by Will Dean
I nod.
‘There’s a container under the bright red one at ground level. Invisible to the outside world. Whoever took her, and we still don’t know for sure who that was, was doing everything from the red ground-level container via a hole in the floor. Passing down bottles of soda, sandwiches, candy. We found Kex chocolate wrappers and a piece of fresh honeycomb. The underground container has a soundproof box at one end. The size of a room, not small like a coffin. Toilet and a sink. She had access to water, thank goodness. All plumbed in. No idea what that underground container was used for but we know there are others buried under Snake River Salvage.’
‘She’s not hurt?’ I say. ‘They didn’t hurt her?’
She blinks three times.
‘From what I hear, this may change, she may start remembering more, sharing more, but no they didn’t hurt her, save for the initial struggle at her food van. Gun at her neck. They locked her down inside that container and then they only ever visited again to drop food down the hole and observe her. She already had the cut on her thumb. When they took her she opened up the wound. She wanted police to find her blood there, I guess. The captors talked to her a little bit but always through a synthesiser. We’ve recovered specialist equipment from Axel’s music studio that could have been involved.’
‘Why did they abduct her?’
Noora takes a gulp. I’ve already finished mine.
‘We can’t say yet,’ she says. ‘They filmed her the whole time. They gave her a crossword book, kind of thing you get at the airport, and a biro. She may have been kidnapped to order, it’s happened before.’
‘Kidnapped to order? Jesus. When can I see her?’
‘Tomorrow, I think,’ she says. ‘Lots of people need to meet with her first. Formalities. Statements and medical tests. Then she’ll need you. She’ll need some normal back in her life.’
‘You want another?’ I ask, holding up my empty glass.
‘I can’t,’ she says. ‘Gotta drive. And I need to be sharp tomorrow. Still have Lisa out there.’
I look at the misshapen ice in the base of my glass. Mainly water but there’ll be some rum. I down the whole lot and crunch the ice and swallow.
‘Same,’ I say. ‘No more for me.’ But I know I must replace this drug with another, this comfort with a different comfort.
I look at Noora, at her left eye, her dimple, then her right eye.
‘I’ve got my own private deluxe shed,’ I say. ‘Want to see it?’
45
When I wake the sun is streaming through the gap in the blinds and I don’t mind it one bit. I pull myself closer to Noora’s back. Her skin is warm and it is soft like skin that’s been rested under a duvet for eight whole hours. We slept well. Lisa’s still missing, I still have much work to do, but my heart is partly at peace.
I move my face close behind her ear. Closer to that cluster of freckles. My aids are out but I can sense her breaths, the rise and fall of her body, the way a stray feather half-poking out of her pillow pulls closer then blows further away. I watch the feather for a while. Noora’s breath on it.
She’s still asleep. In this single bed, the pair of us fitted together like two ICA trolleys. My knees bent into the backs of her knees. The scent of her.
And yet part of me feels guilty. The way I always felt about Mum. Still do. But now I’m guilty for being here instead of with Tam even though I can’t even see her yet. Guilty for being in this warm, soft bed instead of out searching the forests and junkyards for Lisa Svensson, instead of out working for Anders down in Malmö, instead of spending quality time with Aunt Ida.
Noora murmurs something. I can’t hear her and I don’t want to put my hearing aid in just yet. I move my lips softly over the back of her neck, my nose pushing her dark hair out of my way and then I kiss her shoulder. She stretches and I kiss her shoulder again. My lips against her skin. She turns around.
‘Good morning,’ she says.
‘Isn’t it,’ I say.
We get up and shower and sit at Lena’s kitchen table. Lena’s put on a special spread and she looks so damn happy that Noora’s here with me I could burst with love for her. Some people would have been awkward, annoyed even for someone taking liberties. Lena’s just pleased for us.
‘Johan’s due back from his conference this afternoon,’ she says. ‘And you know what, I miss him.’
I chew on a thick American pancake made with filmjolk, the Swedish equivalent of buttermilk. Crisp bacon. Syrup. Strong coffee.
