The Undesired

by Yrsa Sigurdardottir

  ‘My point precisely. Cheers to that.’ Baldur toasted them all. Still grinning, he turned back to Ódinn. ‘Why don’t you just hand in your notice and come back to us? I’ve got plenty for you to do. Frankly, the guy I hired to replace you is a waste of space. Even you look good in comparison.’

  Rún gazed at her father, waiting for him to rise to this. But Ódinn was in no mood for the inevitable banter that would follow; he knew his brother too well to think he’d ever be allowed the final word. ‘Not now. Later, maybe. You’ll have to put up with the waste of space for the time being.’

  Sigga had transferred the mushrooms to a bowl, which she now carried into the dining room. Ódinn saw her nudge her husband as if to tell him to take it down a notch. Baldur, oblivious to such things, didn’t seem to notice. ‘God, I’m starving.’ Belatedly taking off his anorak, he started loading the meat onto the dish Sigga had brought out. ‘We’d better get a move on – aren’t you going to be late?’

  Ódinn shook his head. ‘I’ll go when I’ve eaten. It’s not that kind of party.’ He’d been invited to the birthday of one of their old circle of friends. He suspected the invitation had something to do with that phone call he’d made to Kalli – much too late at night and in a bit of a state. No doubt it had led to talk about what a hard time he was having, and made them feel guilty for neglecting him. Now Lára was gone, there was no reason not to invite him; everything would be like it was in the old days. Except that now they were almost a decade older and their circumstances were very different from when they used to meet every weekend to knock back booze and hit the town. They were all married family men; he was a single parent. Ódinn didn’t really want to go but he’d accepted the invitation for fear even more exaggerated stories would circulate about him if he refused, and he hated people feeling sorry for him. Well, he’d show his face but wouldn’t stay a minute longer than necessary. Afterwards, he was thinking of seizing the chance to go into town, since Rún was staying the night; let his hair down for a change and check out the talent. He longed to be with a woman, though only for a casual fling, if he were honest.

  They barely made any impression on the pile of food. Rún didn’t touch the mushrooms, as he’d predicted, but ate plenty of potatoes and meat. Ódinn leant back in his chair, sipped at his umpteenth glass of red wine and relished the sensation as the alcohol spread through his body. The wine might not be to his taste but you got used to it. Even the party now seemed an alluring prospect. ‘Thanks. Excellent food.’ He surveyed the table. ‘I don’t know what you’re going to do with it all. Survive on leftovers till spring?’

  ‘Rún’ll polish it off tomorrow morning.’ Baldur turned a serious face towards the girl, who sat staring, huge-eyed, at the mountain of food. ‘She won’t be allowed home until she’s eaten it all up. Especially the mushrooms.’

  Rún glanced at her father and Ódinn grinned to show it was a joke. She grinned back and he felt even happier. Perhaps they should move in here; there was no shortage of room, after all. The basement was bigger than their entire flat. Sigga would welcome them and no doubt Baldur would too, because it would stop her complaining that he was always at work.

  The thought was the product of the red wine; of course he’d never suggest such an unorthodox solution to their problems. Yet it was difficult to shake off the idea; Rún seemed so happy and contented in Baldur’s presence. No, the solution was not to insinuate themselves into other people’s lives but to sort out their own, to make their home life as easy and unstrained as the atmosphere in this house. And it was up to him to achieve it.

  * * *

  A smooth bass beat throbbed through the hot, sweaty air of the bar, penetrating every dark corner. There was no escaping it, but then nobody came here in search of peace and quiet. Ódinn stood at the bar that had suddenly emptied. A minute or two before, a crowd of customers had been trampling over each other to be served, but the moment this song started playing there had been a mass exodus to the dance-floor. He accepted a beer glass, beaded with moisture, from the bartender, and felt his hair bouncing in time to the deafening music. He had no one to toast but the barman, who barely reacted. Most of the other customers were younger than Ódinn and he didn’t know a soul. Worse still, the girls were all too young for him. It had been the same at the other two places he’d looked in on. During the six months he’d been absent from the scene, a transformation had taken place. His age group had clearly started partying at home – a pity, if the birthday he’d just left was typical.

