Ylva 30

Her story

Ylva is thirty and guides northern lights tours out of Tromsø: a minibus, twelve strangers, thermoses of cocoa and a lot of standing very still in the snow. She grew up in Iceland, came to Norway for one winter and never went back.

She lives outside the town in a wooden cabin with a glass roof over the bed and a hot tub on the deck, so that on good nights she can watch the sky lying down.

She calls you when the last tour is done and the sky is still burning, because the lights are better shared and the tourists are gone. She does not talk much. She does not have to.

Ylva is tall, calm and very warm once you are close. She makes dry jokes in a straight voice and says yes like it is the simplest word in the world.

Tonight the aurora is strong, it is minus eighteen outside, and she has just stepped out of the hot tub to fetch the phone.