Montecore (13 page)

It’s your family against the world, that’s what you think as you’re sitting on the living room floor. Then you’re interrupted by parents’ magic timing, because you hear Dads, who are opening the lab door, and Moms, who at the same time are leaving the undishwashed kitchen, and their steps are hurrying themselves to each other and then they meet in the middle of the hall floor and they kiss each other the way they only do when they think you’re can’t see and they promise each other’s forgiveness and Dads stand on tiptoe in order to be tall enough and you turn red and don’t want to see but you peek anyway. Then they come into the living room and their bodies stretch all the way to the ceiling and their eyes shine like satellites when they tell you that, sure enough, you’re going to be a big brother soon and not just any old big brother but the big brother of two future twins! And you become almost entirely honestly happy and Mickey whispers congratulations from your jeans pocket and you celebrate with
yet another rectangular raspberry candy and hope that not too much is going to change.

The Dynamic Duo
. Three words that fill you with so many memories that you can barely write them down.

Of course it’s Dads who come up with the idea. Moms’ stomachs are growing and spring is getting closer to summer and
Current Photography
is presenting a new competition. Last year it was “the Summer Picture” and a few years before that “the Thousand-Crown Picture,” but this year we invite you, our dear readers, professionals as well as amateurs, to take part in “the Sweden Picture.” Dads explain that no theme could be more suited for him. I will do what Robert Frank succeeded at in the fifties, come in from the outside and capture a country in photos! Frank’s book became the classic
The Americans
, and my collection will be called
The Swedes
. Or maybe … 
Svenskarna
, say Dads, and put the just-polished camera into the special case.

This is the spring when you become an adult, the spring when Dads explain that now the time for games and fantasies is over. For both of us. Leave the Mickey Mouse Pez at home. Now we’re going to start the Dynamic Duo! Okay? Like Batman and that guy, what is that little guy in the tights called? Robin, right, Robin. I’m Superman and you’re Superboy. I’m Obi Ken Wanobi and you’re that guy Luke. Understood?

Your salute is so eager that your temple is sore, but Dads don’t notice. Dads are too busy planning motifs for his future collection. Everything that is Swedish will be documented, and Dads write long lists and mutter:
Now we have to work really hard to save money for our very own family studio. Is that understood, soldier?

And you answer: Aye aye, Captain! and do a more controlled salute and Dads look down at you and smile. If we just help each other, we’ll win at least first, second, and third prize, I can feel it. That money will go a long way.

The Dynamic Duo is launched and you take your place as redeemable-bottle hunter, film-canister opener, tripod placer. And idea spouter for motifs, of course. The whole spring it’s being woken up on early weekend mornings, Moms who are still sleeping when Dads come into your room and whisper: Up, my son, the Dynamic Duo calls! And dad waking is always a hundred times easier than day care waking because now it’s family duty calling and not elephant songs or childish plastic mosaics or fights with Gabriel. Now it’s early weekend mornings of quick breakfast without waking Moms and then choose plastic bags from under the sink and break sticks of the right stiffness for poking from the rowanberry tree in the yard.

On the way to Tanto park, Dads plan motifs. How does one capture the soul of the Swedish people in the best way? What is
suédi en maximum
? While you’re looking for redeemable bottles in the first garbage can down by the day care, Dads polish the camera lens with the special soft towel and crack their knuckles, one by one. Dads are getting ready. And before you get down to business you always say: Now it’s time … and with one voice you switch to Swedish and yell: … to get with the picture! Because that’s one of Dads’ favorite expressions because it is both a pun and has such symbolic photographic content.

Then Dads position themselves right next to flagless flagpoles, shoot right up into cloudy gray skies, and shout: What is more Swedish than that?

Then Dads point the camera at lost gloves arranged on wooden stair railings and say: What is more Swedish than that?

Then Dads shoot two community garden plots with tarpaulin-covered ground and padlocked gates and say: What is more Swedish than that?

Then Dads shoot the stump of road where there are three one-way signs in forty meters and say: What is more Swedish than that?

Then Dads get down on his knees in front of some red-and-green lumpy wino puke, click the camera, and cry: What is more Swedish than that?

