The Key (5 page)

Next, she sees the roof tiles below her. She raises her head and looks out over the town. The sun is a glowing disc in the sky. Immediately below her is her house. The part of town where she grew up. She sees it all, watches as it grows smaller and smaller as she continues her slow rise.

She should be frightened, surely, but she isn’t. Instead, she observes Engelsfors from a bird’s perspective and registers everything with cool curiosity.

It is so beautiful.

From up here, the streets look different. Some run in smooth curves that she had never noticed while walking along them. She studies the forest that surrounds the town. The waters of the canal and of Dammsjön Lake glitter in the sunlight. The hospital. The manor house.

The silence is absolute. The town looks asleep; not a movement anywhere.

Except in the sky.

Now she is looking at Engelsfors senior school.

Dark clouds have piled up behind the square brick building and are crawling up above the horizon from all directions, swelling and spreading over the sky.

But these are not clouds.

Black smoke pours soundlessly in over Engelsfors. Its tentacles stretch between the tall blocks of flats, and into the gardens of the houses, until the smoke has swallowed all the buildings, the entire town.

The sun grows pale and shrinks until it is a distant star. Then, finally, the star is extinguished. And Minoo no longer knows if she is ejected into space or left to fall.

She opens her eyes.

Dread floods into her; all the fear she had not experienced just moments before.

She gets up from the bed. Her legs tremble as she walks to the window and looks out.

And even though everything looks perfectly normal, she feels certain that what she saw was for real.

Only, it has not yet happened.

Anna-Karin has been walking for several hours. She is inside both her own consciousness and the fox’s. They have seen buds on the trees and flowering meadows on sunny slopes. They have listened to bird song, followed hare tracks and paths of other foxes, found a blackbird’s nest but left the eggs alone.

It is a perfect spring day, but restlessness tears at both their minds.

‘What are we looking for?’ she asks the fox.

During the last few weeks, she has asked that question of him, as well as herself, many times. The fox can’t give her any answers. All he knows is that they must carry on looking.

They are following a path that divides into two at an old, fenced-in quarry full of water. Its edges drop steeply down towards the still surface of the water.

The moss that grows on the rock walls is a glowing, almost fluorescent green.

The fox pads lightly up the winding left-hand path. Anna-Karin has to smile as she looks at his thick, fluffy tail, waving as he trots along.

She wanted to give him a name, but nothing seemed to fit. Later, she realised it was wrong to name him at all. She has no right, so now she thinks of him as the fox. Maybe the same feeling had made Nicolaus use ‘Cat’ for his familiar.

Anna-Karin tries to push thoughts of Nicolaus away. It has been more than six months since he left Engelsfors and he hasn’t once been in touch. Not even to say that he’s still alive.
If
he is.

The fox suddenly stops in the middle of the path and looks up at her with his amber eyes. His tail is still.

‘What’s the matter?’ Anna-Karin asks.

A sharp bark.

She walks towards him, but he doesn’t wait for her. Instead, he leaps off the path and runs off among the fir trees.

Anna-Karin stops and looks for him. Hesitates. There are many stories of people getting lost in these forests and most Engelsforsers feel insecure about leaving the paths. Anna-Karin would rather not, but the fox wants her to come with him.

His mind tugs at hers and she sees what he sees, glimpses moss rushing past underneath, tree trunks flashing by as he speeds up.

She steps off the path. For an instant she is surprised to sense the moss giving way under her feet instead of supporting her paws. Then she hurries in among the trees.

Somewhere ahead, the fox barks. Anna-Karin follows the sound until she spots him waiting near the huge root-plate of a fallen tree. He is staring intently at her.

‘What have you found?’ she asks him.

And then becomes aware of the silence. No birds sing. No wind stirs the pine branches above their heads.

Now she understands.

She walks around the root-plate and surveys the scene. She ought to be used to the sight, but still the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end.

The trunks of the trees have turned grey, the fir needles a dirty brown. They look completely dry. There are no leaf buds on the bare branches of the leafy trees. Yet another dead place in the forest. Since last summer, she has seen more and more of them.

The fox barks once, then pads on. Slowly. Watchfully.

