Sometimes I think about Tøyen. It’s then I see Tøyen quite clearly.

People carrying shopping bags out of the supermarket and pushing buggies through the snow, running to school with bags thumping, and the caretaker standing by the gate at break time, smoking. Then the snow melts, and the Christmas trees lie brown outside the blocks of flats, and then the lawns turn green and full of dandelions, and so it goes on, people walking steadily and staggering and walking steadily again, babies being born and old folk dying, and at break time the caretaker leans against the pillar by the gate, blowing smoke towards the sky.

It’s then he thinks of me. He understood it all, I see that now. He gazes up above the rooftops and remembers everything.

“Standing out here, are we?” the caretaker said.

He took up position at his pillar, taking a packet of cigarettes out of his pocket. And I stood where I always stood, I answered as I always used to answer.

“Yes,” I said.

“You know that’s not allowed?” the caretaker said.

I gave him the reply I’d learned from Dad.