And then the light’s gone.
Sven’s hand finds Lotte’s and they slow to a shuffle, the sky yawning empty and deep above them. All around them.
“Wat?” Lotte says.
“In American,” Sven chides, forcing his smile.
“I don’t anymore think we should—” Lotte starts, but doesn’t finish because Sven, walking now instead of running, is jumping on his left foot, his right splintered or nailed or stubbed, something sudden and unpleasant.
The light at the end of the pier comes on, curious.
“Look,” Lotte says to Sven.
When he stops hopping and grabbing at the sole of his foot, the light goes back off.
He nods, getting it, then stomps his hurt right foot down with authority.
The light glows on.
“Try it,” he says to Lotte.
Hesitant, she does, stomping, getting no response. But then she jumps with both feet, comes down hard enough to jangle whatever bad connection is happening down there.
“Gloeilamp isn’t screwed enough,” Sven diagnoses, pulling her ahead.
“Screwed in enough,” Lotte fixes, traipsing behind.
When they get there, step into that puddle of wavering light, Sven licks the pads of his fingers and reaches up under the rusty cowl to tighten the bulb, the light losing its thready flicker immediately, shining an unwavering cone of warmth down onto their pale thighs now, their shadows stark behind them, bleeding off into the darkness.
“We’re gonna fix this place up right,” Sven says, meaning all of America.
Lotte darts in to kiss him on the cheek, then, her eyes locked on Sven’s the whole while, and still holding his fingertips until she can’t, she steps over the end of the pier as easy as anything.
Sven turns his head against the splash, smiling and cringing both, but the splash doesn’t come.
“Lotte?” he says, stepping forward, shielding his face from the water he knows has to be coming.
She’s in a dark green canoe that’s rocking back and forth— she must have spotted it while he was fiddling with the lightbulb. Sven raises his hands, snaps another make-believe picture of her, says, “Cover up, this one’s for the grandchildrens. I want them to see how amazing their grootmoeder was when I first was knowing her.”
Lotte purses her lips, unable to hide her smile, and Sven steps down with her, arms wide so as not to roll them.
“This isn’t stealing,” he says, reaching up to unhook the canoe’s rope. “It was just floating here—out there, I mean. We had to swim out even to get it, to save it.”
“We’re gonna fix this place up!” Lotte says as loud as she can around Sven, leaning on the shaky little left-behind cooler to push them away from the pier. She trails her hands in the water and, drifting out from the pier now, can just see their rental car. It looks like a laundry bomb exploded over it. No: it looks like two kids from the Netherlands fizzed away from pure joy, disappeared into nothing, leaving only their clothes behind.
“What?” Sven asks in perfect American.
“We don’t have a paddle,” Lotte says. It’s the funniest thing in the world to her. It’s making this little expedition even more perfect.
“Or pants, or shirts…” Sven adds, taking both sides of the canoe and rocking it back and forth.
“Koude,” Lotte agrees, hugging herself. Then, like a dare, “Warmer in the water.”
“Out where it’s diepere,” Sven says, correcting himself before she can: “Deeper.”
They reach over to paddle with their hands, the water bitter cold, and after about twenty yards of this Sven liberates the white lid off the little cooler. It’s a much better paddle than their hands, and—importantly—it doesn’t care about freezing.
“My hero,” Lotte says in precise English, pressing herself into his back.
“It can be warmer up here too,” Sven says, but doesn’t stop drawing them farther out onto the lake.
Lotte presses the side of her face into his back, her new vantage point giving her an angle into the now-open tiny cooler.
“Hey!” she says, and extracts a clear baggie with a sandwich inside, its peanut butter smearing.
“Ew, pindakaas,” Sven says, and pulls deep with the cooler lid, surging them ahead.
Lotte unceremoniously shakes the sandwich out into the water without touching it, crosses her finger over her lips so Sven will know not to tell on her about this, then drops her phone into the baggie and neatly seals the top, blowing into it at the very end so the phone is in a make-do balloon.