Dancing in the Dark: My Struggle Book 4 (38 page)

When he rang that evening in the autumn of 1998 he said that for a moment he had been convinced dad was alive and was following him in a car on the motorway.

‘There I was, in a car full of his things,’ he said. ‘Can you imagine how furious he would have been if he’d found out? It’s absolutely absurd of course, but I’m
sure
it was him following me.’

‘It gets me in the same way,’ I said. ‘Whenever the phone goes or someone rings at the door, I think it’s him.’

‘Anyway,’ Yngve said, ‘I’ve found some diaries he’d been writing. Well, actually, they’re notebooks. He jotted down a few notes every day. From 1986, 1987 and 1988. You’ve got to read them.’

‘Did he write a diary?’ I said.

‘Not exactly. Just a few notes.’

‘What does he say?’

‘You’ll have to read them.’

When I went to Yngve’s some days later, we threw away nearly everything dad had left behind. I took his rubber boots, which I still wear ten years later, and his binoculars, which are on my desk as I am writing this, and a set of crockery, as well as some books. And then there were the notebooks.

Wednesday 7 January

Up early, 5.30. Pjall.

The shower was cold.

Bus 6.30 from Puerto Rico. Nipped a quick snifter here too.

At the airport. Bought a Walkman. Dep. 9.30. Delayed – Kristiansand 16.40. Flight to Oslo 17.05. Problem.

The same in Alta. Met Haraldsen here. Via Lakselv (-31 degrees)

Taxi home. Cold house. Warmed myself on duty-free.
Hard
day.

Thursday 8 January

Tried to get up for work. But had to ring Haraldsen and throw in the towel. Grinding abstinence – stayed in bed all day . . . I made an attempt to read
Newsweek
. Managed a few TV progs. School tomorrow?

Friday 9 January

Up at 7.00. Felt lousy at breakfast.

Work. Survived the first three lessons. Had terrible diarrhoea in lunch break and had to give the HK class a free. Home for repair – rum and Coke. Incredible how it helps. Quiet afternoon and evening. Fell asleep before TV news.

Saturday 10 January

Slept in. Made short work of the sherry in the kitchen. Evening spent in the company of blue Smirnoff!

Sunday 11 January

Had a feeeling when I woke up it was going to be a bad day. I was right!

Monday 12 January

Slept badly. Tossing and turning and hearing ‘voices’. Work. Started with English background. Hard going when you’re out of shape. Evening classes even more stressful!

Tuesday 13 January

Another sleepless night. My body won’t accept being without alcohol. Went to work.

Tuesday 20 January

Another bad night. Always like that when you don’t take any ‘medicine’. After an hour and a half you’re too exhausted to do a good job. Lutefisk for dinner – my favourite. I had a siesta after dinner – a very long nap – up at 10. Worked till 3. Working through the night is the norm now!

And so it goes on. He drinks every weekend, but also more and more often during the week, and then he tries to stop, to have some alcohol-free days or even weeks, but it doesn’t work, he can’t sleep, he is restless, hears voices and is so worn out it’s almost a relief when he finally goes to the Vinmonopol or buys beer and comes home with the drinks, and all his inner conflict eases.

Under ‘Wednesday 4 March’ his notebook just says
Yngve, Karl Ove, Kristin
. We went up north in the winter holiday to visit them. Dad paid for us all. Unni had invited her son, Fredrik, who was there when we arrived. I flew with Kristin from Kristiansand to Bergen, I was a bit nervous about it of course, because of what had happened between Cecilie and me, but she didn’t say a word about it and treated me as she always had. Yngve joined us in Bergen, then we flew up to Tromsø, where we changed to a propeller plane for the last bit.

The terrain beneath was wild and deserted, there was barely a house or a road to be seen, and when we reached the airport there was no pilot announcement of a slow descent, no, the plane simply swooped down like a bird of prey that had seen its victim, I thought, and the moment the wheels touched down on the runway, we braked and were hurled forward towards the seat in front.

The passengers filed out of the plane across the tarmac to the tiny terminal building. It was cold and overcast, the countryside was white with a scattering of shiny black patches where the rock was too steep for snow to settle.

Dad stood waiting in the arrivals hall. He was formal and tense. Asked us how the trip had been, didn’t listen to the answer. His hands shook as he inserted the key into the ignition and let go of the handbrake. He was silent for the whole journey through the vast misty desolate terrain to the town. I observed his hand, he rested it on the gear lever, but as soon as he raised it, it shook.

