‘We do, but not if our guests aren’t into it.’
‘Oh! Of course.’
So I settle myself next to him, not too close, and I try to acclimatise. It’s not the heat I’m aware of first, it’s the strange dryness of the air. I try to slake it away with a big glug of the beer Stellan’s handed me, and we both stare into the coals.
‘Have you enjoyed your trip to Lapland?’ he asks.
‘I have.’ It hits me how much I don’t want to leave in the morning. ‘I feel as though I’ve only just touched the surface of the place. I haven’t even seen the Northern lights.’
‘You might be lucky tonight, in fact I’d say there was an eighty-eight per cent chance of seeing some solar wind activity.’
‘Eighty-eight per cent? Really? That’s quite precise, isn’t it?’
Stellan laughs and drinks from the bottle before saying, ‘There’s an app that gives me the cloud cover and solar wind data direct from NASA. I need it to help manage the tourists’ expectations. Most times Niilo and I take groups out for the aurora experiences we don’t see much, just faint lights in the sky, but if I tell them their chances of success before we set out, it stops angry demands for refunds. Sometimes.’
‘Are we really that troublesome, us tourists?’
‘Some are more trouble than others.’ He turns to face me with a sly wink, and he gets a snuffly laugh in return because I guess I asked for that.
The heat’s making my nose run, and I’m just so glad I didn’t wear any make-up today or I’d be in full Alice Cooper melting mascara mode by now. I huff out a breath.
‘Too hot?’ he says.
I shake my head. He doesn’t look convinced but I want him to keep talking, now he’s on a roll. ‘You grew up under the aurora. How lucky is that! Does the novelty wear off?’
‘Never. And it’s never the same twice. I’ll always look to the skies at night; even if I only catch a glimpse, it’s always incredible.’
I shake my head slowly, wondering at the childhood Stellan must have had out here, and I realise I’ve relaxed into his company. Instead of feeling gross, sweaty, and next to naked, I just feel safe and happy, and, without even noticing, we must have shifted our bodies around so we’re facing each other.
As I sip my beer and we chat, I allow myself quick glances along his glistening shoulders and over his throat and collar bones. I daren’t attempt to look over his stomach, but I can’t help thinking of the tantalising glimpse of abs I clocked earlier.
I realise it’s my turn to talk but I’m struggling a bit, so I scrabble for a rushed question. ‘What evenisthe aurora borealis?’
‘Well, when I was a kid my teachers told us a story of the fox that stirred up a cloud of snowflakes with a flick of its tail. The snowflakes sparkled in the moonlight and that’s how we get the Northern lights.’
‘I like that,’ I say. ‘I think I read that somewhere, a long time ago.’
‘Or… you can say its electrically charged particles streaming from the sun, attracted by the magnetic pull of the earth’s poles. The particles meet with oxygen atoms in the earth’s atmosphere and omit beautiful green light. But that’s just not as romantic.’
‘I don’t know. It sounds magical when you say it. But I guess the fox is cuter.’ I realise we’re looking directly into each other’s eyes and falling silent.
‘See, you’re not thinking about the heat now, are you?’ Stellan says eventually. On the contrary, I feel like I’m burning. ‘What do you think of your first Finnish sauna?’ he asks.
‘Great. But then again, I might feel differently if your bare arsed neighbours turned up and asked me to shift along a bit.’
‘It’s really not so strange, you know.’
‘It is a bit. The average British person would rather die than reveal their body to their friends and family.’
‘What even is the average British person?’ Stellan says with a wry laugh, and I find myself nodding and shrugging. ‘You can’t be talking about yourself,’ he adds. He’s rewarded with a smile for that. ‘But there is nothing to be ashamed of, Sylvie. The sauna cleanses you, body and soul. It’s an important custom. You strip away your status, your worries, your sexuality, and you just relax.’
‘I think I get it,’ I say, but admit to myself I haven’t managed to conquer my curiosity over Stellan’s nakedness. Suddenly my memory replays the way he brushed his lips over mine yesterday with the tentative, respectful caution he always showed when we were younger, and I feel my top lip tingle at the recollection, like the barely perceptible chime of a tuning fork, still resonating into silence.
‘Sylvie? Are you all right, do you need some air?’
‘Sorry? I was miles away. I was thinking about, umm…’
‘I know. Me too.’
