rhythms, the proteins in our brains can help understand life without what we call time. These trees will mark our journey to knowledge.’

Light applause followed. A fiddler nearby said ‘Claptrap as usual.’ Espen smiled over at me making his eyes go cross till I started laughing.

Matis manoeuvred to the side of the trees raising her hand above her head.

‘You have heard the wickedness of science enough on Sommarøy. We shall ascend the unknowable glory of our sun on the limbs of these sequoias. That is all.’

Everyone was given the chance to shovel soil over the root base.

While the band played I walked with Athene along the beach below. She was staring at the men as they bound the muscular trunks to wooden cross beams. Her hazel eyes were red along the edges.

‘Don’t you feel tiny when you look at them?’ She said.

‘They are big.’

‘When they reach the sun we and those who follow will be gone.’

‘But.’ I said. ‘There is here and now, and there is us.’

She started to cry. ‘Shadows of trees over us.’

We kissed, her lips pressed hard on mine.

I took father’s ring from around my neck and placed it on her finger. It was loose so I gave her the chain with the ring threaded back through.

‘I love you.’ I said.

Matis called from the path by their cottage. Athene scratched her tangled hair before taking my face in her hands.

‘We are too small. Too small in everything.’ Then she ran after her mother’s buggy.

The strand was empty except for the sequoias creaking in the warm breeze. Already they seemed taller. When I returned to Harsvold’s, he was writing on his equation wall. I settled amongst the hydrangeas.

The sun filled the sky’s ceiling 

…like morning

…like afternoon

…like evening

There was a scream. 

I was up running and heard Harsvold grunting behind me. Others from the village were chasing the cry along the strand. Espen came alongside and passed me. 

Before I could see for certain, I knew it was Athene swinging from the gantry. I heard my voice call her name like a stranger. I pushed others aside and tried to lift her down. Her limp neck wouldn’t straighten. I yanked at the rope where the twisted chain and ring were marring her beautiful skin. 

Espen shook his head and stopped me. He carried the body to Matis who lay by her overturned buggy. Harsvold was kneeling beside her.

‘Beautiful daughter. Beautiful child.’ 

The light was golden everywhere.

After Athene’s internment I stayed on in Sommarøy to help Espen and others chop up the sequoias, then dismantle the gantries. Harsvold rid his house of computers, gradually washing down the equation wall. 

The day I told him I was leaving we sat on the porch with serinakaker and coffee.

‘Okay.’ He said and nodded as though I’d said something he’d heard before.

’What about your research?’ I said.

He looked to my neck for the ring and tried to smile. 

‘I’m going to shave my beard.’ He said then added. ‘Matis is coming to live with me.’

‘That’s good.’ I said. ‘Being together will keep Athene with you.’

He stopped sipping his coffee.

’That’s true.’ He said. ‘But what will you do?’

On the way to the Airfield, Espen joked about his encounter with the horses.

‘In animal matters simple creatures are wise beyond what we credit them.’

He thanked me for coming to Sommarøy and called me his dearest friend.

‘As for the sorrow of goodbyes your flight may be gentler if you don’t look back after take-off.’

I dropped my bags and hugged him tightly.

‘Thank you for my pillow, Espen.’

I stared ahead as the Cessna rose across and away from the sun of Sommarøy.

The commercial flight from Oslo to Glasgow was heavy with turbulence but it landed on schedule. I sat alone in Arrivals then took a cab to the city centre and drifted around for an hour. Fine rain hung in the wind like static. I threw my bags in a skip and found a cafe. The floor was muddy with footprints. My coffee went cold. 

In the street a group of women assembled, took leaflets from a hold-all and began handing them to shoppers. The women with the hold-all turned fully round. It was Penelope.

When I walked over she seemed puzzled at first then said hello.

‘I went to a place called Sommarøy.’

‘I had a miscarriage.’ She said. 

‘I’m sorry.’ I said. ‘I’m really sorry. Perhaps you and your partner -‘

‘He’s as dead as my child.’ She gave me a leaflet dampened by smir. ‘We run a Centre to support people. It’s on the outskirts of the City.’

‘Penelope at our Graduation when you -‘

‘Your friend Woodie isn’t far from here.’ 

‘Really?’ I said. ‘I never kept in touch.’

She pointed over my shoulder towards an electronic billboard above the entrance to the shopping mall. Flickering on and off was an advert for DeFacto Finance. Dark eyed Woodie stood over a young couple. They were smiling as he passed them a credit card. Perhaps for a car or a house or a sunny villa. The ticker below ran. 

We Make Your Money Work Harder Than You’ll Ever Need To

‘I have to visit my mother.’ I said. ‘Would you come with me?’ 

I didn’t expect Penelope to say yes but she handed the hold-all to another woman and we ran for the 3 o’ clock bus.

‘So she did have a son after all.’ The old neighbour laughed before telling us Mother was dead and buried in a nearby cemetery. The key to the house was under a plant pot.

‘You and your wife will need to clear the place. There’s bills to pay.’

Penelope found the key and shoved open the door.

Father’s shoes sat in the hall beneath his coat. Mother’s chair was in front of the darkening bay window. On the table lay unopened cartons of cigarettes and a disposable lighter. 

‘It’s hard to know where to begin.’ I went to straighten a painting which wasn’t uneven. ‘I don’t think she ever wanted me. I mean I don’t think my mother ever wanted children.’

‘And do you?’ Penelope said.

I let the painting swing back to its original position. 

‘I don’t want to be alone.’ I said.

Penelope nodded. ‘I’ll put the kettle on.’

I sat in mother’s chair. It was cold and comfortable. I turned the ring on my finger and looked out to see, to see.