A Nearly Normal Family

by M. T. Edvardsson

  People in the gallery are crowding each other, shoving and muttering, eager to get out. Meanwhile, I gather my belongings. My purse, coat, shawl.

  Adam tells me to hurry up. I don’t know why he’s in such a rush.

  When I stand up, it’s as if all of my blood pools in my feet. I can’t feel my own body, my head, my arms. I lose my balance and fall back into my seat.

  My hand on my heart, I sit there like I’ve cracked down the middle and concentrate on breathing.

  Adam takes my hand and helps me to my feet again. He tenderly leads me out of the room. My legs are heavy; the air is thick. We walk through the corridor, past all the curious faces and voices.

  “I need something cold to drink,” I say, pointing at the vending machine in the corner.

  I paw through my purse for some change. My hand is trembling; I dig and dig. I bring up a pack of gum and some hair ties and toss them on the floor. My hand keeps moving until everything in my purse is rotating like it’s in a cement mixer.

  “Take it easy!” Adam says, grasping my arm.

  My purse falls to the floor and I stand in front of the flashing vending machine, a quivering mess. Adam hands me two gold ten-kronor coins and fishes my bag from the floor.

  “What just happened in there, honey?”

  I know I have to explain it all to Adam, and soon. I don’t know whether I can.

  “The court will deliberate,” I say, sipping the water.

  “How long will that take?”

  I look at him. My heart is one big, throbbing wound. What have I done to my family?

  “I don’t know,” I say. “It could take anywhere from five minutes to several hours.”

  Adam looks around in bewilderment.

  “I don’t understand. Was Amina the one…?”

  I put a finger to his lips.

  “I love you,” I say, taking his hand.

  It comes straight from my heart.

  Adam and Stella are everything to me. I know Stella and I are everything to him.

  “I love you too,” he says.

  I hold his hand. No, I squeeze it, embrace it, cling to it.

  I have to tell him.

  108

  For a long time I feared that Adam would give away the whole thing. He would never allow me to carry out my plan if he knew what was going on. It was uncharacteristic enough that he had likely hidden the bloody blouse and then lied to the police about what time it was when Stella had returned home. I couldn’t let him find out any further details.

  He had begun to suspect Amina that very Saturday. After our lunch at her parents’, he hinted that Amina had been lying about spending Friday night with Stella. I’d been forced to put up several smoke screens.

  When we returned home from the police station late Saturday night, I lingered out on the street to speak with Michael, who had given us a ride home. He believed that Stella would soon be released, but I had read the messages on her phone and feared that the situation was quite a bit more complicated than we knew. As we waited for further information, I tried to insinuate to Adam that Stella was in need of an alibi. I couldn’t say too much; he must under no circumstances suspect that I knew more than I was letting on, but I hinted that he was the only one who could exonerate Stella by claiming that she had come home earlier than she actually had done. Of course, I could have lied to the police myself to give Stella an alibi. But the statement would hold much more weight if Adam did it. Who dares to question the honesty of a pastor who has spent his entire life campaigning for the truth?

  Furthermore, I strongly preferred not to testify. It wouldn’t be particularly exceptional for me to lie under oath considering everything else I had done; my professional honor no longer exists anyhow. At the same time, it was important for me to follow the entire trial as an onlooker. I wanted to see it all. I suppose it has to do with feeling in control.

  It was impossible for me to sleep on that Saturday night; the thoughts tore through my mind like galloping horses, but after a few hours I discovered that Adam was sinking deeper and deeper into his chair. He blinked several times, his head drooping to his shoulder, and I sat perfectly still without making a sound until deep snores came rattling from his throat.

  Then I quickly tiptoed up to my office and called Amina. She was agitated and almost incoherent. We decided to meet as soon as we had the opportunity, but that very night she had to call Adam and confess that she had lied. She must not continue to claim she had been with Stella on Friday night.

  Adam, however, was not so easily mollified. He has always been good at uncovering lies, and he could tell that Amina was hiding something. In fact, there are only two people who know how to lie to Adam. One is Stella; the other is me.

  On the Thursday after the murder, Amina called me again. Thus far everything seemed to be going as we’d hoped, but suddenly Amina was frantic and out of breath on the line. Adam had been waiting for her outside the arena, trying to squeeze her for information. She was sure he knew. Somehow, Adam had figured out that Stella and Amina were involved in Christopher Olsen’s death.

  I had never intended to reveal to Adam that I, too, was awake when Stella arrived home that night, but as his behavior became increasingly desperate I realized something had to be done. This was also the point at which I had the idea of moving to Stockholm.

  I love Adam. Our relationship has sometimes been shaky, to say the least; it has crashed and burned, but they say that broken vases last the longest. Two people who have gone through everything we have together, who have come through an ordeal like ours in one piece, belong together in a way that is hard for others to comprehend.

  In Stockholm we would be able to build something new from the ground up. At the same time, the preliminary investigation was dragging on, and I had to find a way to get Adam out of Lund before disaster struck. Although in the end I was forced to confess to him that I was the one who made sure Stella’s phone disappeared, and although he must have realized I was the one who had taken care of the stained blouse, I succeeded in getting Adam to follow through with his lie and give Stella an alibi.

