To Siberia by Per Petterson Page A

the gulls flew without a sound as if they were behind blue-colored glass and the boat from Læsø had stopped its engine. The silence grew and pressed against my chest and squeezed up the air I had in my lungs until it was in my throat and I had to open my mouth:
    “JESPER!”
    I climbed down from the concrete paving above the boulders as fast as I could, panting like a dog with no control over my breath or my body, a pump worked in my chest and I couldn’t possibly shut my mouth. When I got right down I tore the boot out of the lump of tar and waved it in the air hoping Jesper would come up and get it. But he was gone. I lay down on the outermost boulder and stared into the water and just by my face a hand stretched up with long waving fingers and tried to catch me. It was the Man from Danzig. I gave a start and began panting again, my throat felt sore. I turned round and turned back again and looked down into the water. The hand was still there. Now it was clenched.
    “JESPER!” I hurled the boot aside and threw myself forward. The boulders struck my knees and chest, and it hurt, my chest had developed during the past year and I was soft where I used to be hard. I stretched right out and squeezed my thighs around the last boulder with a clutch that could crush it to powder, and it scraped me back where I was softest. Then I breathed in and plunged my head and upper body into the water. At first my eyes were closed and then they were open, and then I could see his face. It was green with staring eyes and lips pressed together in a thin line. I didn’t know if he could see me, but I thought he might and I could not understand why he didn’t open his hand. It was clenched hard and I had to use both of mine to get a good enough grip. I was stronger than any girl I knew, and I pulled. First my head came up and then Jesper’s head with his lips pressed together and eyes like marbles. I drew in air, still holding on to him with both hands and screaming as loud as I could:
    “BREATHE!” and then his mouth slowly relaxed and he gave a whistling sound that would never stop, and from being stiff he turned completely floppy and finally he closed his eyes.
    “I thought you were an angel,” he mumbled.
    “Angels have fair hair. Besides, they don’t exist.”
    “Mine do, and they have dark hair.”
    “I thought you were the Man from Danzig,” I said. Then he started to laugh and cough, and I pulled him right in till he could get hold of something and crawl ashore by himself. He kneeled down and vomited salt water and breakfast, I held his forehead, and when he was done I hugged the whole of him and started to cry.
    “I thought you were the Man from Danzig. I couldn’t recognize you.” I felt him smile against my shoulder, he was wet through and cold, and warm too, where the sun could reach.
    “I looked for him, and I looked for his boat, but there was only seaweed down there, so I wanted to get up again. But I couldn’t, the boot was too heavy with all the water in it, and I couldn’t get it off. So I just stood there.” He embraced me with both arms, shaking so my body trembled, and then I felt shy and stood up.
    “Thanks, Sistermine,” he said.
    He emptied the water out of his boot, put both of them on and crawled up on the concrete. Then we started to walk along together. With every other step Jesper took, a ripping noise came from the boot with the lump of tar, and I heard the fishermen talking on the wharf and the gulls from all directions and banging sounds from the Læsø boat where the gangway was being lowered and pulled on to the quay.
    “Maybe we’ll make it after all,” said Jesper, speeding up until he almost ran, and I thought how fast it all goes, we had been far away and now we were back and the world had moved on a millimeter.
    When we came out of the shadows behind the corn silo the first passengers had already come ashore. They were farmers from Læsø coming to do business and have a beer and