The Morning Star

by Karl Ove Knausgaard

  He sighed.

  “I tried earlier on,” he said. “He didn’t answer, of course. He just doesn’t want to talk to us.”

  “So you’re not at home,” I said.

  “On my way to the bus now, as it happens. Have you seen the new star?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “A great big new star, just appeared in the sky.”

  “No, I’ve not seen it.”

  “Well, you should.”

  “Give me a ring when you get in,” I said. “I’m a bit worried.”

  “Don’t be, there’s nothing to be worried about. He’s either gaming or gone to sleep.”

  “I hope you’re right,” I said. “Bye.”

  I got up, put the phone in my pocket and went inside to the ward. I needed that medication, now.

  But first I really did have to make sure they were asleep.

  Cautiously, I opened the door of Olav’s room. He was lying on his back in bed, fast asleep with his mouth open, almost like any other middle-aged man. On the wall was a photograph of him as a child together with his parents. I knew he hadn’t seen them in twenty years.

  Kenneth was asleep with his back to the door, his cheek resting on his arm, the scars on his scalp quite visible against the white linen.

  Karl Frode was sound asleep too, snoring peacefully on his back, his cheeks saggy in repose.

  As I closed his door again, Sølve came out from the TV room.

  “Everything all right?” he said.

  I nodded.

  “Just checking,” I said.

  “I’ll start on the cleaning in a minute,” he said. “Need some more coffee first, though. You having any?”

  “No, thanks,” I said, sidestepping him on my way to the room at the end of the corridor, which was Torgeir’s. He had nothing in there, no furniture, no pictures, no decoration of any kind, just a blue mattress on the floor. He didn’t even have any proper bedding, but slept in his clothes with a blanket over him.

  He tore everything to pieces.

  There was no door to his room either, he wouldn’t have been able to open it, so instead they’d built a partition to provide him with some form of privacy.

  I heard the heaving sound of him breathing inside. He often hyperventilated, but never when he was asleep.

  When I went in, he was crouched in a corner, masturbating. He was naked. His penis was very big and pointed up diagonally from between his legs, his hand moving up and down.

  He looked at me with wide, hateful eyes, and his breathing became a hiss.

  I turned away quickly.

  “Time for sleep now, Torgeir,” I said on my way out.

  Sølve looked at me from the doorway of the duty room.

  “Is he not asleep?” he said.

  I shook my head.

  “He was busy,” I said.

  “Aha,” Sølve said, and smiled.

  I didn’t smile back, but got my phone out of my pocket, pressed Ole’s number and put the phone to my ear as I went toward the laundry room.

  No answer.

  He was probably just asleep.

  Ole didn’t sleep like other people, but would grab a couple of hours here and there.

  That would be it. He’d just forgotten his promise to text me, that was all.

  The sight of Torgeir had unsettled me, and as I emptied the remaining soap capsules for the washing machine into a bag, tied a knot in it and dropped it into the bin, I kept seeing him in my mind, even though I didn’t want to. His feet pointing the wrong way, his big erection poking up between his withered legs, his powerful upper body. The grin on his face.

  What did he fantasize about?

  Oh, for goodness’ sake.

  I took the dry clothes out of the tumble dryer, put the wet washing in and loaded the machine again, only I left it open this time. I carried the clean clothes into the TV room, folded them and sorted them into piles on the table there.

  That done, I went into the duty room where Sølve was sitting on the sofa doing nothing.

  “Better get started, I suppose,” he said.

  “We’ve run out of soap for the washing machine,” I said. “I’m going to pop down to B and borrow some.”

  “I can do that,” he said, getting up. “I’ve not done much yet tonight.”

  “No, you stay where you are,” I said. “I know who’s on duty down there, it’ll give me a chance to say hello to her.”

  “OK,” he said.

  A long-drawn-out screech came from the woods. It sounded like a cross between a bird and something more reptilian.

  A shudder went down my spine.

  Sølve turned his head and peered into the darkness through the open door.

  “I wonder what that was,” he said. “Did you hear it?”

  “No idea,” I said. “Could it have been a heron?”

  “A heron, yes, that’d be it,” he said. “Have you heard herons before?”

  I nodded.

  “They sound quite prehistoric,” he said.

  He got up and went out onto the veranda. I checked my phone again. Nothing. And yet what felt like a thrill ran through me. It took me a few seconds to realize why. The medicine cabinet downstairs.

  The blood began to throb in my temples as I went down the corridor. If I was found out, I’d lose my job. No question about it.

  But I wouldn’t be found out.

  It was a crap job anyway.

  I opened the door at the far end and went down the stairs into the dark hallway. The exertion made me short of breath and I stopped at the bottom to steady my pulse and allow my eyes to adjust to the dark.

  If I went in like it was the most natural thing in the world, no one would suspect a thing.

  A sound from upstairs made me look up.

  But it was only the door shutting.

