Chapter 30
Noah
Exhausted, I lean over the wooden tabletop and blow away the fine wood dust left by my sanding work. The particles scatter in the room, scratching my lungs. Quickly, I turn toward the open window.
At that moment, I spot Hanna wandering among the trees with a wicker basket in her hands. Her hair is tied up in a messy bun. Her jeans are earthy and covered in dried pine needles. She bends down repeatedly, placing something in her basket.
I can afford a short break, so I leave the workshop and walk toward my sister. "Tell me, are there already chanterelle mushrooms?"
She brushes her bangs away from her face with the back of her hand. "Of course," she says, presenting me with her basket filled with golden-yellow mushrooms. "Will you help me clean them?"
I should be staining the table today. And surely, I shouldn't be handling knives in my current state. But I can hardly refuse Hanna's request, so I nod toward the house. "On the veranda?"
A smile spreads across her face. "Absolutely."
A little while later, surrounded by birds chirping, we sit on the self-made wooden furniture of my veranda. Each of us has a bowl for the waste between our legs and a small knife in hand.
Hanna plucks a chanterelle mushroom from the basket and brushes off the dried pine needles from the stem. "You look exhausted."
"The past few nights have been restless." I too pick up one of the mushrooms.
"Because of Elina?" Her lips twitch suspiciously.
So she's heard about it too. But she surely has no idea that Elina keeps me awake in a different way than she's thinking. Should I tell her about it?
Thoughtfully, I brush the coarse remnants of the forest floor from the chanterelle with my thumb. The typical smell of the mushroom immediately reaches my nose, flooding my mind with memories of carefree times.
Memories of Julian, but they have no place here.
"I'm happy for both of you," Hanna says. "Elina has a good heart. Just like you."
I don't. Instead of responding, I shrug. In my peripheral vision, I see her placing the fourth cleaned chanterelle in the designated bowl, while I still hold the first one. An unusually guarded expression forms on her face.
"She will leave me." It suddenly bursts out of me.
"Because of what happened?" My sister's tone is so neutral it’s as if she's talking about the weather.
I grab the knife and, shaking my head, cut off the stem of my mushroom at the bottom. "She must never find out."
Suddenly, she stops her work. Her arms rest on her thighs, and she looks directly at me. "They say love is blind. But I'd rather believe that love opens our eyes to a new world."
A new world? One where Elina wouldn't see medifferently if she knew the truth? Definitely not. "His death is my fault. That's the reality in every available world," I reply, already saying more than I should. I bite my lip.
I sigh, and Hanna continues her work. "Sometimes we only see what we want to see," she says, her tone laden with meaning.
Now, she's exaggerating. "That's not true," I retort.
She raises her hand, silencing me. "And when we're confronted with the truth, we panic."
Dammit. Why did I even bring up this topic?
Our conversation has long veered away from Elina. This is going nowhere, and Hanna knows it. Working with internal tension, I continue at a rapid pace, taking one chanterelle after another and cleaning them.
To make matters worse, she leans over the table toward me. "Allow the memories to come. Not for my sake. Do it for Elina."
What the hell would that accomplish? I don't want to see the tragedy hiding somewhere within me. Never. "That's not the point," I say, just to stop her. "Elina is leaving Tyrol."
For a moment, she looks at me intently. Then she reaches into the willow basket between us, pulls out a chanterelle, and blows the pine needles off its cap. "Why? I thought she had settled in well here."