The Colony

by Annika Norlin

was very boring, but I immediately understood that this was the only place where I could get better again, in the odious Outdoors. Only here did my nervous system stop racing.

The first few nights were the hardest. It was so bright outside, hard to settle down. In the daytime I felt even more stressed, as if the absence of stimuli led to a hyperactivity in my own brain. I could feel the thumping of my heart so clearly when everything else was gone, and the lack of stimulation made each minute long.

Everything exists within you. You already contain it all. You need nothing. You have a big spruce tree to sleep under and warm bodies to press up against.

But the weather—much like humans—simply is, and it’s best not to go against it. Those who greet the weather with acceptance are spared a lot of grief.

Sagne now saw: tens of thousands of dramas unfolding here, in their house, and outside, on the walls and the ground and the paths and down by the lake. Everything that lived and breathed and thrived and happened. All you had to do was choose to see it. Now she saw, and it would never be possible to unsee.

Their love had resulted in a wonderful child. But he had that gaze. As if the trauma had materialized and become a face.

There are some people who make decisions based on desire, and others who make decisions based on fear.

She stood in the middle of a field with no paths at all, oozing potential. She knew that she had potential. Everyone else saw that she had potential. Her humour, and her intelligence, and her charisma, so immense.

“I know that many here might see you as an amazing professional, logical and clear-minded, but to me you are one big, thumping heart, and a backbone in my life.

József called for a doctor, who confirmed that the woman in the bed was dead, and, as soon as he said that, József experienced a mix of emotions in his body so intense that he needed to scream. He went into the bathroom, grabbed a paper towel, and screamed into it. Screamed over how much he had loved her, screamed over who she was and who she had been and what had befallen her, and screamed over now, finally, being free.

His mind hadn’t grasped what had happened yet, but his body had. His body remembered what it was like to be little and sit on her lap; her warm, soft arms; how she had loved him so boundlessly; her gaze on him; that he was the only and most important thing that existed. When that goes away. The person who thinks you are the most important thing that exists. What that does to a person. He took a deep breath and his throat screamed out the exhalation.

József would later think that this was the worst day of his life, and the best, and in hindsight, he would understand that he could never have experienced the best without it being the worst. That’s how life is, and if you think you can take shortcuts, you are mistaken.

Sex can be as many things as a conversation. A game. A bandage. A shrug. A party. Yoga? Violence. Something purely physical, almost like exercise. Bragging. People seeing each other. One seeing the other. If you are lucky: a bond.

She had that giggle. It was the kind of giggle that put people in a good mood; it was boisterous. What is it about some laughs? They cut through everything: age, class, gender, generation, mood. That kind of giggle is an equaliser. It’s irresistible. No one talks about the currency of a really good giggle.

Before things have happened, it always feels impossible that they would. If you had seen from the beginning which way things would go, you would have pumped the brakes from the start. But one day turns into the next and, without much thought, it becomes a life.

“My mother used to work in the forest when I was little. Back then, it felt like scooping from an overflowing bowl. Now it’s like the spoon is scraping the bottom.”

“As human beings, we make so many small choices every day that we forget we also have the ability to make big choices. We don’t have to live where everyone else lives. We don’t have to live like everyone else lives. We can sit down and ask ourselves: what do I truly believe in? And then you try to live that way, with people you actually want to live with.”