The Cruel Stars of the Night (8 page)

“Living with her father in that haunted house all those years would have broken anyone down. Has she never gotten herself a man?”

“I don’t know,” he said and drank the last of the bottle. “She doesn’t reveal much.”

“If she didn’t talk about work, and doesn’t reveal anything, then what did you talk about?”

“All kinds of things. Her house, that it’s a lot of work. She’s apparently cleaning up after her father. There was junk everywhere.”

Jessica sat down across from her husband. He wanted to have another beer but hesitated. Jessica was a teetotaler.

“She has a crush on you,” she said.

“On me! Never. I’m not her type.”

“Then you’re blind,” Jessica said and stood up. “She hates me at any rate.”

“Now I think you’re exaggerating. She’s just a little jealous of you when you do well.”

Jessica let out a harrumph, left the kitchen, and went to the bathroom. Stig immediately got up and took out another bottle of beer.

The beer did him good. On an empty stomach the rush came quickly. He snapped up a potato and ate it with the skin still on, picked up the pork chop and took a bite. He felt strong in an unfamiliar way. Jessica was bustling in the bathroom. He assumed she was preparing herself for the night and getting ready to spend a few hours in bed with a book. As for him, he wanted to stay at the kitchen table and feel strong, in some way outside his normal life, together with a beer, potato, and a pork chop that tasted heavenly.

“Is there anything on TV?” he yelled, mostly to have something to say.

She didn’t reply, perhaps she couldn’t hear. He got the idea that they should watch a porn film. He had bought a videocassette but the first and so far only time they watched it together was a complete disaster. It made him horny but it only made Jessica mad.

She came out of the bathroom and looked questioningly at the second bottle.

“Tomorrow’s a workday,” she said.

He stood up hastily, but sank just as quickly back onto the chair.There probably won’t be a porn film tonight, he thought. It’s a workday tomorrow.

Jessica disappeared into the bedroom. Stig remained where he was.

“I’m a virgin,” he said quietly and found himself getting aroused as he said it.

Laura was a beautiful woman, but crazy, he had understood that much during the course of the evening. For a while he had even become scared of her. It was unlikely that she was a virgin. What kind of life had she lived anyway?

There was something alluring about her. As if she was a figure from a novel living in a house of horrors, surrounded by the wild and unkempt garden. The chaotic mess in the rooms bore witness to a life in disarray. Or had she only started to live like this now that her father had disappeared?

He had worked together with Laura for many years but had never really gotten to know her. She had always been an isolated and complicated person but it was only this evening that he had seen the extent of her problems. There was little to find fault with regarding her work, of course, quite the opposite, in fact. During their low period a few years ago Laura was the one who had contributed the enthusiasm and creativity.

He regretted the fact that he had followed her in, but at the same time it pleased him that he had seen and experienced something beyond the everyday, as if he had taken a step into the land of insanity and returned. The dark side was frightening but also tempting. He was making a guest appearance. Now he was back in his clean and well-ordered kitchen, lit up by an attractive lamp, cherry cabinets, and gleaming white appliances.

Laura’s kitchen was the complete opposite: an interior from the fifties, as he remembered the kitchen from his childhood, dirty and dark, with a smell that was reminiscent of corruption and stagnation.

He thought about her body. Above all it was the delicate whiteness that he remembered, as if Laura was made of the finest china, light in his hands, pleasing to drink from but nothing to take out every day. She would shatter like a fragile, translucent cup if used too often.

He chuckled and took a sip of beer.

“What’s so funny?” Jessica asked from the bedroom.

“Nothing,” he said.

He felt found out, in spite of the fact that he hadn’t said anything. He felt as if Jessica had seen through him and his thoughts, and it put him in a bad mood. She bothered him. Because what he had gone through was something extraordinary that required thought. He wanted to linger in the feeling of unreality and exclusivity. Laura was no casual hotel-room conquest, but rather a rare experience of a mysterious and original liquid that dissipated in his hands. At the same time as he touched Laura she moved, gliding away with a smile he had never before seen in a woman. He had for a few hours been transported to a human sanctuary of intimacy, a moment of magic.

Now he was going to shower and crawl into bed with his wife.

Eight

“I can’t,” Ann Lindell said. “It’s impossible. Another day we might be able to . . .”

Fear shot up into her mouth like sour porridge and silenced her abruptly. Erik was screaming, or rather, singing. In recent months he had started to sing more and more, long strings of unconnected words. Sometimes Ann could identify the sounds, songs she herself sang in a distant childhood.

In September a new preschool teacher had started in Erik’s group and had made serious efforts to bring song and rhymes into the curriculum. Now songs were a constant feature.

“Wait a minute, I’m going to switch phones,” she said, mostly in order to win time. She took the handheld phone, left the kitchen, and went to the bedroom.

“A concert,” Charles Morgansson said.

“Yes, that’s Erik. I have a lot to do right now.”

