Page 73 of The Winter Princess
“Especially on a night like this.”
I didn’t want to be on square one with him, but I didn’t imagine climbing a ladder up to the last row on the very next move. He grabs my wrist. I know what to do. I lift my chin, and my eyes drift—
He pushes through the door, tugging me to the hall. What?
“There’ll be dancing later and talking all night,” he says. “You’ll be warm.”
What? Did he know what I was expecting? I rearrange my face.
We descend hand in hand, all three levels, with him pretending to help me down the stairs, me pretending I need it, nerves dancing with electricity—the feel of it arcing between us like tissue paper bunting across a stairwell. Only when we reach Uncle Timo’s door do we let one another go.
Our eyes don’t meet. He coughs. I exhale. His fingertips rest lightly on my lower back as he guides me through the threshold. Adeline bounces to Oskar’s side, puts a hand through the crook of his arm, and leads him away. Giana, from the inn, waves from the kitchen, and I fix a bright smile on my face, already determined to spend the next twenty minutes asking her about the ingredients of a sauce or a stew.
Dinner is laid out in a buffet, and Giana’s husband Konrad piles my plate with food, explaining each item. I sit on the arm of the sofa, nibbling on knotted sweet bread and honeyed lamb, talking to a succession of people with ties to my father’s homeland.
Adeline follows Oskar from group to group—never my group—finally coaxing Uncle Timo to put on some music for dancing. Sofas are pushed to the walls, and the carpet is rolled up. In moments, there’s a postage-sized dance floor, and I’m pulled into an old-fashioned, brisk-paced dance. I do my best to keep up.
Someone opens a window to alleviate the heat, but it does little to change the atmosphere which is warm and close and loud, and soon my face is shining from exertion. What would my sisters think to see me, moving from partner to partner, trying out a growing number of Pavian phrases—shouting them, almost?
When the heat becomes almost unbearable, someone dims the lights and old women, who have been content to watch, coax old men to the floor. I laugh in the arms of a middle-aged plumber.
One song ends and another begins, markedly slower than the others, a sort of foxtrot if any room could be had to execute it. My hand is enfolded, and even before I turn, I feel tiny sparks travel up my veins. I don’t have to look. Oskar.
I laugh as I have been laughing with handymen and students and house painters all night. “I’m not very good.”
The music is still too loud, and he angles his head. “I’m not very good,” I repeat. I’ve been battling my awareness of him all night, from the moment I set off from the palace with bottles ofanauclinking gently in their crate, and I’m thankful for the refuge of the crowd, the volume of my voice which hides any other feelings.
He whispers against my ear. “Follow me.”
25
Civilized Silhouettes
OSKAR
This has been the longest night of my life.
From across the room, I watched Freja nibble on a wedge of zucchini and feta pie, scarf down fried bacon and polenta patties, sniff an almond shortbread cookie, taste it, delight wrinkling her nose, and lick away the powdered sugar on her lips. I swear, if you feed the girl, she’ll love you.
My mind wanders when it can least afford to. While scraping off a delicate lining or preparing a painting for the hot table, I’ve been running mental simulations of Princess Freja being in my ordinary life. In the grocery store pushing a trolley of cat food tins. At a seaside picnic on a public beach. At a Pavian night with Uncle Timo.
Eventually, she’d gather a crowd and I would be shouldered out of her orbit.
See? You don’t fit together.
But tonight isn’t going as I imagined. She talked, laughed, and danced with anyone who asked, crushed in the embrace of a warm Pavian welcome. She hates crowds but no one can tell.
When I can’t stand it anymore, I slip a young cousin fivemarkkeand tell him to hit the lights and change the music. I watch Freja take a few turns about the room before making a move.
She thinks this—how I’ve slipped my hand casually into hers—is happenstance. Only I know how much maneuvering it took. Being deaf when Cousin Addie asked about my Christmas plans, cleaving my way through the crowd at just the right time, and giving Uncle Paolo a warning look when he tried to move in.
In the low light, her skin shines from the heat and press of bodies. She places a hand on my shoulder. I slide mine around her waist. We look anywhere but at one another. It’s hardly dancing. There are no steps to match, no room for them, but we move to the music in a tight coil, jostling into other couples. The ballad is Pavian, a throwback to the glamorous 1950s, and I wonder if she understands the lyrics.
If you want me
Don’t ask my Mama or my Papa
Don’t ask Cousin Cecilia
