Evie smiled. As much as she enjoyed the wild water swimming with the Selkies, she also loved these stormy mornings when the womendidn’tswim, and instead sat in front of a roaring fire, lounging on Freya’s comfy sofas with hand-knitted blankets over their knees. She would look across the room at Freya, whose round, almost wrinkle-free face shone with happiness at having her house filled with her friends and think how lucky she was to be a part of it all.
She quickly texted Sophia and Freya back, cleaned her brushes, whipped off her painted stained apron and headed out into the storm from the quiet of her studio. Every time she stepped outside in Orkney it took her breath away – but particularly on a day like today. There really wasn’t a place more beautiful on earth. And yet she was denying the healing power of Orkney to Amelia McLean. She knew she would have no peace of mind until she answered her email, but the longer she left it, the more difficult it would be to write a reply.
Evie was torn. Although she wanted to help this stranger, their shared family history was dark and complicated. Evie thought it would be safer to leave well alone, but she was still riddled with guilt and doubts.
Chapter Four
Freya’s House
Arriving in Freya’s living room was like stepping into a rainbow. Freya loved colour, the brighter the better. From the painted walls and colourful throws and rugs over the sofa to the collection of works from local artists (including Evie’s, of course), Freya’s home was as cheerful, charismatic and welcoming as its owner.
Evie smiled as she looked around the room at the different women who, along with Freya, had become her closest friends: Maureen, Kate, Delima and Patsy.
Maureen was a mature bride of almost eighteen months, sitting upright on a comfy armchair with her hands filled with knitting as usual. She’d had to put down those knitting needles for a while after her mastectomy, but she had healed well and was now busily making yet another baby cardigan in fluffy yellow wool. She was wearing a soft emerald-blue dress and felt hat gifted to her by Freya to keep her head warm.
Her beautiful thick black hair was long lost to chemotherapy. It had slowly grown back, wiry and curly and white as snow but Maureen had grown fond of wearing a hat, and truth be told, she still felt sensitive about her hair.
Her face was unnaturally swollen because of the ongoing cancer treatment. She had just recently finished another round of chemo. But her gentle eyes had the glow of a woman whoknows she is much loved. Despite everything that had happened to her, Evie knew that Maureen felt lucky and deeply contented to be married to such a kind and wonderful man; Andrzej had made her so very happy.
Their wedding in the famous Italian Chapel was still talked about, and Maureen loved to show off the photographs and watch videos of that very special day, especially the ones with her beloved Polish husband and her teenage son Rory, whose dad had died young. Maureen, Andrzej and Rory were now a close-knit family and had found real happiness in challenging times.
Evie couldn’t help being worried about Maureen, but the signs were hopeful, and the treatment seemed to be working. If only you could bottle contentment and use it as a cure-all, then Maureen would sail safely through these stormy waters. In the early days after Maureen told everyone she had breast cancer, Evie had often felt at a loss as to what to say to her. Everything seemed trivial compared to the overwhelming reality of the ever-present disease.
Freya had gently told the other Selkies shortly after Maureen started her treatment, “Just treat her the same as we all used to do before she got sick. Of course, you can ask her how she’s doing, but she just really wants to talk about her boy, Rory, and boast to you about how clever he is, and how Andrzej treats her like a princess. She also wants to hear your news. Just normal stuff. You know what she’s like; she doesn’t want a fuss.”
Freya was a wise woman. There weren’t many left who remembered she had once played on the beach on the island of Hrossey as a little boy called Magnus. That was several lifetimes ago and the fact she happened to be a trans woman was the least interesting thing about her.
She was just Freya. Everyone’s friend and supporter, always there if you needed to pour your heart out and be given soundadvice or could do with a quick chat to make you feel better about yourself. She seemed to have an endless supply of coffee, cake and whisky and a deep well of wisdom.
Evie was sitting beside Kate and thought again how relieved she was to have mended fences with her childhood friend, who’d been so hurt when Evie had fled the island aged eighteen and cut all contact for years. The two of them were now as close as they had been at school, making up for lost time.
Evie loved babysitting Kate’s two hilarious little girls who sometimes made her run into the kitchen and muffle her laughter into a tea towel. One day last week, when Evie had been looking after them after school, six-year-old Claire had solemnly told her big sister, Louise, that Siobhan at school had said daddies and mammies made babies just like cats and dogs and sheep and cows. They had both asked Evie if that was really true.
“Did someone have to throw water over mammy and daddy like Mrs Finnegan did when that big black dog was stuck to her peedie poodle,” Claire piped up, all wide-eyed innocence, with Louise looking to Evie for clarification.
Evie managed to keep it together to say she didn’t think that had happened to Kate and Edwyn before she had to flee from the room, hiccupping with laughter. It was moments like these, and just being with her friends today, that made her so glad she’d moved back to Orkney.
That afternoon, everyone’s attention was on Delima and her precocious-yet-adorable daughter Ola, and new baby Hari, a fat contented bundle with big brown eyes and a shock of blond hair. Delima was recounting how appalled Ola had been to witness his first nappy change.
“She asked me to send him back and get a clean one,” Delima said, taking a sip of tea. “I explained to her that daddy waschanging Hari’s nappy for a new one. And that’s when she explained – no, she wanted a new baby! She even said, ‘This one smells bad.’”
Evie and the other women collapsed in giggles and Ola looked at all of them, smiling. She was a beautiful child and the image of her mother with shiny straight black hair and nut-brown eyes. She was as bright as a button and chatted constantly. Baby Hari had just turned two months old, forever smiling and fat as Buddha. He’d arrived into the world a fortnight overdue and no one could quite understand how such a stoater of a bairn had come out of such a peedie thing as his mum.
Delima had a tough time but had been dead set on a natural birth like she’d had with Ola. Even her husband, Jack, couldn’t talk her out of it. After twenty-eight hours of labour in Balfour Hospital, anxious midwifes had wanted her to have a C-section, which gave Delima the determination to push out young Hari with the last reserves of her strength.
Evie looked at Delima with affection and deep admiration. She appeared to be a delicate flower but really, she was a steel magnolia, and very much the brains behind the success of the seal sanctuary and animal hospital she ran with her husband. It was by the shore in Hoxa, just over the barriers in South Ronaldsay, and everyone in Orkney knew to call them if they found a stray kitten or a stranded seal pup.
“Isn’t it time for me to get a cuddle of that peedie mite?” said Freya, holding out her plump arms and engulfing baby Hari in soft sweet-smelling silk. The baby instantly cooried into Freya and fell into a contented sleep.
Patsy, a raw-boned woman who worked with Maureen’s husband, Andrzej, who declared her to be the best carpenter he had ever come across, observed wryly,“I wouldn’t call that baby peedie. You could send him out to work in the fields. He could pick up a coo, put it under his oxter and carry it to market. He’s as strong as an ox.”
Patsy shook her head and added, “I still don’t know how the hell you ever managed to push him out Delima and I can’t believe you aren’t still walking like John Wayne with rickets.”
Delima laughed, “You forget the pain as soon as you have the baby in your arms. Otherwise, no woman would ever give birth again.”
“If I’d ever been unfortunate enough to have kids,” said Patsy grimly, “it would have been as nature intended, with me lying flat on a hospital bed numb from the neck down.”
Freya smiled and rocked Hari in her arms. “Behave yourself Patsy. He’s just a bonnie big boy like his daddy.” She sighed happily, “It’s lovely to have a peedie newborn to fuss over again. Ola has grown up so fast. And it feels like such a long time since your two were bairns, Kate.”
