You (53 page)

She laughs. Suddenly. As if it had just occurred to her that laughter’s permitted.

“I’m really here.”

“Yes, you’re really here.”

It sounds absurd, but everything between you sounds absurd. The fact that she’s speaking German to you, that you’re sitting side by side at a hotel bar in Amsterdam and that the waiter’s left your empty coffee cups there. Especially the fact that you don’t touch each other. Especially that.

“Come,” you say.

You leave the bar and walk past the lobby. You step into the elevator and stand side by side, familiar yet strange to one another. The elevator starts moving, the floor shakes, and nothing else happens. On the fifth floor you open the door to your suite and let her walk ahead. Her scent hovers in the air, sandalwood and oranges, you inhale it deeply before you follow her.

In the morning she travels back to Norway. She never mentions love. She never mentions the future.
Your brother mustn’t know
, she says at one point. She doesn’t want you to come and get her from Norway, everything’s to stay the way it is. And you believe her and don’t see through her lie for a second.
It is the way it is
, you think. In another age you’d have been dismissed as a fool.

She comes to Holland another four times, and you wait for her in the hotel, open the door to the suite and let her walk ahead. You don’t know what she’s told Oskar about where she is at those times, and you aren’t really interested. You don’t question your actions. When she’s in the ninth month, you meet in a hotel in Bergen that’s just three hours away from Ulvtannen. She’s excited, they’re nearly there and it’s going to be a girl. She tells you her name. Taja. You make love very carefully.

Six days later Oskar calls you.

You’re in Munich, you hear your brother’s excited voice through the phone and wonder how you’re ever going to get back out of this mess.

“A daughter! I’ve got a daughter!”

You laugh with him. He wants to know when you’re coming to Ulvtannen. You mumble something about a lot of work and then ask if you could congratulate Majgull. Oskar walks through the hotel, no, he runs, you hear his footsteps echoing down the stairwell.

“See you soon, brother,” he says.

“See you soon, Dad,” you say.

The footsteps move away, there’s a hiss on the line.

“Majgull?”

“Hello.”

Silence.

“Are you okay?”

“Wonderful.”

Silence.

“Good luck.”

“Thanks.”

She breathes in your ear and you don’t dare say anything wrong. You just sit there and have an erection. After another moment of silence you hang up without a word.

Two years of silence follow. Two long, miserable years of silence in which you don’t call, in which you get harder and harder inside, like a diamond that lies in the depths like a dead man who can’t let go of life. Tanner’s the only one who knows.

“Stay away from the woman,” he says.

You have a son you have to look after, and your work demands your full attention. There can be no more lapses.

You listen to Tanner.

Two years’ silence and then there’s a short message on your phone. Majgull calls at three o’clock in the morning and says the Plaza Hotel in Oslo. She wants you to understand her lies. She wants you to see her as she really is. You have no idea what she’s talking about. A fool is always a fool, and that fool needs to see Majgull. Without Tanner’s knowledge. You don’t want an argument, and you
know there’s definitely going to be an argument if you tell him. So you fly out that same day.
I need to see you
. You can’t guess that she doesn’t plan to come on her own.

“Father?”

Your son’s standing in front of you, and we’re back in the here and now. Your drifting thoughts have been rudely interrupted. Your son’s face is wet with tears. You don’t know how much time has passed. There’s a stale taste in your mouth that makes you think of Majgull—sweet and sharp at the same time, the taste of loss. The boy is still lying on the ground in front of you. His back rises and falls. You’re still crouching next to him like a big cat guarding its catch. A few minutes have passed. You look down at your son, you see his tears and think he’s weeping over Tanner. You’re not concentrating. Every time you remember Majgull, you lose your contact with reality. Like now, when you misinterpret your son’s tears. It’s unforgivable. If you were focused right now, you might be able to save your life. But you took your eye off the ball, and for that moment’s inattention you will pay later on.

“I—”

“Don’t say anything,” you cut him off and stand up.

Your son says nothing, you go back to Tanner. His torso has slipped slightly sideways off the rock. You straighten him up, smooth his hair. He’s almost white in the face. The rattling in his lungs sounds damp. It won’t be long now.

“Hold me.”

You sit down next to him again, you take a breath and hold Tanner in your arms. The only light comes from the headlights of the car. Only now do you notice that the engine’s been running the whole time. The storm has passed. No stars. No traffic. Wherever God is now, he should stay there. Tanner shivers in your arms. Something damp runs down your hand, you don’t move, you hold him and don’t move. You give him warmth.

“Ragnar?”

“Yes?”

“Ragnar?”

“I hear you.”

“Let me …”

You wait.

“… let me …”

You wait.

“… please.”

“Of course, my friend, of course.”

Tanner shuts his eyes, his head presses hard against your shoulder, you kiss his forehead and put your hand gently over his mouth. His nostrils flare, you close them with your thumb and forefinger, Tanner presses himself against your chest as if he wanted to merge with you. One minute. A second. The rattling falls silent. Tanner’s mouth moves one last time as if to kiss your hand. The shaking fades, then Tanner falls still into your arm, just as the night falls still on this damned day. No pain anymore.

You pull away and stand up. Your body is vibrating as if connected to an electric line. You lean forward and pick Tanner up. He’s smaller and heavier than you. You carry him in your arms to the car. Your son is sitting on the hood. He understands you without a word and opens the trunk. You put Tanner inside with Leo.

“Where’s your gun?” you ask your son.

