Tómas Jónsson, Bestseller

by Guðberger Bergsson

  Katrín rushed to the scene with a double pocket mirror and held it up to her father’s nose and mouth. The glass revealed no haze, though she stroked with her finger. She held the compact at his nose and kept it there awhile up against the nostrils, but couldn’t force a sneeze.

  They knew he was dead.

  Katrín had to borrow a phone from the milk store and call the GP, who listened to the corpse and after this was done wrote out a death certificate.

  The remainder of the day was taken up with the complexity of “planning a journey” in order to get the body back to Tanga. Katrín called Sveinn for help, but he refused to leave his job for something that was not beyond two grown healthy women.

  At the coach concession the women were advised to buy a coffin for the body, place it inside, and wait until the bus could “take it up top,” some time in the next few days; there was a separate waiting list for standing room. The woman found this an unhelpful offer, especially in such unusual circumstances, and Katrín comforted her; the driver suggested:

  You would lay him out for a wake for the week.

  Mom, we have no space for a body in the house, said Katrín, think about it. My husband will be furious.

  In modern novels, girls in the dairy line represent resourceful, left-leaning, clear thinking. When the girl in the nearby milk store learned of the trouble facing the mother and daughter, she said:

  If you are in a cooperative, the Association of icelandic Societies should be obliged to provide storage for you.

  Katrín borrowed the phone and explained to the Association what had happened:

  I do not know anything more than that my parents always sold first-rate milk. I do not understand how you cannot provide cold storage for Mom in such circumstances.

  We are not exactly dealing with milk here, was the answer, but we shall do our utmost to convey the body with one of our partners, on the first trip possible.

  This Association is conducting itself like a bunch of fanatical capitalists, said the shop woman. She gripped the receiver so that what she said could not be heard. Ask about the cooperative’s vehicles.

  Katrín asked, but when the person asked into it she reported that they were not able to put the extra labor on a driver, and the best solution would be to have the coffin ready at any time of day for when the trip might coincide with a delivery to the co-op in Tanga.

  Forget it, they said to one another. They are just prevaricating. We have to rely on the bus.

  The one “miracle” the shop girl achieved was to have the coffin delivered to the morgue at the hospital, and after that the women went home to wait patiently.

  The very next night the old lady woke up suddenly, crazy in the head and with no idea where she was until her hands touched the bed and felt the night-sweaty children, who now slept in each other’s arms. The woman lay there, momentarily still tired after sleep, then combed herself, cried, and after repeated attempts got back on track with thinking intermittently about two ravens on a telephone pole. She tried to make them fly, but the ravens sat still. And then to her great astonishment thoughts streamed from her mind, mainly regarding this fatal incident which she felt was too normal to be true.

  nothing normal can be trueshe thought a man rises up abruptly, belches in his dreams, and lies down again it is impossible that that is something as unnatural as to be dead he is dead contrary to the wishes and prayers to god that he be allowed to live as long as mewhile health and strength last

  Very unexpectedly she became beside herself with anguish and mental agony—as with an earthquake, when the earth moves in waves and the kitchen table slides about, or when landmines from the war explode and cups are thrown around in closets. Her thoughts fell silent:

  come to think about it the wire knot the doctor did not stab a needle into a cow in a stall I never saw the doctor’s hand operate the needle on one of the fingers of the body and pokes his eye I had never seen it one still has to get used to Ólöf on the pillow Bína with a needle poking creatures healing creatures

  The man had often told her, standing with one foot in hot water in the cleaning bucket before she washed the floor, the other in her lap while she washed his white varicose feet, that his heart had come to a stop with a flash in the hay barn; at first he had become speechless but then an idea flew into his mind, he sat on a hay bale, bent his head between his knees and clasped firmly, maintaining this fixed position a moment with his knees and hands clamped around his forehead and nape, so that the heart pumped again with a jerk. He stood up, felt dizzy, but survived.

  liked hot water no he was not too good to yes to use cleaning water for a footbath no he was not the kind of man to die without knowing it no life secretly hides he does inside the corpse in under the skin and she sat on a chair facing him with a heavy foot in her lap and dried between the toes yes yes apparently unaware of the kissing of his toes after this foot bath my dear she clucked and so sleep

  She started to believe these thoughts. She did not come to any conclusion, and yet she needed nothing but a chance to think.

