Britt-Marie Was Here

by Fredrik Backman

  “Why?”

  “Because we’re not animals.”

  The boy looks at his lemonade can, thinks about it, and then asks:

  “What animal apart from human beings can drink from a can?”

  Britt-Marie doesn’t answer. Instead she picks up the remote controls from the floor and puts them on the table. As soon as she’s done it she bounces back in terror when the until-now timid boys on the sofa all roar “Nooo!” as if she’s flung the remote controls in their faces.

  “No remotes on the table!” hisses the lemonade boy fearfully.

  “That’s the worst jinx! We’ll lose if you do that!” yells Omar and runs up to throw them back on the floor.

  “What do you mean, ‘we’ll lose’?” asks Britt-Marie, as if he’s taken leave of his senses.

  Omar points at the grown men on the TV, who quite clearly do not even know he exists.

  “We will!” he repeats with conviction, as if this somehow explains anything.

  Britt-Marie notes that he’s wearing his soccer jersey back to front.

  “I don’t appreciate yelling indoors. I also don’t appreciate the wearing of clothes back to front like gangsters,” she points out, picking up the remotes from the floor.

  “We’ll lose if we wear our shirts the right way around!”

  Britt-Marie doesn’t even know how to respond to such nonsense, so she takes the remote controls and the children’s muddy clothes into the laundry. When she turns around after starting the washing machine, the ginger-haired boy is standing in front of her. He looks embarrassed. Britt-Marie cups one hand into the other and doesn’t look ready for more conversation.

  “They’re superstitious, everything has to be the same as the last time we won,” says the boy, at the same time explanatory and defensive. He suddenly looks slightly nervous.

  “I’m the one who shot the soccer ball at your head yesterday. I didn’t do it on purpose. I’m pants at aiming. I hope it didn’t ruin your hair,” he says. “Your hair is . . . nice,” he adds with a smile, then turns to go back to the sofa.

  Britt-Marie keeps her eyes on him and by and large doesn’t entirely dislike him. He sits on the far side against the wall behind the boy with black hair and the boy who’s had the most soft drinks, so that he’s out of sight.

  “We call him Pirate,” says Vega.

  She has popped up next to Britt-Marie. Apparently it’s what she does: pops up, all the time. Her jersey is slightly too big. Or her body too small, possibly.

  “Pirate,” echoes Britt-Marie, in the way that Britt-Marie echoes when she has to drum up all the well-meaning feelings she’s capable of in order not to have to explain that Pirate is not much of a name for anyone except an actual pirate.

  Vega points to the other two children on the sofa.

  “And that’s Toad. And that’s Dino.”

  And there goes the limit of Britt-Marie’s well-meaningness.

  “For goodness’ sake, those aren’t even proper names!”

  Vega doesn’t look as if she understands what this is supposed to mean.

  “It’s because he’s a Somalian,” she says, pointing at one of the boys, as if this explains everything.

  When Britt-Marie doesn’t look as if it does explain everything, Vega sighs in a very bored sort of way and explains:

  “When Dino moved to Borg and Omar heard that he was a Somalian he thought it sounded like a ‘sommelier,’ you know one of those people who drink wine on the TV. So we called him ‘Wino.’ And it rhymes with ‘Dino.’ So now we just call him ‘Dino.’ ”

  Britt-Marie stares at Vega as if Vega had just fallen asleep drunk in Britt-Marie’s bed.

  “So your real names weren’t good enough, I suppose, were they?”

  Vega doesn’t seem to comprehend the difference.

  “He can’t have the same name as us, can he? Or we wouldn’t know who to pass to when we’re playing.”

  Britt-Marie snorts hard through her nose, because that’s how Britt-Marie’s irritation comes steaming out when it grows too large inside her head.

  “Surely the boy has a proper name,” she fumes.

  Vega shrugs.

  “He didn’t do much talking when he moved here, so we didn’t know what his name was, but he laughed when we called him Dino and we liked it when he laughed. So he kept the name.

  “Toad we called Toad because he can burp so loud that it’s just sick. And Pirate we call Pirate because we . . . I don’t know, we just do.”