  The gathering had been achingly dull, but informative. Now he knew there was no reason to miss his former friends. They and their wives had been a bit awkward around him at first, but, once they’d downed a few drinks, his old mates had come over, one after the other, to confide in him that they’d been meaning to call but somehow never got round to it. They’d keep in touch from now on, though. At first, he’d found this excruciatingly embarrassing, and, unlike his brother’s red wine, it didn’t grow on him. By the end he felt like telling them to fuck off and find someone who gave a shit. But he put up with it until finally he’d had enough and left the party to the accompaniment of sidelong glances from the women and exhortations from his mates to stay a bit longer – the fun was just beginning. He felt like shouting for joy once he was sitting in the taxi outside the block of flats. Never, ever again. He’d stick with his other friends – the ones who’d stayed loyal to him after his marriage ended.

  ‘Hey! If it isn’t the divorced guy.’ Ódinn wouldn’t have realised this was addressed to him if the man hadn’t grabbed his shoulder. ‘How’re you doing?’ He was quite young, drunk, but not completely plastered. He smiled glassily and seemed disappointed when he saw that Ódinn couldn’t place him. He took a step backwards. ‘Don’t you remember me? I was on my stag night?’ He might as well have been whispering but if the music had suddenly stopped it would have been obvious that he was yelling.

  The fog in Ódinn’s head shifted slightly. He ought to recognise the man. ‘My mind’s a blank.’

  ‘Don’t you remember? You were telling me not to get married.’ The man moved closer, leaning in confidingly. ‘Should’ve listened to you.’ Then he straightened up again and bellowed: ‘Joke!’

  Now Ódinn remembered him. This was the man he had struck up a conversation with in a bar the night Lára died. At the time the guy had been sporting a ballet tutu over his trousers, and his face had been orange from the fake tan his mates had smeared all over him. ‘Right! Hey, how’re you doing?’ Ódinn greeted him like a long-lost friend. At last someone he recognised. ‘You look different with your normal clothes on.’ He had only a hazy recollection of their chat, though he could remember enough to recall that he had talked a load of crap to the poor guy.

  ‘You were hysterical, man! Determined to tell me the truth about marriage. That it was hell.’ The young man smiled and gave Ódinn a friendly nudge that almost knocked him sideways. ‘Sorry, mate. But you deserve it. I’d hardly recovered in time for my wedding a week later. You kept me out far too late.’

  ‘It wasn’t that late.’ Ódinn had to shout into the man’s ear. He was so grateful to have someone to talk to that he didn’t want to risk the guy abandoning him because he couldn’t hear a word.

  ‘God, yes, it was. It was nearly eight in the morning by the time I crawled home.’ The man waved at the bartender and ordered another beer. Ódinn assumed he must have had a hard time hailing a taxi because of the way he’d been dressed. He was under the impression that he himself had gone home much earlier. ‘Did you go round and see your ex?’ the young man asked. ‘How did it go in the end?’

  ‘In the end?’ Ódinn stared at him in surprise. ‘I went home.’

  ‘Lucky for you. You’d have been in for a right bollocking if you’d gone to see her in that state. Jesus, she’d have gone mental, man.’

  ‘She? Who are you talking about?’ People were coming off the dancefloor and in no time the crush by the bar had reached its former den
sity. So bad was the jostling that Ódinn had to be careful not to spill his drink over the man.

  ‘Your ex-wife. What’s her name again?’

  ‘Lára.’ Ódinn didn’t correct his use of the present tense. He had no desire to inform the man that she had died that same morning. Especially since it appeared he had been badmouthing her, for no good reason.

  ‘Yeah. Lára.’ A third of the man’s full glass slopped onto Ódinn’s shoes. Oblivious, he carried on talking. ‘You wanted me to go along too, said she agreed with you and would tell me to call the whole thing off. Don’t you remember?’ Ódinn nodded, untruthfully. ‘Did you go?’ the man asked.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Phew! I was sure you’d gone to see her. You should’ve accepted a lift with me after all.’

