by Tore Renberg
‘We didn’t see it coming either, bruv,’ Cecilie said, consolingly.
‘No,’ nodded Jan Inge. ‘Tong was one tough nut, we knew that. We also knew that given certain circumstances, he was capable of doing the unexpected. But this? After being such a model prisoner in Åna? After all that meditation?’
Rudi’s Adam’s apple bobbed up and down visibly, but Cecilie assuaged any emotion by lifting his hand to her mouth and giving it a kiss.
‘No,’ Jan Inge repeated, ‘the conclusion I’ve reached, dear friends – dear Tong, if you can hear me – is that—’
Jan Inge broke off and cleared his throat. Cecilie and Rudi remained holding hands, Rudi with eyes narrowed and ears pricked.
‘That,’ Jan Inge attempted to continue, obviously moved by what he was thinking, ‘well, I’ll just say it straight out: Tong walked the earth with a cold heart.’
A gust of wind swept through the garden and clouds gathered above their heads.
‘It’s not a nice way to put it,’ Jan Inge said, slowly and deliberately. ‘I mean, is how I feel now the way the mother of a rapist feels, as she has to come to terms with the fact that her son, the boy whose nappies she once changed and has loved for so long, had a cold heart?’
Neither Cecilie nor Rudi had anything to say in the light of such a grave comparison.
‘I mean,’ Jan Inge said, bending down to the ground and picking up a rusty spanner, which he began to turn in his hand, ‘I mean, of all the people we know. Hansi, for instance. A prize idiot.’
‘Such an asshole,’ Rudi snorted.
‘But a cold heart?’ Jan Inge said, continuing to rotate the spanner. ‘No. Hansi has a stupid heart. And Melvin, for example, who went solo. A cold heart? No. An extreme heart, perhaps, but not a cold one. Buonanotte?’
‘No.’
‘No!’
‘Right. Buonanotte. An amusing heart. And Stegas?’
‘Ha ha.’
‘A wet heart,’ Jan Inge said in a fluty voice, laughing, and tossed the spanner away. ‘And Pål,’ he added, clipping the wings of the laughter he had spread, ‘what about Pål?’
‘I liked that Pål guy,’ Rudi said, promptly. ‘A good heart, I would’ve said.’
Jan Inge nodded in agreement. ‘And Cecilie, if I may ask – what would you say about Mum and Dad, if you’re able to talk about them without upsetting the child in your stomach?’
Cecilie let go of Rudi’s hand and lit up a cigarette. ‘Well,’ she said, ‘you couldn’t say Dad had a cold heart, maybe more of a … I don’t know … a stuff-and-nonsense heart, I think? And Mum … it wasn’t hard, just weak. A fish heart.’
Cecilie turned to Rudi. ‘What about your people?’
‘Who do you mean,’ Rudi knitted his brows, ‘you mean … are you talkin’ about … do you mean my fami … is it my fam—’
‘You don’t need to say anything,’ Cecilie smiled, blowing out smoke before stretching up on her toes to kiss him.
‘Anyway,’ Jan Inge said, seizing the chance to speak as the sky above them grew more and more unsettled, ‘anyway, the way I see it, Tong had a cold heart. And it’s awful for me to have to say these things, because I don’t want to be seen as a racist or anything, and it’s unpleasant that having now broken one of my fundamental principles and shot someone, having taken my place in the murky ranks of the men of violence, it turned out to be an immigrant. It’s horrible for me to have to say these things, because standing here, I have difficulty thinking of anything positive to say about the man lying beneath us.’
It grew quiet in the garden.
‘And it pains me to say,’ Jan Inge said after a while.
Once again there was silence.
‘He had too little love in him,’ Jan Inge whispered, after another pause. ‘And that is the knowledge we can glean from this.’ He added, pensively, ‘That it’s all about love.’
Rudi nodded and looked at Cecilie. ‘That’s what I always say,’ he whispered. ‘He got that from me.’
‘What was that, Rudi?’
