The Reckless Kind
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Synopsis
It’s 1904 on an island just west of Norway, and Asta Hedstrom doesn’t want to marry her odious betrothed, Nils. But her mother believes she should be grateful for the possibility of any domestic future given her single-sided deafness,
unconventional appearance, and even stranger notions. Asta would rather spend her life performing in the village theater with her fellow outcasts: her best friend Gunnar Fuglestad and his secret boyfriend, wealthy Erlend Fournier.
But the situation takes a dire turn when Nils lashes out in jealousy—gravely injuring Gunnar. Shunning marriage for good, Asta vows instead to live the life of her choosing, along with Gunnar and Erlend. With few ties left to their families,
they have one shot at gaining enough money to secure their future: win the village’s annual horse race.
Despite Gunnar’s increasing misgivings and difficult recovery, Asta and Erlend intend to prove this unheard-of arrangement will succeed. But the more they defy small-town tradition, the stronger the villagers’ hateful ignorance becomes. With
this year’s competition proving dangerous for the reckless trio, Asta and Erlend soon find they face another equally deadly peril: the possibility of losing Gunnar, and their found family, forever.
Release date: November 9, 2021
Publisher: Soho Teen
Print pages: 336
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The Reckless Kind
Carly Heath
1
False Gods and Unnatural Passions
ASTA HEDSTROM
Gunnar’s arm was gone—everything below the elbow. Though Erlend’s mama had bundled it in calico bandages, I kept imagining his injury and what he must’ve endured during the accident—the sound of the snap, the jolt of pure agony, the hours he’d likely suffered until Herr Doktor Engen arrived to treat him. Gunnar Fuglestad was my best friend since childhood and one month ago he’d almost died.
The bleeding didn’t do him in, but the septic infection nearly did and now his skin shone pale as a corpse. Gunnar: a corpse. The vision struck me like a rifle-ball to the gut.
I had to sit down.
Near the foot of Erlend’s four-poster stood a dainty slipper chair. Quietly, I pulled it close to the side of the mattress, nearest to where Gunnar lay beneath the quilts. As I settled onto the ornately patterned seat, I wondered why Erlend had asked me to come to his house to resume our theater rehearsals if my scene partner remained not only abed, but also terribly debilitated.
Looking over Gunnar once more, I sighed in relief at the gentle rise and fall of his chest. Though it’d only been a month since the accident, it felt like an eternity since I’d last seen him—the longest we’d been apart since we first became friends. Erlend’s parents, the Fourniers, had taken him in upon hearing about the calamity at the Fuglestads’ farm, but each time I had tried to visit, Fru Fournier insisted Gunnar was quite unwell and quite unable to see anyone. Now, finally, I knew what she meant. Quite unwell meant Gunnar’s arm was quite missing and the rest of him quite unconscious. I wiped my sweating palms on my skirt.
Breeze from the Norwegian Sea usually subdued our summer heat, but this morning’s air settled into an oppressive swelter. Despite the temperature, Gunnar slept beneath a blanket of silk jacquard, his head tilted to the side, his ginger lashes heavy and still. A scab, shaped like a falcon in flight, spanned the width of his forehead; a yellowing bruise marred one cheekbone. Sweat sheened upon his brow and corded his blood-red hair, and yet, somehow, he still smelled like cinnamon and rain.
With my brown huckaback pinafore and Gunnar’s many-hued wounds, the two of us seemed so out of place in the expanse of Erlend’s bedroom—double doors on one side, portière on the other, imported piano, ski medals, rococo mirrors. The refined luxury forced me to find things I hadn’t noticed about Gunnar Fuglestad before: the rough orange stubble on his jaw, oddly precocious for a boy who’d only just turned seventeen, and the hardness that remained on his face even in slumber.
With a steaming forehead and a twinge of guilt, I found myself thinking about the play. If Gunnar were to recover in time, his Benedick would have one arm. It might still work. Much Ado began with men returning from war, so Benedick could’ve lost his limb in battle. Gunnar would likely have a number of clever ideas on how to play the part one-handed. He’d make it brilliant.
