When she reached the footpath along the water by Norr Mälarstrand, she quickened her pace. The pain in her legs was already easing and she was forcing herself to keep a steady, resolute stride. Her breathing increased and the heart found a new, more intense rhythm.
She used to think it was more fun to be at work than to be at home. As a reporter she would see quick results, get everyone's appreciation, and have a picture byline several times a week. She had full command of her beat and knew exactly what was expected of her in different situations; she could swing things and make demands. At home the demands were more numerous, harder, and less explicit. She was never sufficiently happy, horny, calm, efficient, parental, or rested. The apartment was always more or less in a mess, the laundry basket always on the verge of overflowing. Thomas was very good with the kids, almost better than she was, but he never, ever wiped the cooker or the worktop, hardly ever put the dirty dishes in the dishwasher, and always left clothes and unopened letters lying in mounds on the bedroom floor. It was as if he thought the dirty dishes found their own way into the dishwasher and the bills paid themselves.
But it wasn't as much fun to go to work anymore, not for the past eight weeks since she became an editor. She hadn't had the faintest idea of how strong the reactions to her promotion would be. The decision hadn't even been particularly controversial. In practice she'd been running the crime desk alongside her job as a reporter for the past year. Now she was paid for it; that's how she saw it. But Nils Langeby had hit the roof, of course. He considered the job his. He was 53, Annika only 32. She had also been astounded by how people felt they had a right to openly discuss her and criticize her over all kinds of matters. Suddenly people would comment and question her dress, something they'd never done before. They would say things about her character and abilities that were completely insulting. She hadn't realized that she became public property when she put on the editor's hat. Now she knew.
She quickened her pace further. She longed to be at home. She looked up at the houses on the other side of the street. The windows gave out a warm, welcoming glow over the water. Nearly all of them were decorated with Christmas lights or Christmas candelabra. It looked beautiful and safe. She left the bank and turned into John Erics-sonsgatan, up toward Hantverkargatan.
* * *
The apartment was quiet and dark. Carefully she wriggled out of her boots and coat and tiptoed into the children's room. They were sleeping in their little pajamas, Ellen's with Barbie on them and Kalle's with Batman. She sniffed them slightly, as Ellen moved in her sleep.
Thomas was in bed but not yet asleep. A reading lamp cast a discreet light over his side of the bed. He was reading
The Economist.
"Exhausted?" he asked, after she had pulled off her clothes and kissed him on his hair.
"So-so," she answered from inside the walk-in closet where she was pushing her clothes into the laundry basket. "This explosion has turned into a nasty business."
She was naked when she came out of the closet and crept in beside him.
"You're freezing cold," he said.
All of a sudden Annika noticed how cold her thighs were. "I walked home."
"The paper didn't pay for a taxi? You've worked for twenty hours, a whole Saturday!"
A feeling of irritation immediately hit her. "Of course the paper would have paid for a taxi. I wanted to walk." She was almost shouting. "Don't be so bloody critical!"
He put the magazine on the floor and switched off the lamp, demonstratively turning his back.
Annika sighed. "Come on, Thomas, don't sulk."
"You're away the whole Saturday and then, when you finally come home, you swear and shout at me," he said wearily. "Are we just here to take shit from you?"
She could feel the tears welling up in her eyes, tears of fatigue and inadequacy. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "I didn't mean to fly off the handle at you. It's just that they're at me all day at work, and it's really hard. And then I feel guilty for not being at home with you and the kids. I'm so scared you'll think I'm letting you down, but the paper won't allow me to let them down, and so I'm caught in the middle of some crossfire…"
She started crying for real now. She could hear him sighing on the other side of his back. After a few moments, he turned around and took her in his arms.
"There, there, damn it. Come on, darling, you'll be all right. You're better than the whole lot of them…. Shit, you're cold as ice! I hope you don't catch cold, just before Christmas."
She laughed through her tears and cuddled up in his arms. Silence fell over them in a warm and safe mutual understanding. She leaned her head back onto her pillow and blinked. Up there in the dark, the ceiling was floating. Suddenly she remembered the image from the morning and the dream she was woken up from by the telephone.
"I dreamed of you this morning," she whispered.
"I hope it was a dirty dream," he mumbled, half asleep.
She laughed quietly. "And how! In a space shuttle, no less. And the men from
Studio Six
were watching."
"They're just envious," Thomas said and went to sleep.
LOVE
I was an adult and had already gained a certain position in life when it first hit me. For a few short moments, it lifted my sense of universal loneliness. Our souls really did merge in a way I hadn't experienced before. It's interesting to have taken part in it, I won't say more than that, and since then I have met with this sensation on several occasions. Looking back on it, however, most of my impressions can be summed up as indifferent and almost resigned. I say this without bitterness or disappointment; it's simply a statement. It's only now, this last year, that I have started to waver in my opinion. The woman I have found and come to love is perhaps capable of changing it all.
But deep down I know this isn't so. Love is banal. It fills you with the same chemical intoxication as a long-sought success or the dizzying experience of high speed. Your mind is oblivious to everything except your own enjoyment, your existence is distorted, and an irrational state of possibility and happiness is created. Despite the varying subjects, the magic has never been long lasting. In the long run, it breeds nothing but weariness and aversion.
The most beautiful love is always impossible to attain. It has to die when it's most alive; as for the rose, its only chance is to be cut down at its prime. A dried or preserved plant can give pleasure for many years. A love that is hastily crushed at its moment of strongest passion has the ability to hold people spellbound for centuries.