“Petrus Blomgren is dead and we can’t do much about that. Not tonight.”

“I was thinking . . .”

Her objection stopped here. She knew he was right.

“What were you planning to see?”

“A crime film,” he said and chuckled into the receiver.

It was the first time she heard his laugh.

“Mystic River.
Clint Eastwood is the director. I’ve read the book and it’s damn good.”

She knew nothing about the film or the book.

“A detective story,” she said doubtfully.

Charles Morgansson waited for her objection, but Ann knew she wasn’t going to be able to think of another suggestion due to the simple reason that she didn’t know what else was showing right now. The last movie she had seen had been a French production that she saw with Beatrice, probably a year ago.

She looked out the window. All snow had melted on the parking lot. The wet asphalt reflected the light from the streetlamps. She wiggled the blinds back and forth. Erik had started a new song that reminded her of something she felt was familiar:“. . . little bunny . . . oh, oh dear me . . .”

“One moment,” she said quickly and put the receiver down on the bed, took several steps toward the kitchen but stopped just as quickly and stared at it. Now he was lying there, Charles Morgansson, on her sloppily made bed. He was breathing into the phone. He was waiting for an answer.

She picked it bak up.

“It may work out,” she said.

They decided on a time and place. Morgansson promised to get the tickets. The only thing she had to do was show up on time and buy him popcorn.

She exhaled, stood absolutely still for a few moments with her eyes closed, before she dropped the phone onto the bed, picked it up again, and dialed Görel’s number.

The clock in the kitchen read several minutes past five.

“Spaghetti,” she said.

Erik looked up but kept singing. Ann crouched down.

“I love you,” she said softly and stroked his head.

“Little snail,” he said.

Erik was watching a video. Ann let her clothes fall in a pile on the hall floor.

“Mommie’s going to take a shower,” she yelled.

She closed the door, opened the bathroom cabinet, took out her razor and inserted a fresh blade, stepped into the shower stall, changed her mind, stepped out, and cracked the door. Erik was singing along to the song in the film.

With the razor in her hand, she scrutinized her body in the rectangular mirror. Sometimes she had the impression that it lied, made her look more slender than she really was. She often felt chubby despite the fact that Beatrice—the only one at work who ever commented on her appearance—nagged her about how she should eat more.

“You’re as thin as a goat!” she would say.

Ann thought Bea’s comments came from the fact that she herself was getting increasingly chubby. After her second child she had put on eight, nine kilos, remained there, and now had to struggle in order not to put on more weight.

She was right about Ann having lost some weight. She thought it was due to her changed evening routine. Not as many sandwiches and only one glass of wine a night.

She ran a hand down her breasts and stomach and felt a feeling of joy, a reminder of something long ago. She turned her body. Her thighs were still good. She twitched as if a hand had appeared on her buttock. She closed her eyes and tried to remember the feeling, but it wasn’t the same.

“This is me,” she said aloud, stepped closer to the mirror and looked at herself intensely, let her hand caress down her stomach, find its way lower down, but the feeling wouldn’t come. Her hand was somehow too unrefined, too insensitive. It only signaled a longing for pleasure but someone’s hand on your body meant something else, so much more.

Ann climbed back into the shower, studying herself and her own reactions. She wanted to emerge from the stall not only clean and fresh-smelling with a pleased smile and an attractive bikini line, but also purified, with anticipation. Sure of her own wishes and desires.

She wanted a promise, or rather a contract, regarding life.

She stepped out of the shower with a feeling that the past didn’t have to mean anything. There was only this moment, with these thoughts, this body, this life. She put in a period, wrote a line, turned the page,sprayed deodorant under her arms, dressed in the clothes she had laid out: the completely new and expensive thong from Wolford, bought at Kastrup Airport, the just as new bra, the silky-smooth pantyhose from H&M that promised “to give your derriere a lift.”

She laughed. That’s what I want, she thought: to give my derriere a lift. She put on a black skirt, a red top, clasped the silver necklace and threaded the earrings through her ears, brushed her hair, applied makeup discreetly but with noticeable deliberation, and then went out to Erik who, when he saw her, immediately stopped singing and got stumbling to his feet. At that moment Görel rang the doorbell.

Ann Lindell was ready.

He was only ten or so meters in front of her. She recognized the worn, dark leather coat that he often wore at work. She continued scrutinizing him. He had solid legs, maybe he had been a soccer player, and he walked with a swagger. That’s how her mother would have put it. Strong steps that echoed against the wooden bridge. His hands shoved into his pockets.

Ann glanced at the water, the Fyris River. She could still extricate herself from this. She could blame it on Erik, say that he had suddenly come down with something. She slowed down, hesitated, but knew it was theatrics for her own benefit. Or not? Was there a streak of masochism inside her, that would make her back out simply so she could later wallow in self-pity?

What she most of all wanted was to accompany Charles Morgansson into the darkness of the movie theatre, into
Mystic River.
She wanted to speed it up, run up to him, so that she wouldn’t have a last chance to pull out of this.