The tip, top, tip of Erlend’s slippers echoed through the bedchamber. A flush of heat invaded my chest. Sounds coming from things I couldn’t see always made me anxious as a cornered hen. I was born with an unhearing left ear, so I’d developed a habit of turning to the right until I’d find the source of a sound. Erlend tried to keep me from doing it on stage. An actress needs to face the audience, he’d say. But even after weeks of rehearsals, I still fought the urge to face my castmates. And in real life, where I’d be unrehearsed and unscripted, I’d always turn right, then right again, and right once more until I could finally identify the location of the noise-maker. Twisting in my chair now, I spotted Erlend standing in the doorway, script pages folded in his hand.
Erlend. Glorious Erlend.
Only recently, during rehearsals, did I realize he was handsome. Before, I’d have used other words to describe his face: pleasant, kind, sweet. From his French papa, he’d inherited a deep bronze complexion—an anomaly in this land of sunburn and freckles.
“Thank you for coming, Asta.” His tense gaze landed on Gunnar’s sleeping figure. “Has Fuglestad dozed off again?”
I nodded.
“Hell.”
I turned back to Gunnar. Above his wraps, the short sleeve of his undershirt stretched thin and tight around his bicep. A rumple of pulled-away blankets revealed the beige twill of his trousers. He must’ve dressed prior to my arrival. Perhaps the effort of it had been too much.
“Look.” Erlend shoved the pages into his desk. “I’m sorry. Maybe we shouldn’t rehearse today. Clearly, he needs more rest.”
If only I’d known he was this bad. If only I could’ve done something. I got up and joined Erlend on the far side of the room. Hoping not to wake Gunnar, I kept my voice so quiet I nearly mouthed the words. “Has he been like this since the accident?”
“He looked better this morning,” Erlend whispered. “That’s why I sent for you. Fuglestad insisted—he wanted to start rehearsing again.”
Gunnar insisted? How could he insist on anything? The poor boy lay still as a carcass.
“Erlend”—I spoke as softly as I could—“what happened to him?”
What little I knew came from town gossip: Something occurred up at the Fuglestad farm; Sigrid died and her two boys, Fred and Gunnar, were injured. When the Fourniers ventured up there to see how they could help, they came home with Gunnar, who lingered near death for almost a month while Fru Fournier tended to his sickness—clearly the result of his mysteriously mangled limb and Herr Doktor Engen’s befouled amputation.
“Erlend?”
“I don’t know,” he said.
There were a million other questions I wanted to ask, but the strained look on Erlend’s face dissuaded me—for the moment, at least. While I liked to think of Erlend as my friend, being the theater’s director separated him from the rest of us. Maybe it was the mystique of his family’s wealth, the precision of his tailored garments, or the way he seemed so much older than his eighteen years, but something about Erlend Fournier remained beyond reach.
Watching me, Erlend bit his lip. “His mama was killed.”
“Yes, I’d heard that.” It was what everyone in town had been saying, but no one would tell me how. Now, Erlend’s unease suggested he didn’t know anything more than I did. He’d gone to their farm, though. Surely he had to have seen something.
“And his younger brother?” I asked. “They say he was injured as well.”
“Papa and I told him he’d be welcome to come here, but the boy maintained he needed to stay at the farm and tend to the animals.”
All this uncertainty surrounding the Fuglestads pulled my insides into knots. I needed Gunnar to be safe, forever—away from whatever tragedy unfolded at his family’s place up on Old Viking Road.
Erlend would protect Gunnar. Of that I had no doubt. But what about Erlend’s parents? They were wealthy and generous, but that didn’t mean they’d be interested in taking in this ginger-haired heathen as their permanent ward.
“Will he stay here?” I pressed. “Will you get to keep him?”
“Keep him?”
“He can’t go back.” Though I’d never been to the Fuglestads’ farm and didn’t know much about their family life, I did know what everyone said about Herr Fuglestad—that the man was a drunk. Was he violent? Had his fury been what injured Gunnar? I made my voice firm. “He can’t go back to his papa.”
The rustle of bedclothes stopped me from saying more.
“Asta.” Gunnar’s deep voice rattled like pebbles inside a tin can. “You’re making me sound like an orphaned kitten.”
I rushed back across the room and to his bedside.
