Page 29 of Adrift in Iceland
‘Mamma, I’m sorry, but he has taken everything this family had left, and what do we have to show for it?’
‘People like you, working for the big fishing companies are killing the family fishermen!’ Leifur felt the rage bubbling within him and, in the moment, he thought he’d explode if he didn’t say something to hurt his brother the same way he’d been hurt. But he regretted it immediately because it wasn’t Isak’s fault. He had to leave the business because the capelin were no longer reliable. He hadn’t left of his own accord, and Leifur braced himself for Isak’s retaliation.
‘Leifur! Enough!’ Peta slammed her hands on the table and stood up. ‘We are family. There is no blame for either of you to take or place. Isak, your brother saved this family after your father died, and he deserves your respect for that.’
‘Sorry, Mamma,’ said Isak.
‘And Leifur. Your brother must earn a living. As the eldest son, you haveBrimfaxi. He has nothing. You must respect his choice to continue fishing.’
‘Sorry, Mamma. And I’m sorry, Isak. It was unfair of me to say that.’ It hurt that they were both forgetting that he hadn’tdecided to close the business alone. Isak had been the one to suggest that he might work on another boat even before Leifur had realised that the absence of the capelin might spell the end for them. And Leifur had supported the idea, knowing that his brother had to earn money somehow. Isak wasn’t a saver like Leifur, who kept a buffer in case of leaner times, so he couldn’t afford to go out day after day only to return disappointed when there were no fish to sell. But he never expected his brother to go onto a boat run by one of the conglomerates.
‘No problem,’ Isak said with a shrug, but not going so far as to apologise in return.
Their mother sat back down. ‘How was your holiday, Isak?’
Isak chatted for a while about his first holiday abroad. He was earning more money than he’d ever done before, and Leifur envied him. Not because of the money as much as that yes, he’d lost his job onBrimfaxi, but he’d been able to move on without a backward glance. He’d been unconcerned about what Leifur would do next, and there had been no suggestion that they might do something together, even though Leifur would have been open to that at the time. Not any more; the guilt he’d felt at letting his brother down had totally worn off after tonight.
‘Right, I have to meet someone,’ Isak announced almost as soon as they’d finished eating. He stood up and grabbed his coat before Peta had chance to put her cutlery down.
‘I haveGrjónagrautur,’ she said, thinking that the creamy rice pudding type dessert might tempt him to stay longer.
‘Sorry, Mamma. It’s work.’
Leifur highly doubted it had anything to do with work, but it stopped Peta from suggesting he didn’t need to leave. If Isak had admitted he was meeting a woman, which is what Leifur suspected, she would be upset with him for leavingearly.
Peta busied herself packing up some leftovers for Isak to take with him, as well as a huge portion of the pudding.
‘Good to see you, Leifur,’ Isak said, shaking his hand. He sounded like he meant it, despite what they’d said to each other across the dinner table.
‘You too.’ He would have loved to ask Isak if he’d been at the same family meal as him, but he didn’t want to upset Peta again. So he stood at the door with his mother and saw his brother out.
‘He works so hard,’ Peta said with a sigh as they went back to the table to tuck into the Grjónagrautur.
‘He needs to if he’s going to the Caribbean.’
‘You ought to have a holiday, Leifur. The past few months have been hard on you too.’
‘It’ll have to wait until the end of the season.’ As well as not having enough time before they started the tours, he barely had enough money to take a bus to the next town, let alone a holiday.
‘I’m looking forward to seeing the boat. Do you have your crew organised?’
‘It’s just me and Astrid.’
‘Astrid. She is a tour guide?’
‘She’s a marine biologist, but she’s between jobs, so Jonas has signed her up for the summer. Her knowledge is incredible. She’ll be an enormous asset.’
‘It sounds as if you are quite taken with her,’ Peta said, smiling.
‘We get on well together. I thought it would be difficult working with a stranger on the boat, but she’s…’ He almost said perfect, but that would have sent his mother’s imagination into overdrive and he could do without that. ‘She’s got a lot of experience working on research vessels.’
‘I expect that will come in handy. So is it just the two ofyou?’
‘Yes.’
‘Very cosy.’
‘Mamma…’
