Meet Alexandra (plus, an excerpt)

As I wrote previously, I’ll be introducing the characters of my debut novel, Between Here and Gone, over the next several weeks. Today, meet Alexandra Amalie Johanson Anderson Peterson, my great-grandmother and the protagonist of my novel. She was born in a one-room cottage near Vestersand, Norway. The following is how she described the area, taken from a brief family history she wrote prior to her death in 1960 (transcribed from Norwegian):

“In 1872, on the 18^th of September, I saw daylight for the first time, on the outside of the coastline of Lofoten, against the huge Artic Ocean where my cradle stood one time. Yes, in all truth, there was a rich opportunity to listen to the song of the ocean, which many times would rock you to sleep. But, there were other times when the towering waves would break with all their force against the shore and there was no time to sleep because your dear ones were out on the stormy sea. There were many tears shed for the one’s that never came home, but such was a fisherman’s lot in life. All in all, the sea gave of its riches to the people and therefore they loved the sea as it was. And when we go back on our memory, we will remember the times when the sea looked like a mirror, and the beautiful summer nights with light and sun.”

This dreamy yet tragic language offered me insight into Alexandra’s character. That and my great-uncle Erling’s memoir, Hang on the Potatoes, named after a phrase Erling insisted his mother used in reference to making potatoes. That was never corroborated (and some in the family said he made it up), but I wonder if how Alexandra meant the phrase was relative to the nineteenth-century idiom “Hold on to your potatoes,” which meant “be patient.” I heard a similar phrase, “Hold on to your horses!” many times when I was growing up, so it’s likely the mother of seven used a similar phrase with her children, but Erling took it literally. Either way, the book provided me with many facts of Alexandra’s life, but since he couldn’t include any of her thoughts and feelings, I had to invent a fictionalized Alexandra.

While Alexandra’s complete story is a Tolstoy-esque saga, I stayed true to the person she was. According to my mother, who always speaks fondly of her grandmother “Sandra,” she was a kind, unassuming woman who, all her life, had thick, long hair. (She also enjoyed a bowl of Post Toasties every night before bed.) Alexandra was also trusting, which in the case of her lying, cheating husband, was her downfall. My novel is my attempt to give her the happier life she was denied.

The following excerpt is set in 1922 in Norway, where the family had returned after living in Minnesota for seventeen years.

The ferry arrives at the docks, and I look up at the top of the red façade of the only hotel in Svolvaer, The Hotel Lofoten, a few blocks away. That Mathias has chosen to conduct his tryst there is an added insult. The hotel had offered safe harbor after our family’s chaotic ten-day journey back to Norway, which included losing a suitcase on a Brooklyn street car, a Swedish fugitive jumping over the ledge of the ship, and the near-capsizing of the small boat that brought us from Bodo to Svolvaer. Even Mathias, usually unshaken by sea travel, had been grateful to be on solid ground after that tumultuous final leg.

My anxiety increases with every step, and I pray in between breaths, Let me be wrong, but when I round the corner, I see Mathias’s car parked in front of the hotel. I stop abruptly, and a man walking behind me nearly knocks me over. I regain my balance without taking my eyes off Mathias’s car and continue on to the hotel.

Once inside, I pause to gain my composure. The reception desk, made of native birch and stained a rich brown, is more worn; its rounded edge is now bare wood. I remember I’d scolded Alpha when she’d mindlessly picked at its flecks of stain while Mathias checked us into the hotel. We’d all been tired and hungry, and Mathias had convinced the chef—who was closing the restaurant for the night—to make us something to eat. His stubborn determination had made our first night more comfortable, although I suspect he was being overly attentive because he knew he was the only one who wanted to be there.

I look around the lobby and see that the table where Mina, Erling, and Mathias had played cards is still tucked in the corner opposite the stairs, and the painting of King Haakon VII still hangs above the key rack and cubby shelf. I peer up at the second-floor mezzanine. Visible through the wrought iron railing, a pair of wingback chairs stand against the wall with a small round-top table between them. Erling had spent much time reading in one of the chairs, and more than a few nights, I’d found respite there after the children went to sleep and I’d not been ready to go to bed with Mathias, who’d made it clear he’d been missing me. But after he’d blindsided me with his decision to move us to Norway, his every touch had felt like a betrayal, every attempt to bring my body closer to his, a lie.

“May I help you?” The clerk is short and thin with a mustache that seems to swallow his upper lip.

“Yes. Mr. Petterson, he is a guest of yours. What room is he in?”

“Tsk. I can’t tell you that.”

I slam my purse on the desk. “I am his wife!”

The force of my words surprises us both, but I continue. “I will knock on every door until I find him!”

Wide-eyed, the clerk says, “Fine, fine. He’s in room 302. But, Mrs. Petterson, he’s—”

“I know.” I don’t want to hear the rest and start for the stairs.

“Please, no trouble,” the clerk pleads.

Ascending the staircase, I feel like I’m floating above myself, a spectator to someone else’s life. For more than two years I’ve watched idly as Mathias gets everything he wants: Norway, his business, and now…

I pause on the third-floor landing.

What am I doing? Mathias is already with her. What more can I do?

An invisible force thrusts me forward until I am in front of room 302. My heart is beating so hard I think it might knock on the door all by itself.

As I raise my hand, I hear a man’s voice cry out, and I press my ear against the door. While I can’t make out what he’s saying, I know it’s Mathias. He’s never been one to make love quietly when he can get by with it. He’d been mindful of the thin walls of the farmhouse, but more than a few times, I had to place my hand over his mouth at the height of his passion.

“You make me crazy,” he used to whisper afterwards. “I love you so much, I can’t stay silent.” 

I step away from the door, dizzy from the memory. The pain of Mathias’s betrayal is too hot for me to think clearly, let alone act. I walk away, down the stairs, and to the front desk, where the clerk is nibbling on his mustache.

“I didn’t make trouble,” I tell him. “Now I ask that you return the favor and not tell my husband I was here.”