“Baby kitten!” I squealed, attempting to pet him, attempting to bring a smile to his bruised and sleep-swollen face—attempting to quell my own worry.
He shielded himself with a pillow as I pawed his head. “Yes, and this kitten”—the pillow muffled his words—“has caused the Fourniers too much trouble.”
Erlend stepped closer. “You’re not the trouble, Fuglestad. It’s Pastor Odegard. He’s the troublemaker.”
“Odegard wouldn’t be making trouble if your parents hadn’t brought a heathen into their home.”
Smiling now, I lowered myself back into the seat. Gunnar’s family never attended church and, much to the town’s dismay, didn’t hide their pagan practices. “Making trouble?”
“Since Mama’s been taking care of Fuglestad,” Erlend explained, “we haven’t been to church and Odegard’s been saying things about the theater.”
My smile fell. Anything Odegard had to say about the theater wouldn’t be good. With its opulent fittings and spacious foyers, the Fourniers’ playhouse was the only structure in town made of white stone rather than wood. During the warm seasons, enormous planters of red roses lined its portico while a cast-iron fountain dribbled melodiously upon the shaded terrace—such a contrast to the surrounding plain houses, which weren’t adorned with anything more elaborate than a few small window boxes stuffed with myrtles. Had it not been for Herr Fournier’s fortune and unending desire to provide his only son with such spectacular indulgences, the theater would’ve never been built, much less produce enough kroner to remain in operation. Was the pastor’s dissatisfaction over the extravagance of its appearance, the antics of its players, or the fact Erlend Fournier—the eighteen-year-old theatrical genius who’d served as our leader for the past five years—favored art over hunting or fishing, and made no effort to hide his interest in literature while other boys engaged in roughhousing and team sports. With Odegard knowing Erlend’s influence on so many of us, the pastor once remarked on the dangerous trend toward softness amongst the young men of our generation and, though he didn’t mention Erlend’s name, the reference was undeniable.
Perhaps I noticed such things because I, too, was quite different from everyone else in town. When I was a schoolgirl, the other children asked if I was an elf or a fairy. Mama said it was because I had thin lips, as if the large space between my unmatching eyes and the white chunk in my brown hair weren’t far more talked about than the fact my mouth lacked a Cupid’s bow. Herr Doktor Engen called what I had a condition, but never gave it a name or a remedy. Not that I needed one. I had something better than two working ears and same-colored irises. I had my best friend, Gunnar Fuglestad, to keep me company. We were alike, in a way, though I couldn’t fully articulate how other than the fact that his heathenism and my appearance meant we were both on the outside of everything. Being peculiar in the eyes of our schoolmates had a way of making us understand certain truths a great deal more than everyone else.
But Erlend hadn’t finished what he was saying about Pastor Odegard and the theater.
I tipped back in my chair, making a creak. “The pastor has been talking about the theater? What’s he been saying?”
“That it isn’t a proper place for children,” Erlend said. “That the plays of Shakespeare and Sophocles promote false gods and unnatural passions. That we have young ladies with hammers building sets alongside the young men. Not to mention the rumors of parties and alcoholic spirits.”
Though usually timid in Erlend’s dazzling presence, I ventured for intimacy, feigning shock, and then bringing a hand to my mouth. “Where would a bunch of youngsters obtain alcoholic spirits?”
Erlend bestowed me with a wicked smile.
On Saturdays during the summertime, all of us would carouse in the theater basement amongst the shelves of chintz, crepe, and velveteen while Erlend provided the booze and performed on the piano. The festivities never succeeded in making us feel any less intimidated by our magnificent director—he’d mostly spend the evening alone on his bench focusing on the keys—but we surely appreciated the effort he put into seeing we all had a good time.
With a faint grunt, Gunnar twisted left and right in an attempt to free himself from the silk cushions and charmeuse bedsheets engulfing his limbs. Erlend came over to help and all my insides melted. There’s nothing quite as nice as boys being sweet to each other—sweeter still since, it panged me to remember, Gunnar no longer had much in the way of family.
“Shouldn’t we begin?” Gunnar asked.
I blinked. “Perhaps you’ll need additional rest before resuming with more rehearsals.”
