Imminence (2 page)

Now, thinking back, I feel I should perhaps have settled into some international metropolis where it’s possible to lose yourself in masses of people and live your life nearly invisible for years. I considered that once, but I don't really like big cities, and after I met David, that was not an alternative anymore since he hated those noisy places even more than I. Now I know I have been selfish and all too careless. Now that I look back at my life, I notice the many little clues I have left behind along the journey. One who knows me and knows who I really am would be able to find me by following those clues. Had I unconsciously left those signs behind me? Do I actually want to be found? I’m startled by Clarissa winding her arms around me.

“Mother, what´s wrong with you? I've been talking to you for at least ten minutes and yet you haven’t listened to me at all.”

“I must be a little tired. Shouldn't you be heading to school already?”

Clarissa throws me a long, questioning look and I feel the fear trying to rise to the surface again. Have I said something? Could she know? I shake my head and try to calm my unsettled thoughts.

“That´s what I've been trying to tell you this whole time. I´ll walk to the crossroads today and Stella’s mom will drive us to school,” Clarissa says impatiently, as if I were a three-year-old child.

“Flow and Bruun can come with you. They´ll return home anyway when you are at the main road,” I say in a placating tone and attempt to smile bravely.

Even though I´m very frightened, I feel my fighting spirit rising. Nothing shall destroy my family and I will do whatever I can to defend it.

I send an invitation to the dogs in my mind and they run to the gate to wait for Clarissa. I give them a stern mental lecture on how they should behave on their accompanying walk. If threatened, they must immediately message me and stay close to Clarissa. No games of finding trails or chasing birds. Flow is especially impossible with birds. She enjoys nothing so much as chasing birds and sometimes, when I watch her stalking games in the yard, disbelief fills my mind. Even though this beautiful shepherd dog is related to the wolf, I feel betrayed. Flow had been chosen to protect my family because I am able to communicate with her so easily, and I know she would give her life for the sake of any member of my family. Both her parents were pedigreed White Shepherds, but one of her dam’s distant ancestors was a hybrid. Half wolf, half dog. I know that Flow is at heart more dog than wolf and even though she is very dear to me, right now I need a stronger and tougher protector for my child.

Bruun, on the other hand, is a hybrid, even though he looks more like a dog. Bruun is a good guardian, but unpredictable. Were Flow in danger, I wouldn't be able to trust Bruun to save my child first before going to Flow’s rescue. Me, the alpha of the pack, he would naturally rank first priority, but the other members of my family are still not full members of our pack in his eyes. David has washed his hands of our dogs and pays no attention to their similarities with the wild wolf. Otherwise he would surely have noticed the slightly too big and sharp teeth of our pets. He would have noticed how large our dogs look beside other dogs and how alert they are all the time. Our sinewy dogs look like they are lying in wait for prey, even though in reality they are merely much more aware of their surroundings than ordinary pet dogs.

Clarissa mutters something about overprotective moms but relents without much argument. I know she likes the dogs accompanying her to the crossroads. The walk is nearly three kilometers long and especially in wintertime it’s miserable to head down the dark road when one would much rather have preferred to stay in bed under the duvets. Clarissa also thinks it very cool that the dogs wait for her after school. As if some mystical power had made them sit quietly on the roadside and Clarissa’s appearance would wake them from their spell. Sometimes Clarissa wonders how they always know when she is on her way home.

The door bangs closed and silence wraps around me. I mentally search the surroundings of our house but can’t recognize any signs of the nocturnal danger. Were it not for Clarissa, I would probably shrug the nightmare off and forget it, but as things stand I must take precautions to protect my family. I just don’t know where to start and what to do. I know that something is stalking my family, but nothing else. Even though I have a pretty strong idea of who or what is behind this, I can´t believe it to be true. I have no way of telling David or the girls about this. I have no one I can talk this through with. Longing fills me and my throat constricts at the thought of my parents and my siblings. I have not thought of them for years. I had just escaped and even the thought of being in contact with them had been impossible. And yet I miss them this morning more than ever. They would know precisely what I should do.

