‘Huomenta ja hyvää joulua. My name is Niilo Oskal.’
Some of the staff whoop and cheer at this. He has the attention of everyone in the place.
‘I look after the reindeer here at Frozen Falls resort. My family are Sámi people and have lived in the lands to the south of this area for generations. They taught me how to sing traditionaljoiksongs. I would like to sing one now, a new song. It is called “Nari’s Joik”.’
He adjusts the microphone in front of his mouth and looks down at the keyboard before him. I hear Nari exhale sharply, but we both sit in silence, awestruck, as he stretches long fingers over the keys, and then he closes his eyes and opens his mouth to sing.
His voice, when it reaches us, is soft and tender, repeating the first word of his song:Nari.
As he incants her name, his fingers touch the keys and lend a melodious swell which builds as his voice grows stronger and he breaks into longer lines of poetry. The words sound a little like Finnish, but somehow more ancient and with greater complexity and power. And he’s looking only at Nari, as if they’re the only two people here.
Their gaze feels so intimate I shift my chair a little distance away, leaving Nari in a space of her own where only she and Niilo exist.
The music is like nothing I’ve ever heard before, and is sung in languages I’ll never understand, but I do understand the look on their faces and the electric feeling in the room, which is palpable.
I’ve never actually seen two people fall in love before, right in front of me. I imagine it’s what seeing a baby being born is like: the perfect combination of wonderful, splendid nature in all its terrifying glory and magical, unfathomable love in all its intangible, inexplicable wonder. Niilo is singing his love for my friend, and I watch helplessly, my own heart swelling with happiness for her as she falls. I can see the tears shining in their locked eyes.
Niilo’s song ends with a sweet sustained note, and suddenly, Nari’s on her feet and I bet she isn’t even aware of that fact yet. She’s leading the applause as the room wakes from Niilo’s enchantment.
I look down at the spa gift token still in my hand as Nari breaks her gaze away from Niilo and turns to me, wiping her eyes with her sleeve. We’re both thinking the same thing.
‘Sylve?’ she says, with a shaking voice.
‘Off you go,’ I say, and I admit a tear or two might have spoiled my own mascara at this point. ‘Have fun.’
She kisses me hard on my cheek, and she’s gone, and I’m left smiling sadly like a mother of the bride waving off her daughter at the end of the wedding reception.
I watch as they meet in the middle of the room and take each other’s hand and race for the doors and out into the snow. Through the frosted pane I see Niilo fastening Nari’s helmet straps under her chin before they leap onto a snowmobile with a loud, revving engine and disappear into the white world beyond the resort.
And suddenly, I’m very aware that I’m alone and still standing by the breakfast table. I have a sudden urge to check my pockets, feeling as though I’ve misplaced something, but nothing is amiss.
I look around the room, which is slowly emptying. The staff are chatting amongst themselves as they clear away dishes and strip table cloths into big laundry baskets.
‘Right,’ I say aloud to myself, catching my breath. Christmas day. Alone. In Lapland. Of course. What should I do now? I stand there for a while, like a satnav rerouting after an unexpected diversion.
I suddenly think of the key to the dog sheds back at my cabin. Although I doubt I’ll see Stellan today, there is someone who I know will be pleased to see me later. I gather up the remnants of breakfast in a napkin and put it in my bag. Toivo will enjoy these, I tell myself.
Then, looking at Nari’s Christmas gifts lying on the table, I try, with a bit of effort, to smile, shake my hair back and straighten my shoulders. My best friend is off having a romantic adventure with a beautiful, talented, surprising man, and if she’s happy, I’m happy.
I run my fingers over the jackets of the books she gave me. They’re festively foiled and glittering. I have something nice to readandI have something nice to do today. That’s not too bad. Surely, I can be content on my own for one day? I catch one of the staff as they bustle past with a tray of coffee cups.
‘Can you point me in the direction of the spa, please?’
Chapter Twenty
Niilo stands astride the snowmobile, clasping the throttle tightly, powering through the landscape, as Nari, her hands gripping his waist, laughs and screams. Once out of sight of the resort and on the wilderness track, Niilo throws his head back and howls a deep call into the grey light of the late morning sky.
The vehicle’s suspension absorbs the impact of each snowy mound and curve as Niilo pushes it to its absolute limit, sending birds scattering from the few scrubby trees and bushes they pass by before crossing the vast frozen lake and taking a turn southward onto a narrow forest track that Nari has never seen before.
Under the cover of the thick evergreen branches burdened with snow the headlights shine out, making the fine flakes in the air shine like glitter in a snowglobe.
Niilo takes the opportunity offered by a straight stretch of track to look around at Nari. Their faces are obscured by their black ski masks and helmets but each knows the other is smiling. The pair voice elated shrieks as they speed over a snowy mound and are, for a few exhilarating moments, airborne.
As the track widens, Niilo slows the pace and sits down on the wide seat. Nari pulls herself close to his back and wraps her thighs tightly around him, causing Niilo’s heart to pound even harder as a breathless, light-headed sensation washes through him. Gasping for air, he briefly reaches his gloved hand for hers and presses it reassuringly against his chest.
Nari closes her eyes, loving the sensation of this man being in control. When she opens them again, she gasps, though Niilo cannot hear her over the engine noise. There, running alongside them, just a few feet inside the treeline on both sides of the track, are a pack of wolves, their sleek necks bobbing and stretching as they run, their shaggy backs undulating with the speed of the chase. Niilo knows they are there but keeps his eyes fixed on the track ahead, and he and Nari race on through the wilderness making wild howling cries into the air before the creatures suddenly turn and disappear into the dark wood.
The cabin at the edge of the forest is almost entirely snowbound. Niilo parks the snowmobile beside what, in the summer months, would be recognisable as a herb garden. Clambering off the machine, he helps Nari step down into deep, untrodden white drifts.
