Resolutions for an Arbitrary Holiday

Chapter 2

But I’ve always ached to visit this place, and despite living not more than one hour’s car ride away, I’ve never been here before. My parents aren’t history lovers—“who cares about when some old king or other died?”—and our family outings and vacations have always included beaches, both domestic and international. “No one wants to spend their vacation watching a pile of old rocks,” my dad said when I was a kid and we went to Crete—“they have lovely beaches there”—and I begged them to go see the ruins of Knossos.

And somehow, I’ve continued to surround myself with people like that. My group of friends is a great bunch, but I don’t have a lot in common with them other than we’ve known each other forever. The differences have become more pronounced over the years, but we’re still sticking together.

Which is one of the reasons I’m up here in the first place. I wanted to embrace my real interests and do something for myself for once. To start the new year like I want to continue it or however the saying goes.

Because earlier this fall, I decided I’d had enough and needed to do something about my life, so I applied to university. I was ecstatic when I got accepted, but I still haven’t told anyone. Except for my boss, when I had to give my notice.

I’m looking forward to getting a second degree, the one I always wanted, and not in the mind-numbingly boring field of accounting.

“It’s a sensible career, Petter. You need sensible in your life.” My parents are big on sensible and refused to entertain the idea of me majoring in history when I was eighteen and started university the first time around. Most people my age would have rebelled and done whatever they wanted, but that’s not who I am. I pushed back my desire, ignored my wishes, and went with my parents’ plan.

But not anymore. Maybe I’m a late bloomer, at least as far as rebellions go?

“Ah, well. At least I’ll die surrounded by history,” I say, my words snatched out of my mouth by the strong winds. I salute the bright moon, the black ocean, and the neighboring stone, then I take another sip of the bubbly.

“Blech. This is disgusting.” I put the bottle on the ground between my legs and look at my phone. It’s 11:10 P.M., fifty more minutes until midnight and the new year.

Still no reception—can strong winds blow away the cell signals?—but it’s kind of fitting, considering the ancientness of this place. It would be convenient, though, I won’t lie. I could call Jonas and tell him to come and rescue me. He’d grumble over having to leave the party, but he’d come, his lovely girlfriend Maja would make sure of it. He’d lecture me—he’s almost as good at that as my parents—but he’d come.

I know I can always reach 112, but I’d feel like an even bigger i***t calling them. Besides, I’m not sure that thoughtlessness counts as an emergency. I can just imagine how the call would go.

“Can you tell us what happened, sir?”

“Ah, you see, I hiked alone in the middle of the night on New Year’s Eve and told no one, and I fell.”

Yeah, they’d probably laugh at me, tell me it was my own damned fault, and leave me here.

Nope. Not gonna happen. After midnight, I’ll make my way down that hill myself, even if I have to crawl the whole way, and that’s that.

That decided, I shove the phone into my pocket and turn off the headlamp to save battery. Then I take off my long, wide scarf that Grandma knitted for me and wind it around my head, so it covers my ears and around my neck, making sure there’s no exposed skin below my mouth, and I put my mittens back on.

At least I’m dressed for the weather in my thick downy jacket, my knitted sweater—another of Grandma’s gifts—and my sheepskin boots. The only part of me not dressed in layers and layers are my legs; the jeans aren’t the best choice for this weather, but the jacket is long enough to cover my ass, and the boots reach halfway up my calves, so not much of my legs are exposed to the elements.

I tilt my head and look at the sky, trying to remember how to identify other constellations than the Great Bear. I find Orion’s belt and his shield. And I think I recognize Cygnus.

All alone with only the stars and the moon to keep my company, I can almost feel the magical energy of the stone ship wrapping around me. It takes my breath away that I’m leaning against a stone that’s believed to have been a part of an even older monument at this very spot thousands and thousands of years earlier. If I let myself forget the circumstances for a second, I’m happy I trekked up that hill to start my new year here.

Then my ankle throbs and reminds me that my situation is, in fact, less than ideal. I can practically hear my parents’ disappointed voices in my head. “Oh, Petter. You never learn.” They still treat me like I’m a kid, even though I turned twenty-nine this year. I guess that’s what I get for being the youngest and smallest of their five-kid litter. Or maybe the truth is simpler than that? Maybe I deserve their disappointment for never learning to think before I act?

I grab the bottle and lift it to my mouth, but the smell wafting out of it is truly off-putting, so I lower it again.

Maybe I’d better get going. The village isn’t far, but it’ll take me forever to get down with my hurt ankle. It’d be stupid to linger here.