  Take things calmly, Mom, Katrín requested.

  But her orders had the opposite effect. After lunch, the woman’s anguish reached the point where Katrín gave her a sedative, since she didn’t want to touch her food.

  Take this, three pills on an empty stomach, she said, reassuringly, and your cares will be gone, you will get your balance back.

  The old lady swallowed the pills eagerly and drank some water. Katrín stood at the opposite table corner observing the effects. As soon as her mother’s eyes became blurred she smiled a victorious smile. The remainder of the day the woman dozed on the chair with her arms crossed over the back of another chair. She felt like she was inside a telephone pole. The children came up to her and prodded her broken nails; they painted them with water colors and her whole hands green and the woman did not move one bit.

  Stop painting her, Katrín shouted at them, otherwise she won’t know she’s the same person. Would you still recognize yourself in the mirror? You’d at least be startled.

  The old woman went to bed entirely unaware and passed the night in shallow slumber.

  The next morning Katrín was going to give her mother more sedatives, so her concerns wouldn’t trouble her, but the woman flat out refused to take any more pills. Her suspicion that life still lurked hidden inside her husband had become a conviction, one she came to feel sure about while she was in the telephone pole situation. She could not dismiss what the telephone line had buzzed in her ears: without doubt there’s plenty of life still there under the skin in the ears in the eyes

  The woman demanded the body be checked by a physician who was trusted by responsible people.

  I do not want to live on suffering murder on my conscience, she said, resolutely.

  Katrín went to the dairy and said to the shop girl:

  The death has begun to prey upon mother.

  (Reader, your suspicions are correct: the cashier was none other than Todda Bomb, Haraldur Sóldal’s fiancé.)

  Todda called her sweetheart once Katrín had called a GP who made it clear that no one in their right mind could doubt the man had died of a heart attack. The response, hardly worthy of a doctor, aroused resentment in the neighborhood. The rumor spread rapidly, resulting in hostile divisions: for or against there being life concealed in a corpse. What GP dare be snappy and inflexible when answering a woman who has conviction and faith that life lies hidden in her husband’s body. They asked god to help them and the basement apartment filled with fervent women offering advice and wringing their hands over the GP’s irresponsibility, caring only about collecting money from people and not bothered to give effective treatments let alone examine women with a machine which uses steam to destroy unwanted pus.

  What medical implement is a tube with a sucker, they jabbered. Why not just invert a glass of water on the chest? Have to examine a graph? People have no need for all this, and who pays for it?

  We pay, wit
h our health insurance and our doctors and our taxes.

  The bustle, quarrelling, and panic in the apartment led to the woman feeling pain in her heart and screamed protracted moans, lying in bed with three hot water bottles:

  He knows he should be ashamed of himself.

  The women grinned triumphant at her bedside, at the head and the foot, by the wall, by the door, the closet, on chairs, and with their butts up against the antique sewing machine. By and by two or three went into the hallway to whisper:

  Truly, she does not have long left, they said and smirked and shrugged. A while since a woman has “gone the way of her husband.” Widows have become so healthy and unconcerned with obligation. Modern medicine prolongs life and a neglected heart encourages a desire to outlive one’s husband so you can finally blossom and go out dancing.

  The women were busy washing the woman around her mouth and nose with cotton soaked in schnapps and had bound her feet facing the North Pole with cords knotted to the ceiling so that blood would go to her head; just then the girl at the dairy came and said she had “arranged matters” so her mother could examine the coffin. A taxi was waiting outside to transport them to the hospital.

  The hospital carpenter showed them the way to the basement.

  I cannot have on my conscience the live burial of my husband, sighed the woman. Bury me alive instead.

  Yes, but Mother dear, said Katrín, if he wasn’t dead to begin with, he will surely have suffocated by now.