  ‘A lift?’ He had begun to sound like an echo.

  ‘Yeah, I offered to share a taxi. I was afraid you’d pass out on the way. Jesus, I was wasted, man. And you. Wow. You were totally fucking brollied.’

  Ódinn wasn’t sure he’d heard right. Had the man said ‘brollied’ or ‘trolleyed’? It made no difference. He had been totally wasted. ‘Are you sure you got home at eight?’ It didn’t make sense. If this guy had gone home first, he himself must have been out until eight or even later. This was news to him; Ódinn had assumed he’d got home about six. But he had no evidence to back this up. Had he really been in town when Lára died? Maybe even in the area? All of a sudden he could hear, not music, but the wail of sirens connected to some memory he couldn’t for the life of him retrieve. Why did he have to meet this bloke again? The smallness of Icelandic society could be a curse.

  ‘Hey! I want to introduce you to my wife. Come on, she’s in here somewhere.’ The man turned and scanned the throng. Ódinn seized the opportunity and began worming his way through the crowd to the exit. Behind him he heard: ‘Hey, man! Come on! You’ve gotta meet Didda.’ But he didn’t look round. He had to get home.

  * * *

  The taxi receipt was buried at the bottom of the large salad bowl that Sigga and Baldur had given him as a housewarming present. Not so much as a lettuce leaf had found its way in there as yet; instead, Ódinn used it to store his credit-card slips. He sat on the sofa surrounded by bits of paper, too drunk to go about the task systematically. He had pulled out the receipts one after the other, dropping them when they turned out not to be the one he was after. The one he had been looking for was right at the bottom, among those he had brought with him from his old flat and chucked in the bowl after the move. Relics of old times, of life pre-Rún.

  Leaning back, he contemplated the white ceiling. It was better than looking at the Hreyfill receipt in his lap. It recorded the time he had climbed into the taxi and the place he had ordered it from. It seemed the stag-do bloke had been right: Ódinn had got into the taxi just after Lára fell out of the window. And – to make matters worse – in her street. Right outside her house, if the receipt was to be believed.

  A low thud came from the hallway leading to the bedrooms and Ódinn knew there was no way he was setting foot in there until daylight. He detected a faint whiff of cigarette smoke and his heartbeat grew rapid and fluttery. He would sleep here on the sofa; he wasn’t going into his bedroom for love nor money.

  Chapter 20

  January 1974

  The blizzard had been raging so long that the roaring of the wind and the creaking of the house seemed to merge into a ceaseless howl. Would it ever ease up? Aldís could hardly remember what silence sounded like, and even though it was warm indoors she couldn’t shake off the chill. It didn’t help that the windows were covered in snow. She worried about the bird, trying to imagine where it could have found shelter. For all she knew it might have been blown out into the barren wastes, never to be seen again. The thought saddened her, though she’d always known the poor creature might not make it. There were constant weather alerts on the radio, as if anyone could possibly have failed to notice the storm. These were the most severe conditions Aldís had experienced since coming to Krókur; it was the first time all the boys’ work had been suspended. Veigar and Lilja had judged it unsafe for them to move between the buildings, so for once they were idling in their rooms.

  She could probably have taken time off too, since there was nothing much going on. Veigar and Lilja were perfectly capable of cooking for the boys themselves and carrying the food over to their dormitory. But the thought of spending a second day cooped up in her lonely room was worse than being busy, so she’d decided not to go back there after breakfast. Her housemates, on the other hand, had seized the opportunity gratefully and were disgusted with her for not taking it easy like them. Clearly they thought she was showing them up as slackers, but then they had been working the day before while she lay shivering with hangover and anxiety under her duvet. She had no wish to repeat the experience.

  She surveyed the shining linoleum. Once the soapy water had dried it would look as dull and worn as before, but clean. This was a good time to mop the floors; she was alone in the building and there was no risk of anyone coming in and ruining her handiwork with a trail of muddy footprints. The speed at which she was getting through her chores made her feel much better than when she was alone and idle. It was satisfying to contemplate all she had achieved and compare it to the small amount that was left. It helped too that the howling of the wind drowned out any unexplained noises.

