Agnes was happy that her parents had taken the closure so well, and they didn’t even seem to consider themselves unemployed – but she was angry for Länninge’s sake. For the way that an American company could suddenly decide to close down an entire community. That was in effect what they had done; it wasn’t just four hundred or so unemployed industrial workers they had left behind, but a dying town as well. Her dying hometown.
The train made two stops on the way before it was time for Agnes to get off. She thought about taking the bus to Snickarvägen, but that would mean a wait of forty minutes. It would be quicker to walk – and anyway, it would save her having to stand there freezing in her far too flimsy coat. Sunshine at this time of year was no guarantee of warmth. And yet she’d still hung up her winter coat for the spring, having had enough of the gray wool for the time being. She’d rather freeze.
She started to walk with long strides, her body feeling a little stiff after the journey. And in truth she hadn’t fully recovered from her hangover, despite the fact that almost 24 hours had gone by. It took longer and longer for her to recuperate from a party as the years progressed. Still, she’d done her best – eaten a guaranteed nutrient-free meal down at the hamburger bar on the corner. Fat, salt, and sugar in huge doses. And then a video. She’d rented The Celebration, a reputedly classic dogma film that everyone was talking about. To be on the safe side, she’d taken out a backup film, too. After fifteen minutes of The Celebration, she’d switched to her backup, Gladiator. This she’d watched to the end.
The sun was shining in her face as she walked along the roadside bike path. There were no cars in sight. She tried shutting her eyes, walking long stretches, maybe thirty feet, without looking. The light was filtered to a red mist by her eyelids. The air felt fresh, at least compared to that of Stockholm. Agnes thought about the job, the restaurant. Sensed the anticipation. And then she thought about Tobias. The blow to her gut came as usual, but with less force. These days she was able to control it. Sure, she missed him. But she could see what Lussan and everyone else was talking about, that he hadn’t been particularly nice to her. Besides this latest slap-in-the-face, Ida, he’d cheated on her on one occasion before. At least.
That time they’d been together for a little over a year. He’d never been with someone for so long and said that he’d been overcome with panic. Done something stupid. He’d apologized, really, until he’d had remorse squirting out of his ears. Agnes had been hurt, but had forgiven him. Being dogmatic wouldn’t have done any good. Next time it might be her, she’d reasoned. Madde, Lussan, Camilla, and all the others who heard her theory had laughed in her face. The chances of Agnes Edin being unfaithful were clearly infinitesimal.
But it was one thing to slowly, inch by inch get over Tobias. It was quite another to move on. Not just to throw herself into someone’s arms to prove her independence, but to be in love. With someone else. The very thought still felt absurd. Her love for Tobias had felt as big as her heart, and as it slowly withered, so did her heart. There’d be no room left in it for anyone else. It would become just a tiny little heart. The thought of that made her sad.
The rest of the way home to her mom and dad she walked with her eyes open.
Her dad was sitting at the computer when Agnes entered their little basement recreation room. They’d set up an office space there and removed the bar, that homemade construction of stained pine, which had been the pride of the house when Sven banged it together some time in the 1970s. It had never been used, the bar. It had looked very cozy in the brochure, with all the neighbors gathered around, leaning on the top with frothy beers in their hands. The host was pictured behind the bar, with shaggy sideburns and an open-necked shirt, as he leeringly poured out a glass of wine for a woman who was probably not his wife. A bar in their recreation room was the only status symbol the Edin family owned. And it soon turned out that it was not the party magnet that the brochure had promised it would be. Probably because all their neighbors had one, too. Also possibly because it felt fairly unnatural to sit in the corner of someone’s den, perched on a barstool and drinking Bavarian beer fetched down from the kitchen fridge. Unnatural and not much fun.
They’d teased Sven a little for it, the bar having been his idea, but he always looked so hurt that they soon backed off. Agnes didn’t mention its absence now as she leaned over the desk to see what he was up to.
