Out of Thin Air by Anthony Adeane

Author:Anthony Adeane
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins Canada
Published: 2018-02-19T05:00:00+00:00

7

Dad’s Place

Kristin’s baby was born prematurely, and her minute body, with its tousle of dark hair and tiny features, can be cradled in a pair of cupped hands. When she sleeps, the air draws in and out of her mouth so softly that it is difficult to tell whether or not she is still breathing. But when she wakes up, her brown eyes alert with unknowable intent, the room is in thrall to her presence.

We rig lights in the sitting room and set up the camera. Kristin is understandably distracted. She chit-chats and brings us coffee, but her gaze continually wanders to the pram to check that her baby sleeps soundly. Her partner watches us from a doorway. He looks exhausted.

Kristin moves into position for the interview and the cameraman pulls focus on her face. She is blonde and powerfully built. Her English is flawless. There is something no-nonsense about Kristin when she describes details personal to her, so that the facts of her life are presented as if they had happened to someone else. This is what transpired, she seems to be saying, make of it what you will. Only later in the story, when her absorption in the narration of her memories is total, does it become possible to detect the tightness at the edge of her jaw as she clenches her back teeth to prevent the emotion from showing on her face. Her detachment is not due to disinterest. It is her last line of defence against the emotions that stir in her when she speaks about her father’s life.

Just before the camera operator presses ‘record’, Kristin takes her baby outside to the balcony and leaves her in the pram to nap.

Kristin’s first memory of her father is visiting him at his home when she was five years old. She called it ‘Dad’s place’. They would go there on Sunday mornings, her and her mother, the bus winding its way through the pale browns and greens in the southwest of the country until the spray from the sea began to speckle the bus windows, and the white immensity of Litla-Hraun rose upon the horizon.

Everybody knew Kristin there. ‘How are you?’ they would ask, and, ‘Are you going to finish the picture that you drew last time you were here?’ The one rule that Kristin had to follow was that she would never walk alone in the building without her father’s permission.

In his room there was a bed, a stereo and a fridge. Bodybuilders grinned and flexed in the pictures that lined the wall. The windows were covered in bin bags and when she asked him why, he replied that he didn’t want her to see the bars.

It didn’t feel like a prison to Kristin. The guards were always friendly and she enjoyed seeing her dad. She was allowed to play with the other children who were visiting their fathers. They would throw frisbees to each other down the long corridors. Later, when her parents got married, they had their wedding reception there.

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