"There Are Things I Want You to Know" About Stieg Larsson and Me (18 page)

THE NEXT
day, I speak with Per-Erik, who agrees to represent me. I’m greatly relieved that someone like him—a lawyer, a former judge, the former head of the Judicial Department of the Council of State under Prime Minister Olof Palme, a former chief ombudsman of Sweden—is taking charge of what I cannot handle on my own.

We meet for the first time on January 21 at the offices of
Expo
, since I’ve gone back to work up in Falun as of January 10, and am out of Stockholm for four days a week.

I send an email to Joakim to explain all this and let him know that Per-Erik will be contacting him and Erland. Joakim tells me to keep my chin up, saying that I’m right to entrust the handling of this business to an experienced lawyer. He tells me again that there must be some way to deal with this that effectively proceeds just as if Stieg and I had been married. He signs off by asking me to take care of myself.

In mid-February, the inventory of assets is completed. Stieg’s father and brother did not come to the meeting at the lawyer’s office.

Tuesday, February 22

I WORKED
all day long at the office, and dealt efficiently with a respectable number of files. I even spent a long time digging through the EU directives and regulations to find the rest of some information I needed.

This evening, at home, all became silent and calm. Surrounded by this silence, concentrating on myself, I began to cry. Wrenching sobs, dreadfully deep. Everything I have lost is in this suffering, along with a cruel feeling of insecurity. During the day, there’s no room for silence, or sorrow: they’re beaten down. In the evening, though, they rise again, stretching delicately, almost tenderly, and they take up all the room.

Sunday, March 20

A FEW
weeks ago, I’d made up my mind to consult a crisis therapist, but after the tsunami last December in Southeast Asia, all of the psychological assistance services offered by the county council have been devoted as a matter of priority to survivors of that tragedy. It’s been five months since Stieg died, and I’ve only just now found a private therapist. We met for the first time today. After all those months when I couldn’t manage to express my pain, suddenly I’m being asked to talk about it. I still can’t do it. I could only paint a picture of what I feel like: a ball.

Thursday, March 24

I’VE RECEIVED
several emails from Joakim this month about inheritance taxes and accounting surpluses. He also informed me that Weyler had sent him the first volume of
The Millennium Trilogy
and asked me if I’d gotten one, too. I had no idea what he was talking about. After March 24, I never heard from Joakim again.

Tuesday, March 29

AFTER EASTER
weekend, I took two and a half days off because I didn’t have the courage to go up to Falun for such a short time. I stayed in Stockholm to change the apartment around a bit. I wanted to clear the books out of Stieg’s office, which is also the guest room, and rearrange the furniture. So his whole life passed through my hands. Sorting out his beloved books, his warmth and insatiable curiosity became tangible, and I kept stopping to cry awhile. I got back to work, but tearful despair struck again, a rolling gray sea pouring out of me. I’m sad, so infinitely sad.

Tuesday, April 5

THIS AFTERNOON
I sent an email to Joakim to tell him
that after calling the tax authorities to ask for an extension regarding filing the estate taxes, I’d been given until June 16. Anything longer than that would have had to be requested in writing. I also explained to Joakim that I hadn’t yet dared face sorting through Stieg’s papers, but that all the receipts would still have to be found.

I added that I was intending to ask for help from the guy in charge of accounting where Stieg worked, because the receipts to be used as deductions had to be separated from the ones representing expenses for which he’d already been reimbursed. Since the accountant had already helped him with his previous tax returns, he’d be familiar with the problem.

I also shared with Joakim the fact that I was seeing my therapist every two weeks, which I definitely felt was a good thing, because as he said himself, that’s how you can learn to know yourself better. Which was perhaps vital right now, when I no longer much knew who I was.

I added that I wasn’t very strong these days and sometimes had to stay home from work. And that I missed Stieg unspeakably, but I knew he wanted me to keep going and not give up on everything he’d begun. Easy to say, but so hard to do, after losing half of myself.

I closed by asking him to say hello to Maj for me, to take care of himself and not overwork, because he shouldn’t end up like Stieg just because, like Stieg, he couldn’t bring himself to say “no.”

I received no reply to my email. One month later, I understood why.

Monday, May 9

THIS MORNING
I received a letter from the tax authorities marked “For your information.” I am thereby informed that, regarding the inventory of Stieg’s assets and the distribution of his estate sent to them on April 14 by Joakim and Erland, everything goes to them—including Stieg’s half of our apartment. They’re giving Joakim’s children 100,000 kronor each ($15,000) from the advance offered by Norstedts and are leaving me the furniture, valued at 1,200 kronor (less than $200)! Then I remembered that on April 13, when I’d phoned Erland to find out what was happening, he’d said he had no idea and that I ought to call Joakim instead, because he was the one taking care of everything. Erland was cold and distant. The next day, the two of them sent the inheritors’ division of the estate off to the tax authorities.

What an insult to Stieg! To his life, to our life for thirty-two years! I’m wracked with anger, outrage, panic, and despair. If Erland and Joakim demand Stieg’s half of the apartment from me, I couldn’t afford to buy it from them. Where will I go?

Before taking the train to Falun, I called Per-Erik Nilsson to tell him about this infamous “For your information.” So far, he hadn’t done a thing for me! But he promised me he would now intervene on my behalf.

Saturday, May 14

I PHONE
Svante Weyler to let him know that while filing some papers, I’d finally found the original contract Stieg signed, a document Weyler had been pestering me about back in December. Strangely, though, it no longer interests him at all. He even says something unbelievable to me: that the best solution would have been for Norstedts to manage Stieg’s literary legacy.