Chapter 22
Erik had seen enough of the landscape on their hike yesterday to know that it would be pretty easy riding if they hired a couple of bikes. He figured they could follow the river and find a nice place to eat on their way.
‘Do you want to invite Thea?’
‘No. I think she’ll sleep all day. It’s her first day off in a couple of weeks.’
‘What does she do on that boat?’
‘She’s the entertainment manager. They have a lot of tourists on the boat and they do talks and arrange excursions for them.’
‘Sounds like fun.’
‘Yes, and I think she loves it, but it’s a long stretch without a break.’
‘Not that different to your job, then.’
‘I’m on holiday right now!’
‘And I’m taking all the credit for making that happen.’
She grinned at him, which was kind of a relief.
He’d been worried that the still unfinished conversation about his family research was becoming an elephant in the room, with both of them knowing it was looming there, needing to be addressed, but neither of them ready to do that yet.
He’d half expected Ida to bring it up again this morning but since she hadn’t, he’d stick to his plan and leave it until they got back to Bergen.
This couple of days in Voss had done him good.
Since running into the guy who’d recognised him yesterday, he’d thought a lot about what he could do, rather than dwelling on what he couldn’t, and now he was kicking himself for not having seen things that way sooner.
He wasn’t ready to be a snowboarding coach, but maybe one day he would be.
They strolled into town and picked up some snacks for the backpack in case they didn’t find somewhere to eat on route, then hired two bikes and helmets, and they were off.
‘Do you know your way around here?’ he asked Ida.
‘Don’t talk to me yet,’ she said, looking a little wobbly on her bike. ‘It’s a while since I was on a bike.’
‘Okay, let’s go up and down this street a few times before we head out on the open road.’
Thankfully, the road they were on was flat and off the main drag, so it was fairly quiet. After a couple of runs up and down, Ida declared herself ready.
‘I don’t know Voss very well at all when it’s not covered in snow.’ She pulled her phone out and opened the maps app.
‘I’d love to cycle near the water.’
Ida proposed a circular route that went around the edge of Vangsvatnet, a lake at the base of the mountain they rode up on the gondola yesterday.
The west side was a main road which would be good while Ida got her biking game pinned down, and the ride back to town was on smaller, quieter roads, through green fields and farmland on the banks of the lake.
She led the way, and he was happy about that.
Now he’d got a taste of having the wind in his face as he cycled, he wanted more of it and he might get carried away and leave Ida behind.
Everything felt good, and he felt like whooping every time they had a small run downhill where he felt the tiniest bit out of control and had to overtake Ida a couple of times to avoid running into the back of her.
‘You look like you’re enjoying this,’ she called out as he overtook her on one such occasion.
He squeezed his brakes at the bottom of the incline so she could catch up with him, and they rode side by side on the road.
She was definitely more at ease now, but she wasn’t confident enough to take her eyes off the direction of travel.
Whereas he was loving the view. The water was still, perfectly reflecting the landscape around it like a mirror. It was truly beautiful.
‘I am loving this, Ida. Best part of the trip.’
He knew she was dying to look at him, to see if he had a glint in his eye to tell her he was teasing. Of course he was. Being with Ida somewhere where she could let herself go, not be at work, or too close to work to feel she could switch off, that was great to see.
‘I’m kidding.’ He put her out of her misery. ‘Turns out you can be a lot of fun to hang out with.’
She laughed, and he loved seeing her light up like that.
‘I don’t think anyone’s thought I was fun before. Except maybe Emil.’ She pulled over onto the side of the road where the shore of the lake levelled into a beach. ‘I need a drink.’
‘Let’s take a break then.’
They propped the bikes up against a tree and sat on a couple of rocks near the water.
‘Every single view in this country is awesome.’
‘Isn’t Canada like that?’
‘Yeah, but I didn’t think anywhere else would be. And also we have a lot of endless flat parts which you don’t have. There’s something spectacular going on across the whole of Norway as far as I can tell.’
‘That’s probably true. But I think this part of the country is the most beautiful.’
‘I’m so glad we did this. I love Lysg?rden, but this has scratched an itch I had.’
‘You’re properly sporty. I mean, I knew that had to be the case because you were a champion snowboarder, but I hadn’t realised that you needed the activity and the sport to make you…’
‘Happy?’
She nodded. ‘You’re happier since we came here. In the great outdoors, being more active. That’s what you need, isn’t it?’
‘I don’t know if I even knew that until today, which is crazy.
The snowboarding isn’t what I’m missing.
I mean, I’m missing it, but because of the community and friends I don’t have now.
Not because of the relentless training, my whole body being sore all the time, and my whole life being run for me around competition dates.
But that’s a lot of stuff to replace, and I was focussing on how I was going to fill my time instead of what parts of that are the parts worth replacing.
’ He looked at Ida to see if she could make sense of all of that which he was only processing himself as he was talking.
It was like a revelation, all because of a bike ride.
‘So what I’m getting from that is you want to be a championship mountain biker?’
He laughed. ‘Your English is terrible then.’
She scooched to sit closer to him. ‘I think your life was all about one goal, and when that was taken away, you thought you needed a new goal. Maybe it doesn’t have to be one thing.
