August 1991. The stars. She was fourteen years old and certain that if she closed her eyes tightly and concentrated hard enough, she would be able to see the stars through the roof. All around her were women's breaths. Heavy, rhythmic breaths in the night. Someone was snoring. It was Aunt Sara, who had been given a mattress and was sleeping under the open window. She closed her eyes and tried to breathe like the others. It was hard to sleep, especially when everything around her was so new and different. The little forest beyond the open window and the sounds of the night here in Estgord were different too. People she knew from the gatherings at the Castle and from the summer camps, here, in a strange way, were not the same. But neither was she the same. The face and body she saw in the mirror this summer were new. And so were her feelings, those strange hot and cold currents that ran through her whole body when the boys looked at her. Or, rather, when one boy in particular looked at her. Robert. He was different this year too.
She opened her eyes again and fixed her gaze on the ceiling. She knew that God had the power to do great things, for example, to allow her to see the stars through the roof. If it was His will. The day was long, full of events. The dry summer wind made the cornfields rustle and the leaves of the trees stir nervously, casting shadows and light on the faces of those gathered in the clearing. They were listening to one of the cadets from the Salvation Army Officer School who was talking about his work and sermons in the Faroe Islands. He was handsome and his speech was full of sensitivity and passion. But she was trying to chase away a bumblebee that kept buzzing around her head and then, when the insect finally left, the heat made her drowsy.