  The outside door had to be unlocked too, and I pulled out my keys as I stepped slowly across the floor, found the right one, the only one with a rubber key cover, and after fumbling for a moment managed to insert it and open the door.

  The air outside was as hot as a holiday abroad.

  In the darkness behind me someone suddenly came running. I turned, only to be shoved aside as a figure hurtled past me.

  In the light from the parking area, I saw that it was Kenneth.

  He turned the corner and was gone.

  He was stark naked.

  Oh, Christ.

  I’d really dropped myself in it now.

  I hurried after him as fast as I could round to the other side of the building.

  He wasn’t there.

  He’d run into the woods.

  My chest ached and I leaned back against the wall as I tried to catch my breath.

  What was I going to do?

  I had to sound the alarm. A resident absconding was a serious matter. And this one was naked and had disappeared into the woods. The police would be brought in. With helicopters, I shouldn’t wonder.

  And all because of me.

  Oh no.

  I imagined how Berit was going to react.

  She’d give me the sack.

  There was no doubt about it.

  But no one knew when he’d escaped.

  What if I tried to find him myself? Maybe he was sitting on a stump just inside the trees.

  And if I didn’t find him, I could claim he’d only just gone missing.

  If I could just find him myself! Who was to say I couldn’t have a bit of luck now and again like everybody else?

  I was about to call his name when I remembered that the door onto the veranda above me was open. Sølve was probably still sitting there.

  Without a sound, I crossed the narrow strip of lawn between the building and the woods, and stepped among th
e trees. The pale light from the windows dissolved after only a few meters, and darkness closed around me.

  ARNE

  I woke up in such acute pain that for a few seconds I didn’t know where I was or what had happened. All that existed was the searing sensation in my face, my pounding head.

  I put my hand to my nose. My fingertips were at once wet with blood and a sharp pain stabbed at my skull.

  I’d crashed the car.

  The headlights were still on, pointing at the trunks of some trees.

  I passed my tongue over my upper lip, sensing blood. The salty, metallic taste almost made me heave.

  I opened the door and climbed out.

  The car had come to a halt against a tree a few meters from the road. The right side had taken the impact. The headlight casing was smashed, the wing crumpled.

  Everything was still. Not even a murmur from the sea.

  And no traffic, thank Christ. No one to call the police.

  No houses nearby.

  I couldn’t remember a thing about whatever had happened. But I couldn’t have been going very fast.

  I’d been driving while drunk.

  How stupid was that?

  I touched my nose again, as if somehow I needed the dull pain to detonate, no matter how much it hurt.

  Ow, fucking hell! Ow, ow, ow!

  After a moment it subsided and only a constant, throbbing ache remained.

  I was still a bit drunk, I realized, losing my balance and gripping a tree for support as I staggered back to the road to get my bearings. It was like there was some kind of membrane in between me and what I could see.

  I stopped in the middle of the road. The air felt hot, like at the height of afternoon, and completely dry, a faint scorching sensation against the skin.

  So strange.

  Through the trees on the other side I could see the moon reflecting on the surface of the sea below, and more distantly, to the right, a cluster of small lights that could only come from the houses out on Vågsøya.

  I was at least twelve kilometers from home.

  How was I going to get out of this?

  I could switch the engine off for a start. No sense in lighting up the whole scene.

  I got in and turned the key.

  Maybe I could remove the number plates and just leave the car here? Walk home.

  But then the police would be involved.

  Tove?

  She was too far gone to be of any help.

  Wait a minute, didn’t I have a packet of cigs somewhere?

  I leaned across the passenger seat and immediately a shot of pain went through my head again with the sudden build-up of pressure.

  But there they were, on the floor. A shiny, red-and-white packet of Marlboro cigarettes. And, next to them, my mobile.

  I lit one straightaway.

  A trickle of blood ran down my lip. I licked it away, and this time there was no sudden urge to vomit.

  I opened the glove compartment and found a packet of tissues, tore it open and pressed the soft paper gently to my face.

  Then I phoned Egil.

  He answered immediately.

  “Arne?” he said.

  “Hi, Egil,” I said. “How’s it going?”

  “Fine,” he said. “You? It’s not like you to be calling. Not this late, anyway.”

  “That’s the thing,” I said. “I’m in a bit of trouble.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yes. I’ve crashed the car into a tree.”

  “OK.”

  “Do you think you could get out here? I’m a bit drunk, you see.”

  “Understood,” he said. “Where are you?”

  “At the side of the road just before you get to Vågsøya. Keep going after the shop and you’ll see me after four kilometers or so.”

  “What state’s the car in? Can it be driven?”

  “I don’t know. I reckon so.”

  “OK.”

  “Are you coming, then?”

  “Yes. I’ll come in the boat, then I can drive you and the car home.”

  “Brilliant.”

  “Mind what you say. You might have to do something for me one day.”

  “Of course, no problem,” I said.