He thumps his jacket. You can see that he’s in shock, and that’s okay. He should go on living in shock, for a whole century, because two men have died on his account.

“Take the boy behind the rock.”

For a few seconds you’re like panicked chickens, running about in a minefield, before you turn back into four girls sitting in a brand-new car that doesn’t belong to you and isn’t budging an inch.

“Shit, it’s not an automatic!”

“Just drive, drive!” yells Stink.

“Are you deaf or what?” says Nessi shrilly. “I can’t drive this thing, it’s not an automatic!”

“Shit, he’s looking at us!” Taja shouts next to you and smiles anxiously outside as if Marten could seriously see her from this distance. You all lean forward and look over at the restaurant. Four chickens pausing for a photograph in the middle of a minefield. Marten’s mouth is gaping. He’s a good fifteen yards away from you in the restaurant and can’t believe his eyes. As far as he’s concerned you’re still in the bathroom. As far as he’s concerned this isn’t really happening.

“DRIVE!” you suddenly screech and break the spell and sound like one of those girls in the manga cartoons. “DRIVE, DRIVE, DRIVE!”

Nessi turns the ignition. The engine comes to life. Nessi puts her foot on the accelerator, the engine wails, Nessi’s so nervous that she’s forgetting the simplest hand motions, she tugs on the gearshift, the car jumps forward and bumps with a crash against the nose of the Range Rover, before the engine stalls.

Stink slaps Nessi on the back of the head.

“PULL YOURSELF TOGETHER, YOU SILLY TART, WE’VE GOT TO GET OUT OF HERE.”

“I’M TRYING, CAN’T YOU SEE THAT? I’M TRYING.”

“REVERSE!” yells Taja. “PUT IT IN REVERSE!”

Nessi shakes her hands out as if she’s got a cramp, then she starts the engine again and shifts the stick to R. The car jumps back and stalls again.

“I CAN’T DRIVE THIS THING!”

Nessi sounds as if she’s about to burst into tears. You can see that Marten’s up from the table.

“HE’S COMING!” cries Taja.

You burst out laughing.

“Stop it,” she says.

“That sounded as if someone had tied a knot in your ovaries.”

Stink drums her feet on the floor.

“NESSI, DO IT, JUST DO IT, OR DO YOU WANT THE GUY TO DRIVE THE CAR FOR YOU?”

Nessi jiggles the gearshift, tries to work the clutch, pumps with both feet as if this weren’t a car but a paddleboat.

“You’ve got to lift the clutch gently,” you say as calmly as you can from the backseat.

“The what?”

“The clutch, Nessi, gently.”

Nessi starts wailing. The engine stalls. Nessi holds both hands in the air and says she can’t and she doesn’t want to and could Stink stop annoying her. Stink looks back at you.

“You do it.”

“I’m too small.”

“There’s no such thing as too small!”

Stink pulls you forward as she herself climbs into the back. Nessi makes room for you and slips into the passenger seat. Behind the wheel you feel like a dwarf in the land of giants. You stretch and the tip of your left foot finds the clutch and your right the brake, while your spine stretches and strains. Now you’ve got to pretend you know what you’re doing. When your father gave you driving lessons, you sat on a pillow and drove across a parking lot. Back then it was all a game.

You concentrate and start the car. You put it in reverse, bring the clutch up slowly, and you move back at a snail’s pace. Your girls cheer. You brake, put the clutch down, and shift into first gear. You slowly bring the clutch back up. You do it very elegantly and then you destroy the moment when you tap the accelerator. The car shoots off, your girls screech, you pull the wheel to the left, miss the restaurant by inches, manage to turn and race toward the exit without leaving a scratch on the car. The rain seems to applaud you, the windshield is a steeply flowing river.

“I CAN’T SEE ANYTHING! THIS FUCKING RAIN, I CAN’T SEE ANYTHING!”

Nessi reaches under your arms and the windshield wipers come on, but you still can’t see anything, because it’s dark, because it’s night. There’s something missing. Stink shouts in your ear, “LIGHT! DAMN IT, SCHNAPPI, TURN THE LIGHTS ON!”

You shove all the levers on the steering wheel up and down and at last a light comes on and the road flares up and of course at that very moment a car comes charging straight at you and a voice in your head yells:
THAT WAS IT!
You pull the wheel to the right and the car speeds past you.

The road in front of you is empty and as brightly lit as a football stadium.

“Your high beams are on,” says Nessi.

“So,” you say, and think you can taste the adrenaline on your tongue. You enjoy being in the role of the crazy driver. Nessi reaches past you again and finds the right switch.

The high beams come off, but the dipped headlights stay on.

“Everything okay back there?” you ask and reach for the rearview mirror the way you’ve seen people do in movies, but your arm’s too short. You can’t even reach the mirror. Hell, why are you so small? You glance over your shoulder. Taja’s turned pale from all the rocking, and Stink looks as if she’s bitten a lemon. She looks at her right hand and wails, “One of my fingernails is broken!”

“Pussy,” says Nessi.

“Double pussy,” you say.

Stink kicks your seat, you swerve deliberately from left to right, the girls screech again and then laugh, because you’ve got everything
under control and it’s always reassuring when someone has something under control. If your father could see you now, you know what he’d say:

Little, but wow!

After half an hour it suddenly stops raining, you look suspiciously out the window, it feels as if someone has turned the power off on the night. The storm has passed, and you’re still on the road. Driving is easier now, but your shoulders are tense because you still have to stretch to see the road ahead.