by Kim Golden
“He’s probably in Christianhavn,” Mads said grimly. “That’s where he was last time I heard. Drinking away whatever money my grandmother or the state gives him.”
“I just wondered…if we should tell him that he’s going to be a grandfather,” Laney ventured. She took a careful step forward, testing the icy sand. “I’ve been trying to decide if I should contact my father too.”
It was one of the things that bound them–they were orphans of sorts. Both of them lost their mothers–Mads mother had died in a horrible car crash, Laney’s lost her battle with breast cancer. Both of them had also been abandoned by their fathers. He could still remember the night when Laney told him about how her father turned his back on her. They’d been watching a film–it was Susanne Bier’s first American film, Things We Lost in the Fire, and Laney had been quiet all day. He’d tried to get her to tell him what was wrong but she’d only flashed him irritated looks before she returned to pretending she was interested in the film.
It wasn’t until the scene when Halle Berry rails at Benicio del Toro and blames him for her husband’s death that she curled into Mads’s shoulder and whispered in his ear how her father left her, how he’d always made her feel unloved and unwanted. And Mads had confessed to her how his father could not resist alcohol, how he’d made sporadic appearances in Mads’s life, with promises as fragile as dew drops on a spider’s web. Promises Mads learned at an early age to have no faith in—they were just words…and words sometimes meant nothing.
“I don’t know, elskede,” he confessed. “I don’t know if I trust him in our daughter’s life.”
“Will she hate us though? We’re making this decision about her grandfathers. Maybe she’ll resent us when she’s older.”
He pulled Laney closer to him. He needed to feel her warmth, needed to feel that stability she brought to him. His chin rested atop her head and he breathed in her scent and the crisp air and reminded himself he could be a father without being as awful about it as his had been.
* * *
The last time he saw his father, he was sixteen years old. His mother was hooked to life support at Bispebjerg Hospital, and Mads was only allowed to see her for fifteen minutes every day. No one would come out and say it but he knew she would not survive much longer. He’d overheard enough of the doctor’s whispers to his grandparents, that she was not responding to any treatment, that the machines were the only thing keeping her alive.
Mads shut his ears to them. He didn’t want to hear what they had to say. He sat by his mother’s bedside and held her hand, ignoring how lifeless it felt in his. Sometimes he imagined she squeezed his fingers to reassure him, but he knew it wasn’t possible. Sometimes he reached up to touch her cheek or brush her pale hair from her damp forehead. And he talked to her, thinking if nothing else, she would know he loved her, he wished she would wake up, he wanted her to know that he was there waiting for her to come back.
Just then he was murmuring to his mother of what had happened in school, the new girl who was darker than everyone else, who was being bullied and how he’d stood up to the gang who always bothered her. His grandfather Henrik pressed his hand to Mads’s shoulder and said, “Your father is here. He wants to see your mother.”
“Does he want to see me too?” he asked automatically, though he had the feeling the answer was no. His father never knew what to do with Mads.
His grandfather patted Mads’s slumped shoulder. “Give him five minutes. He needs to make peace.”
Mads wanted to tell his grandfather his father deserved nothing, but the words felt tight and prickly in his chest. Reluctantly, he released his mother’s hand and let his grandfather lead him out of the sterile hospital room. When they opened the door, Benjamin Rasmussen was leaning against a wall, his jittery hands shoved in his pants pockets as he stared down at the floor.
He bit down the filthy words he wanted to fling at his father. They’d do no good. He just stared at him, unable to move, and wondered why now. Why come now when his mother had been in ICU for so many days? Why come now when there were so many other times they needed him?
His father finally pushed himself away from the wall and stared at Mads, as if seeing him for the first time. In a way it was. The last time they’d met, Mads was ten. Now he was sixteen and nearly as tall as his father.
“Is she awake?” his father asked.
“She’s in a coma.”
“I thought she was awake.”
“No.”
His father nodded. “Just as well.” And then he walked past Mads and into the room. His grandfather called after Benjamin but then the door to his mother’s room snapped shut.
Just as well.
* * *
That night, when they returned to the city and Laney had fallen asleep, Mads went for a walk and wandered the city in the wintry darkness. He told himself he was not looking for his father, but it was a lie. His cousin Henrik had warned him that Benjamin was still drinking, though not as much as before, still in Christianhavn. Mads had memorized the address. He found it easily, rang the bell and waiting to be buzzed in. The building wasn’t as shabby as he’d expected.
According to Henrik, Benjamin lived on the fourth floor in the elevator-less building. Maybe it was a blessing. It gave him time to think through what he wanted to say. But when he was at the third floor, his resolve faltered. Above him a door creaked open and he considered retracing his steps and escaping. Then he heard a gravelly voice calling out his name.
He swallowed hard. “Ja, det er jeg. Jeg kommer.“*
At the top of the stairs, his father waited, half the man he used to be. His once coppery hair was a dull gray, his face sallow and heavily lined. He was dressed in an old fisherman’s sweater Mads remembered from long ago and faded corduroys. On his feet were felt slippers that looked slightly too large.
“So you came,” Benjamin rasped. “Your cousin said you were looking for me. Well, now you found me. Come in.”