  She nods towards the ginger-haired boy, who still can’t be seen. Britt-Marie smiles graciously and says:

  “And I don’t suppose there are any girls’ teams for you to play on? No, of course not.”

  Vega shakes her head.

  “All the girls play for the team in town.”

  Britt-Marie nods with absolute, absolute helpfulness.

  “I suppose that team wasn’t good enough for you, was it?”

  Vega looks annoyed.

  “This is my team!” she says.

  A player on the TV is rolling about on the pitch. Omar uses the stoppage time to climb up on one of the kitchen stools and start changing the lightbulbs on credit. Britt-Marie circles nervously.

  Vega starts looking around as if there’s a person missing.

  “Where’s the ball?” she calls out into the room.

  “Shit! Outside!” Omar cries, looking out at the rain outside the window.

  “You can’t possibly be thinking about bringing that ball in here!” gasps Britt-Marie in terror.

  “It can’t just stay out there in the rain!” says Vega, with a similar level of terror in her voice, as if this was a question of a human life.

  Before Britt-Marie has time to realize what’s going on, a chain of Stones and Scissors being put in Paper Bags is initiated across the room, until ginger-haired Pirate in some way loses and is on his way up from the sofa towards the door in a fluid movement.

  “Mother of God! Not in your newly washed jersey! No!” She catches hold of his collar but he’s already wearing his shoes and has already gone over the threshold. Britt-Marie, in absolute agitation, gets into her own shoes and runs after him.

  The boy is standing six feet away, with the muddy soccer ball in his arms.

  “Sorry,” he mumbles, staring down at the leather.

  Britt-Marie doesn’t know if he is apologizing to her or to the soccer ball. She holds her hands over her hair so the rain doesn’t ruin her coiffure. The boy peers at her, smiling sincerely, and then, embarrassed, looks down at the ground.

  “Can I ask you something?” he says.

  “Excuse me?” says Britt-Marie, the rain running down her face.

  “Would you help me fix my hair?” he mumbles, avoiding eye contact.

  “I’m sorry, what was that?” asks Britt-Marie while she keeps her gaze focused on a patch of mud left by the soccer ball on the boy’s newly washed jersey.

  “I have a date tomorrow. I was going to . . . I was thinking . . . I wanted to ask if you could help me fix my hair,” he manages to say.

  Britt-Marie nods as if this was quite typical.

  “I don’t suppose you have any hairdressers in Borg, oh no. I suppose that will also be my responsibility now, is that what you mean? Is it?”

  The boy shakes his head at the ball.

  “Your hair’s really nice. I was thinking you’re good at doing hair, because your hair is nice. There isn’t a hairdresser in Borg because it closed down.”

  The rain tails off somewhat. Britt-Marie is still holding the palms of her hands like a pitched roof over the top of her head, and the rain is running down into her sleeves.

  “Is that what it’s known as these days? A ‘date’?” she says, a touch thoughtfully.

  “What did you call it before?” asks the boy, peering up from the ball.

  “In my days it was known as a ‘meeting,’ ” says Britt-Marie firmly.

  Possibly she’s not an expert at this, she’d be wi
lling to admit. She has only ever been on two meetings with boys. One of them she ended up marrying. The rain stops completely while they are standing there, she and the boy with the ginger hair and the muddy soccer ball.

  “We say date, or at least I do,” mumbles the boy.

  Britt-Marie takes a deep breath and avoids his avoidance of eye contact.

  “You really must understand that I can’t give you an answer now, because I have my list in my handbag,” she says in a low voice.

  The boy immediately starts nodding with altogether worrying enthusiasm.

  “It doesn’t matter! I can make it anytime tomorrow!”

  “Ha. I imagine school isn’t of much concern here in Borg.”

  “It’s still Christmas holiday.”

  And then their silence is so abruptly broken by the children’s howls of euphoria from within that Britt-Marie is startled and makes a grab for the boy’s jersey, and the boy in turn is so surprised that he tosses the ball into her arms. She gets mud on her jacket. Half a second later the men in the pizzeria burst into fits of braying until the neon sign above the door rattles.

