As they were going up the steps to the plane a crack opened in the clouds and there was a sudden brightness on the mountains beyond.
‘I can see the sun and the sky, Simon,’ Tone texted to her son.
‘No need to rub it in, Mum.’
Rain and rough weather were forecast for further south.
Summer Fever
It was the sort of weather for lying at home under a warm blanket drinking tea. Lara made some thyme-leaf tea and brought it to Bano.
‘Are you feeling any better?’ she asked.
‘Maybe a little bit,’ answered Bano.
Lara had plied her elder sister with grapes, apples, honey, hot milky cocoa and cod liver oil. Now she was following her mother’s tip that thyme was good for your throat. But she was also trying to cool down Bano’s face, hand and feet with a damp cloth.
At eleven o’clock the previous evening Lara had rung her mother, who had gone with Ali and Mustafa to the Football Cup in Gothenburg. While father and son were at the championship, she was visiting relatives in nearby Borås.
‘Have you got Lana’s number?’ asked Lara.
Lana was Bayan’s sister. She lived in Erbil and was a doctor, a paediatric specialist.
‘What do you want to talk to her for?’ asked Bayan.
‘You know Bano and I are supposed to be going to Utøya tomorrow, but Bano’s almost lost her voice and her temperature isn’t coming down. What can I do to make her better by tomorrow?’
‘Lara, it’s past midnight in Kurdistan, you can’t ring Lana now! I’m coming home tomorrow. And anyway, you mustn’t ring my sister and tell her you two are alone at home! What sort of mother will she think I am? I’m coming home.’
‘No, Mum, you don’t have to do that.’
‘Yes I do!’
Bayan told Mustafa she would be going back the next day, whether Ali’s team went through to the next round or not. The two of them had never got used to the relaxed attitude in Norway. They were anxious when they were not supervising in person and always feared the worst if the children were out and did not answer their mobiles. Bano was at home with a fever in the middle of summer; it must be something serious.
Bano grumbled to her sister.
‘I don’t think God wants me to go.’
‘Stop talking rubbish. Of course you’re going to be well enough!’ Lara retorted. Bano had been so looking forward to Utøya. They had wanted to go the previous year, in fact, but then they had to go with the family to Kurdistan, a place where they could only bear to stay for a fortnight at a time. All the restrictions, all the looks, all the rules; no, they preferred life in Norway.
Lara massaged her elder sister’s feet and neck. She had bought crisps and sweets, and tried to tempt her with all the exciting things that would be happening on Utøya. Bano could hardly stand up, so Lara packed for her: warm clothes, a sleeping bag, a ground pad.
They dozed off on the sofa, both of them.
‘You’re bound to be well enough to go tomorrow,’ said Lara before she fell asleep.
First thing on Wednesday morning, Bayan caught the train from Gothenburg. Four hours later she took the tram from the railway station to Aker Brygge, then the ferry over to Nesoddtangen and the bus home to Oksvalkrysset, and by noon she was ready to take over the role of nurse. She came home to find the place a total mess. Not a glass had been washed since she left, not a plate, nothing. Bano had had enough of being ill, and Lara of looking after her.
Lara was ready to leave when her mother arrived.
‘I’m sure you’ll be better tomorrow!’ she called to her elder sister before she slammed the door and went down to the bus stop. In Oslo she was going to meet up with the other AUF members arriving by plane and boat and train from all over Norway to continue the journey to Utøya.
She got to the island mid-afternoon, which meant she did not, after all, have to choose between the various seminars on offer, on subjects like refugee integration and drilling for oil in the Lofoten islands, as they were already over. All that was left now was a fashion show featuring the AUF leader Eskil Pedersen and his second-in-command Åsmund Aukrust. They would be on the catwalk modelling the new AUF clothing range of soft-feel T-shirts, sweatshirts and trousers. Then it was time for the football tournament to start and after that there was something in the programme called speed dating, before it was time for a quiz in the café. The late-night cinema started at midnight.
Lara got changed, ready for Akershus county’s match. They lost.
She could not be bothered with the speed dating and went to lie down in the tent and read Mornings in Jenin. She wasn’t having such a good time without Bano around. That was often the case. Bano made everything seem so much fun, sometimes even when it wasn’t. How often had Lara found herself doing things because Bano had said they were wicked or awesome, but when she tried them for herself, they were nothing special?
Bano lay in her parents’ double bed. She felt poorly, had earache and was tender all over. Her mother gave her some painkillers and brought warm cloths to hold over her aching ear. Bayan had gone out to the kitchen to make more tea when she heard a crash from the living room. The alarm clock was lying on the floor in pieces. Bano had thrown it from the bedroom.
‘Its tick was driving me mad, Mum.’
‘That’s all right Bano. It doesn’t matter.’
Bayan lay down beside her daughter in the bed. Everything was wrong. She was sick, she wasn’t on Utøya and she had failed her driving test twice.
‘Bah, I’ve spent so much money on it, and I’ve got to have my licence by the time we’re russ…’
Bano was in a hurry in life. She wanted it all, right away. The first time she failed she had gone through a red light, the second time she had turned the wrong way at a roundabout. When she was out in the car with Mustafa to practise, they always ended up quarrelling. The last time she had driven was the morning Mustafa was taking Ali and Bayan to Gothenburg, while she was going to work at the Tusenfryd amusement park. Bano was running late as usual, and on the winding section of road just before the Vinterbro junction she found herself behind a lorry.
‘I’m going to overtake!’
She moved into the opposite lane and sped up.
‘Are you mad?’ cried her father. Bano pulled into her lane in front of the lorry, but a few seconds more and they would have crashed into the car coming the other way. ‘Your driving will kill us all!’
‘You should be like my driving instructor,’ Bano said. ‘He never makes any comments until I stop the car.’
Once they got to Tusenfryd and she was dashing off to change into her work uniform, she shouted cheerfully: ‘Don’t forget to bring the allowance of four litres of red wine back with you, it’s much cheaper in Sweden!’
Now Bano asked her mother to bring her laptop to her. There was something she wanted to show her. As she was finding her way to it, her spirits rose. That’s how it was with Bano; it was never far between the highs and the lows. She found what she was looking for.
‘Mum, can we go to New York?’
For the first time, the family was planning to go away in the autumn holidays and her parents were talking about Spain or Greece. The girls preferred the idea of a city break.
Bano showed her mother the cheap tickets she had found and a hostel ‘that ‘would cost almost nothing for the five of us’.
Lying there with her poorly daughter beside her, Bayan was in a soft-hearted mood.
‘All right Bano. Let’s go. I’ll pay.’