‘Your food is amazing,’ says Noora. ‘But I feel bad for eating your breakfast.’
‘Everyone’s gotta eat,’ says Lena. ‘Besides. Big day ahead, you looking for Lisa Svensson, Tuva investigating, me with the story of the year to work on. We need good carbs.’
Noora and I smile and chew and nod.
I drive Noora to the police station and we pass Bertil Hendersson outside St Olov’s. The white beehive is still roped down in the flatbed of his truck. His face is covered with his bee mask and he’s holding a smoker. He lifts it to say hi. We pass and I press my hazards to reciprocate the gesture and then pull up outside the cop shop.
‘Wait here two minutes,’ says Noora.
I wait.
She comes back out, the sun lighting up one side of her face, and she says, ‘Tammy will be dropped off at her home this afternoon. Sometime after three. We offered her a safe place nearby, just temporary, but she wants to get home. She slept well. You two spend some time together when she’s ready. Don’t worry about me.’
The thought of seeing Tammy, of laughing with her, walking along the street with her, eating with her, fills me up to the brim with simple, good happiness.
‘You going back to Snake River today?’ asks Noora. ‘The police line’s been pushed back – you won’t see much.’
‘I’m heading into Utgard forest first,’ I say.
Noora grimaces.
‘You said her captors gave Tam crossword-puzzle books. I saw a Sudoku puzzle book near the lumberjack’s caravan. A ripped page near one of the plastic gravel bins.’
She frowns. ‘There are puzzle books all over the place, my grandma completes about six each day.’
‘They’ve been living right next to Snake River. Just want to check them out,’ I say.
‘Take bug spray,’ she says. ‘And take your phone.’
I think to myself I’ll take my illegal stun gun, but I can’t tell her about that. She might be pleased I have some protection or she might just confiscate it.
I wind down my windows but I can still smell Noora in my truck. That nutmeg scent. Sweet and woody. It mixes with salt-liquorice steam from the factory. I set off and breathe it all in.
The misshapen yellow dress on the wire hanger’s been placed outside the charity shop again. More bugs now. A leaf trembling on the shoulder. The fabric starting to fade. And it’s half falling off the hanger, the edge of a hem crumpled on the pavement.
I see Freddy Bom cycle to his shoe store and chain up his BMX. He’s carrying a microphone and a small stereo.
I drive out of Toytown and leave the twin chimneys of the factory in my rear-view mirror. The day is heating up and the asphalt’s shimmering all the way up to the E16. Monday morning. Tam’s free. We are halfway to getting back to normal and I’m driving with a smile all over my sunburnt little face.
Through the underpass and on to Utgard. The wall of thick spruce looks at odds with the rest of the world. Oil and water. The dark mass in amongst wildflowers and sunshine and girls in pale cotton shirts selling strawberries. Swedish strawberries.
Viggo Svensson passes me in his white Volvo taxi. The ‘Careful. Kids on Board’ pop-up sign is erect on his roof but he has no kids on board. His taxi is empty. He’s wearing Top Gun-style aviator sunglasses and he nods to me and I just speed up and get the hell past him.
Right turn from smooth asphalt to rough gravel, from solid to granular, from uniform to pot-holed.
There’s a moth in my cab a
gain so I slow and open all my windows but it won’t get out. It lands on the dash up close to the windscreen. I slow to 5kph. The moth is the size of a shrew with wings. It’s furry and it shimmers grey-blue. It’s fat. Well-fed on something. I try to blow it off but it just stays put and then another moth flies out from my right, from the passenger side. Same species but this one’s even bigger. I blow but it just flies straight at me. Straight into my hair. I brake hard and the truck jerks on its wheels. I scramble, fingers dragging through my hair, and I manage to get it out. It lays dying next to my gear stick. On its back. Soft, furry belly pointing up, wings opening and closing like the eyes of someone giving up.
