Ane Riel - Resin

Liv knew that not being seen was a matter of life and death, so whenever she had the slightest suspicion that someone was coming, she would disappear, quick as lightning and without a sound, into the furthest corner of the container. Here, with her father’s help, she had made a wonderful little den for herself behind tyres and cardboard boxes. Two big duvets and a whole pile of blankets kept her warm, but should she get cold in spite of that, there was a sack of extra-warm clothing which she could help herself to. She also had books and torches and plenty of batteries and sweets, crackers and bread and bottles of water, so she wanted for nothing.

To begin with, while everyone was searching for her, she hadn’t dared to switch on the torches. Instead she had lain quietly under her duvet in pitch darkness, listening out for the faintest sound. In the constant darkness she had lost track of time, and it wasn’t long before she couldn’t tell whether it was day or night. Soon the darkness also started to feel heavy in her eyes and lungs.

She was missing Carl, who wouldn’t join her.

Finally, after far too much time, he came. She didn’t see him, but she knew that he was there with her in the silence. She didn’t dare talk to him, due to the risk of being overheard, but he whispered to her that he was there – and that he was scared of the strangers, of the darkness, of time, of uncertainty, of the air. And the smell, which enveloped them like a thick blanket of old rubber and dust and mould and dried-out paint and turpentine rags.

His fears made her calm down. She comforted Carl without a word, and felt stronger than she was. As long as she focused her attention on reassuring her twin brother, fear would not take hold of her.

They lay like this for a long time, she and Carl, surrounded by the darkness, which was surrounded by things, which were surrounded by a sealed metal container. They thought about the air outside, the scent of the forest, and tried to pull it deep into their den, through the thick blanket and right into their lungs.

Eventually they heard sounds, they heard the padlock on one of the hatches being unlocked, and through a gap between two tyres Liv caught a glimpse of a starry sky, and she heard her father’s voice speaking to her. At last she dared turn on the torch, which she had been clutching in her hand the whole time.

He brought her tea and tinned food, which he had heated on the camping stove outside his workshop. Reaching the stove in the kitchen had become difficult, so now that it was just him doing the cooking he preferred to use his own kitchen, as he called it. He had stretched a canvas sheet over it as an awning, so that it was reasonably protected against the rain. Sometimes he would light one of his home-made torches and stick it in the umbrella stand next to the camping stove. On such occasions, the smell of food and resin would fill the air and Liv imagined that her father was happy.

Right now it was the tea and the food that made Liv happy. The air from the open hatch felt like happiness too. The light was warm and good. Dad was with her.

Liv told him about the darkness and the heavy air. And he left, came back and drilled three holes in the side of the container and metal shavings snowed on the newspaper below. Afterwards he folded the newspaper and placed it and the shavings in between the other newspapers. Then he placed a piece of black fabric over the three holes and fixed it at the top with gaffer tape.

‘Now you can have fresh air whenever you want,’ he said. ‘You’ll need to lift up the cloth if you want more air and you can also look out at the road. But be careful with the light. You must never switch on the torch, unless the cloth is in place. The light can be seen from the outside. Do you understand?’

Liv nodded. Then she switched off her torch like a good girl, lifted up the cloth and pressed her face against the three holes arranged as an inverted triangle. Through the bottom hole she took a long, deep breath; she could smell spruces and coarse grass and salty sea air. And through the two top holes she could see the night sky and the moon lighting up the gravel road. Somewhere, an owl was hooting. She imitated it quietly, and smiled when she felt her father’s hands on her shoulders.

‘You’re very good at this,’ he whispered. Then he told her that it was best that she stayed in the container until people had finished looking for her. ‘The police must be absolutely sure that you’re dead, Liv. But then we’ll be left in peace.’

She understood. Being left in peace was a good thing.

And one day she was allowed out. Her father lifted her up over the dark blue metal edge and out through the opening with the slanted hatch, even though she insisted she didn’t need any help. He had placed a couple of crates and a tractor tyre outside, so she could easily climb back into the container, if necessary. She obviously couldn’t lock the hatch from the outside once she was inside, but he had made a device so that she could secure it with a metal bracket from the inside. Just to be on the safe side.

He had a surprise for her in the living room: two baby rabbits that had been left in a box for collection along the roadside. She experienced a strange, unknown joy as she stuck her hand into the cardboard box and stroked the animals’ soft fur. They would be allowed to live in the house; they wouldn’t be caught in snares in the forest and be flayed and eaten as ragout. The small, living rabbits looked cheerfully at her and chewed and munched and moved about the hay in soft jumps. Liv’s heart leapt.

And yet, for some reason, she still began to cry when she climbed into her mother’s bed. And for some reason, her mother also cried. Then they ate sweets and biscuits and snapped them and shook them and read a book about a woman who was very much in love. It was Liv who did the reading aloud but her mother who recognized being in love and felt it ripple deep inside her.

And one day the child arrived. Too soon. Maria gave birth in the bedroom, which at that point she could just about leave. But only just and only if she forced her way out.

Her husband and daughter helped welcome the baby.

Liv stared at the drama unfolding in front of her eyes. The head. The tiny head that came out towards her like a marbled moon before it became a complete head that stuck out of the bottom of a giant body.

She marvelled at the effort, the fluid, the small body attached to the tiny head which eventually followed it outside, but with great reluctance. A transparent, wet and far too small body with a long, grey-and-white snake squirming from its tummy.

And she heard her mother make noises that grew louder and louder as the hours passed. They weren’t screams, not the loud, high-pitched cries of a bird of prey. They were cries that came from deep inside the earth. Deep roars without consonants.

And the earth fought with itself in the bed. The big body lay like a trembling landscape with mountains and gorges and wild shrub fighting in front of Liv.

Shouting.

At something or for something.

And then the tiny person dangling in front of her.

At the head.

And her father holding its feet and slapping it.

Why did he slap it?

And then the silence.

Carl was terrified.

Liv was told to cut the cord with her dagger. They attached a clip. And some gauze. In time she had picked up so many rolls of gauze and compresses and white surgical tape from the small ‘help yourself facility’ on the outskirts of the Head that a sign had been put up asking the islanders if they really needed quite so much gauze.

The child also fought. It really did. It had fought its way out of the earth, out of the water, out of the darkness, and now it gasped for air, surrounded as it was by so much of it. Without vowels or consonants. It just opened its tiny lips. Like the flounders.