Aliss at the Fire

So now we better go in the house, let’s go in, Asle and Grandma, Grandma says

Yes let’s go in, Asle says

You were such a good boy Asle to help Grandma so much with her bag, Grandma says

After Grandpa Olaf died, you’ve been my biggest help, she says

and she sees Grandma go in the front door and he goes in after her and she thinks that no, she can’t just stay standing out here in the cold even if someone else has just gone into her house, home into the old house, because it is her house after all, it’s she and he who live there, she thinks, and besides it was definitely him who went inside just now, and the old woman, that was his Grandma, she thinks, so then, so, then maybe she can still just go in? she thinks, and she really does need to just go inside, she too, because it’s windy and raining too much for her to be able to stay standing here outside, this wind, this rain, and this cold, she needs to get indoors too, she thinks, but can she really go home into the old house when someone else lives there? she thinks, but really it’s she who lives there, they who live there, she and he, Signe and Asle, so she just has to go in, she thinks and she goes in and there in the hall she sees Grandma stand and take off her yellow-white hat and she puts it on the shelf and then Grandma unbuttons her coat and she takes it off and hangs it on a peg

Can you shut the front door, Asle, Grandma says

and she looks at him going and shutting the front door

Yes, it’s cold these days, Asle, so we can’t let the warmth get out, Grandma says

And it’s slippery, it’s dangerous for an old woman like Grandma to walk out there, yes, even just stepping outside, she says

But for you, for you it’s not dangerous, you’re young, Asle, she says

No not for me, Asle says

Not for you, no, you’re young, Grandma says

and she sees that Grandma takes hold of her red

shopping bag and opens the door to the kitchen and goes in and then she sees that he goes in after her and shuts the door behind him and now she just has to go inside and lay more wood in the stove, she thinks, because it needs to be warm in the house when he comes home, now she has to just go inside and then she has to fill up the stove well, she thinks, because it can’t go out, it has to be nice and warm in the room when he comes home from the water, with the wind blowing like this, with it raining like this, it’s so dark out there, and so cold, so when he comes home it has to be warm and nice in the room here at home in the old house, she thinks and she takes off her raincoat and she hangs it up on the peg where Grandma just hung up her coat, she hangs her raincoat over Grandma’s coat, and then she goes over to the door to the room and she opens it and she goes in and she sees, lying there on the bench, herself come into the room and she sees herself turn around and go and shut the door and then she sees herself go over to the woodbox and take out a couple logs and she sees herself bend down and put the logs into the stove and then she sees herself stand up there on the floor in the room and stand there and look at the flames and she thinks, standing there, that it’s good that it didn’t go out, that it’s still burning, and here inside it isn’t so cold, so if he could just come home now, she thinks and then she sees the kitchen door open and then the smell of bacon glides into the room and then she sees him come in from the kitchen and right after him comes Grandma

Just sit down at the table, the food’s almost ready, Grandma says

You’re so nice Grandma, Asle says

You’re such a good boy, Asle, Grandma says

We are good friends, the two of us, aren’t we, Asle says

and she sees him go over to the table and he sits down at the end of the table and she sees him sit there and swing his legs back and forth and Grandma goes out to the kitchen again and he sits there and swings his legs back and forth and then Grandma comes in with a plate of bacon and eggs, and roasted potatoes and fried onions, and in her other hand Grandma has a big glass of milk

Yes now you’ll have some good hearty food, Grandma says

and Grandma puts the plate and the glass down in front of him and he starts to eat and Grandma sits down at the other end of the table and she, lying there on the bench, sees herself standing and looking at the flames in the stove and then she sees herself go over to the window and she sees herself stand there and look out the window and then she looks, standing there in front of the window, at the bedroom door and it opens and then she sees Brita stand and hold the door open and she sees her hair clinging tight around her face and then she sees Kristoffer standing in the bedroom door and in his arms he is holding a little white wooden coffin and he walks into the room

So, it has to be, Kristoffer says

Yes we have to say farewell, Brita says

It has to be, Kristoffer says