She couldn’t believe she had actually voiced that. And how? How had her career dream changed from all she could think about night and day into an ‘OK’. What did that say about the path she had set herself on for so long? What did it say about her future?
‘You know,’ Gunnar began, standing close. ‘Sometimes when we have been very focussed on one thing for a long time we can be blinkered to everything else going on around us. Sometimes, dreams and ambitions they can be solitary places, places that we go to that feel strong and grounding and safe, always there to hold on to, our one purpose.’
‘Yes,’ Chloe said, nodding. ‘Exactly that.’
‘For me, this is Magnús,’ Gunnar admitted. ‘From the moment he arrived in my life he was the focus, the purpose. I did not think about anything else other than giving him everything I could to try to make up for everything he had had taken away from him.’
‘And you have done an incredible job with him,’ Chloe said.
‘Maybe,’ Gunnar replied. ‘But, you know, that one thing or person or goal, it can hold you back from exploring other things, missing other moments in your life, or even finding a different road to travel to a destination you never had the time or the space to realise.’
‘You have regrets about being Magnús’s guardian?’
‘No!’ Gunnar stated passionately. ‘No, not one regret for that. If the same situation would happen again I would do the same thing. But, I think I am beginning to realise that accepting responsibility for Magnús should not have meant shutting down every other area of my life.’
And that was exactly what Chloe had done with her work. She hadn’t been able to conceive, which had made her relationship with Michael fall apart and all she felt she had left was her work. She’d needed something she felt she could excel in, succeed in, something that was totally under her control and something that wouldn’t ever have to rely on someone else. Safe but oh so solitary… She gripped the handrail of the boat.
Gunnar put his hand over hers and interlinked their fingers. ‘To be honest with you, I think the problem with most things is expectation.’ He sighed. ‘Other people’s expectations, society’s expectations, everyone doing the same things because people have done the same things for centuries. There is no room for personal expression, for deeper personalised thinking, for living without pressure, for living gently.’
Living gently. She liked that. She really liked that.
‘Ah! Look!’ Gunnar said, pointing ahead of them, his breath visible in the freezing air. ‘I do not believe it! There is a blue whale! See?’
Chloe looked and there it was, a huge mammal swimming in the water. ‘Is that rare?’
‘Yes,’ Gunnar said. ‘They come only in the summer usually and, even then, they stay maybe a few days here to feed and then they leave again. In the winter this is not normal.’
She could sense his excitement and she loved how his thrill made her feel. And that’s when it hit her. That’s when it fully, truly, all-the-way hit her. She smiled to herself as she watched the blue whale submerge then pop up again and the other passengers started to ‘ooh’ and ‘aah’ as they took photo after photo. She wasn’t going to take photos. She was going to drink this moment in for all that it was and all that it was telling her.
‘Gunnar,’ she said, squeezing his hand.
‘Yes,krúttio mitt.’
‘I like “not normal”,’ she told him.
‘Me too,’ he said, wrapping an arm around her. ‘Me too.’
64
GUNNAR’S HOME, OUTSKIRTS OF REYKJAVIK
‘So, are you going to tell me what is wrong?’ Hildur asked later that night, looking up from her knitting. ‘Or will you pretend you are reading that book for the rest of the evening?’
Gunnar lifted his head from the page he had re-read so many times and looked at his old friend. ‘Are you pretending to knit?’
‘Do not be stupid! Look! See how long the work grows!’ She shook her needles and the wool attached to it that was forming a long train of something. ‘Tell me about the story you are “reading”.’
Gunnar closed the book, put it on the coffee table next to a display of pine cones Magnús and Hildur had painted silver, then leaned forward in his chair.
‘We saw a blue whale today.’
Hildur gasped and put her knitting to one side. ‘You saw a blue whale!’
‘We know they are here but?—’
‘Not in the winter time,’ Hildur said. ‘Are you sure?’
Gunnar nodded. ‘I am sure.’