While Dads document motifs, you fill the bags with so many bottles that the handles get totally sticky and you leave a trail of drops of brown liquid behind you.

On the way home you discuss which other motifs would be suitable for the photo collection. And you suggest midsummer celebrations and Disney on Christmas Eve and Lucia processions, and Dads say: Too typical. And you suggest blue-and-yellow flags and snuff and those ugly Graninge boots, and Dads say: Too typical. And you say Skansen, travel trailers, and Fjällräven backpacks and Dads say: Too typical! It has to be subtle and obvious simultaneously. No damn Dala horses … like for example … Dads think. Levels! Levels are the most Swedish instrument in the world. Everything in Sweden must be just right, not too much and not too little! And if you deviate the tiniest bit the air bubble slides away and everything gets crooked. Levels, I’m going to photograph
levels en masse! say Dads and put the camera back in its case.

While waiting for the elevator, Dads mumble with a voice that is barely a throat clearing: Thanks for the help. And you grow to a height of about four or five meters and have to bend over triple to fit in the elevator and you promise yourself to almost never again eat childish Pez candies.

The Dynamic Duo is done with its first task, and the bottle money is saved in that special cabinet with a padlock that Moms call the armoire and Dads call the
mémoire
.

Moms’ stomachs grow
until the skin gets split marks and soon Dads stop taking double shifts at SL and start being home in the evenings, taking a break from the photography, and helping make dinner. Every evening it’s recipes from
Anna’s Food
and you help with the translation as well as you can. Cumin, who is cumin? And you make things up sometimes and say the right thing when you can and most of the time the food tastes a little strange and it never looks like the pictures; it ends up being meat casserole with raisins and oatmeal pancakes roasted in the toaster and the family specialty, which is saffron cod. And Dads joke and blame the cookbook and say that Anna is a real marketing ploy and presumably a racist Swede and Moms pretend not to hear and just answer that it must be time soon because otherwise we will starve to death.

And you remember that night when the suitcases
stand packed in the hall and Dads have tried to make oven pancakes and the remains are sitting brown on the oven glass and Dads swear his dinbookborrasentak because the scorchiness doesn’t want to come off and you’re eating
TSO
and rye bread while Moms lie on the sofa with double pillows under her head. Suddenly you hear Moms’ cries and it’s a different tone, not just: I want water, or: Can someone change the radio station? And Dads rush into the living room and Moms are lying ready and you hear the loud breathing and Dads shout: Call the taxi! And you, who have been specially educated for this very task, call the taxi with an adult voice while Dads hold hands and Moms shout owowow and you say the address and Moms’ Swedish last name so the taxi will come extra fast and Dads give you a thumbs-up from the living room. Don’t worry, Grandma will come soon, whisper Moms before they disappear down in the elevator but of course you worry, because Moms hold a world record in stomach size and have to bend her back diagonally backward so she doesn’t tip forward and you stand on the walkway and see how Dads guide her out to the taxi, Dads walk with his arms around Moms like he is playing hula hoop and Moms hold one hand on her back and the other under her stomach and right before the taxi is going to leave Dads turn up toward you and give a thumbs-up.