  * * *

  The moment I discovered that Stella had left her phone at home, I realized that something was wrong. Stella never forgets her phone. With each passing minute, my worry grew. In the end I saw no other way out than to read through her texts.

  I read Stella’s last, desperate message to Amina in horror. For a fleeting minute I considered showing Adam, but I quickly realized that would be disastrous.

  I was sitting on the sofa, my eyes glued to Stella’s phone, when Michael called.

  “I’m so sorry, Ulrika, but the police have Stella in custody.”

  It was a shock to hear his voice again after all these years.

  “She has requested me as a public defender.”

  “What?”

  I was bewildered. Stella had requested Michael as her attorney?

  “Does she know who you are?” I had asked as he drove Adam and me home later that night.

  “Of course.”

  This was so typical of Stella. She knew that my relationship with Michael had extended beyond the professional; she had heard us speaking on the phone, and that was why she had now requested him as her defense.

  Because surely it wasn’t the case that she knew? That she realized Michael would break confidentiality and involve me?

  It was a dreadful decision, leaving Stella in the dark about all that was going on, abandoned in a jail cell. I felt so sick about it that I finally asked Michael to arrange a visit so I could explain, but Stella refused and I didn’t dare to entrust Michael with making her understand. There was no other way out. If I were to succeed in saving both Amina and Stella, this had to go to trial. The stakes were terribly high. I was risking my daughter. My family.

  * * *

  On Sunday afternoon, just after the police searched our house, Amina came to see me. Adam was being interrogated by the police, and when he called I bought time by c
laiming that there were still technicians in the house.

  Once we’d made our decision, Amina took out a plastic bag she’d had hidden inside her jacket. She explained that she had found the bag in a trash bin at the playground, and I knew at once what it contained.

  We got in the car and drove straight to the quarry in Dalby, where I stopped and turned off the engine on a small gravel road.

  I looked around anxiously before emptying the contents of the bag on the ground. Amina stood next to me, sniffling as I stomped Christopher Olsen’s phone to pieces.

  “Yours too,” I said.

  She looked at me, wide-eyed. Then she handed me her phone and I pried the SIM card loose with creeping-spider fingers before stomping it to pieces as well. I was wracked with agony, but there was no time to hesitate. At last I knew what was important, what really meant something. Here was my opportunity to prove it.

  I stepped onto the cliff above the quarry, to the very edge, where the wall of rock plunged into the dark water that was so still it looked like a deep, black hole. I pulled on a pair of gloves, then threw the knife that had killed Christopher Olsen over the precipice. It sailed in a wide curve through the air, and the edge cleaved the silent water. The deep lake opened up and swallowed it with a slurp.

  109

  Adam takes a step back and almost crashes into the vending machine.

  “Do you realize what you’ve done?”

  The pain is enormous. At that moment, I regret everything. Not only do I risk losing my daughter—Adam won’t be there either.

  “I did it for you. For my family.”

  “And Amina?”

  I nod.

  “But I don’t understand. I saw with my own eyes that Linda Lokind had the same shoes as Stella. And she followed her that night.”

  I drink up the last splash of water, crumple the bottle, and toss it in a trash bin.

  “Linda Lokind didn’t kill Christopher Olsen,” I say. “Everything Linda said when she was trying to warn Stella off was likely true. Olsen subjected her to atrocious abuse.”

  I take pains to really emphasize this last part. Perhaps I do so to convince Adam that he did the right thing? Perhaps it’s mostly to convince myself?

  Adam still looks confused.

  “But what about those Polish guys?”

  “The ones from the pizzeria,” I say with a shrug. “They’re certainly petty thieves and swindlers, but they have nothing to do with Olsen’s death. They just wanted to keep their pizzeria in his building.”

  Adam shakes his head.

  “This is crazy,” he says. “Why didn’t Amina say anything? How could she let Stella endure this?”

  I open my mouth, but my voice has vanished. Adam will never forgive me. He’ll never understand.

  “And you?” he says. “You, too?”

  This mostly sounds like a statement. I don’t hear any accusation in his voice.

  “What won’t a person do for their child?” I say.

  Adam gazes into my eyes. Maybe, I think. Maybe he can understand after all.

  “I love you,” I whisper.

  At last I know it’s true. That’s what I do. I love Adam. I love Stella. I love our family.

  Then the loudspeakers crackle and we are summoned back into Courtroom 2.

  * * *

  Adam and I are holding hands. The benches of the gallery are nearly empty now. Many of the journalists appear to have assumed that the deliberations would drag on, and so have left the courthouse. Others must have expected no surprising news, reckoning instead that Stella would have to remain in jail pending sentencing at a later date.

  She is so thin. Her hair is hanging in tangled clumps and her gaze is dull and empty. She doesn’t look in our direction. Like everyone else, her eyes are on Presiding Judge Göran Leijon.

  “The court has deliberated,” he says, looking at the lay judges. “We are prepared to deliver the verdict.”

  My heart stops. They have a verdict already? Although not even twenty minutes have passed?