“Asta’s right.” Erlend leaned against the wainscoting. “Your color’s still off.”
Downing a cup of water from the bedside table, Gunnar pushed his way to the edge of the mattress, then struggled to stand. “My color is fine.”
“Fuglestad”—Erlend sucked in a breath—“I don’t think this is a good idea.”
Rising to his feet, Gunnar grinned, then faltered. His legs seemed to disconnect from his hips. His knees gave way.
“Gunnar!” I shrieked.
With his one arm he reached for the bedside table, clasping instead a gold horse statuette standing atop a marble base. The statuette toppled. So did my friend.
Lunging forward, Erlend caught him, Gunnar crumpling in his hold like an abandoned marionette as the horse went thudding along the rug.
“Dammit.” Gunnar’s curse was small and embarrassed. “Sorry.”
I picked up the statue to put it back on the table. It pressed into my palms heavy as a brick. Using my skirt to wipe away the fingerprints, I checked to see if the Valkyrie sapphires were still in place over the eyes. They were—still gleaming like the sea beneath moonlight.
“We’ll try next week.” Erlend lifted him back onto the mattress. “It’ll give you a little while longer to get your strength back.”
Gunnar shook his head. “Next week we need to be on stage. We need to have the action worked out. After that we’ll only have two weeks until the opening.”
At once a warm, rubbery tension began to grow in my throat.
“We’re not opening in September,” Erlend said. “Maybe in January. Maybe it’ll be our winter show.”
This knot in my neck stretched, choking me.
“No, no, we can still do it.” Gunnar strained to remain upright as he sat on the edge of the mattress. “We can still have a fall show. You said the costumes are nearly done. So all we need now is to get Benedick and Beatrice doing our Benedick and Beatrice things.”
“We’re not opening in September,” Erlend repeated, throwing a nearby blanket around Gunnar’s shoulders since the poor fellow shivered so severely.
“Yes, we are,” Gunnar said. “We can. We have to.”
Erlend went to pour him another tumbler of water. “Why does it have to be September?”
Gunnar hesitated, looking to me for assurance. Even with his mama dead and his arm gone, he was still the sweetest, dearest, kindest friend a girl could hope for.
“Because of me,” I admitted, holding back the tears as best I could.
Erlend turned my way. “Asta?”
I picked at the embroidery on my sleeve, hoping Erlend would be inclined to let the subject drop. “Never mind, Erlend. It’s not important.”
“It is important,” Gunnar said.
“You need to get better.” I forced myself to match Gunnar’s fortitude. “Your health is more important than some silly play.”
“But this is your play.”
Erlend lowered himself between us. “What’s going on with you two? Asta, what’s the matter?”
I brushed away his concern. “We can talk about it another time.”
“Asta,” Gunnar said, “you should tell him.”
“Tell me what?” Erlend asked.
The damn tears made hot streams down my cheeks. “This will be my last play.” My words sounded slow and thick in my ear. “I’m almost nineteen. I’m to be married. And come January, I won’t belong to the theater anymore. I’ll belong to Nils Tennfjord.”
“I had no idea,” Erlend said.
Of course Erlend had no idea. He spent his days analyzing script pages as though they were scripture, oblivious to town gossip.
“Do you have a date set for the happy occasion?” he asked politely.
My gaze stayed low. “It’ll be a Christmas wedding—held the morning of the Christmas Race.”
Erlend brought his palms together, a gesture of sober cordiality rather than any kind of genuine enthusiasm. He could tell my engagement was a less-than-happy occasion, but didn’t fully understand why. “Congratulations.”
Gunnar reached for my hand, but I pulled it away. I had no right to cry. Gunnar had lost his arm—as well as his mama—and he never cried. He’d been courting death for a whole month, and yet here he was, ready to continue on with the rehearsals or lend a sympathetic ear to my misery.
When Nils came to give his gold to Papa, Mama’s face had gone frozen with surprise. She’d always thought I’d end up an old maid and yet, finally, a good and pious young man had managed to overlook my faults. By consenting to Nils’s proposal, I’d finally proved her wrong.