I take a deep breath and drive on and another moth starts to flutter down by my ankle. It’s inside my jeans. I let out a yelp and kick my feet together but it keeps on fluttering. And there’s another one in the back seat. What the fuck is this? It’s flying back and forth and the one by my ankle is moving up my shin. I smack my leg but it keeps on moving. I slap myself again and feel something drop down my shin, its wings, its thorax scraping down my unshaved legs.
Past the hoarder’s abandoned house and the sun’s so bright just here where the trees spread apart that my sunglasses aren’t enough. It’s okay, Tuva. They’re just moths. Keep going. Lisa Svensson. You need to find her because her captors, whoever they are, one or two, or more than two, a gang. A Gavrik web. They’re still out there.
I stamp my brakes just before I hit him.
‘Jesus.’
It’s little Mikey, Viggo’s boy. He’s out on the track on his own and he’s holding his bug jar.
I stick my head out the window.
‘Hej Mikey, can you let me pass?’
He walks to my door and says, ‘You have to come see.’
‘See what?’
Then I remember Viggo speeding off towards Gavrik with that grin on his face. Those Top Gun sunglasses.
‘In the garden,’ says Mikey. ‘Games.’
I pull in next to the dark red torp cottage and park up where the Volvo taxi normally is. I step down and Mikey takes my hand.
‘This way,’ he says.
I can hear chainsaws. Not too far away.
‘There,’ says Mikey, pointing to the jordkällare cold store, the underground larder I already searched that time.
‘It’s okay, Mikey,’ I say. ‘I’m sure there’s nothing to worry about.’
But he looks worried. He looks like he’s seen something terrible.
‘Come on,’ I say. ‘Let’s look together.’
He stares up at me and shakes his head.
‘Pappa said I couldn’t. His games. Says I’m not allowed.’
‘You can come with me.’
He doesn’t hold my hand but he walks with me.
A truck passes by. Rust-coloured. Looks like the Viking paramedic driving with someone else in the passenger seat.
‘Down there,’ Mikey points to the door almost flush with the grass. From up here the cold store looks like an oversize grave; a hump of earth freshly seeded. And a single ventilation pipe.
‘I heard something,’ he says.
I pull up the door and look inside.
Black.
No light at all. The smell of soil and something sour. Urine?
‘Hello?’ I call down.
A faint echo. No reply.
There are steps down into the cold-store.
I take one step down.
‘Careful,’ says Mikey.
‘It’s okay.’
I remember the layout from last time I was here. Back then the sun was pointing from the other direction, it was evening, I could see inside.
I reach the bottom. The smell intensifies.
‘Hello,’ I say.
A slight echo.
I reach out into the darkness and hear other voices.
Voices outside. Around me.
A man’s voice? Karl-Otto? Viggo?
‘Mikey?’ I say. ‘Who’s up there.’
I dash back to the steps.
But I’m too late.
The door to the cold store slams shut and I’m left down here alone in the darkness.
46
I reach around, desperate for another door, another exit.
My hand finds a light switch.
The cold glow of a low-energy LED light brightens slowly from the wall. This place is a large, white plastic tub, like a big fridge buried in the earth with the door facing upward.
I run up the steps and heave at the door.
It hardly moves.
‘Mikey!’ I scream, and then I run to the centre of this buried plastic tomb so I’m directly underneath the ventilation pipe and I stand on tiptoes and scream, ‘Mikey! Help!’
I can hear footsteps overhead. No, I can’t hear them, I can feel them. Vibrations. Boots stomping over me. Heavy boots.
There’s a scream right at the top of my audible range. It could be from the chainsaws or it could be from Mikey, it’s difficult to tell from down here, my aids are playing up, the acoustics are distorted.
‘Leave him alone!’ I scream up through the pipe.
I’ve been searching for missing women for a week and now I am one. Am I Tammy’s replacement now she’s free? Is that how this works?
My heart’s pounding. I can’t think straight.
