Short Story

The Island

I thought that being an au pair in Finland would be a new and maybe even adventurous experience. But I didn’t know how adventurous!
I’m sitting in a little hut by a lake with no electricity and water in the middle of Finland and having a fire burning by my side. I can see the movement of the water and the wind in the leaves when I look out of the window. Sounds romantic, doesn’t it? But there is a problem; a big problem!
The hut I spend my nights in belongs to the property of my host mom’s mother and it is on an island which can only be reached by boat. The main house is quite small and doesn’t have enough space for all of us. And I was quite glad to have my own place to sleep in because I tend to wake up very easily when I share a room with somebody else. But the hut is about 500 m away from the main house. However, so far, I’ve made my way through the forest every morning to have my morning toilet and breakfast and it seemed good to have some fresh air right after getting up.
But one morning something seemed to be wrong. It was quieter than normal: I couldn’t hear any singing of the birds, the ducklings were gone and even the mosquitoes seemed to have disappeared. However, I still got up and went to the main house, but even that was quiet: No screaming of the two wild boys I take care of, no flickering TV and no Finnish voices. I figured that my host family must have gone to the main land to get some groceries because the boat was gone. So, I had breakfast alone and got dressed. I decided to sit by the lake and read while I was waiting for my host family to come back. But when it was afternoon, I became worried. They still weren’t back and I was seriously becoming to get bored. I tried calling them, but my Finnish phone connection was dead although I always had such a good connection here on the island in the middle of nowhere. And even my German phone didn’t work. It actually scared me a bit because now I couldn’t reach anybody in case something happened. But I thought that something must be wrong with the network. I had a quick lunch/dinner. However, I wasn’t really hungry because I felt quite lonely and I convinced myself that my host family would be back soon with delicious sausages for the bbq. But it became later and later and there was still no sign of them. Although the island isn’t big, there is one more house on it, but it also just serves as a summer cottage. So, I walked along the gravel road to find it and looked inside, but it seemed to be empty as well. I was sure that something must have happened to my host family. Maybe they had a terrible accident or maybe they all drowned. However, I decided to go to bed and hoped that it was all just a bad dream and that I would wake up and everything would be back to normal. The next morning, the birds, mosquitoes or ducklings still hadn’t returned and the main house was just as deserted. Since I was feeling like I was stuck in one of those horror movies I like to watch, I decided to try out the kajak to get to the main land. I had never used it before, but it wasn’t so hard. You just had to be careful to not turn it over when you got in. When I got to the main land, the car of my host family was gone. I walked along the street to the next few houses and all of them were empty. I didn’t see one cat or hear a dog barking. I didn’t know what else to do and went back to the island. Back there I realized that the electricity in the main house wasn’t working: the fridge wasn’t cold and none of the lights were working. I hadn’t realized it before because here in Finland it is so bright at night that you don’t need any artificial light. I have now been alone on the island for 4 days. I barely have any food left. I did a few more trips to the main land and walked along the street to knock on the doors of other houses, but all of them are empty and everything around me seems to be dead. I have the feeling that even the trees are dying. I have no idea what happened. Was there some kind of attack? But of what? Poison? An atomic bomb? And why did my host parents leave me alone? Did they have to flee so fast that there was no time to inform me? I don’t know what to do except to stay here and wait for somebody to turn up to rescue me. Where else should I go? My laptop battery is nearly empty and since the electricity isn’t working, I can’t charge it. So, I need to go. Bye!