‘Nothing,’ Rudi said. ‘Well put, brother,’
It grew quiet around the grave as the first raindrops spattered on washing machines, VCRs and spades. They stood there and let it come down upon them, both the rain and the scary feeling of having buried a person they had, or thought they had, known so well; a person who ate chocolate chip cookies and hardly ever spoke, and when it came down to it – they now understood – had never allowed anyone to get close to him or allowed himself to express too much. A person they had not known at all. About whom they could not think of anything good to say. And in this atmosphere, images began to float through Cecilie’s mind. She pictured the flashing intensity in Tong’s eyes as she sat astride him, the animalistic hunger and snapping of his mouth when she offered him hers to kiss, pictured Tong, smiling, pulling into their driveway years before, with the window rolled down and a cigarette dangling from his lips, proud of coming home with thirty-five thousand after a simple break-in in Eiganes. There was a Tong they were on the point of forgetting, Cecilie felt, and because of this she turned to Rudi, whose shoulder-length hair was damp and lined face wet, and to Jan Inge, and said: ‘But even though he didn’t have enough love inside him, either for us or for anyone else, that doesn’t mean we’re going to be just as bad.’
‘That’s beautifully put, baby,’ Rudi said.
Jan Inge stood beside them, conscious of a tear perched precariously in his eye.
They remained there, all three of them, as the rain grew heavier, in front of Tong’s grave, each wrapped in their own thoughts. Three people dressed in boiler suits by some freshly dug ground, surrounded by old junk. On impulse, Rudi began to stomp on the soil, bringing his large soles down on the grave as he walked, after a fashion. Having gone back and forth like this for a while, he turned and looked into Jan Inge’s tiny blueberry eyes.
‘If Tommy Pogo shows up again,’ Rudi said, ‘I wouldn’t like the thought of him coming out here into the garden.’
‘Calm down,’ Jan Inge said.
‘Easy for you to say,’ Rudi said, ‘you’re the laidback type.’
‘Should Pogo,’ Jan Inge said, ‘turn up, we’ll tell him we know who he is and what he’s trying to do, we’ll tell him we have nothing to hide, and if he, or any other investigators from Lagårdsveien 6, ask where we were on Thursday, we have an alibi, and we’ll make sure to let them know that we think it’s a pretty lousy thing for Lagårdsveien to be harassing ordinary removal people and putting the frighteners on us or whatever it is he thinks he’s up to, and then we’ll point out the garden and the clear-up we’ve carried out—’
Rudi shook his head, flabbergasted.
‘Jesus, you are one hell of a managing director.’
‘And then,’ Jan Inge continued, ‘then we’ll make sure to tell him that from now on there’s going to be some changes out here in Hillevåg. Changes, Rudi, you hear me?’
Rudi clapped Jan Inge on the back. ‘Well said,’ he whispered.
Jan Inge filled his lungs with air and then exhaled.
‘I just don’t want any more grief,’ whispered Jan Inge.
‘There won’t be any more grief,’ Rudi replied, in a soft tone.
The rain grew heavier, turning the ground wet and muddy.
Jan Inge turned to Cecilie. He had broken out in a nervous rash, his eyes were red, the corners of his mouth were quivering and she saw him as she had seen him so many times before so very long ago.
‘Are the two of you moving out?’ he asked, trembling.
Cecilie looked at him askance. ‘Moving out?’
‘Moving?’ Rudi said, looking puzzled. ‘Wherethefuckdidyougetthatideafrom, brother of tears?’
Jan Inge sniffled. ‘I dunno,’ he said in a low voice. ‘Have you thought of any names for the baby yet?’
Cecilie and Rudi looked at one another, the way parents do when they ask each another, wordlessly, if they are going to reveal their secrets to the
world, and Cecilie nodded to Rudi.
‘Steven,’ Rudi said, ‘if it’s a boy.’
‘Jambolena,’ Cecilie said, ‘if it’s a girl.’
‘Jambolena?’ Jan Inge whispered and cleared his throat. ‘Isn’t that … a tree?’
There was a sound in the distance.
‘It’s going to be fine,’ Cecilie whispered. ‘Changes, right? There’s a lot that’s going to happen soon and we’re going to be happy together. It begins now, Jani, you hear me?’