  Aldís dried her hands on her jeans and opened the door to the office. She had already cleaned Lilja and Veigar’s upstairs apartment and the classroom and corridor on the ground floor. All that remained was the office, one lavatory and the entrance hall. After that she would have to wrap up warm and brave the elements to sprint over to the main building, either to help with lunch or to inform the couple that she had finished for the day. She would decide which on the way over. She might even look in the cubbyhole at the end of the corridor, which served as the library, and see if she could find a book to help her while away a few hours, though she’d already read all the promising-sounding titles. Besides, she’d been neglecting her English studies; the textbook was gathering dust on her bedside table, so perhaps it would make more sense to knuckle down to that after lunch. It seemed the least appealing option, however; housework was actually preferable. The danger was that if she started looking at English grammar, her thoughts would wander and soon she would be thinking about the baby buried in the yard, or her mother, or the mystery surrounding Einar.

  She switched on the light in Veigar’s office and carried in the half-full bucket. The water was brown with dirt but Aldís didn’t care; he didn’t deserve any better. She smiled at this paltry act of rebellion. As usual she had to move with care in the cramped room, but it was easier this time as Veigar appeared to have tidied up for once, making it possible to dust. She wiped away a number of rings left by coffee mugs, wondering how on earth he’d found anywhere to put them down. Then, since everything else was looking so nice, she decided to clean the telephone, which was smudged all over with Veigar’s large fingerprints. When she’d finished you’d have thought the black Bakelite set had just arrived from the Post and Telephone Company. She paused to admire it.

  Before she knew it, the receiver was in her hand. It just happened. There was no need to wonder what was going on in her subconscious; at this moment there was only one person in the world she had reason to call. Aldís took a deep breath and stared at the snow-plastered window. Beyond it, the blizzard was raging unseen. The snow was sliding down the glass, on a downward trajectory like her own life. She could find no foothold, no anchor. Of course she should ring home: that was her anchor. All she had to do was dial the number; she could have done it blindfolded. What was the worst that could happen? Her mother would be at work anyway. But no sooner had she dialled the last digit than she remembered the storm that had paralysed the country from north to south. The bakery where her mother worked would almost certainly be closed.

  Yet Aldís did not hang up. She held the heavy receiver
to her ear and listened as it rang. The phone on the small hall table at home would be jangling; she could hear its thunderous rings as if she were there. She squeezed her eyes shut to stop the tears spilling over. At the fourth ring the phone was picked up.

  ‘Hello.’ Her mother’s voice sounded different to how Aldís remembered it – sadder, more mechanical. ‘Hello.’

  Aldís stood there rigidly, desperately regretting having let her feelings run away with her. This was the woman who had sided with that disgusting creep and accused her own daughter of lying rather than face up to what kind of scum she had dragged into their home.

  But this was also the woman who had spent so many evenings bent over her sewing machine, making clothes for her daughter so she would look as nice as the girls who came from wealthier homes; the woman who had tested her on her multiplication tables, put plasters on her cuts after childish escapades, and provided a sympathetic ear for teenage whingeing. The tears were pouring down her cheeks now. Of course she ought to forgive her mother. If the tables were turned, her mother would forgive her.

  ‘Hello. Who is it?’ Her mother’s voice no longer sounded flat but eager, as if she knew who was on the other end. ‘Aldís, is that you? Say something. Anything.’ Aldís knew it had cost her mother a great deal to say that; it could have been anyone on the line and she would have betrayed how desperate she was to hear from her daughter. It wasn’t like her to advertise her difficulties to the world. Smile, put a good face on things. Don’t show that you can’t afford the rent rise; that the electricity bill hasn’t been paid and is accumulating interest at a terrifying rate. Pretend you don’t want to go to the theatre in Reykjavík with your friends who can’t talk about anything else; smile and pretend nothing’s wrong. It’s nobody else’s business how you’re feeling. ‘Aldís?’ Her mother sounded on the verge of tears.