  I have thirty years of experience in this field, interrupted the carpenter, and know of no case where a person has woken up in his coffin, and that is not perhaps surprising since, in the past, corpses were bound under the throat but nowadays the mouth is glued together with adhesive plasters, or the corpse would lie there open-mouthed.

  I never saw him press the needle into the soles and he never poked around in the eyes, replied the woman.

  Mother, Dad has passed, said Katrín, this is all about you; leave him be. He is taking his rest.

  While the carpenter unscrewed the coffin lid, the women stood at a distance and held hands.

  Call me, said the carpenter, when you have had your ceremony.

  At this very moment some nuns who were carrying a coffin waddled across the floor to lay the tree-wood there in a corner behind the canvas screen. They came out from behind, dusted off their layered skirts, and stepped out of their wood shoes, which clunked on the stone floor. The woman watched them then approached the coffin with slow steps. She stood over it, listened, stilled her breathing and put her ear to the rigid breast. She pulled a pin from her tassel cap, closed her eyes and stabbed him in the sole. The body did not stir. The nuns were waiting at the door and raised their white kirtles. Katrín looked at them apologetically and snorted and twirled her index finger beside her temple. The nuns smiled and shuffled their feet. The old woman bent over the corpse’s face to kiss it a last kiss and stroke the neck, as one does with a corpse, but Katrín turned away and went to find the carpenter. The nuns walked out smiling in their crisp blue aprons.

  Well, Katrín sighed.

  In a few words, the carpenter explained to her how everyone who dies in the hospital has to have an autopsy.

  I am much more than a carpenter. I sew sheets to go around the bodies and I label the toes, so there is no confusion about the candidate.

  He laughed and added:

  It is so neglected. These are the things that make the mourner sorrowful. Sometimes I have to shave the poor wretch and trim them if they come to me looking awry. Some of the winos are significantly greasy.

  A person in your line of work must meet all sorts, said Katrín. Gee, I couldn’t stand it. I’d go mad.

  They talked for a while about hospital conditions, how Katrín had wanted to be a nurse, that caring was a rich vein in the female character, but now she only wanted to move to Mallorca or Spain.

  I’m not made for this cold climate, she said.

  The old woman lay her head down in the coffin, and as if overcome with grief she emitted strange sounds from her mouth, mumbling and sobbing and struggling to break away from the body.

  Stop, Mom, Katrín begged, tugging her black satin skirt at the back.

  She was trying to haul her mother away without looking in the coffin but the woman did not stir even as her skirt was tugged. The daughter stooped, defeated, grabbed her firmly by the shoulders and said:

  Come on now, Mom.

  Because she could not help keeping her eyes from the coffin, she saw a thick line of blood running from the corners of her father’s mouth, down his neck to gather in a puddle on the base of the coffin. She gave a low sound and the carpenter hurried over to the scene.

  What is wrong? he asked.

  No one answered. Katrín squeezed her eyes shut. The carpenter went around the coffin and came to the realization that the corpse had bitten the lips of the old woman while she was kissing it, and it had them in its teeth. With dexterity, without doing further harm, the carpenter managed to break the grip of the corpse’s teeth with a screwdriver instead of a chisel and free the woman. Her lips hung in shreds from the corners of her mouth like red pulp, and there were bits left in the corpse’s mouth. Katrín and the carpenter supported the woman into the service elevator up to the first floor, where the nuns received her and led her into the office, from where she was taken to ER after the receptionist said:

  Unfortunately, all general accidents fall under that department.

  And you should have seen the poor woman’s mouth after. The doctors had to cut the tatters from the remaining parts of the lips, sighed Miss Gerður, and stitch them back together. Sóldal, this renowned expert, did not even try to graft chicken meat on, as is done in such cases. No, her mouth was an open space. You could see her dentures, and when she took out her false teeth her tongue moved restlessly like a piece of blood pudding in a hole, and her uvula dangled. Absolutely awful.

  Recorded following Miss Gerður’s account.

