Falling

by Simona Ahrnstedt

  “Maybe even more than you think?”

  “The thing I struggle most with, it’s my feeling that . . .” He fell silent, didn’t know if he could even express this.

  “Go on.”

  “That women are only ever with me for what I have to offer them physically and financially.”

  He waited for her to argue, to smooth it over. But nothing came. And so Alexander continued, for the first time putting into words the things that had plagued him for so long, had affected all his relationships with women. “They like the good bits, the fun parts. They like the sex. The surface. But no one is interested in the inside.”

  In me as a person.

  He almost expected Isobel to laugh, to disagree, to joke it away, but of course she didn’t. He hadn’t realized he had been carrying this raw pain, that it ran so deep. Had never realized how it hollowed him out. How he had longed to be seen. How afraid he’d been that he was his mother’s son to the core. That he would exist only if he slept with someone. He wiped his brow, noticed his hand was shaking.

  Isobel leaned toward him. The candlelight danced in her gray eyes, making them look like diamonds and stars. She rested her hand on his, and Alexander felt, ridiculously enough, his throat tighten.

  “Thanks for telling me,” she said quietly.

  They sat in silence. All around them they could hear the clink of porcelain. Smell the aromas of food. Hear hushed conversations. Their food arrived, but he wasn’t hungry, and she didn’t touch hers, either.

  He gave her a wry smile. If Isobel wasn’t hungry, she must have been shocked after all.

  “I’m so sorry, Alex. What you described, it’s sexual abuse.”

  “No,” he denied. “Nothing so serious as that.”

  She cocked her head. “So you’re telling me that you were abandoned by your parents, left alone and scared, physically and sexually abused, but it wasn’t serious?”

  “Not in comparison to what other people endure.”

  “You can’t compare it. Oh, Alex, I wish I’d known before I started to talk about swapping roles. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have suggested it. It must be hard for you; I really understand if you don’t want to do it.”

  He studied her. A strange euphoria was taking hold of him, as if he were a balloon eager to soar. As though the things he hadn’t realized were weighing him down had suddenly disappeared. Like a pressure, a constant, unwelcome feeling, had just gone up in smoke. And something else had taken its place. Mostly relief. But also happiness. Confidence. And trust. He felt a wide grin breaking free. He felt like a king. A person—a man who could do and choose whatever he wanted to.

  “No, I want to try it,” he said, confidently.

  “But after what you said . . .”

  “No. As of today I’ve left that behind.” He had. And besides, he trusted Isobel. Completely. It was an incredible feeling.

  “You have to promise me that you’ll say something if it feels wrong. It should only feel good. Can you promise me that?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “What if I go too far? I’m not experienced.” She smiled wryly. “And I’m rather strong.”

  Alexander laughed and found himself again, left behind the confused teenager he’d been, and stepped back into the adult man he’d become.

  He took Isobel’s hand and held it across the table. “You could never go too far with me, babe,” he said.

  She raised an eyebrow.

  “Okay, fine,” he said with a stifled laugh. “If I can ask for one thing, it’s that I’d rather not have a vibrator shoved anywhere.”

  She nodded graciously, and Alexander thought it was probably just as well he’d given her at least that limitation. A new kind of excitement coursed through him. Had he really just agreed to it? For real?

  He caught her gaze. Something had happened here tonight. A new closeness he had not experienced before. He raised her palm to his mouth, pressed his lips to her skin, breathing her in.

  “So, how should we do this?” he asked quietly.

  “Tomorrow,” she said. Her eyes glittered.

  He kissed her hand again, murmured his words between kisses on her warm palm: “Do you want to come to my apartment?” He loved having her there; just the thought made him hot as hell.

  “No, no. I’ll call and tell you where to go.”

  He smiled at this bossy side of her. It was sexy.

  “Fine,” he said.

  “Now let’s eat.”

  So they ate, talking about food and wine and films they had seen, not about sex. Alexander’s good mood had returned in full force. He was so happy to be here, with Isobel. To eat and laugh with her, flirt with her. To crave her. There was nothing hidden between them; she knew everything about him now. And he knew more about her than anyone else ever had. Tomorrow he was hers to do whatever she liked with.

  It electrified his entire being.

  He could hardly wait.

  Chapter 48

  Gina stared out the subway train window. Rock walls and platforms sped by. People stepped on and off. Played with their cell phones or looked straight ahead. She liked to take the subway, liked how it linked the city to all its constituent parts. You could take the train from Tensta to Central Station, change, and take another to Östermalm and, by doing so, step on in one world and climb off in another.

  It had been a terrible mistake to get mixed up with Peter. She was someone who never did anything without thinking, planning, and analyzing, but this time it all got away from her. She had told herself she had control over her feelings. Had thought the fact they were so different in all respects would protect her from starting to feel something. Completely wrong, apparently, because he had kissed her and she’d been in turmoil ever since.

  She played with her leather satchel. She was on her way home from the exam. It was a rare luxury, being able to go home in the middle of the day. Her bag was full of nonfiction texts and the blue A4 block she’d brought from the institute, covered in tightly written notes. She had bought the bag with her own money, been so proud of it and what it symbolized. But now she saw it with completely different eyes. Saw how simple it was, how worn and cheap.