The building he parked under was outside the centre, facing the sea, on an estate that must have been built in the 1970s, judging by the shape of the houses. They had rented the whole of the upper floor and had a big balcony outside the living room. The windows were rough, I supposed the salt from the spray had caused that, even though it was several hundred metres to the sea from there. Unni met us in the doorway, smiled and gave everyone a hug. A boy who must have been Fredrik was sitting in a chair watching TV and got up and said hi.

He smiled, we smiled.

He was tall, had dark hair and was a distinct presence in the room. When he sat down again I went into the hall for my rucksack and caught a glimpse of dad as I passed the open kitchen door. He was standing by the fridge and knocking back a beer.

Unni showed us where we would be sleeping. I left my things there. On my return the first bottle was on the table while he was attending to the second. He belched quietly and put the bottle down next to the first, wiped the froth from his beard and turned to me.

The tension was gone.

‘Are you hungry, Karl Ove?’ he said.

‘I suppose I am,’ I said. ‘But there’s no hurry. We can eat when it suits you.’

‘I’ve bought steaks and red wine today. We can have that. Or shrimps. They’ve got good shrimps up here, you know.’

‘Both fine by me,’ I said.

He took another beer from the fridge.

‘It’s good to have beer in the holidays,’ he said.

‘Yes,’ I said.

‘You can have some later, with the food,’ he said.

‘Great,’ I said.

Yngve and Kristin had sat down on the sofa. They were looking around the way you do when you are somewhere new, discreetly absorbing their surroundings, constantly aware of each other, not necessarily with their glances but in the total way that lovers can be when everything is about the two of them. Kristin was a miracle of joy and naturalness, and that rubbed off on Yngve, he was fully open to it and wore an almost childish glow that he only had when he was with her.

Fredrik sat in his chair on the other side of the table and shyly answered the questions Yngve and Kristin asked him. He was a year younger than me, lived somewhere in Østland with his father, played football, was interested in fishing, liked U2 and The Cure.

I sat down in the chair beside him. On the wall above the sofa hung the blue picture by Sigvaldsen that dad had taken with him after the divorce, on the two longer walls there were more pictures we used to have at home. The suite of furniture in the other corner was the one dad had always had downstairs in his office, one of the carpets on the floor came from there too. I recognised the furniture from Unni’s flat.

Dad sat down on the sofa. He put one arm around Unni, in his other hand he held a bottle of beer. I remember thinking I was glad Yngve and Kristin were here.

Dad asked Yngve a question, which he answered briefly but not in an uncivil tone. Kristin slowly tried to bring harmony to the situation with questions about the town and the school where they worked. Unni answered.

After a while dad turned to Fredrik. His tone was light and good-natured. Fredrik’s body language was dismissive, it was obvious he didn’t like dad, and I could understand why. Only an imbecile would not have heard the false ring to dad’s voice, as though he were talking to a child, and not realised that he was doing this for Unni’s sake.

Fredrik gave a surly response, dad stared into the middle distance for some seconds, Unni said something kind but reproachful to Fredrick, who writhed with discomfort.

Dad sat motionless, drinking. Then he got to his feet, hitched up his trousers and went into the kitchen, where he started making dinner. We stayed in the living room chatting with Unni. By the time the food was on the table, at about eight, dad was drunk, he wanted to pour oil on troubled waters but his efforts were too bumbling and he made a fool of himself. Fredrik in particular suffered. We were used to dad, we had nothing else, but Fredrik had lost his mother to this idiot.

Dad sat silent for a long time with a stupid disgruntled expression on his face. Then he got up and went into the bedroom. Unni followed him, we heard their voices, they came back as though nothing had happened, chatted about the holiday they’d had and the dispute they were having with their travel company. It transpired that dad had collapsed in Gran Canaria, fallen over in the room, and had been driven to hospital by ambulance. He said it was heart failure. At any rate he had sued the tour operator because there had been several incidents – rows with the reps, rows with other tourists at the hotel – and now they reckoned that everyone had been against them, indeed bullied them almost, and that had led to dad’s heart problem. He had been kept at the hospital for two days. He showed us photos, and some of them were an unpleasant sight: we saw photos of a couple on a terrace, the camera zoomed in, the couple got up, shook their fists and walked towards the camera. What were they doing? See how cross they were, dad said. What fatheads. They’re as bad as Gunnar. What’s wrong with Gunnar then? Yngve said. Gunnar? dad repeated. OK, I’ll tell you. For a whole summer he was snooping round the flat in Elvegate. He was supposed to be keeping an eye on me, you know, making sure I wasn’t drinking. He’s so self-righteous, that brother of mine. He told me so too, that perhaps I ought to cut down, can you imagine? Is he his brother’s keeper? I was an adult when he was only knee-high to a grasshopper. Can’t a man have a beer in his own garden? He really went too far. And just look how he ingratiates himself with grandma and grandad. He’s after the cabin. He’s always wanted the cabin. And he’ll get it in the end. He’ll inject them with his poison as well.

