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Down here, I’m heavy. A few metres farther up, when buoyancy grabs me and lifts me higher, my lungs are ready to pop and my vision begins to flicker. And finally, my head breaks the surface. The air and the blackbird’s song taste sweet in my mouth.
    I push out on a bank, shake the water off me, and walk back to my clothes. While shimmying my wet legs into my underwear and pants, I think of chucking the gross wool pad far away. But that would only worsen the mess. I put on my shirt and climb the stairs to the top of the low-pressure turbine housing, unlock the hatch and peek into the power duct. The sun stands too low. All I see is black, with the occasional metallic reflection.
    When I gaze down towards the valley, darkness already conceals the high-pressure turbine at the very end of the narrower piping. The steel artery is a massive six feet in diameter up here and four feet wide where it spits water into the lower reservoir, but only white-and-red stakes are visible, marking the water’s path down the hill. The pipe itself is buried at two metres depth, so it won’t freeze up in winter.
    During the summer months, excess energy produced by the black solar paint covering all roofs in the village, drives the pumps that gradually fill the upper reservoir to the brim. Every night a tiny fraction of that water flows back down, pushing through the turbines and making them turn so the generators can supply energy for people to switch on lights, for the baker to run his mill, for the wire heaters in the greenhouses’ raised beds to keep the crop growing in winter, and for the butcher’s storage to keep the meat below freezing in summer. Among many other things.
    Come winter, when all excess solar energy from the summer months is stored as hydro energy up on the hill, and no more water is pumped up because the reservoir is full and the sun stands too low, the village relies almost solely on wood and what’s in the reservoir. Then, piping and turbines will run at full capacity and the vibrations up here will be epic.
    Long and hard winters hit every three to four years, and they are a problem. When the sun is still hiding behind a thick blanket of clouds in April, or even May, and snow keeps falling, covering the roofs and the solar paint; when the reservoir, root cellars, and grain barrels have been emptied, people freeze, starve, and get ill. Then the ones too old and too young die.
    Any drop of water less in that reservoir and a hard winter will become even harder. The turbine has to be fixed before sunrise. I need a torch and tools — although I don’t know which ones yet — and I have to make sure the high-pressure turbine in the valley is clear before I fiddle with the low-pressure turbine up here.

    ———

    With a bang I enter my father’s workshop, but he’s not in. Weird. I grab a torch, a bunch of tools, and an extra pack of batteries — valuables only few families have in their possession, but an absolute necessity for the turbinehouse keeper.
    When I knock the dirt off my shoes and step into the house to tell my parents where I’m going and why the power will be off for a while, Mother greets me with a tense, ‘Hello, Mickaela.’
    I stumble to a halt. ‘Is everything all right?’
    ‘Yes, yes. Only…Father is running a high fever.’
    He’s never had a fever in his life. Maybe my certificate made him ill. I drop my gaze to the doormat, wondering if she might unleash her fury any minute now. ‘Something’s wrong with the upper turbine. I’ll fix it quickly.’
    ‘Be careful,’ she calls after me, and I’m shocked. The last time she told me to be careful was when I was ten.
    They are still fretting about my poor grades, but what makes them so unnaturally quiet? Will they boil over once I return? Or are they already packing my stuff so they can quietly leave it at the doorstep?
    No, they would never do that. Whatever is up with my parents, I’ll deal with it later. First, I have to fix the