  “What’s going on?” Britt-Marie wants to know, with panic in her eyes, as she throws the ball on the ground.

  “We scored a goal!” howls the Pirate boy ecstatically.

  “What do you mean, ‘we’?” asks Britt-Marie.

  “Our team!”

  “I thought you didn’t have a team!”

  “But I mean: our team, the one we’re supporting! On the TV!” the boy tries to explain.

  “But how is it your team if you don’t play in it?”

  The boy thinks this over for a moment. Then he seems to take a firm grip on the ball.

  “We’ve supported this team for longer than most of the players in it. So it’s more our team than theirs.”

  “Preposterous,” snorts Britt-Marie.

  In the next second the sound of a front door being slammed cuts through the January night. Britt-Marie spins around in pure dismay and starts running towards it. The boy runs after. The door is locked from the inside.

  “Like, they’ve locked it so we can’t come in! Because we were out here when we scored!” puffs Pirate, jubilant and out of breath.

  “What on earth are you trying to say?” Britt-Marie demands and tugs frantically at the door handle.

  “I mean it’s important that we stay out here, because while we were out here we scored! We’re bringing good luck out here!” hollers the boy as if that’s reasonable. Britt-Marie stares at him as if it certainly isn’t. But then they stand in the parking area, despite the rain that’s falling again, and Britt-Marie doesn’t say anything else.

  Because it’s the first time in an absolute age that anyone has told Britt-Marie it’s important for her to be somewhere.

  Soccer is a curious game in that way. Because it doesn’t ask to be loved.

  11

  The children open the door at half-time to let Britt-Marie and Pirate back in. Britt-Marie spends the second half in front of the mirror in the bathroom. Firstly because she doesn’t want to come out and risk having to talk to any of the children, and secondly because their team scores again so they forbid her from coming out until the match is over. So Britt-Marie stays in there and dries her hair and brings them luck and has a life crisis. It’s possible to do all of these things at the same time. Her mirror image belongs to someone else, someone whose face has been touched by many winters. The winters have always been the worst, both for the balcony plants and for Britt-Marie. It’s the silence that Britt-Marie struggles most of all to live with, because while immersed in silence you don’t know if anyone knows you are there, and winter is also the quiet season because the cold insulates people. Makes the world soundless.

  It was the silence that paralyzed Britt-Marie when Ingrid died.

  Her father started coming home later and later from his work, and at a certain point he started to come home so late that Britt-Marie would already be asleep by the time he walked in. Then she woke up one morning and he was only just coming home. And in the end she woke up one morning and he hadn’t come home at all. Her mother said less and less about it. Stayed in bed for longer and longer in the mornings. Britt-Marie meandered around the flat as children do when they have to live in silent worlds. Once she knocked over a vase just so her mother would yell at her from the bedroom. Her mother didn’t yell. Britt-Marie swept up the glass herself. And never knocked over a vase again. The next day her mother stayed in bed until Britt-Marie had made dinner. The day after that she got up even later. And in the end she didn’t get up at all. Of course several of her mother’s girlfriends sent beautiful flowers and condolences, but they were too busy with their lives to pay their respects to someone who was already dead anyway. Britt-Marie cut little notches in the flower stalks and put them in newly washed vases. She cleaned the flat and polished all the windows and the day after, when she took out the rubbish, she met Kent on the stairs. They stared at each other as children who have turned into adults tend to do. He had been married with two children, but he had recently been divorced and had now come back to the house to visit his mother. He smiled when he saw Britt-Marie. Because in those days he used to see her.

  Britt-Marie rubs her ring finger in front of the mirror. The white line there is like a tattoo. Taunting her. There’s a knock on the bathroom door.

  Pirate is standing outside.

  “Ha . . . Did you win?”

  “Two to zero!” Pirate nods blissfully.

  “Because actually I have only stayed in here all this time because you told me so. I have no intestinal problems,” says Britt-Marie very seriously.