Mads followed him inside, glad his father had saved him the embarrassment of whether they should hug. They did not have that sort of history, yet he knew it should have been expected. The apartment was small–only one large room with a curtain sectioning off the bedroom from the living room. It was much more orderly than he’d expected. The last time he’d visited his father at one of his state-funded apartments it had been a tip that reeked of stale cigarette smoke and alcohol.
“Do you want coffee?” Benjamin asked but he didn’t wait for an answer. He shuffled to the small kitchenette and began prepping the coffee maker.
Mads stood in the center of the main room and looked around. On the wall was a framed photograph of the three of them–his father, mother and Mads from the one family vacation he remembered taking with his parents. They were in front of a caravan, and his mother was laughing, her head tossed back, her hair whipping in the wind, and a six-year old Mads was laughing too, his arms spread out as if trying to grab the world, while his father smoked a cigarette and grinned at them. Where had they been? Was that the year they drove to Spain? He could only remember they were together and it was the only time they’d all been like that and his parents weren’t arguing.
Mads shrugged out of his jacket and laid it over the back of an armchair. His father busied himself with pulling out faded coffee cups Mads recognized from his grandmother’s house.
“Do you need help?” he asked.
Benjamin shook his head. “This is nothing.”
When the percolator finally bubbled and hissed, Benjamin set about serving their coffee and then retrieved a tin of the butter cookies all the tourists loved.
They sat on the lumpy couch, the silence between them deafening. Benjamin coughed and cleared his throat. “Your cousin says you have something you need to tell me.” Benjamin said, bridging the uncomfortable silence.
Mads nodded. “I’m going to be a father…”
“Yes, your cousin Henrik told me.”
“I just wanted you to know. Laney
and I…”
“Is that her name? Your girlfriend?”
“Yes. We’re getting married once the baby is born.”
“That’s good. You can have a family then.” Benjamin took a slow sip of his coffee. “I wasn’t much of a father. I’m sure you’ll be better.”
“Do you want to meet Laney?”
“Do you want me to?”
“I don’t know. I thought if we met, I’d figure it out.”
“And what is the verdict?”
“I still don’t know.”
“Drink your coffee before it gets cold. There is nothing sadder than cold coffee.”
Mads did as he was told but he could think of a lot of things far worse than cold coffee.
“Do you want to be a part of your granddaughter’s life?”
“I can’t make that decision.”
“Why not?”
“That’s for you to decide. You have to decide if you want me there. I can’t force you to do anything.”
“You could at least say that you care you’ll be a grandfather.”
“I’m glad for your sake that you’ll finally have a family. I know you’ve been unhappy. I know your American girlfriend makes you happy. Your grandmother tells me things, so does your cousin Henrik.”
“I wish…”
“Don’t wish, Mads. Wishes only make us heavy at heart.”
They both sipped their coffee and stared at their hands. Mads stole a glance at his father and wondered if this was what he would be when he was older. Perhaps not, not now when he’d found happiness.
“Will you at least come and have dinner with Laney and me one night?”
“If you want me to.”
“Do you want to know me? Do we have to keep going on like this? Like there is nothing between us?”
“We’ll see.”
This was better than nothing, Mads thought. At least there were no promises that could be broken. He listened as his father stumbled forward with awkward small talk, filling the silence with news of how his drinking was not “as bad as it used to be.” He even spoke of Mads’s mother and how he’d visited her grave and left some peonies there. “They were always her favorite.”
Mads nodded and blinked away the hot rush of tears threatening to fall. He didn’t have the heart to tell his father that his mother’s favorite flowers were not peonies. At least Benjamin had gone. At least he’d tried to do something nice.
“So I will be a grandfather.”
“Yes, in three months.”
“What will you name her? One of those fancy American names?”
“No, Laney says she was thinking of a Danish name that works in English too.”
“You should name her Liv, after your mother.”
“Maybe.” But Mads had already thought of this. And when he thought of his daughter, waiting patiently to be born, her name was always Liv.
*Translation: “Yes, it’s me. I’m coming.”
13
BOY AFRAID
That night, Mads walked home in the freezing cold and tried to focus on what was ahead of him. He wasn’t the same angry, insecure teenager who lost his mother too soon. He was a man now. Soon to be a father. But walking alone, on near-deserted streets did nothing to improve his mood. He’d thought seeing his father and telling him about the baby would make him feel better. If anything, it had left an even larger hole inside him. Questions still remained unanswered.
By the time he reached Dronning Louise Bridge, the questions he hadn’t asked, the ones he’d felt too uncertain to ask, burned inside him. Almost too soon his apartment building loomed ahead. The sky was a weird orangey black with thick, heavy clouds. Snowflakes fluttered down around him as he stared up at the windows to his bedroom. Laney was sleeping still, he knew this. She hadn’t called and asked where he was. Lately she slept like the dead. Sometimes he woke in the middle of the night afraid that something was wrong and her steady, even breathing and the heat rising from her body was enough to reassure him. Maybe that was all he needed now, to be close to her again.