I glance at the clock and drag myself upstairs. I knock at Marie’s door without getting an answer. I push the door open carefully and sit on the edge of our youngest daughter’s bed. How beautiful she is. I carefully sweep a few tendrils of hair away from her face with my finger and let my hand stay on her silky soft hair.

A mass of curly hair is spread in a tangle around her shoulders. Her eyes, fringed by long, dark lashes, are firmly closed and her deep red lips are slightly open. Marie’s skin is very pale and often when I’ve had the chance to observe her unnoticed, I’ve been reminded of the story of Snow White. Marie, however, is a far cry from Snow White. She is very beautiful but highly temperamental. It feels like Marie is always ready for a fight. If one needs to decide something quickly with Marie, one needs to be clever. As a matter of principle Marie is always of a different opinion than others and she wants to know all possible sides of an argument. Sometimes it is extremely annoying.

Nevertheless, Marie is always completely fair and just. Even at a very young age she had defended her friends against bullying from bigger children. Her fists poised, she would often rise to face boys many years older than herself, and thus had ended up coming home nearly every day with her face dirty and her hands scraped. Her torn clothes and determined expression had warned others from a distance not to laugh at her. I knew the bigger children never seriously hurt her and I had never gotten involved. I also knew they thought Marie irresistible.

I watch Marie slowly beginning to wake up. Her eyes flutter a few times restlessly and then her big, deep eyes are staring at me. In a blink Marie gets up and stands in the middle of the room in her too-large T-shirt. Her thin, long legs make her look like a colt. Regardless, everything about her transmits how well she controls her body. The countless hours in a dance studio have not gone to waste.

“Mother,” she sighs and relaxes.

“Is it time to get up already? I´ll rest a little while yet.”

Before I’ve had the chance to answer, she has climbed back to bed and I hear a deep sigh from underneath the feather duvet. I gently stroke her silky hair. Marie is so sweet and I’m frightened to death for her. Marie had succumbed to a very serious case of encephalitis at the age of six. No one had been able to explain why she had become sick. I had been sure it was connected to what I am. I’d been sure she’d been about to transform, but in the end no transformation had occurred. She’d had to spend months in intensive care and her small body had seemed to fade away by the weeks. Strong convulsions had shaken her and no medications had seemed to be working. Everything possible had been attempted and various doctors had tried to figure out what was wrong with her. Nothing had been found and she had finally had to be placed on the ventilator in a state of induced coma. We had been in shock. Clarissa had refused to visit the hospital and I had been so close to telling David the truth about myself. I‘d been ravaged with guilt and I’d been so sure that Marie would transform any minute. She had been at the perfect age for transformation.

After months of torture I’d had a chance to catch my breath. Marie had started recovering and had been transferred from intensive care to a normal ward, where a rehabilitation program had been commenced. Marie had still suffered from serious convulsions and had had to swallow several drugs from morning to night. She’d had to relearn everything. She hadn’t been able to eat or move independently. She hadn't known who we were. We’d had to teach her to recognize us again. We had taught her who our relatives and friends were, where we lived, where her room was and what her things were. We had been endlessly proud of her, as the pain in her eyes had been evident to us, but she had still continued to persevere. It hadn't taken long until she’d been able to walk short distances and her speech had begun to improve. Still, the doctors had been cautious. Nobody had known how permanent her situation was and we all had known she could relapse at any stage. No medications had worked for her and even though we had looked abroad for a cure, one hadn’t been found. The seizures had continued.

