Toxic by Helga Flatland

Author:Helga Flatland
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Orenda Books
Published: 2024-07-15T00:00:00+00:00

‘It blends in with the landscape,’ I say, gently stroking the fiddle in the open case on Johs’s living-room table, ‘it’s really beautiful.’

‘The landscape?’ says Johs, smiling.

‘Yeah, you’ve got whirls and curls and curves on everything, there are hardly any straight lines,’ I say. ‘And there are mountains and valleys and gorges and paths, nothing’s flat and straight ahead.’

‘No, I guess not, it’s hard to see when you’re constantly surrounded by it,’ says Johs.

We sit in his lounge, which is absolutely covered in decoration and ornamentation, there are wall- and corner-cupboards full of silver spoons and silver bowls and silver plates, and hand-painted rose decoration everywhere you look; on the four-poster beds and the kubbestol chairs, each hand-carved from a single log, even the wall above the fireplace has a floral border. And it’s all in liberatingly colourful yellow, red, green, blue and brown. I feel small, not inferior, but as though I’ve physically shrunk from the intensity of the surroundings, although the furniture was clearly made for small people.

‘Two people slept in that,’ says Johs as I try out one of the four-poster beds, in which I can’t straighten my legs without hitting the footboard. ‘They were smaller back then.’

‘Or more adaptable,’ I say. ‘How do you know that it was for two people?’

He laughs. ‘I don’t actually know, it’s just something my mum told me. Several generations would live here at a time, so they had to utilise the space,’ he says. ‘There were people sleeping in every room.’

‘Amazing how they managed to produce several generations with sleeping arrangements like that,’ I say.

He smiles but doesn’t reply. ‘Do you want to have a go on the fiddle?’ he says, nodding towards the case.

I climb off the bed and straighten my hair, suddenly feeling like I’ve perhaps made myself a bit too comfortable. It’s his home after all, not a museum.

‘Yes, you promised to teach me,’ I say, ‘without realising what you’re letting yourself in for.’

‘Do you play?’ he asks, nodding towards the fiddle. ‘Not the Hardanger fiddle, I mean – an instrument.’

Mum has always had this misguided idea that somewhere inside, I have a repressed musical talent inherited from my father, so she has sent me to both piano and guitar lessons, and I’m musical enough to hear that I’m no good at either of them.

‘No, but my father was a pianist,’ I say.

Johs doesn’t look particularly impressed. He nods and picks up the fiddle.

‘A concert pianist,’ I say. ‘He was one of the best in the country.’

‘Right,’ he says blankly, without asking why I might be using the past tense. ‘But do you know what a Hardanger fiddle is?’

I get annoyed. ‘Of course,’ I say.

‘It’s not that obvious,’ he says, smiling, ‘what’s special about the Hardanger fiddle is that it’s got eight or nine strings instead of four.’

After three days here I’ve already understood that mansplaining is an ingrained form of communication. Every man I’ve met seems to be working under the assumption that I cannot do anything, at least nothing of practical importance.

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