Anna-Karin follows him.

The air feels heavy to breathe. The only sounds are the crackling noises under her feet. The trees seem to come closer. As if the forest were about to engulf her.

Only her imagination, of course. Everything is so still.

Far too still.

She jumps when the fox suddenly barks. He has stopped to look at something.

A blackbird is lying on the ground, belly up. Its beak is open a little, its wings spread out on the moss.

‘Poor little thing,’ Anna-Karin says.

She wants to get out of here. Now, at once. The fox sniffs the black feathers cautiously.

‘Come along,’ she says. And then she looks ahead.

The ground is so stony that it looks as if waves of moss are advancing on them. And now she sees all the bird bodies. All of them with wings spread out, as if they had fallen out of the air in mid-flight.

Anna-Karin takes a few steps. They are everywhere.

Magpies. Crows. Lots of small birds.

She stops by a buzzard lying on its back. She realises from the markings on the inside of its wings that it is a young bird. And wonders for how long these birds have been lying here. The bodies look intact and show no signs of decay. With so many cadavers around, the air should be humming with insects.

The fox pads up to her side.

‘Come on,’ she whispers to him. ‘Let’s go home.’

She turns round and starts walking back, feeling safer the moment her feet are back on the path. Her mobile pings and the fox’s ears point. She is relieved to see Minoo’s name on the display. Everything will feel better once she has told Minoo.

‘Something has happened,’ Minoo says as soon as Anna-Karin replies.

Anna-Karin has difficulty swallowing while Minoo tells her about the black smoke. How it ate up Engelsfors.

‘I daren’t be here alone tonight,’ Minoo says. ‘Dad is staying the night in Fagersta. Can I come over to your place?’

Anna-Karin thinks quickly. Minoo has visited her home a few times and Anna-Karin has been as nervous every time. She can imagine only too easily what their flat looks like to someone like Minoo.

Besides, Mum has been worse than usual lately. She has hardly moved from the sofa, only lain there, chain-smoking and moaning about things, with the TV on non-stop and much too loudly. This morning, when Anna-Karin asked her how she was, she just snarled:
Why don’t you stop asking? You might as well: it’s not as if you’d ever understand anyway
.

‘Or, do you want to come here?’ Minoo asks, and somehow it’s clear that she understands why Anna-Karin hesitates.

Suddenly, Anna-Karin feels irritated. Why should she feel ashamed? She’s not the same person as her mum.

‘No, it’s fine,’ Anna-Karin tells her. ‘Come over to us. I’ll give you a ring when I’ve tidied up a little.’

‘You don’t need to tidy up.’

Anna-Karin has a vision of Mum’s ashtrays, the overflowing laundry basket in the bathroom. The dust balls everywhere, so large you can pick them up with your hands.

‘Actually, yes, I do,’ she says.

When she opens the front door, Peppar comes over to sniff her. He is always fascinated by the smell of fox.

The door to Mum’s room is closed. Anna-Karin takes a long, hot shower to try to wash away the sense of a catastrophe drawing close. She finds a pair of jogging pants and an outsized T-shirt in her room and pulls them on.

The lamp in the ceiling flickers. The electricity has misbehaved for almost a whole year. Just another reminder that the apocalypse is coming closer. She switches the light off to avoid having to see it.

In the kitchen, she soaks the dishes to shift the dried-on food, then checks the contents of the fridge. She must ask Mum for money so she can shop. She feels bad about it because she’s well aware that they live on a knife-edge. And Mum doesn’t even pretend to look for a job any longer. Anna-Karin has no idea what will happen when their bank account is empty. Will she have to speak to social services? Will anybody help them?

She doesn’t want to think about it now. Instead she phones Granddad.

His phone rings out again and again, but no one answers. It worries Anna-Karin. Granddad should be in his room at this time. She is just about to give up when she hears a woman’s voice.

‘This is Taisto Nieminen’s telephone.’

‘Hi, I’m Taisto’s granddaughter. Is he there?’

‘He’s asleep. He has been a bit peaky today.’

Anna-Karin stares at the water in the sink. Its surface is turning greasy.

‘How is … is it something serious?’