‘Yeah,’ Jan Inge said, ‘yeah, you’re right. A nursery. Mariero Moving. Clear-up. We’re going to take everything up a notch. Everything is going to be good.’
The sound grew louder, came within earshot, and their eyes turned in the direction of the source. It was coming from the front of the house. It was the revving of an engine, a motorcycle, or moped perhaps on the street outside. They looked at one another.
‘Hm,’ Jan Inge said.
The sound ceased. Most likely the ignition being turned off.
‘Okay,’ Rudi said.
Cecilie cocked her head to the side. ‘Is that outside our place?’
Jan Inge exchanged looks with the others. They put down the spades and other tools, walked up on to the veranda, signalling silently to one another with seasoned expertise while removing their muddy footwear and slipping out of their boiler suits, before going into the living room. Cecilie gave the boys a quick once-over, fixing Rudi’s hair a little and wiping some dirt off Jan Inge’s face, and then they made their way into the kitchen. Jan Inge gave Cecilie and Rudi one last look before drawing the curtain carefully aside and peeking out.
There was a moped in front of the house. An old Suzuki, red with a black leather seat, the kind people drove when Jan Inge was small.
His attention shifted to the front door.
There was a boy standing there.
‘What is it?’ Cecilie whispered.
‘I don’t know,’ Jan Inge whispered back.
‘Who’s out there?’ Rudi said in a low voice.
‘I don’t know,’ Jan Inge replied in a hushed tone.
‘What does he want with us?’ whispered Cecilie.
Jan Inge shook his head resignedly. ‘More changes, maybe,’ he whispered.
‘Looks that way, headmaster,’ Rudi sighed, as the doorbell rang. The three of them walked slowly in line out into the hall. Jan Inge opened the door.
A beautiful boy with deep-set eyes, wearing a leather jacket, stood before them. He looked gaunt and tired. He did not look like he had slept in several days. He held a black crash helmet in his hands.
‘Hi,’ the boy said, with a quick nod.
‘Hi,’ Jan Inge said. ‘What do you want?’
The boy looked at them, ‘I know who you lot are,’ he said.
Jan Inge cleared his throat. ‘Okay?’
Oh Jesus, he thought, are we going to have to open up the grave again?
The boy tossed the moped helmet from one hand to the other.
‘You have something I want,’ he said, ‘and I have something that none of you want.’
Rudi took a step towards the boy.
‘Is it the internet you’re on about?’ he said sternly.
Jan Inge put a hand on Rudi’s shoulder, but he paid no heed. ‘Listen,’ he said, ‘you can’t go round knocking on strangers’ doors talking like that, you get me? One more word and I’ll get my baseball bat and clobber you with it. Youhearmebirdseed?’
The boy remained unflustered. ‘You have something I want,’ he repeated.
‘What exactly do you mean?’ Jan Inge asked.
‘I want in,’ Daniel said, ‘in to where you lot are.’
‘Jesus,’ Jan Inge said. ‘What are you talking about?’
‘I know what you’ve done,’ the boy whispered and stared right into Jan Inge’s eyes.
‘Excuse me?’
‘Pål Fagerland,’ the boy said.
Oh no, Jan Inge thought, clenching his teeth as hard as he could, do I have to get the shotgun, do I have to murder again?
‘I don’t need any more changes right now,’ Cecilie whispered while she looked over the unusually beautiful boy with his deepset, hungry eyes, his bright mouth, sharply defined jaw and long-fingered hands. Then she brought her hand to her stomach to safeguard her child against this terrible, ineluctable world it would one day be part of.
Acknowledgements
See You Tomorrow asked for hard work, patience and a lot of research, and I have been fortunate to have the generosity and devotion of intelligent and empathic people during these six years of writing.
Thanks to my editor Kari Joynt and everyone at Forlaget Oktober in Oslo. Thanks to Aschehoug Agency for their work with my books abroad. Thanks to Karen Sullivan and Gary Pulsifer at Arcadia, Amélie Burchell and everyone at Faber Factory and Faber Factory Plus, my translator Séan Kinsella, and all my foreign publishers and translators for making this happen around the world. I am grateful for the generous support of Norla and the Norwegian Embassy, who have made so much of this possible.
