NOVEL

I Feel Numb, I Am Frozen

The Love We Had, Chapter 21

A writing challenge

Write and publish a book review of the novel The Love We Had, based on freely chosen chapters published on medium.com.

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21

I’m not well. I feel numb, I feel frost inside. I can feel almost nothing.

I have long since passed the middle of my life. I have three kids. For more than twenty years I have had a man that I thought I loved, and I long believed he was fond of me too. He’s a man I thought would love me my whole life. I thought I would grow old with him. He’s the man who chose me more than twenty years ago. In the clear light of the reflection, I have been thinking: Because I chose him! — He chose me because I chose him!

He’s a man who has changed. Together with me, with all my mistakes and all my faults, he has been digging trenches between us. We have created an abyss between us, an abyss so dark, so dangerous that it hardly is to endure.

If I shall endure, I have to get it out. I’ll get it out. I have to write it out of me I’ll write me free from it, here in this fiction blog, this, my novel blog

And then it gets there, this journal, and they get to read, those who want to read, those who can read my words, my stories about wine that turned into vinegar, about a love that was ours. Yes, they’ll read about bitterness and resignation, and about many other things that happened in this small industrial town that Lonely Planet some years ago named” the ugliest town in the world”.

Life is short. Yes, we know, both my husband and I know it is. I have always known it, and yet we have messed it up. As it appears, we have let the chances go.

We haven’t seen each other like we needed to be seen, the way we wanted to be seen. We have had focus in the wrong places at the wrong time. We have cared too little about each other. And should I survive now — I will have to get it out, I have to get all this done. I have to write it away from me.

Because, I am still the mother of three children. He is still the father of three children. We are both still parents of our three children, even though today it feels like we’ve lost track, he and I.

Feels like — we’ve lost one another forever.

The story that the novel tells takes place in a small industrial town at the end of a fjord in western Norway. The story being told and the characters are fictional.

The photos included in the chapters are taken on location in the Odda Smelter (Odda Smelteverk, 1906–2003), the carbide factory that is part of the story.

The Love We Had

Part 1 The Longest Night -chapters 1–3, told by Lars. Part 2 The Light Inside -chapters 4–17, told by Aslak. Part 3 Save Our Secret Love -chapters 18 — XX, told by Eira.

Previous: Chapter 20 Anger

For quick access to all chapters, go here.

Øivind H. Solheim writes fiction, essays and articles aiming to help others understanding life, other humans and themselves. He has published five novels, two non-fiction books and a poetry book.

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