  She hated that.

  Peter had kissed her. A real kiss. She still had trouble believing it. Without thinking, she brought her fingertips to her mouth, let them linger there. She wished she hadn’t enjoyed it so much. That she hadn’t been affected.

  When she went through the exam afterward, she had gone cold with shock. She had missed a subquestion. She wouldn’t get full marks. She couldn’t explain the fear she felt at the thought. She had gotten the maximum number of marks on every test they’d taken. On every assignment and every question she’d ever been given in her medical studies, she had gotten perfect results. Now she’d lost at least one point. Because she wasn’t focused. Because she had been out, wasting time, instead of concentrating. It was unbearable.

  Gina got off at Tensta, wandered through the run-down underpass, took the steps up to the center, and walked toward home in the heat of the sun. She had to stop this. Everything. Her cleaning job was temporary; she would work her final shift there soon. Then whatever had happened between her and Peter would be gone, as if it had never occurred.

  It wouldn’t even be difficult, she told herself. She had survived so much. This was nothing.

  “Hello? I’m home!” she called as she came into the apartment.

  She heard voices from the kitchen. Her father and Amir. At first she thought they were having an argument, their voices were so loud. But then she heard them laugh. Did they really laugh so infrequently at home that she almost didn’t recognize the sound?

  And then another low voice, one she recognized immediately.

  Peter.

  She hurried into the kitchen, her body tense. This wasn’t right. She saw her brother first. Amir’s face glowed in a way she had never seen before, or not in a long time, anyway. He was talking loudly, gesticulating with his long teenage
arms, laughing.

  “What’s going on?” She felt Peter’s eyes on her, but she avoided looking at him.

  What is this?

  “We have a visitor,” her father said.

  “I can see that,” she said, finally looking at Peter. Suntanned. Big in their little kitchen. “When did you get here?”

  “I wanted to surprise you.” He grinned. His hair was slightly ruffled, and he had rolled up his shirtsleeves. His jacket hung over the back of a chair. There was a sports bag on the kitchen floor, and she could see water bottles and training clothes in it.

  “He brought soccer cleats! For me! And goals, can you believe it? Actual goals! He’s just gonna change and then we’re gonna play!”

  Amir was practically yelling with excitement. He had on slender soccer boots and sports clothes, and they were so bright and new that it hurt her eyes.

  Her father laughed as Peter lifted up a net bag full of bright new balls and orange cones to show them to her.

  Gina’s eyes flitted between them: Peter, her dad, her brother. Three against one, she thought. Was she the only one who saw the danger here?

  Peter disappeared. Gina filled a glass with water, drank, studied her father and brother without uttering a word, and waited until Peter came back, now in his sportswear.

  “Want to come?” he asked with yet another of his wide smiles.

  Gina shook her head. Peter left with Amir, who was happily chatting away. The front door closed behind them.

  Her dad said nothing, just picked up his newspapers and went out into the living room and sat down in an armchair.

  Very deliberately, Gina seated herself at the kitchen table. Waited with drumming fingers. Inside, she was simmering away.

  When they came back, Amir’s cheeks were rosy. He was sweaty. Peter laughed and talked loudly about penalty kicks and offensive techniques.

  Amir disappeared to take a shower. Peter stood there, smiling, his hip against the kitchen counter. His hair was even messier than before, and his skin had color. He looked satisfied as he took a drink from a blue plastic bottle.

  A white man, the center of everyone’s attention.

  Gina played with her glass of water. Irritation washed over her in waves.

  “What are you doing here, Peter?”

  “Playing soccer,” he said, wiping his forehead. “We had fun. You should’ve come.”

  She frowned. Either he was pretending not to notice she was angry, or else he really couldn’t see it.

  “I guess you thought you could just sweep on down to the suburbs and hand out a bit of charity,” she said coolly. “Get some attention. Maybe relieve your guilty upper-class conscience a little?”

  “No, no, it was an impulse,” he said. “I remembered you said you wanted Amir to get out more. Didn’t you see how happy he was? I thought you’d be happy too.” He scrutinized her. “Are you mad?”

  His amazed tone didn’t make things any better.

  “So what happens afterward? When you get bored? How do you think things will be then? When we can’t afford to buy new shoes, when he grows out of everything?”

  Peter frowned. “I didn’t think . . .” he started.

  “Right,” she interrupted him, her irritation reaching new levels. “You didn’t think because you don’t need to think. Life’s easy for you. You do whatever you want without having to think. Give the cleaner a ride home in your expensive car. Buy toys for a lonely boy. Like some kind of fucking Santa Claus.”

  “But . . .”

  “This is you going too far. You should have checked with me first. How do you think this is going to end? You can see how we live. You sweep in with your expensive clothes and your ridiculous gifts. They probably cost more than we spend on food in a month. How do you think that feels? Or do you think we have no pride?”

  “I really didn’t mean to . . .”

  They heard Amir shout for a towel, and Peter fell silent. They waited as Gina’s father spoke in a low tone. The mumbling died out.