“Come and look at this!” said her dad, pointing proudly at the screen. “Our home page – www.gardenofedin.com. Clever, eh? The Garden of Edin.…”
“Yes, I get it. Very clever.”
“And, look, we’ve got some headings: perennials, trees and bushes, seasons, tips, the family.…”
“Family? Can I see?”
“Sure. We’ve scanned in some pictures of us in the garden. Here, for example, is one of Mom weeding the strawberry patch. Or this one, of you running through the sprinkler. How old were you, do you think? Five, six?”
“It’s really nice, but I still don’t quite get who’s going to be visiting it.”
“Pah! Word gets around.” By now, her mom had entered the basement and was standing behind them with a cup of coffee in her hand. “That’s what everyone says. We’ll have to tell some gardening magazines that we exist.”
“Yes.…” Agnes found it hard to conceal her misgivings. Her dad continued.
“We’re going to have a theme. A Year in the Garden of Edin. We’re going to photograph everything that we do, and upload it onto the page as a kind of series. Fertilizing, digging, sowing, flowering, harvesting.…”
Her mom broke in. “We’ve already started with the pruning. Show Agnes the pictures, Sven.”
Sven clicked on the heading A Year in the Garden of Edin and then on the subheading Spring. Images of a bare apple tree appeared. And then a picture of Sven sawing. The last picture showed a pruned tree. Her mom pointed at the pictures.
“Shouldn’t we move that one, Sven? We could place it more to the right. And move the heading up. What do you think, Agnes? Wouldn’t it look better with a little more space here?”
“Yes, possibly.” Agnes found it hard to see what difference it would make; all that she could see was that her parents seemed like children with a new hobby. They discussed fonts, tags, gifs, and html a while longer. It was a little like catching her parents in bed. There was clearly a side to their lives completely unknown to Agnes. Unlike any sex life they might have had, their interest in computers appeared to be something they were only too happy to share with their offspring – for her dad was continually trying to interest Agnes in different things on the screen. Finally, it was Maud who called it a day.
“But, my dear, you must be hungry!”
“Well.…”
“We were going to have fried herring with mashed potatoes, but now that you’re here, perhaps we should make something more proper.”
“Fried fish is fine. I won’t be staying that late either, so don’t put yourselves out for my sake.”
They climbed the stairs. Sven remained at the computer after having assured them that he’d be along in a minute. Her mom chatted on about the opening party and how pleasant it had been. And Sture Reuterswärd had been there too, and, why, if she hadn’t just seen him on the TV! The Fjellners had been so impressed when she told them that they’d been to a party with a celebrity. Agnes smiled. It wasn’t as if her mom was usually particularly interested in celebrities, but Agnes could understand how it must feel when suddenly someone you had only seen in the tabloids materialized in real life. Existed in reality, so to speak. At first at Le Bateau Bleu, Agnes had also been fascinated by all the famous people visiting the restaurant, but she soon got used to it. They were just people, too. Asking for the restrooms, pretending to understand the wines they were given to taste, leaving pathetically small tips, and letting their ties dangle in the sauce.
Maud took some herring fillets from the fridge, poured some breadcrumbs onto a dish, salted them, and mixed together some but
ter and dill, which she inserted into the fish. The potatoes were ready on the stove. Agnes watched. Everything looked so easy; with practiced hands, her mom did everything as if working to a well-rehearsed schedule. A knack is maybe what one could call it. But then again, Maud never experimented in the kitchen. She had her recipes, her dishes, but she’d refined them to perfection and prepared them with love. A love that Agnes had learned to appreciate over the years.
When she was little and her classmates were eating instant mashed potatoes and processed meatballs or frozen fishcakes with bottled remoulade sauce, Agnes ate the same. Although homemade. But she didn’t like it – she also wanted the brand-name, store-bought versions. In just the same way as Camilla wanted off-the-rack designer clothes despite the fact that her mom was a seamstress and could sew whatever she wanted.
