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Her mother’s eyes widened slightly. “Well,” she looked to the girls, “I will run back and get the car.” To Margie she said with serious eyes, almost threatening, “Linnea is welcome at our house. Any time.”
Margie snuffed and dropped her eyes to her daughter. “Go get your things.”
Linnea grabbed Ulla’s hand, beckoning her, but Ronja yanked Ulla back with a hiss in her ear, commanding in Swedish, “You are never ever to step foot in that house again.”
Once the girls were settled inside Ulla’s room, on a pile of blankets, it was nearly dawn. Ulla tried not to stare at Linnea in fascination, but the shimmer of the moon made her appear ghostlike, so beautiful.
Linnea spoke to the ceiling, “Your mom seems really nice. And pretty.”
Ulla felt bad she couldn’t say the same for Linnea’s mom, but maybe that was the point.
A silence drifted over them, not uncomfortable, but it made Ulla restless. On instinct, what she always did when she was restless, crawled on her hands and knees to her wonky dresser piled with scattered car parts. She yanked out the bottom drawer, reached into a deep corner, and emerged with Beskyddaren.
Ulla offered the Dalahäst to Linnea. Linnea accepted Beskyddaren, her eyes widening as she touched the jewels. “Are they real?”
Ulla nodded. “His name is Beskyddaren. It means protector in Swedish. He was my mother’s but belongs to me now. He’s special.”
“Besky-ddaren,” Linnea repeated clumsily. “This looks a little like our giant horse statue by the pool. Prettier though. What makes him special?”
“It’s stupid.”
Linnea frowned. “Stupid?”
“You promise you won’t laugh?”
She looked slightly hurt. “Why would I laugh?”
Ulla sighed. “When my mother came to America, this was all she had. She said it’s magical.”
Linnea’s face expanded. “What kind of magic?”
Ulla, nervous, said dismissively, “Never mind.”
Linnea dropped her gaze as if disappointed.
“She said the horse can give you what your heart wants.”
“Like a genie? Do you get to make a wish?”
Ulla nibbled on a lock of hair. “No, not like that. She said he knows who you love. And as long as you hold onto him, he’ll make it so that you’ll never be separated from that person.” She thought of her mother. “Or if you are—he always brings you back together.”
Linnea caressed the horse. “Who do you love?”
“My mother . . . ” Ulla thought of Melia and Shorty. And Peter. “My pappa.”
“I thought you never met him.”
Ulla felt the pull inside her chest. “Can you love someone you’ve never met?”
Linnea stared at Beskyddaren, spellbound, and nodded. “It’s because he’s your dad. Everyone loves their mom and dad.” Her expression fell. “Until there’s a reason not to.” She handed the horse to Ulla.
Ulla reached over and tucked aside Linnea’s soft, overgrown bangs, revealing a healing bruise, and, before she lost the nerve, she gently pressed her lips on it.
Ulla’s mother kept her promise. From that first night on, Linnea practically lived at the Bergstrom home. Ulla always kept the sliding door unlocked for her, in direct opposition to Ronja’s paranoid triple lock-checking and blind closures.
On school days, the other children, perhaps curious—perhaps jealous of the girls' new bond—took pleasure in squashing them. When Wiley Gardner shoved Linnea in the recess line, Ulla told him he smelled like dog breath. When Wiley went to shove Ulla, she sidestepped him and rammed his face into the brick wall. Wiley’s bloody nose sent Ulla to the principal’s office. She was banned from recess until she wrote a proper apology letter:
Dear Wiley,