  Those who listened to the story Sunday afternoon debated whether the corpse was awake. It was like a con. Some felt it had been caused by sudden muscle spasms in the jaws, but Sigurður argued that the woman had been bitten thanks to another unrelated story, published in the journal Writing and Art. A few years later I heard the same story over several cups of coffee outside Kjalarnes, with the exception that life remained inside the body and Sóldal pasted the so-called heart-cans on its skin, on either side of the neck, so they looked like sick thyroid glands you see in pictures of African pygmies suffering from iodine deficiency. One can was a pump that propelled blood around and the other was a suction device that drew it up through the body to the brain. The equipment was invented by an uneducated person or at least by someone self-taught. His name was Tómas, and he was reckoned to be a Jónsson.

  The old man, who had been a corpse, reportedly lives in full swing, for which he can thank the woman’s spirit and his own trickery; she should be applauded for her innate instincts about corpses, too, and last but not least Tómas Jónsson deserves thanks for his creativity.

  Their persecution, their dissimulation, and their inquisitiveness give me strength, support and justification. The defiance and contempt of the public is fuel for the artist’s engine and genius. Now they discuss my sudden weeping fits. What fits. Am I not even allowed my health. And to be made to go manage it in some damn complex, The Spa Center. Will nothing remain, finally, except a large dying torso with dead, dangling limbs. Tomorrow I will smoke you out like a fox from a spruce. I’ll remove your gas cans from the cubby (it is illegal to store gasoline in residential dwellings so you can have no complaint), pour them over the carpet and chairs while you sleep, then set fire to everything, scurry into the toilet, turn on the shower bath in haste, stand still in the seatbath as you burn and turn to ashes. I need to preserve the apartment to conduct certain experiments. I will say to the creatures, i.e. you: My sister and brother-in-law are moving here and they have no roof over their heads, and they are
demanding to live with their brother. I had to borrow from my relatives to pay for the apartment. Now everyone is gathering in the city. Forces conspire in a wasteland. No one wants to keep doing the things he is already doing. Rural folk no longer want to stay in their farm lairs and watch the sun disappear into the glaciers and darkness fall gentle and quiet over the valley, which sleeps an extreme slumber in the blue reflected glow of the slopes where lambs ramble nightdrunk in the dew by the streams, and the wind dies in the arid canyon. (Here I have succeeded thoroughly; chic style, nothing coarse.) No, everyone wants to get lost in the throng and live an oppressed life. To become wretched. To suffer from muscular dystrophy. Mentally and physically deformed. Enfeebled. Men complain and whine in a thinly-veiled complacence. These days, whining and cruelty pay best. Losers are rewarded everywhere, on the radio and in the press, and they act without consequence in movies. Everyone discovers he is needy. Why should people not pursue the renown that follows from inferior behavior. For my part, I say: I am a wonderful wretch. I need everything from everyone. And then all I do is write memories. I’m disabled enough and mentally paralyzed so that people get interested in my poor life. I’m going to write the first book ever with the intriguing title: How I became a mental and physical invalid without also becoming a jerk. Buy the bestseller by Tómas Jónsson, a book about a jerk that is being translated into seven foreign languages. The author describes with sensitive self-understanding and openness and unprudishness his mental suffering; he is an old, sick, and friendless invalid in a basement apartment of which he has been robbed; he is an invalid with shit on his ass. This gently written book is full of subtle understandings and awareness, full of sympathy for the underdog. The book is a warning to all of us who are not yet confined to bed. This is a book for the entire family, good for learning about life and the fate of children. A bold book. It will awaken many questions in its reader that will remain unanswered by the author; each must answer for himself. Is Tómas actually really disabled. Was he stripped of his apartment through trickery. Is he a dadaist. Did he rape a ten-year-old little girl down in the laundry room. Is he perhaps a homosexual. Is he a murderer. Who is Tómas. Is he all of us. Is he a symbol of the modern icelandic nation, mentally and physically disabled and ill-fitted with military clothes from the American base. About these and other questions, you will break your brain reading our must-have christmas book this year: How I became a mental and physical invalid without also becoming a jerk. Read the book about the man who wrote about his genitalia (the way people once wrote of warts) as a small but lively wart below his belly and wrote to Heads of State. Tómas Jónsson Bestseller—our christmas book this year.