Now he turned right, up toward West Ågatan, kept walking determinedly to the
Filmstaden
cineplex. She stayed several paces behind him. Yes, he did indeed have nice buns.

Ann smiled, suddenly extremely self-satisified. She felt light as a feather, if a little warm.

The theater was packed and Ann was happy about that. So far they hadn’t said much.

“It’s great you managed to get away,” he said and held the popcorn container while she sat down.

“Remind me. What kind of movie is it?”

He started to tell her but was interrupted by the previews. The light was dimmed, the sound of people talking died away, and everyone’s attention was directed forward.

Ann snuck a peek at her colleague. He smelled faintly of cologne. The light from the screen was reflected in his face. The whole thing felt otherwordly as if she had been thrown into a new reality. Was it really her, Ann Lindell, sitting here? She who never, or very rarely, went out for entertainment.

The previews ended and
Mystic River
started. At first Ann had trouble following the film but was swept up. The grief in the actor’s face when he realized his daughter had been killed was almost unbearable.

Charles changed position, sagged down, and straightened up, shifting his weight here and there. Ann thought about how restless Edvard had been the few times they had gone to the movies.

They stepped out into a light rain. Morgansson guided her along the sidewalk, put out an arm to lead her right, helped make their way through the crowd of people.

“This is our
Mystic River,
” she said as they walked over the New Bridge.

He stopped and looked at the river in silence. He had turned up the collar of his coat. His hands were again shoved down into his pockets. Ann thought for a moment that he looked like a very unhappy man.

“What’s the name of the actor who plays the father of the girl?”

“Sean Penn,” said Morgansson without lifting his gaze from the dark waters.

“We had a murder last spring,” she said, “and he reminded me of the mother of the murder victim. She simply sank down, disappeared from us, from life.”

“She drowned herself,” Morgansson said.

“So you know about it?”

“I read up on the investigation. You want to know something about the place you’re going to.”

“You wanted to know what kind of colleagues you were going to get.”

“Something like that,” he said and smiled for the first time.

“Sean Penn didn’t commit suicide. He transformed his grief into hatred and revenge.”

“His wife egged him on.”

“It’s good to have a wife to egg you on.” The words slipped out of Ann’s mouth and Morgansson burst into laughter.

“Should we go get a beer?”

Ann nodded.

They ended up at a little establishment by the river. A few of the guests were having a late dinner. Ann suddenly felt ravenous.

“I just have to make a quick call,” she said and excused herself.

Görel had everything under control. Erik had fallen asleep at around seven and she herself was reading a book.

“You’re sweet,” Ann said.

“Is he nice?”

“We’ve sat in the dark together for two hours,” Ann said, “so I don’t know.”

“You don’t have to hurry back,” Görel said.

She returned to the bar. Morgansson was conversing with the man behind the counter. He let out something like a laugh, or a snort. Morgans-son smiled, nodding at the cook who could be seen in the open kitchen.

“You come here often?”

“I found this place last summer and keep coming back.”

“Why did you move here?”

“Same old story,” Morgansson said, but made no further attempt to explain what the story was, and Ann didn’t ask.

They each took a beer. Ann looked around. Morgansson took a couple of deep sips.

“What do you think?” he asked.

“You mean about the murder?”

He nodded.

“To be perfectly honest, I don’t really want to talk about it,” she said. “Don’t get me wrong, I mean . . .”

“Are you prejudiced against forensic technicians?”

“No, not at all,” she said and laughed.

“You’re beautiful,” he said suddenly.

Ann gave him a quick look as if to assure herself she had heard him correctly His gaze was resting on her, did not turn away, and he smiled.

“Beautiful,” she said and looked down into her beer glass.

“If you don’t want to talk about work then why don’t you tell me about yourself?” he said.

“It’s just the same old story.”

He accepted this answer, turned to the bartender, and asked if it was allright to order a bite of food.

She got up and went to the bathroom. Inside there was a poster by Botero: a voluptuous woman in the process of taking off her bra. In front of her is a man resting on a bed. He appears to be asleep, looks innocent, kind, with a thin tango moustache that hints at vanity. The man is miniscule, the woman so much bigger; robust buttocks and thighs dominate the picture. Ann had the impression that the Amazon was about to devour the man with ease and at any moment.

She sat down on the toilet seat and studied the scene. It appealed to her. The self-possessed and proud woman in the process of seduction, of spreading herself out across this lilliputian and taking her pleasure with the same sense of entitlement with which she allowed her breasts to burst forth. This woman doesn’t make any excuses, that was how Ann read the picture, she acted from her own desires.

The pantyhose—that were supposed to give her derriere a lift—were difficult to pull back up. Now go out to the bar and vanquish this man, she thought and smiled, tugging at her skirt and scrutinizing herself in the mirror.

She pushed her hand against her crotch as if to get in touch with herself, her body, and her desires.