Agnes remembered an occasion when Madde and she had gotten together and talked their mom into buy some canned bolognaise sauce. They wanted the brown bolognaise sauce that they were given at school and that they had to drown in ketchup to give it some sort of taste. Maud did what they wanted, but it was a one-time event, for somewhere deep inside their innocent souls they were forced to acknowledge that their mom’s bolognaise sauce was better after all, in spite of its being red and tasting of oregano and garlic.
The herring started to fizzle in the pan. A little of the dill butter melted out and slowly turned the fish from silver to gold. She helped set the table, her mom humming the theme tune to Saturday evening’s all-star celebrity game show. It was warm in the kitchen, and secure. Maud asked her to call her dad up from the basement as dinner was ready. Sven appeared on the fourth summons, and they sat around the table. Maud poured low-alcohol beer into their glasses and told everyone to help themselves.
After dinner, Agnes had to leave. Her train ran less frequently at night, and she wanted to get to bed at a decent time. She walked back to the station, satisfied and content. She was feeling better now. The serenity of her parents’ home had rubbed off. Tobias hadn’t entered her head since she’d stepped over the threshold at Snickarvägen. So when a vision of him squeezed into a pair of black Levi’s popped into her mind, she resolutely pushed it aside and decided to think of something else instead, something fun. Tomorrow was the big day.
CHAPTER 20
“NOT LIKE THAT! The napkins shouldn’t stand there like ice cream cones! It looks stupid!” Huffily, Kalle snatched up one of the pale red linen napkins that Agnes had just folded and placed on the table. He shook it out and refolded it. When he returned it to the table they both considered the result for a few seconds before Agnes carefully began to speak.
“I’m not sure if I can see any real difference,” she said. “Apart from the fact that that,” she pointed at the napkin that Kalle had just folded, “is a little off kilter.” At that moment, it collapsed down beside the plate. Kalle snorted.
“Yeah, yeah, do what you like, then,” he said and tramped off to the kitchen. Agnes watched him go. All the time at Picnic, she hadn’t once seen him stressed. Even when they were in deep trouble, he’d kept his cool. Could even joke around and calm others down. That was one of the reasons why he’d been so popular. In the kitchen, bad language and jibes were more common than encouragement and praise, particularly when things were getting stressed and the orders were flying up onto the board. At times like that, Kalle could stand there like an old seadog in a storm, issuing orders so that the guests could still, miraculously, get their meals in time. Maybe he’d inherited his father’s indubitable bank-director’s authority; whatever it was, people listened to him, obeyed him, and felt that he had everything under control.
What Agnes was looking at now had nothing to do with control. He’d been whining and whining ever since she came in. She saw Paolo and Filip making faces behind his back, so it probably wasn’t just her work he was picking on. Yet she didn’t feel put out. Who wouldn’t be nervous in his situation?
They had two reservations for the opening evening. It wasn’t much, but Agnes tried to console Kalle by reminding him that it was Tuesday evening after all. On Tuesdays, even Le Bateau Bleu was quiet. And anyway, wasn’t it nice to have a gentle start? Wouldn’t a rush on the first evening have been worse? Kalle didn’t quite fall into her arms when she said this, but at least she felt that he seemed a little calmer.
Everything was ready. The dining room tables were laid. Pernilla was standing in the bar slicing lemons. Candles were burning on the tables. In the window was a large, handsome ceramic dish bearing a mountain of lemons. Some of the flowers from the party were also still there. As far as she understood, they were ready in the kitchen too. All that was missing were the guests. It was half past six, and they’d been open for half an hour. It was often like this, most of the guests arriving at seven or eight. It didn’t mean a thing that it was empty now. It was like this at most places.
Agnes adjusted her top. She’d been right: the lime green color made her look pale. But it didn’t really matter. It was rather stylish, and anyway, what was wrong with pale and interesting? After all, no one was forcing her to buy a bikini in the same color.
At five to seven, the door opened. Kalle had already resigned himself to failure, convinced that the restaurant would flop, and had gone inside to sit down and work out how many decades it would take to pay off his loans. The couple in the doorway halted and looked around the empty restaurant.