  Adam squeezes my hand and looks puzzled.

  “They’ve decided already?”

  I nod and lean forward.

  The only thing that exists in my world is Göran Leijon’s voice. I don’t hear everything that is said, but the important parts make it through. The essential words find their way through the roar and hit me like a blow to the face.

  I can’t move. It’s as though my brain is registering the information but doesn’t want to accept it.

  After a moment I turn to Adam. He’s staring at the floor.

  This isn’t true. I can’t believe it’s true.

  “Stella Sandell is exonerated of the charges, and with that the court lifts the detention requirement.”

  A buzz goes through the courtroom. My brain is chaos. Can it be true?

  “What’s going on?” Adam asks.

  He looks at me, his eyes huge.

  “The charges were exonerated.” It’s not until I say it out loud that it dawns on me what this means. “Stella is free!”

  Meanwhile, Michael has stood up to embrace Stella. People in the gallery begin to move. Everyone is suddenly in a rush. A large guard puffs out his chest and readies his eagle eye. Only now can each part of my brain finally accept what is happening as real.

  “Stella!” I cry, forcing my way between the chairs, passing under the sharp gaze of the guard, and butting my way past Michael’s teary smile.

  As if on a bridge spanning the shit that has happened, through a tunnel of brilliant, streaming light, I dive right into Stella’s arms.

  Behind us I hear Adam’s astonished voice.

  “Is this real? What happened?”

  “The chain of evidence broke,” Michael says with such pride in his voice that one might think this is primarily thanks to him. “After your testimony, and Amina’s, there was far too much doubt. They were forced to free Stella.”

  Adam stares at Michael.

  “I apologize for questioning your methods, but I didn’t know what was going on,” he says. “I understand now what you’ve done for my family.”

  Michael looks almost overwhelmed. He nods at Adam and then, when he sneaks a look in my direction, I catch a glimpse of a smile. It looks like he’s enjoying this. Is that why he does it?

  “I’m sorry, Stella,” I say, moving a lock of hair away from her pale cheek.

  “For what?”

  “For this. For everything.”

  She looks at me for a long time.

  My little girl. I stick to her trembling body like a Band-Aid. I tighten my arms around her; I never want to let go of her again. Her heart beats against my breast and the longing in our eyes calms, finding peace.

  “Mom,” she whispers.

  It doesn’t matter if she’s eighteen years or four weeks old. She is always my child.

  I would do anything for her.

  “I love you, Mom.”

  I try to respond, but it all gets caught in my throat. Like a clot of emotions. Years of pent-up yearning forming a dam in my throat. And when it breaks, it feels as if my whole body turns to liquid.

  Time doesn’t exist; space has no meaning. We flow together in eternity, my little girl and me. Slowly, she leans forward and whispers in my ear.

  “I sure picked a good lawyer, didn’t I?”

  My body goes hard and stiff. As Stella pulls away, I can see myself in her eyes. She turns to her father.

  Adam looks wrecked. As if something fundamental has broken.

  I have let him down one time too many. If Adam finds out about Michael and me … I would never be able to repair that.

  Michael smiles at me again. I turn toward Stella.

  “Thanks,” she whispers to her dad.

  Adam is crying like a child. He just lets it all come out, absolutely uninhibited and stripped bare.

  Stella extends a hand to touch him. Adam watches her hand move, sees the fingers stretching out and meeting his skin. The tiny hairs on his
arm stand up.

  “Does it feel good in your heart now?” Stella asks.

  Epilogue

  After I’d rung the bell at Chris’s place and pressed my ear to the door, I rushed back down the stairs. I got on my bike and pedaled around the neighborhood aimlessly as I tried to figure out what had happened. Had Linda Lokind really been following me, or was it all in my mind? Was I losing it?

  I’ve always been different and I’ve never really seen myself reflected in other people. What if I’d always been heading for this: a psychosis just waiting to blossom?

  After a few random rounds, I parked my bike outside Polhem and sat down on a bench. My legs were shaking and I could feel my pulse pounding at my temples. I couldn’t just bike home and leave Amina.

  For the hundredth time I read her text.

  Everything’s ok. Sleeping. See you tomorrow. <3

  I could buy the heart at the end. But ok? Periods in a text? No, not a chance. I frantically scrolled through the mile-long thread of texts we’d exchanged and found that sure enough, Amina had never ended a single text with a period. She hadn’t written that text.

  It must have been Chris. He was refusing to answer my calls or texts. Had Linda Lokind been telling the truth after all? What if Chris was holding Amina prisoner? Or even worse…?

  I paced up and down the street, impatient, walking into the schoolyard and up to the roundabout and back again. I went along the hedge, over to the building where Chris lived. I stared up at his window, but noticed a shadowy figure in the window next door and hurried back toward the school. As soon as I stopped, sat down, or leaned against a tree, that creeping sensation came back, tiny insect feet on my skin, unrelenting twitches of muscle that forced me back up and off again.

  * * *

  When the silence broke, I was in the middle of my course between the schoolyard and the playground, fifty meters from Chris’s building. Out of nowhere, the night filled with the patter of tottering footsteps, repressed screams against the asphalt.