The Cold Song Read Online Free PDF Page B

handlebars. His scream was cut short as he hit the ground. He lay perfectly still for a few moments, until the pain kicked in. Grazes on the palms of his hands and his knees. Grit in the cuts. Blood. He hobbled over to the side of the road, slumped against a tree trunk, and cried. But no matter how loudly he cried his mother and father wouldn’t hear him. Their house was way down the road,the party drowned out everything else up here, and he was alone and hurt all over, his knees hurt worst of all, his bike was probably wrecked, and his palms were grazed because he had put out his hands in an attempt to break his fall, protect his head. That was what you were supposed to do if you fell off your bike. And not only that, you were supposed to wear a helmet, his mother would be furious with him for not wearing a helmet and he wouldn’t be allowed to go out alone on his bike in the evenings ever again.
    His bike was still lying in the middle of the road. All funny and bent looking. Simen howled even louder. That was when she appeared. The girl in the red dress, with the long dark hair with a flower in it. She had a shawl around her shoulders. She was the prettiest girl Simen had ever seen—and the mist, now thickening into fog, didn’t touch her, but appeared to shy away from something so beautiful. He went on crying even though a voice inside him was telling him that when something as pretty as this girl is coming toward you, you shouldn’t be sitting in the ditch, crying like a baby. On the other hand, if he hadn’t been sitting in the ditch, crying like a baby, the girl would never have stopped, she would never have crouched down in front of him and put her arms around him and whispered, “Did you fall off your bike? Did you hurt yourself? Can I see?” She would never have helped him to his feet, asked his name, and used her red shawl to wipe the dirt and the tears off his face. She would never have bent over his bike to inspect the damage. “It’s not wrecked,” she said, pulling it up onto its wheels. “Look, Simen, it’s not wrecked.” And she would never have walked with him through the fog, all the way down the long, winding road fromJenny’s house to his house, five hundred and sixty-seven steps—with one hand in his hand, the other on the handlebars. “I’m Milla,” she said when they finally got there.
    She propped his bike against the fence, looked at him, and smiled. Then she bent over and kissed the top of his head.
    “I’m Milla and you’re Simen and you’re not to cry anymore.”
    Then she turned and walked away.

JON DREYER HAD fooled everyone.
    He was in the attic room at Mailund, that dilapidated white turn-of-the-century house, where the Dreyer-Brodal family spent their summers. He was looking at Milla.
    The room was small and bright and dusty with a view of the meadow and the woods and of Milla picking flowers with his children. His wife, she of the asymmetric back (a little kink in her waist, that’s all), owned a restaurant in the center of town, in the old bakery. Siri was her name.
    Siri was at work.
    He was at work too.
    His work was right here. He had his desk, his computer, this is where they left him in peace. He had a book to finish.
    But he was looking at Milla.
    Siri’s restaurant was called Gloucester, after the fishing port in Massachusetts where she and Jon and Alma had spent a summer when Jon was writing the first part of his trilogy. That was nine years ago, when Alma was three and Liv wasn’t even born yet.
    Oh, how he could write back then. Pages and pages, effortlessly every day. And now here he was, working on part three;the first and second parts had been great successes, published in quick succession in 2000 and 2002. And then nothing. Part three—nothing!
    He was supposed to have finished part three a long time ago but the days were frittered away and he had nothing to show for them. Maybe he was depressed. Siri said she thought he might be depressed.
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