Maybe it’s about building a life that’s all the things you enjoy so that if one day one part isn’t going well, something else can still give you some happiness.
Maybe one good thing to come out of your accident is that life doesn’t have to be all or nothing anymore. ’
It made a lot of sense. And also made him realise that his goal in coming to Norway was to use the legacy to help him move on.
His mom using that as a guiding star for him had been almost the only thing he’d had to cling to, and maybe she was being smart and knew already that he needed to switch his attention from snowboarding to a new goal.
Going along with that might have brought him here, to Norway, but being here had made him realise he didn’t need that.
And it was kind of a relief. Especially since that meant that telling Ida about the legacy didn’t hold as much importance for him as it had a couple of weeks ago.
‘Come on, let’s go,’ he said, hauling himself to his feet. ‘The other side of this lake looks perfect for skinny-dipping.’
‘We didn’t bring towels.’
He grinned at her and raised an eyebrow. ‘Huh. I expected a hard no to that suggestion. I think my sense of adventure is rubbing off on you.’
‘Don’t think you’re the first man I’ve been skinny-dipping with,’ she said haughtily, taking her bike and straddling it before clipping her helmet back on.
‘Oh, really?’
She side-eyed him, and he knew she was lying.
‘You’re the only girl I’ve skinny-dipped with.’
‘That can’t be true,’ she laughed.
‘Why not?’
‘Because… you’re gorgeous. Didn’t you have girls fighting to go skinny-dipping with you?’
‘No girls who wanted me for the right reasons. I guess I’m not the kind of guy who’s happy skinny-dipping with someone who only sees the snowboarding champion.’
‘I have a confession to make. I googled you after you first checked in.’
‘You did?’
He was still pondering that when Ida rode off.
Climbing onto his own bike, he pedalled hard to catch up with her.
So she had known exactly who he was all the time he was being a grumpy asshole.
All the time he’d thought he’d landed in a place where no one knew him, and he couldn’t have been more wrong.
He also loved that she felt brave enough to tell him he was gorgeous.
It kind of made him laugh because since he’d been here, he’d hardly taken care of himself.
He was unshaven most of the time, and he hardly looked in the mirror to check how he looked at all. So it felt good that she thought that.
‘You googled me.’ He pulled up alongside her.
‘I don’t want you to think I have any interest in you other than that you used to be a championship snowboarder.’ She looked at him quickly before she turned her eyes back to the road, but not before he saw the glint in them.
‘Understood. Although I think there was something between us right then. Before you had chance to google.’
‘Do you?’ She looked at him properly, then wobbled dramatically.
‘Sure.’
‘Was that before or after the salute?’
‘Shit, Ida. You remember that?’
‘Of course. You’re the first guest I’ve had who saluted. I’m not going to forget that. It felt like a moment.’
‘That might be the most embarrassing thing I’ve ever done, but I thought I’d got away with it.’
‘I like to think it was a sign you were flustered around me.’
‘Yes, that’s exactly what it was. Like I said not two days after that, you’re beautiful.’
Ida pulled off to the left, across a bridge slung low over the water, marking the crossing point at the end of the lake.
The sun was higher now, and it was warm. A perfect summer’s day with nothing to do other than meander their way back to town.
With no prospect of finding anywhere to eat in the countryside, they carried on riding until they came to a patch of woodland with a track leading through it, presumably to the water’s edge.
‘Shall we stop here for a snack?’
‘Okay,’ Ida said, leading the way down the track, through the trees until they could see the lake again.
They got off their bikes and left them in the shade of a tree, then sat close to the water under another tree.
It seemed to be a small inlet, an extension of the main lake, so out of sight of anyone.
Perfect for skinny-dipping. As if they’d manifested it with their earlier conversation.
Without saying anything, Erik began stripping off while Ida looked on, arms crossed, an amused look on her face. Only a moment later, she did the same.
She actually beat him into the water, squealing as the cold water hit her skin. Both of them were hot from riding, and the cold was welcome, but maybe a little too refreshing. And it was too shallow to plunge your whole body into in one go.
Erik scooped a hand through the water and splashed her, making her scream. Then she returned the favour, and it wasn’t long before they were both laughing, soaking wet and out of breath.
‘Now I’m really hungry,’ Erik said, scooping Ida into his arms and carrying her back to where they’d left their things. He put her down, then took the spare sweaters they’d packed in case it was chilly, and laid them down on the floor. ‘We can dry off in the sun while we eat.’
‘This is so weird being outside naked.’
‘Kind of freeing, though.’
‘It is,’ she agreed.
‘You know, whatever happens, Ida. This has been one of the best times of my life.’
She looked at him, a mixture of worry and affection in her eyes. ‘Me too. Whatever happens.’
It felt like an acknowledgement for both of them that what was to come might not be all good.
They had to let it play out. That was why he’d come here.
Did Ida have an inkling? He was pretty sure she did.
And he also knew that both of them were smart enough to realise that making any promises to each other beyond having spent a great couple of weeks together was impossible.
The best he could hope for was that somehow they could both take these two weeks and realise that maybe they’d helped each other to move on.