My love goes out to my lifelong friend and internet-dude, Kristian Fjermestad, and thanks to my designer Asbjørn Jensen, the directors Stian Kristiansen og Arild Andresen, and Motlys and Yngve Sæther for making films of my books.
For invaluable information, I thank investigator Eldfrid Vestbø at Stavanger Police Station, lawyer Anne Kroken, inmates and workers at Åna Prison, pupils and teachers at Gosen School, and everyone else who so generously shared and listened.
A big round of applause to my colleagues: Karl Ove Knausgård for years of inspiring friendship and reading, Jo Nesbø for advice and interesting talks, Frode Grytten for so much support and joy, and Tønes and Janove Ottesen for all those great songs.
It often feels as if my energy comes from listening to music. I’d like to take the opportunity to thank a handful of artists who have meant so much over the years: Nick Cave, Jarvis Cocker, David Bowie, Ray Davies, The Flaming Lips, David Sylvian, Morrissey, Pet Shop Boys, Tom Waits, Kate Bush, Duran Duran, Phil Collins, Bob Hund, Depeche Mode, XTC.
Without family, there would be no great books. Thanks to my lovely mother, Mirjam Elisabeth Renberg, to my beautiful children, Petra and Allan, to all the cowboys and Indians in my family, and to my shimmering girlfriend, Hilde.
First and foremost, thanks to my great readers. You are the reason.
(And thanks to the Tjensvoll Gang. You sure did frighten us back then. You wrote this.)
This book has been selected to receive financial assistance from English PEN’s Writers in Translation programme supported by Bloomberg and Arts Council England. English PEN exists to promote literature and its understanding, uphold writers’ freedoms around the world, campaign against the persecution and imprisonment of writers for stating their views, and promote the friendly co-operation of writers and free exchange of ideas.
Each year, a dedicated committee of professionals selects books that are translated into English from a wide variety of foreign languages. We award grants to UK publishers to help translate, promote, market and champion these titles. Our aim is to celebrate books of outstanding literary quality, which have a clear link to the PEN charter and promote free speech and intercultural understanding.
In 2011, Writers in Translation’s outstanding work and contribution to diversity in the UK literary scene was recognised by Arts Council England. English PEN was awarded a threefold increase in funding to develop its support for world writing in translation.
www.englishpen.org
About the Author
Tore Renberg is a multi-award-winning author, who has distinguished himself as a literary critic and TV host for the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation. A student of philosophy and literature at the University of Bergen, where he met lifelong friend Karl Ove Knausgård, he first achieved major success at the age of 23, with the short-story collection Sleeping Triangle and then the novel The Man Who Loved Yngve, which was made into a major motion pictur
e. This was followed by four further novels with the same protagonist, which sold over 400,000 copies in Norway. In addition to his work as an essayist and novelist, Tore has played in several bands, and written for the screen and the theatre. His work has been translated into 15 languages.
About the Translator
Seán Kinsella is from Dublin. He has previously translated works by, amongst others, Kjell Askildsen and Frode Grytten into English. His translation of Stig Sæterbakken´s Through the Night, was long-listed for the BTBA 2014. He lives in Norway.
Copyright
Arcadia Books Ltd
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London W10 6PH
www.arcadiabooks.co.uk
First published in the United Kingdom by Arcadia Books 2014
Originally published by Forlaget Oktober, Oslo, as, Vi ses i morgen 2013
Copyright © Tore Renberg 2013
English language translation copyright © Seán Kinsella 2014
Tore Renberg has asserted his moral right to be identified as the author of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the written permission of the publishers.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 978-1-909807-82-2
This ebook edition published in 2014
Arcadia Books gratefully acknowledges the financial support of NORLA.
This book has been selected to receive financial assistance from English PEN’s “PEN Translates!” programme, supported by Arts Council England. English PEN exists to promote literature and our understanding of it, to uphold writers’ freedoms around the world, to campaign against the persecution and imprisonment of writers for stating their views, and to promote the friendly co-operation of writers and the free exchange of ideas. www.englishpen.org
Arcadia Books supports English PEN www.englishpen.org and