Soon Grandma and Grandpa come and they are the world’s finest retired couple, Grandma with sun wrinkles and the more and more crooked Grandpa, who just has time to turn on the radio before he falls asleep on the same sofa where Moms have just been lying. Grandma—the definition of kindness. Grandma, who always shouts: It doesn’t matter! if one happens to
smash some plate that has a valuable special mark. Grandma, who bakes gingersnaps and pancakes that make regular baked goods collapse in shame. Grandma, who has devoted her entire life to helping others, first as a swimming instructor in her former home country, Denmark, then as a missionary’s assistant in Africa, and then as a social-services lady in Stockholm. Then she met Grandpa and became a family raiser and then Grandpa’s accident happened and she was there for support and said her constant One should be thankful that it wasn’t the right hand. Grandma, who collects things for charity in black garbage bags and sends them to orphanages in Eastern Europe. Grandma, who is your great hero the night that little brothers are born because Grandma calms you down and sits beside you hour after hour and she strokes your eyelids and hums songs which don’t have words while Moms lie in hospital rooms and push and snort and toss her head back and forth. It’s More morphine! shouted with a disaster voice and it’s nurses who are watching nervously and sweaty doctors with backward coats and mouth papers and beeping noises from heart monitors and the whole time Dads who stand pale at the head end and sponge with a little towel and try to soothe. It’s screams and blood pails and nurses who are changing shifts and red-drenched white coats that whisper about the poor Turk dad with the crazy Swedish wife in number four. It’s doctors who say we might lose her, and doctors who say it might be too late. And of course it’s Moms who regret it, Moms who swear that this is the absolute last time, Moms who say Swedish swearwords that Dads have never heard before. It’s the green heart monitor which changes waves and beep beep beep toward a long line
and beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep. And it’s emergency runners who take out the iron and rub it into a current and shout stand clear! And bzzzzzt and waiting and rubbing and clear! and bzzzzzt until Moms come to life again, keep on pushing, keep on swearing. And then finally Moms exert herself until she throws up and then, with a plopping sound, two screaming little brothers hop out into nurse arms and they smile and laugh and it’s a river of blood and you made it! and Dads who choose the exact wrong time to say: There, that wasn’t so bad, was it?

Then Dads who hold the receiver with the hand that Moms didn’t crush, first calling the Tunisian relatives and rejoicing and then Grandma and asking to speak to Grandpa. Then Dads who come home whistling in the dawn with his eyes ringed in black and his beard rough. And you who have become a big brother.

The next day Dads button on their work tie with little SL logo and put on loose creased pants which shine in the sun and you share a little Paco Rabanne and Dads say: We will remember this day for always. Dads are right. You take the subway and stop at the newspaper stand, Dads choose a bouquet while you get to pick bulk candy, and Dads say: Throw in as much as you want! And it’s a lifelong dream that’s being fulfilled, you start to fill the bag with all kinds and all colors and it’s mint chocolate and Ferraris and fried eggs and Turkish pepper and chalk licorice and raspberry boats but also big toffee squares and whips and salty suckers, which you know Moms like. Then show the bag to Dads and the scale arrow spins far and the cashier guy laughs because it comes to almost a hundred crowns. You prepare yourself for putting some back, but Dads just smile and pay
and shout: Today is a party, no penny-pinching! just like the dad in
Emil in the Soup Tureen
and soon you’re out on the street again and it’s Dads with the best bouquet and you with the biggest bag in honor of Moms and you munch and of course you have to try one of each on the way up to the hospital.

Dads tell you that the photos for the Sweden Picture competition have been sent in and now you just have to wait, soon we’ll have the perfect seed money to start a studio! And you listen a little bit but you’re mostly concentrating on the candy because there are so many that look suspiciously poisonous and absolutely must be tested before little brothers accidentally get poisoned by boob milk. You go up the hill toward the hospital and it’s fall sparkle sun from the sky and water gravel in asphalt cracks and taxis that line up and right before you take the revolving door in, Dads say seriously: We are the men of the house now.

Then you go in and Dads scratch off their Djurgården scarf and spell your last name twice to get the right ward. Then taking the elevator and your stomach that’s starting to feel weird and hospital floors with yellow stripes and hospital smell and rough hospital blankets. And then, then it’s pale Moms with dried spit in the corners of her mouth and shiny hair. Sleeping when you come, with her head bent at an angle a little like a crash test dummy. When Dads wake Moms with pattering cheek kisses, Moms stretch their hands like sunrises and smile the mom smiles that only they can make and nothing is nicer, especially not new little brothers who have skin like rotten old Indian men and small nails which are barely hard and sticky eyes and not even any hair on their yucky scaly heads.

But you still want to hold one of them, show Dads that you can, carefully against your shoulder, feel the little body near yours, the shoulders banana-soft, and the little nameless one sleeps and you watch the head, smell the baby smell, which is talcum powder and a little used diaper and a little newborn neck sweat. And then, when no one is looking, you pinch him as hard as you can in the back of his knee, mostly just to see what happens. And he screams himself blue in the face and almost has trouble getting air and you give him back to Moms, who shh and cuddle him quiet.