“Are you open?” asked the man without stepping down.
“We’ve just opened,” answered Agnes. “Literally. You are our first guests. Welcome.”
The man and woman looked a little unsure and glanced awkwardly at each other. Did they really want to go in? They could still turn around and go to some other place with more people in it. It probably felt even more embarrassing for them to go than to stay, for they eventually stepped down into the room. Agnes gestured toward the coatroom and selected a table for them. Near the window, so that other passers by would see that, oh yes, here was a restaurant that had guests. Loads of guests. Two.
She gave them each a menu and asked as casually as she could if they wanted something to drink. They ordered two glasses of wine and Agnes left them in peace. Before going to pour their wine, she slipped into the kitchen to pass on the good news. They had guests. Kalle sprung up from his chair, in which he’d been slouching. He rushed to the door and peered through the window out into the dining room. He smiled to himself. His shoulders dropped and Agnes heard him exhale.
“OK,” he said to the others in the kitchen. “We’re rolling.”
Success would perhaps be too strong a word, but things had gone well. It wasn’t exactly as if Pernilla and Agnes had been rushed off their feet, but they had at least been kept busy. They’d had twenty-four paying dinner guests, and two who had indulged in a beer at the bar. The food had been enjoyed and highly praised, and their mocha broulee with candied pecan nuts had even made one woman promise that she would definitely return.
One of the two reservations, some friends of Kalle’s, had also been good enough not to demand a special discount, every restaurant-owner’s nightmare. All these friends and acquaintances that suddenly show up expecting free food and a liquor with their coffee simply because they’ve been kind enough to “pop by.” Agnes had encountered many such people. “Surely this is on Gérard, isn’t it?” was a question she’d heard countless times at Le Bateau Bleu. She usually countered by asking if they wanted her to fetch Monsieur Cabrol so that they could ask him personally, and they would usually quickly change their minds. It was one thing to try to talk a hapless waitress into giving a free meal, or even for that matter a head waitress, if she was just a young one; it was quite another to demand favors of the restaurant owner himself. Especially as Gérard Cabrol wasn’t exactly known for having created his empire on benevolence alone.
Agnes, for her part, had smuggled innumerable beers to Tobias and his mates over the years, but that was different. The Yellow Lemon Tree was not “someone else’s” rest
aurant. It was Kalle’s, and she knew how tight things were. Her friends would just have to accept that, if they ever turned up.
Before she left for the night, Kalle caught her arm.
“Thanks for this evening, and sorry for being such a grump earlier,” he said.
“That’s all right,” replied Agnes. “I understood why.”
“Thanks.”
“And Kalle.…” she added, throwing him a serious look. “You should definitely practice your napkin-folding skills.”
It was a long time since she’d worked a full evening. When Agnes woke the next morning, her calf muscles were stiff and she had a small blister on her right little toe from her new indigo sandals that she’d bought for the job. It was a price she was prepared to pay for being back in action again.
She fixed herself a bowl of yogurt and sprinkled a little muesli on top. The packet was almost empty, and what came out was more like some kind of insulation than a breakfast cereal. She thumbed through the local paper again, for what must have been the fifth time.
After breakfast, she walked into her sitting room – which was neat and tidy as usual. The light Ikea sofa almost looked like it could have been bought at an upmarket interiors showroom, at least from a distance, and the cushions were in natural tones. The armchair was the same model as the sofa, and the rug under the coffee table was also a light beige. A vase of full-blown tulips stood on the table; a few petals had dropped, and Agnes made a mental note that it was time to trash the bouquet.
She picked up her phone and dialed Lussan’s number. For once she wasn’t out rushing around but sitting at her computer. Yet Agnes could still hear from her voice that she was feeling stressed.
“Much going on?”
“Mmm, too much.”
“Shall I call back?”
“No, I’ll manage. If I don’t get it done, I don’t get it done. How did the premier go?”
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