The room is round. It’s like I’m inside a massive golf ball. I remember some young salesman explaining all the details over the phone when I wrote the article last year. Him telling me how the plastic prefabricated cold stores are watertight, so ideal for high-water table areas like much of Gavrik Kommun. I remember him telling me you dig the hole and do the concrete work and they drop it in. I remember him saying your perishable goods can last for weeks down inside a cold store. Months even.
‘Help!’ I scream again.
I have been locked inside a building once before and I will not allow it. I will not.
The walls are white and there’s a drainage hole in the base. I think it goes to a sump pump, that’s what I remember from the patronising salesman. I try to jump up to the fist-size hole above me but I can’t reach. If I jump my fingertips can almost touch the ceiling.
People might hear me. If I scream and yell a wood-carving sister might hear as she passes by in her van. Utgard searchers might hear. I kneel. They won’t hear. I’m in Utgard forest at the bottom of an underground pit, a place that has already been searched at least once.
There’s no food inside here. No toilet, no water, no means of escape. Nothing. A hollow plastic grave. Who locked the doors? I want to know who I’m facing, who I am dealing with.
I put my fingers down the drainage hole. Nothing. A small pump down there. A dried-out spider. A dead bee. Nothing I can use.
The vent pipe above me is covered over.
I’m lost without sky. Nothing to offer any hope. No way to look up to Dad, to ask for some reassurance down here in this cold store.
‘Help me, I’m down here!’ I scream. And then I scream it over and over again until my throat hurts.
Vibrations above.
The cap on the pipe is pulled off.
I see light. Clouds moving up in the warm summer sky.
‘Help me,’ I shout, not as loud as before.
A banana falls and hits me on the shoulder. Then another comes down and lands on the floor and splits open, its yellow-brown guts visible through the rip.
The pipe gets covered again. But not with the lid. Something else. Red glass? I can still see light through it but there is something hovering over the top of the vent pipe.
‘Hello,’ says a voice so deep it could be from Darth Vader. Or a grizzly bear. Or some Neanderthal talking from inside his cave.
‘Let me out,’ I scream back.
It just breathes, each breath like waves breaking on a shore. Heavy breaths. A smoker’s breaths.
‘What have you done with Mikey?’ I ask.
More breathing. Then the voice says, ‘Mikey’s fine.’
<
br /> ‘What have you done with Lisa? Are you filming her?’
More breathing. The air inside this golf ball is warming up and his breaths are pouring down through the ventilation pipe, mixing with mine, sinking back down to me. There is no ventilation any more. The air is running out.
I cough.
‘Get me out of here,’ I say. ‘You have to let me go.’
My heartbeat. His breathing. Some herbal smell. Mint? The distant screams of chainsaws.
The red plastic moves over the pipe.
I can see sky again.
Then it darkens.
A face.
A smooth, glossy, young face.
Clear eyes.
A playful, childish smile.
47
I am sunk beneath the earth of Utgard forest like one of the children in Aunt Ida’s tall-man-of-the-forest tale.
But I am not stored under a tree, protected by roots. I am locked inside a plastic tomb.
And it’s not Freddy Bom up there.
This is more awful.
Unthinkable.
I’m staring up at little Mikey Svensson’s face. Viggo’s boy.
Like father like son.
‘Mikey, you have to let me out now. I don’t like it down here.’
He tilts his head as if to say, what’s not to like.
‘You need to open the door now.’
He sniffs and scratches at the inside of his nostril, then he places his face right over the vent pipe, his eye staring down at mine.
‘Let me out!’ I scream. ‘Let me out and you won’t be in any trouble. I won’t tell your dad. Open the door.’
He pulls away and I see his face again, the bags under his eyes. He brings the voice disguiser to the vent pipe and I can see it clearly now. It’s the shape of a loudhailer. But plastic. Small. It’s a toy with four voice setting buttons and a plastic trigger.
He presses the button and breathes and I can hear each breath from this boy like the exhalation of a dragon.
‘I want to watch,’ he says, the growl of his changed voice rolling around the interior of this cellar.
And then he’s gone.
I slump to the ground, my head in my hands. I can’t even understand. He wants to watch? And see what?