He pressed in the code to the main door and then pushed it open. His neighbors’ bikes were all jumbled to the right, under the loggia and protected from the falling snow. Tomorrow he’d have to remember to move his and Laney’s bikes to the shed. He crossed the cobblestone courtyard and then climbed the timeworn granite steps to his apartment. For a brief moment an image of his father, his lined face and sallow skin, his shaggy, dull gray hair flooded his mind. Damn it, no good would come of their being in touch.
He fumbled for his keys. He could have sworn he’d shoved them in his jacket pocket but they weren’t there now. Had he dropped them along the way home? Walking back to his father’s place would take too long and it was too cold. His legs were freezing and the gloves he wore weren’t thick enough to hold the pervasive damp chill at bay. A stream of choice curses rushed out of him as he knocked on the door. What an idiot he was…the keys….they’d fallen out of his jacket pocket at his father’s place and now he could picture them on the scarred coffee table, waiting for him to return to claim them. He’d have to go back in the morning. His keys to the workshop were on that key ring.
The door creaked open and a very sleepy-looking Laney pulled him inside.
“Where’ve you been?” she asked as she fidgeted with the buttons on his coat. “I woke up and you weren’t here.”
“I went to see my father,” he said and gathered her in his arms. Holding her close, breathing in the warm scent of her skin and the faintly floral scent of the oil she used in her hair always calmed him. “I don’t know if it helped. I don’t know what I want from him.”
“What did he say?”
“Nothing…I don’t know. I told him about the baby, but he knew already. Henrik had already told him.”
“Was he interested?”
Mads kissed the top of Laney’s head, then planted a gentle kiss on her forehead. She smiled up at him and pushed the darkness away. “I…he said she should name her Liv.”
“After your mother…”
He nodded.
“We should. We could call her Olivia and have Liv as her nickname, or we could call her simply Liv.”
“You’re okay with that?”
“I know you call her Liv already.” She stepped back and then pushed his coat off his shoulders. “I saw it on the designs for the nursery.”
Mads hung up his coat and unraveled the woolen scarf from around his neck. A teenage boy wandered into the living room. He looked uncertain, tired. “Hvem er det?” Mads asked Laney cautiously though he had an idea already. The boy looked too much like Laney’s ex, Niklas. He hung back and said a cautious “hej“. “Er det Jesper?”
Laney nodded. “He arrived a little while ago.”
Mads regarded the teenager. Something about his slumped shoulders and the dazed expression on his face reminded him of the teenager he’d once been. “Does your dad know you’re here?”
Jesper shook his head no. “I just needed a break. And…I missed Laney.” His voice was raspy as he spoke. He didn’t look up from his feet.
“You can stay here with us,” Mads said. Laney leaned into him and he slung his arm over her shoulder. “But you need to call your father and tell him you’re here.”
“He’s at a conference in Barcelona,” Jesper retorted sullenly. He finally looked up from the floor and raked his hair back from his face. A bluish bruise shined from under his right eye.
“What happened to you?” Mads went over to him and examined the black eye. It looked fresh, perhaps only a day old at most.
“Someone hit me.”
Mads grinned at him. “I can see that.”
“Who hit you?” Laney asked him. “Were you in a fight at school?”
“Skinhead asshole at school.” Jesper muttered.
Laney took Jesper’s hand and led him into the kitchen. “You were good at hiding this from me when you arrived.”
“I didn’t want you to worry,�
� he muttered.
Mads pulled out a chair at the kitchen table and gestured for Jesper to sit. “Are you hungry?”
“Laney already gave me something to eat.” But Mads began pulling cold cuts out of the refrigerator anyway. Teenage boys were always hungry.
Laney handed Jesper a bag of frozen peas. “For your eye. It’ll keep it from swelling more.”
While Mads made sandwiches, he eavesdropped on the conversation Laney and Jesper were having. There was an easiness to them that he hadn’t expected. Laney was sitting at the table now, holding Jesper’s free hand and telling him he needed to at least leave a voicemail for his father.
“Nobody cares what’s going on with me,” Jesper muttered. “I wish I could just stay here with you.”
“Honey, you know you can’t…you’ve got your mom and your dad.”
“You were the one who always looked out for me.”
“I know, sweetie, but things are different now…”
“Dad didn’t tell me you were pregnant. Does he know?”
“I don’t know. I left a voicemail for him but he never answered.”
“So…your boyfriend, he seems nice. I can’t understand him so well though.”
Laney laughed. “Speak English with him then…He can speak Swedish too. He used to live there.”
Mads grinned at the boy and said in perfect Swedish, “It’s true. I lived there for four…maybe five years.” Then Mads set the plate of sandwiches on the table and sat opposite Laney.
He watched how she mothered Jesper, how she brushed his hair away from his forehead and chided him for not getting a haircut, how she seemed to know the right way to ask questions so the boy would answer without the usual sulky “I don’t know” or “Leave me alone” he remembered from his youth.
And as they sat there, Jesper finally told them about the skinhead who’d stalked him, who’d called him a svartskalle because Jesper had a girlfriend–a girl who was born in Sweden but whose parents were from Iran. Mads inched closer to the boy, remember how it had been when he’d been in love and defended a girl…he still bore the scars from it.