  Pirate nods, in some confusion, mumbles, “Okay,” and points at the front door, which is open.

  “Sven is here again.”

  The policeman stands on the threshold and lifts his hand in a fumbling wave. Britt-Marie draws back, deeply affronted but not sure why, and closes the bathroom door behind her. Once she has fixed her hair properly she takes a deep breath and reemerges.

  “Yes?” she says to the policeman.

  The policeman smiles and holds out a piece of paper, which he drops just as he’s giving it to Britt-Marie.

  “Whoops, whoops, sorry, sorry, I just thought I’d give you this. Well, I thought, or we, we thought . . .”

  He makes a gesture towards the pizzeria. Britt-Marie assumes he means he has spoken to Somebody. He smiles again. Clasps his hands together on top of his stomach, then changes his mind and crosses his arms just below his chin.

  “We were thinking you need somewhere to live, of course, of course, and I understood you didn’t want to stay at the hotel in town . . . Not that you can’t live anywhere you want to. Of course! We just thought this might be a good alternative for you. Perhaps?”

  Britt-Marie looks at the paper. It’s a handwritten, misspelled advertisement for a room that’s available for rent. At the bottom is an image of a little man wearing a hat, who appears to be dancing. The relationship between the man and the advertisement is extremely unclear.

  “I’m the one who helped her make the ad,” says the policeman enthusiastically. “I did a course in it, in town. She’s a very nice lady, the one who’s letting the room, I mean, she’s just moved back to Borg. Or, I mean, it’s just temporary, of course, she’s selling the house. But it’s here in Borg, not far at all . . . it’s walkable but I can give you a lift, if you like?”

  Britt-Marie’s eyebrows inch closer together. There’s a police car parked outside.

  “In that?”

  “Yes, I heard your car’s at the workshop. But I can drive you, it’s no trouble at all!”

  “It’s obviously not a problem for you. Whereas I’m supposed to be driven around this community in a police car, am I, so everyone thinks I’m a criminal, is that what you are telling me?”

  The policeman looks ashamed of himself.

  “No, no, no. Of course, you wouldn’t want that.”

  “I ce
rtainly would not,” says Britt-Marie. “Was there anything else?”

  He shakes his head despondently and turns to leave. Britt-Marie closes the door.

  The children stay in the recreation center until she has tumble-dried their clothes.

  Clothes that cannot be tumble-dried she hangs up to dry, so the children can pick them up the next day. Most of them go home in their soccer jerseys. In a certain sense this is how Britt-Marie turns into their team coach. It’s just that no one has told her about it yet.

  None of the children thank her for doing their laundry. The door closes behind them and the recreation center is steeped in the sort of silence that only children and soccer balls can fill. Britt-Marie puts away plates and soft-drink cans from the sofa table. Omar and Vega have left their plates on the dish rack. They haven’t washed them up or put them in the dishwasher, haven’t even rinsed them off. All they’ve done is put them there.

  Kent also used to do that sometimes as if expecting to be thanked for it. As if he wanted Britt-Marie to know that when the plate was back in its place, washed and dried, in the cupboard tomorrow, he had certainly done his allotted share of the task.

  There’s a knock at the front door of the recreation center. It’s not a civilized hour, so Britt-Marie assumes that it’s one of the children who’s forgotten something. She opens with a:

  “Ha?”

  Then she sees that it’s the policeman standing outside again. He smiles awkwardly. Britt-Marie immediately changes the tone to a:

  “Ha!”

  Which is something quite different. At least the way Britt-Marie says it. The policeman swallows and seems to be drumming up some courage. A little too abruptly he whips out a bamboo curtain, almost smacking it into Britt-Marie’s forehead.

  “Sorry, yes, well, I just wanted to . . . this is a bamboo screen!” he says and almost drops it into the mud.

  “Ha . . .” says Britt-Marie, more guarded now.

  He nods enthusiastically.

  “I made it! I did a course in town. ‘Far Eastern Home Design.’ ”

  He nods again. As if Britt-Marie is supposed to say something. She doesn’t. He holds the bamboo screen in front of his face.