The myth of love is a fairy tale, as unreal and unrealistic as a continuous orgasm.
Love shouldn't be mistaken for true devotion. That's something completely different. Love doesn't "ripen"; it only fades and, at the best of times, is replaced by warmth and tolerance, though mostly by unspoken demands and bitterness. This goes for all types of love: that between the sexes, between generations, and in the workplace. How many times haven't I come across bitter wives with fingers scoured to the bone and sexually frustrated husbands? Emotionally handicapped parents and neglected children? Misunderstood managers and employees who long ago stopped being glad they had a job and instead were only making demands?
It is possible to love your job. That love has for me always been truer than that between people. The genuine delight in succeeding with something I had set my mind on outshines all other experiences I've ever had. To me, it's self-evident that devotion to your task can be just as strong as to a person who doesn't deserve it.
The thought that my beloved perhaps does deserve it fills me with dread and insecurity.
SUNDAY 19 DECEMBER
Sunday has always been the tabloids' day of big sales. People have both the time and the inclination to read something reasonably undemanding, and they are relaxed enough to do crossword puzzles and try out various quizzes on one another. For years, most Sunday papers have also invested in bulky supplements with extra reading. The TS,
Tidningsstatistik,
the body that authenticates and publishes newspaper publication figures in Sweden, therefore separates the Sunday edition from the rest of the week's sales when compiling the statistics.
Nothing ever sells as much as a really good piece of news, however. If, in addition, it happens on a Saturday, there's potential for huge sales. That this was the case this Sunday, Anders Schyman immediately saw when he had in his hands the tabloids that were delivered to his house in the fashionable leafy suburb of Saltsjöbaden. He brought the papers with him to the breakfast table, where his wife was pouring out the coffee.
"Looking good?" his wife asked but only got a grunt in reply from the editor-in-chief. This was the magic moment of the day. His nerves were taut and he focused completely on the papers, putting his and the rival's on the breakfast table, comparing the two front pages. Jansson had done it again, he noted and smiled. Both papers had gone for the terrorist angle, but
Kvällspressen
had a scoop with the death threat against the Managing Director Christina Furhage.
Kvällspressen
had a better lead story, better celebs in the masthead, and a more dramatic picture of the stadium. He smiled even wider and relaxed.
"Fine," he said to his wife and reached for the coffee. "Very good, actually."
* * *
The cartoon voices from the children's morning TV were the first thing Annika heard. The high-pitched howls and special effects leaked in under the bedroom door. She put the pillow over her head to block out the noise. This was one of the few drawbacks of having children: The affected C-movie actors who supplied the Swedish voices to
Darkwing Duck
were more than she could take on a Sunday morning. Thomas as usual didn't notice. He slept on with his half of the duvet crumpled up between his legs.
She lay still for a moment to see how she was feeling. She was tired, and the pain in her legs wasn't completely gone. She immediately started thinking about the Bomber and realized she must have been dreaming about the attack. It was always like that when a big story broke— she would enter a long tunnel and wouldn't appear again until after the story was finished with. Sometimes she had to force herself to stop and breathe, both for her own and the kids' sake. Thomas didn't like it when she became swallowed up by her work.
"It's just a job," he would say. "You're always writing as if it were a matter of life and death."
But it almost always was, Annika mused, at least in her particular line of work.
She sighed, tossed the pillow and the duvet to the side, and got up. She stood there swaying for a moment, more tired than she'd thought at first. The woman reflected in the window looked a hundred years old. She let out another sigh and walked out into the kitchen.
The kids had already eaten. The plates were still on the table, standing in pools of various spilled dairy products. Nowadays, Kalle could take out yogurt and cereals himself. After burning himself on the toaster, he had stopped serving Ellen toasted rye bread with peanut butter and jam, which otherwise was a big favorite.
She put the kettle on and went in to the children. The cries of joy rose to meet her before she was through the door.
"Mommy!"
Four hungry arms and eyes rushed toward her, wet mouths kissing and bubbling and hugging and assuring her, "Mommy, Mommy, we've missed you so much! Mommy, where were you all day yesterday? Were you working all day, Mommy? You didn't come home, Mommy, we were already in bed…"
She held them both in her arms, squatting in the doorway to the TV room.
"We got a new film yesterday, Mommy.
You're Crazy, Mardie!
it's called. It was really scary, the horrible man hit Mia. Do you want to see my drawing, Mommy? It's for you!"
They wriggled free from her hold and ran off in different directions. Kalle came back first, with the cover for the film based on Astrid Lindgren's book about her childhood friend.
"The head teacher was really horrible. He spanked Mia for taking his wallet," Kalle said earnestly.
"I know, that was really bad of him," Annika said, stroking the boy's hair. "It was like that at school in the past. Terrible, isn't it?"
"Is it like that at school now?" he asked with concern.
"No, not anymore," Annika said and kissed him on the cheek. "No one could ever hurt my little boy."
A terrific howl came out of the children's room, "My drawing's gone. Kalle has taken it!"
The boy stiffened.
"I have not!" he shouted back. "You've lost it yourself. You did!"
The howl in the background turned into loud crying. "It's Kalle. He took my drawing!"
"Little brat! I never did!"
Annika put the boy down, stood up, and took him by the hand.
"That's enough now," she said firmly. "Come on, let's go and look for the drawing. It's probably somewhere on the desk. And don't call your sister a brat. I don't want to hear that word."
"Brat! Brat!" Kalle yelled.
The loud crying became a howl again. "Mommy, Kalle's being horrid! He's calling me a brat!"