  “Maybe something you don’t want to,” he said. “See you in a bit.”

  He hung up.

  I tossed the glowing end of my cigarette into the road and lit another. The bottle was still intact, I noticed then, firmly in place in the holder in front of me.

  It wouldn’t look good if someone came and saw me drinking in the car, so I took it with me and went back over the road into the trees on the other side.

  And then I remembered the strange star. The crabs on the road.

  So it wasn’t moonlight, I realized, looking up into the sky behind me.

  There it was, shining brightly.

  Smaller now, farther away.

  Or maybe it had only looked bigger and closer before because I was drunk.

  Was that where the heat was coming from?

  Oh, don’t be so stupid.

  The stars were out there, beyond an endless expanse of icy darkness. This one was no exception, no matter how close it seemed.

  The forest floor was bare and dry, carpeted with yellow needles. Above, the trees stood straight and tall, spreading their branches from a height of some five meters or so, but as I went on they became lower and more twisted in shape where the wind blew in from the sea, and I found myself having to forge a more convoluted path until at last I emerged onto the pebbled shore.

  A heavy log had washed up a few meters below the last line of trees. It looked like it had been in the sea for a long time. I passed my hand over its surface, it was completely smooth, and had not yet begun to rot. I sat down on it, lit a cigarette and stared out at the sea. It was calm, and my gaze was drawn to the point where it dissolved into the thick, velvety darkness that rose up above the world like a bell jar. A darkness in which light shone through the tiniest holes. At least, that was how the madman Strindberg had construed it, I thought to myself, and gulped a swig from the whisky bottle.

  I hadn’t checked the message I’d got yet. I supposed it was from Ingvild. But I couldn’t help her sitting here, whatever the matter was, and I reckoned she could cope perfectly well on her own anyway. She was dependable. So exceptionally unlike her mother.

  What a damn mess.

  Mother manic. Father drunk. Car wrecked.

  How did it get to this?

  And how could I dump so much responsibility on Ingvild?

  She was only fifteen.

  I took another swig.

  Ahh.

  The strong alcohol not only burned in the back of my throat, shifting my mind from the throbbing pain I felt in my face, it cleared my head too. I could almost follow it in my thoughts, the path of the alcohol as it spread with the blood through the brain, removing all detritus. Yes, the function room was being cleared now after the party, dirty plates and glasses taken away, new tablecloths laid on all the tables, the floor washed, the run-down candles making way for new ones. Soon it would be pristine again, gleaming and ready.

  And then I could dance.

  I took another swig.

  The dark sea lay motionless in front of me. Apart from a gentle, rhythmic, almost inaudible clacking of pebbles where the water lapped at the shore, everything was silent.

  What a night.

  I felt an urge to go down and dip my hands in the water. In this heat it was surely well above twenty degrees by now.

  The thought of crouching down and splashing my face filled me with such sudden desire. How good it would be!

  I stood up and realized I still had the phone in my hand. I slipped it back into my front pocket, where it rested against my thigh.<
br />
  It wouldn’t do me any good knowing what the situation was at home. I couldn’t do anything about it anyway until I got back.

  The round stones I stepped on occasionally knocked together, a sound that was at once hollow and sharp. It felt like it could be heard several hundred meters away.

  I stopped and listened into the darkness. He’d be here soon.

  Nothing.

  I went toward the three big rocks I could see a bit farther away, which I recalled so well from when I was a kid. I used to climb on them whenever we came here with Mum and Dad. One of them looked like a priest with a bulging belly in his black cassock, perhaps mostly because of the gray-white band that resembled a cleric’s collar where the rock narrowed toward the top.

  I ought at least to read her message. Maybe she’d only texted to say everything was all right?

  I put both my hands against the big rock. It was warm, almost warmer than my hands in fact.

  But it couldn’t be.

  I bent down and touched one of the stones at my feet.

  It was just as warm.

  Could it be some kind of volcanic activity under the ground? That had warmed up the rock?

  No, not here. In Iceland, maybe, but that was a couple of thousand kilometers away.

  OK. I decided to rinse my face first, then go back to the log, sit down, have a cig and then read her text.

  It was a good plan.

  Dark objects didn’t just absorb heat, they stored it too, so obviously the rock temperature was going to rise.

  Relieved to have come up with an explanation, I went down to the water’s edge, sat on my haunches, cupped my hands and filled them with water at the same time as leaning my face forward.

  The water was warm and soothing; I dashed my face with it several times before the salt, which I hadn’t thought about until then, began to sting in my wounds.

  But that too felt good, etching into my flesh.

  I looked across the sea.

  At the same moment I heard the distant hum of an outboard. It was like an auditive zip opening up the stillness.

  I went back to where I’d been sitting before, drank what was left of the whisky and lit a smoke. He was still some way off, so I had plenty of time to check that text, as I’d told myself I would.

  But as long as I was here it didn’t make much difference what I knew or didn’t know.