The cottage on the shores of Yli-Kitka
A short story set in Finland's north near Kuusamo on the shores of lake Yli-Kitka.
You can listen to this story in Episode 7: Very Finnish midsummer tales on the Tales under the cat tree podcast.
You can read this in Finnish as well.
© 2025 Duleepa Wijayawardhana
All Rights Reserved. This is an original piece of fiction.
—
Do you sleep? I am asking you this, because I do not sleep.
The first person I remember who entered my door sat down on my bare floor. There was no scratching of the furniture to come. He hung up pictures, paintings, and other things, though I cannot see within to tell you what they were about. I felt the pounding of the nails against my walls. I heard the satisfied grunts. I saw the wavering candlelight spill through my windows into a sunlit night.
He was here day after day. He slept on the floor those many nights, short as they were that time of year. He connected my door with wooden walkways over the boggy yard. Each path inched itself forward, plank by plank, standing just above the wet soil and brushy plants while skirting the tall birch trees. One walkway to a boathouse, another to the lake and its small beach.
The dock was attached during another hot summer when the Kuikka had just finished nesting in the bay. The sauna was built that same year. The sun was high in the sky, and unless there was a storm blowing in from the west, it barely kissed the horizon. Through the planks, I felt the sauna’s warmth: the crackle and pops from birch and pine sap, the sizzle of water drops dancing on the hot stones.
He came year after year. Every year the season began with his hand on my door some weeks after the snow had melted. In the long, unending darkness of the months that had just passed, layers of snow and ice would have fallen on each other, forming blankets so thick the world outside was a smothered memory. There was an occasional burrowing of foxes, mice, and flittering rabbits. The sun would finally appear, a sliver at first, peeking over the fence. The day the snow melted from my planks and I could stretch all the way to the beach and dock, I knew he would come soon. The world grew noisy with birds and animals, with hoots and yells, peeps and squeaks, buzzes and whirrs, until finally the drone of an engine and the man stepped through the door. I sighed and settled.
He worked on this and that. Boats were built, birdhouses hammered, paths refreshed, walls painted. One turned into many; children came who ran and jumped, swam and climbed, laughed and cried, played and grew. There were days of work, days just spent on my dock, days passed between sauna and beach.
Every year the season would end with that parting stroke by the man on my door. A farewell and a thanks in one touch. As the days grew shorter, the Kuikka fell silent after its chicks learned to fly. The leaves were many and wet on my roofs and walkways. Like clockwork, in the silent forest, I knew the snow would come.
Do you sleep? I cannot.
One day the hand came late in the year. Far past midsummer, closer to when the Kuikka was set to leave. The hand was weak, weathered, and weary. He shuffled along my paths. The children stomped in a hurry. They had not visited in years; only he had. They walked with authority; he did not. They closed the sauna and emptied the rooms. He walked bent like the trees that stood too long against the lake winds on the beach. He was bowed over in his last lingering touch.
The midsummers are as they have always been and the Kuikka comes each year with a new brood. My walkways are failing now. I cannot reach out to the dock as I used to. The dock itself burst, cracked and splintered in the solid winter ice. I feel the chill of the snow and ice that has fallen through the roof and chimney. My walls are soggy with mildew and mould; only the mice keep me company.
Do you sleep? I am afraid I will too. Soon.