‘Not to worry,’ the woman replies. ‘He is probably only tired. Why don’t you phone again tomorrow?’

Anna-Karin ends the call. In her head, she hears the echo of Mona Moonbeam’s prophetic words.

Say goodbye when you can. There is still time. Use it well
.

Linnéa sits back on the uncomfortable sofa in Diana’s room at the Engelsfors social services offices.

She wonders how many times she has been propped up somewhere or other here.

Then she wonders how many times she’ll come back here in the future.

Diana is sitting opposite her on a chair covered in some kind of felt. Jakob, the psychologist, is on Diana’s right and, on her left, is a plump woman whose name Linnéa has already forgotten.

They are like those three monkeys. Jakob hasn’t uttered one word so far. The plump woman has asked a lot of questions, but not listened to the answers. And Diana is avoiding looking at her.

This session is called a ‘networking opportunity’ which is presumably meant to sound reassuring, but makes Linnéa think of a fish caught in a net, twitching as it tries to free itself.

‘Now it’s not long until your eighteenth birthday,’ Diana says. ‘The main change for you is that you can’t rely on the Mental Health Service for young people afterwards.’

She glances at Jakob, who clears his throat.

‘That’s right,’ he confirms. ‘Afterwards, adult psychiatry takes over. But, in your case, attendance is voluntary.’

They all look expectantly at Linnéa. She doesn’t need to read their minds to figure out that they hope she’ll say something thoughtful and mature.

‘I feel so much better now,’ she tells them. ‘About the panic attacks and all that.’

Jakob and Diana nod sympathetically. They believe her.

What she hasn’t told them is that Erik Forslund and Robin Zetterqvist forced her to jump off Canal Bridge and that, ever since, she hasn’t had a single night without nightmares. And whenever she sees anyone who looks like either of them, the panic comes rushing into her head.

She has no intention of telling Diana and Jakob what happened. For a start, they might not believe her. If they did, they would want to report the incident to the police and that is something she absolutely doesn’t want. Helena is dead, but both boys are still protected by the alibi she provided. Word would stand against word, and she doesn’t doubt for a second who would be believed. Erik and Robin are local hockey stars and their families belong to the pathetic social elite in Engelsfors. Linnéa is a known mental case, who wears bizarre clothes and whose father is one of the most notorious alcoholics in town.

‘It’s wonderful that you feel so much better,’ Diana says. ‘But, you know, it might be good to have that extra bit of support all the same.’

‘I’ll think about it, naturally,’ Linnéa lies.

What is the point of seeing a psychiatrist if you must hide everything that matters to you? Like, someone trying to murder you? Or having to save the world from a demon invasion?

‘That sounds sensible,’ Jakob nods.

‘Well, as we’ve agreed, for as long as you’re in senior school, little will change otherwise,’ Diana continues. ‘You can stay on in the flat, as before. And I’ll still be assigned to be your social worker. Unless you want to end our relationship, that is.’

She is smiling, but Linnéa notices the insecurity in her eyes.

When Minoo ripped the metal sign amulet from Diana’s neck, right here, in the social office, it was as if Diana woke up after a dream. Suddenly, she couldn’t understand why she had attempted to have Linnéa transferred into closed juvenile care. A little later, she went on sick leave for several weeks. Linnéa has picked up that Diana thinks she was recovering from burnout syndrome. And she senses the terror Diana feels about not being able to trust her own mental stability. How she worries that her mind will suddenly break down – something that Linnéa sympathises with.

‘No, that’s fine,’ she says.

Diana looks relieved.

‘Right. That’s agreed. Now, over to you, Anette. Can you explain a little about how you two will deal with things?’

The plump lady, Anette, talks very slowly, as if Linnéa is incredibly slow on the uptake. Plus, everything she says is so predictable that, after just a few words, Linnéa can work out the rest. She has to bite her lip not to fill in the final bits of sentences.

The thing is, she knows exactly how this will work out. Anette is supposed to manage her benefits and Linnéa has to apply on a monthly basis for her maintenance grant. All should work smoothly for as long as Linnéa attends school. And behaves properly.

The arrangement will carry on until she passes her school finals.