For six years, we had fought for Marie’s life. She had put on weight and her movements had become very laborious. All her old friends had felt strange in her presence and she had been really isolated. Luckily she hadn’t been fully aware of what had been happening around her, as I think she would have lost her will to live and her fighting spirit had she realized how unwell she was. Marie had lived on borrowed time for six years. Then something unexpected had happened. The medication had finally seemed to be working. She had started losing weight and her mobility had improved. For almost two years I had waited for a relapse. It had felt like Marie was cured overnight. Marie had started attending dance lessons and living her life like there was no tomorrow. No relapse had ever come and now she is fourteen years old. A beauty of almost fifteen. The only reminders of her difficult illness are the scars on her abdomen and neck and the huge pile of medications she has to take daily. I fear for her. If she had ever gotten part of my inheritance, no one would be able to predict her future. All I can do is thrust my fears somewhere in the back of my mind, and wait.

Marie is making noise in the bathroom and I’m cooking breakfast for her. Two hard-boiled eggs and toast with cheese, liver paté, and mayonnaise. Yuck. I don’t even dare to imagine what the liver paté and mayo combo tastes like, but Marie loves it. She also loves dipping cheese puffs in Coca Cola and mixing ketchup with cereal. Whenever Marie is cooking, people tend to vacate the kitchen in a hurry.

After a while I hear her jumping upstairs and singing at the top of her voice and out of tune to Black and White. I smile and make a cup of tea. Marie is so full of life. She loves and hates wholeheartedly. No one ever truly knows what mood she is in. She can burst into tears for very peculiar reasons or laugh helplessly at jokes no one else gets. Her laughter is incredible. It’s infectious to everyone around; it arises so true and honest from deep within her heart. It bubbles and foams and no one is safe from it.

“Mom! It´s Friday today!” She shouts from upstairs.

Marie loves Fridays. Friday is definitely the best day of the week because it signifies the beginning of the weekend. Two whole days to be spent in the dance studio! Can there be a more magnificent way of spending the weekend?

“Marie, come down at once! We´re really late already!” I shout back, my voice full of laughter. Surely no one can resist that unreserved happiness about the weekend.

I took Marie to school and started driving towards the nearest town. I didn't really want to go to the city, but I had to restock our food supplies and the little village shops near our home didn’t offer much choice. As I had to drive so far anyway, I decided to have a look around the other stores at the shopping mall. However, I was feeling so restless after the previous night’s experience that I found it difficult to relax and enjoy my day off. I made myself try on some spring clothes but I couldn't decide what I wanted. All the while, my mind was shadowed by the thought that I was being watched. I sat down on a bench in the corridor in order to observe my surroundings, but I couldn’t find anything unusual. Still, I had the unpleasant feeling that I wasn't alone. My neck bristled and my senses picked up on something new, but try as I did, I could not grasp it. I continued trying on clothes and a few times I was sure that someone was standing behind the door of the fitting booth. I attempted opening the door suddenly, but there was never anybody behind it besides the sales clerk or another customer, who looked at me in confusion. I felt really silly.

At last I reached a shop where I had always been able to find something that suited me. Today was no different; their selection didn't let me down. I found a beautiful black jersey dress with sleeves adorned with long silk ribbons that could be tied into a bow. On the waist there were similar black ribbons that could be tied around the hips or at the back. I was excited and forgot my unpleasant feelings. I twirled around in the booth, admiring the dress. The small cubicle didn’t allow me to see the dress from every angle so I stepped outside. At once I spotted two young men, who were obviously staring at me. Both men were tall and lean and about twenty to twenty-five years old. One had longish light brown hair and a stunning tan. He looked like a surfer and had it not been only the early days of spring I would have expected him to spend his days on the beach rather than in the mall. The other man looked like he had a black Harley Davidson waiting outside the shop and might stride out of the shop any minute to join a passing motorcycle gang. He had black hair and very dark, almost black eyes. He was dressed in a black leather jacket and trousers, and he wore cut-up black leather gloves. He was looking at me in a very hungry way and when I touched his mind I sensed pure craving. It was not sexual; it was rather as if I were a highly coveted possession or a prize which he had to have.