I didn’t say anything. Met Yngve’s gaze.

How could he stoop so low? They were brothers, Gunnar was his younger brother, and he not only had some order in his life, the children he brought up were close to him, they trusted him, I could see that whenever I saw them, there was not a trace of fear in their eyes, on the contrary, they liked their father. If he had told dad he was drinking too much, he was perfectly within his rights, who else was going to say that? Me? Ha ha, don’t make me laugh. And the cabin? Gunnar was the only one of the brothers who used it and always had done, he loved living out there. Dad didn’t. If dad got his hands on the cabin he would sell it.

I watched him, he sat there with his eyes brimming and the slightly stupid expression around his mouth he always had when he was drunk.

‘Perhaps it would be best to show the slides tomorrow,’ Yngve said. ‘It’s already late.’

‘What slides?’ dad said.

‘Of China,’ Yngve said.

‘Oh, that’s right, yes,’ dad said.

Unni stretched her arms above her head.

‘Well,’ she said. ‘Now I really
do
have to go to bed.’

‘I’m coming too,’ dad said. ‘I’ll just have a few words with my two sons, who have come a long way to see their dad.’

Unni ruffled his hair and went into their bedroom. As soon as the door was closed Fredrik got up.

‘Goodnight,’ he said.

‘Are you off too?’ dad said. ‘You aren’t pregnant, are you?’

He laughed, I looked at Fredrik and raised my eyebrows to indicate to him that he wasn’t alone in what he thought.

‘I’m tired too,’ Kristin said. ‘Either it’s the journey or it’s the sea air. Whichever it is, it’s goodnight anyway!’

After she had gone we three sat saying nothing. Dad gazed into the air and finished his beer, then fetched another. I wasn’t drunk, but I could feel the alcohol.

‘Here we are then,’ dad said.

‘Yes,’ I said.

‘Just like in the old days. Do you remember, in Tybakken? Yngve and Karl Ove. Sitting in the kitchen and having breakfast.’

‘How could we ever forget?’ Yngve said.

‘Yes,’ said dad. ‘It wasn’t an easy time for me either. I’d like you to know that.’

‘Times aren’t easy for lots of people,’ Yngve said. ‘But it’s not everyone who takes it out on their children.’

‘No,’ dad said. He started crying. ‘I’m so happy to have you here,’ he said.

‘Do you have to get so sentimental?’ Yngve said. ‘Can’t we talk about this in a normal fashion?’

‘Unni’s got a new life in her tummy now. It’ll be either your brother or your sister. Think about that.’

He smiled through the tears, dried them, emptied the bottle and rolled himself a cigarette.

Yngve and I exchanged glances. It was hopeless, you got nothing from him but hot air.

‘I’m going to bed,’ Yngve said.

Dad said nothing as he left. I didn’t want him to be on his own and stayed a little while longer, but when he made no sign of either leaving or speaking, and just sat there staring into the room, in the end I got up too and went to bed.

After breakfast next day Yngve, Kristin, Fredrik and I went to town and wandered through the snow-covered windblown night-black streets. While Yngve and Kristin went into a clothes shop I sat in a café chatting to Fredrik. We exchanged a few names of bands, established a kind of base and then we started talking about what we could actually do in this godforsaken town. We couldn’t just sit on our hands in the flat. He said there was a swimming pool not far away, perhaps we could go there later in the day? That’s a good idea, Unni said when we went home. Yes, a great idea, dad said from inside the living room. I haven’t been to a pool in years. Are you going to join them?! Unni said. Yes, why not? he said. I could see Fredrik wasn’t happy, but I thought it might be OK, the evening was a long time away. Unni drove us because dad had drunk a couple of beers. We went into the changing room with our gear and sat down on the bench.