Gunnar found my hand again and I succumbed to its warmth. Back in school, we shared a bench and a slate. When he finally joined the theater, we had a way of linking up during a crowded rehearsal, snapping together like the steel jaws of a bear trap. A romance, sort of, but without any bothersome longing. Snug, cozy, agreeable. Yes, I found him pleasing to look at, but the love between us resembled that of a brother and sister. I cursed under my breath.
Why was my future fated to be a Tennfjord not a Fuglestad? Not that I wanted to be Gunnar’s wife, but if ladies were to be shuffled off into other families once they reach a certain age, why couldn’t we be offered as sisters or aunts or cousins? Instead of entering the Tennfjord family as a wife, I could join the Fuglestad family as a something-else.
Gunnar, would you take Asta to be your lawfully-wedded something-else?
There’d be cake and everything.
“Why the morning of the Christmas Race?” Gunnar asked, his expression subtly pained. “Of all days to be married?”
How could I have forgotten? The Christmas Race belonged to the Fuglestads. More precisely: Sigrid Fuglestad. For the past five years, Gunnar’s mama had driven the winning sleigh, taking home the prize hog. Not to eat—the vegetarian Fuglestads didn’t use their prizes for pork ribs, or sausage, or Christmas ham. Sigrid let her pigs live out their days on their farm, growing into massive pink boulders of flesh who enjoyed their lives as pampered pets.
My mentioning the Christmas Race clearly tormented Gunnar, who was still mourning his mother.
“I should go.” I wiped my nose. “Gunnar, you need to rest.”
“What I need is my Asta.” He squeezed my fingers. “I’ve missed you, you know.”
That was it. My tear ducts were wide open and I couldn’t stop the rest of my despair from breaking through. “I’ll come by tomorrow and see how you’re faring. But really, you need more sleep.”
Of all the things I’d miss when I became a wife—donning wigs and theater cosmetics, my solitary saunters through the cannery alleys, delivering handfuls of corn to the scores of rodents behind the refuse bins—I’d miss this the most: being with these two boys and relishing the way we inspired one another. I tried to push it out of my mind, but the despair of this loss was all I could think about as I swept out the door.
Chest aching and fingers trembling, I made my way through town and back to my family’s dingy, overcrowded two-room house. Rolling hills and distant jagged peaks encircled our village while the southward corridor led to sheer cliffs overlooking the bay. Nearing the grand square, I squinted beyond the clusters of low, red-roofed dwellings to where the theater stood—upstream from the church and shaded by slender birches. A quartet of young theatricals idled between the building’s pillars. With pages in their grasp, they studied their lines. Some polished the balustrade while others pruned the potted shrubbery. It made sense that Pastor Odegard resented how we devoted ourselves so ardently to the playhouse while his own decaying church fell out of repair.
The Fourniers’ theater—my true sanctuary. But since the play would likely be postponed through January, my days with the theater and my friends were most definitely over.
Even if I could summon the gall to jilt Nils, those two lovely young men would soon find their own wives and I’d be left alone, eventually. After all, no lady would want some spinster calling on her husband for conversation and companionship.
I squared my shoulders and faced the truth: my fate belonged to Nils Tennfjord, a young man generous enough to accept me—a chinless girl with eyes too far apart, a deaf ear, and a strange clump of white hair on the side of her head. My destiny was to give birth to his litter of hog-farming offspring and the only performing I would do would be acting as if I loved them.
Wiping my nose on my sleeve, I stepped onto the main road. Down by the tailor’s shop stood a familiar sight—a pair of white ponies hitched to a farrier’s wheeled smithy. Until she’d died, Gunnar’s mama had driven that wagon and shod everyone’s horses, but now her fifteen-year-old son, Fred, sat alone upon the plank, his posture slumped, his fingers nearly releasing the reins. My heart clenched. Fragile, ginger-haired boys could make me tender as boiled beans, but now he looked so exceptionally frail. From what Erlend told me, I’d gathered Fred had been well enough to not need the Fourniers’ assistance, but clearly the full truth of last month’s accident hadn’t been shared. It was time to find out what happened.
Hurrying past the butcher and saddle maker, I rounded the signs advertising their services, to where Fred slouched upon his seat.
“Fred?” I placed a cautious step onto the rig’s footboard and laid a hand on his knee. ...
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