  Peter lowered his voice.

  “I didn’t realize you would be so angry. I still don’t really understand what I’ve done wrong. The only thing I wanted was to do something for someone.”

  “But why, Peter? Why do you feel like you have to do something for someone in my family? Why do you think you have the right? Did I give you the right?”

  “No.”

  The expression on his face was closed. It was just as well, because this could never lead to anything good. Life wasn’t a fairy tale. They had fled all the way to Sweden. A country she had never even heard of. Left behind her mother’s grave, everything they owned but the clothes on their backs and their bags, and spent weeks on the move. She had lived in asylum centers. Seen her family broken down, heard her father cry at night, seen her brother change, lose hope, lose interest in the world around him. She had helped build them up again, knowing they needed her strength and determination, that they relied on her. Nothing good came from hoping for things, believing that anyone else, society or people who came from another world, could be trusted. Hard work, realistic expectations, and her own intelligence, they were the only way forward.

  “You have a low opinion of me,” Peter said. He had put down his water bottle and shoved his hands into the pockets on his shiny, new track pants.

  “Do I? Tell me, what am I to you? Us out here? Did you think I would be grateful that you bought us things we could never afford ourselves? That what we need most of all is some new stuff?”

  His brows lowered “Now you’re being unfair.”

  “But don’t you know that? Life is unfair. That’s what you don’t understand.”

  She hadn’t realized she was so angry at him. It all came pouring out. She knew she was ruining things now, that she sounded completely unreasonable and that she was probably overreacting. But it was as though another part of her had barged in and taken over. It hurt, being in an inferior position. To be reminded of their differences as she sat in her own kitchen. For a few moments last weekend, she had forgotten. Peter had made her lose focus, made her think about him instead of herself and the future she needed to secure for her family.

  “There can never be anything more between us,” she said, feeling she had made up her mind. When she forced herself to look at it objectively, and she needed to be objective, not see things through some kind of fantasy filter, Peter De la Grip was just one white man among many. They might as well be from different planets, their expectations of life were so different. With Peter, she could feel herself being reduced to something she didn’t want to be. She wanted to be strong. Independent. She knew what it was like to be dependent. Had experienced enough fear and powerlessness for a lifetime, and then some. She couldn’t end up there again.

  “I had no ulterior motive,” he said quietly.

  She sneered. “Really? No ulterior motive? You know, I find that hard to believe. Are you telling me you didn’t want to sleep with me? That it’s not sex you’re after when you come here, spreading your joy? I have trouble believing I’ve misunderstood things that badly.”

  She had gone too far. Gina could hear it herself, and she saw it in him.

  Peter held out his hands. There was no laughter in his face.

  “What do you want me to say? That I misunderstood our relationship? Clearly I have.”

  “A black girl, what were you thinking? Have a little fun in the suburbs between two blond wives?”

  He went pale, looking like she had hit him. Gina almost hoped he would do something rash now, something to prove she was right, that he was a bad person.

  She watched him struggle with his words. He really wasn’t someone who had them on his side.

  “I can’t apologize for who I am,” he eventually said. “I came here to give your brother something he hasn’t had in a long time, and I did it because I thought it would make you happy. That was my only motive. Amir laughed the entire time, and he met another boy his age. They’re going to hang out tomorr
ow. That was all.”

  “But you have no idea about our world. How can you fail to see the enormous differences between us?”

  “Of course I see them.”

  “So why can’t you see the difficulties?”

  “But now you’re the one creating differences between people. Not me.”

  She rolled her eyes. “That’s so naïve you should be ashamed. Are you really telling me you don’t make distinctions? Between people from your class and mine?”

  “I try,” he answered. “Isn’t that obvious?”

  “Nothing you do makes any difference. I wish none of this had happened.”

  Peter’s face was empty; he looked tired. “What do you want me to say? Do?”

  “Nothing. You’re just going to go back to your normal life.”

  “So now I should disappear? Were you just playing a game this whole time? I don’t get it.”

  She knew he was thinking about their kiss. That goddamn kiss.

  “Go, Peter,” she said.

  He opened his mouth to speak, but closed it again. It was just as well.

  “Gina . . .” he eventually said, pleadingly.

  She shook her head. Her pride had won out. It was for the best.

  And so he left. Passed her by. Took his bag. Forgot the water bottle. Closed the door behind him.

  She blinked. She had been horrible. Said unforgivable things. He hadn’t raised his voice once. Hadn’t slammed the door. Just left, silently. Maybe he was relieved she had done the thing they both knew needed to happen.

  Gina took an unsteady breath. She looked up. Her father and Amir were on the threshold, looking at her.

  “What happened?”

  “I won’t be seeing him anymore,” she said firmly. She looked at Amir. “And you won’t either.”

  Her brother simply turned on his heel, went to his room, and slammed the door.

  “You know I did the right thing.”

  “He’s a good man, Gina.”

  “And what is that assessment based on?”

  “Don’t be like that with me. He was polite and respectful. He was kind to your brother. He talks to me like an equal. He was really trying.”