Frozen Tracks

by Ake Edwardson

  Nobody seemed to have noticed. Nobody had been listening to the busker. He stood up, grabbed his empty guitar case and his guitar, and hurried away.

  The sculptures were hovering over Winter's head. He took a step backwards and looked up at the roof that extended from the north arcade to the square. Four enormous ventilation shafts were fixed under it, like pedestrian tunnels. He followed them with his gaze. They came to an end just in front of the work of art. You could see the sky through a circular window. The highest of the figures were surrounded by mirrors that formed a circular prism reflecting the display windows of the shops round about. He could see the reflections of people moving. The white sculptures were of naked bodies, on the way down from heaven to earth. He'd looked closely at them for the first time the previous day. He was the only person looking up. Before long, several more people would wonder what was happening, and look up as well.

  The bodies were attached to transparent lines that seemed to freeze their movements.

  Some were jumping.

  Some were diving.

  Then he saw him.

  There was a new body hanging up there.

  He hadn't seen that one yesterday.

  White like the others, as white as snow.

  Jerner's features had stiffened just like the rest of them. He was on his way down from heaven in a frozen movement.

  His arms and legs were attached to wires that he must have carried with him through the ventilation shafts.

  He'd tied the last of the wires around his neck.

  Then he'd jumped.

  Winter was able to work all that out in a flash.

  He closed his eyes and looked again. Jerner was hanging there, frozen in his death leap. He was flying, just like he'd told his brother he would do, flying in his own way. Winter looked round, and he could see that he was the only one who had seen. Bertil had disappeared in the sea of humanity.

  Winter looked up again; he couldn't help it. Next to Jerner's left shoulder he could see the reflection of H & M's display window. The mirror was curved in a strange way that made it possible for him to see the bottom part of some clothes rails inside the shop. He saw a small, shiny wheel and something that could be a stay, or a stand of some sort. He turned round and forced his way through the crowd and ripped the clothes off the rails and there was the pushchair, and Micke's head was leaning to one side, and a little arm hung down and he could feel a faint pulse.

  On the plane he kept his leather jacket on, and his sunglasses. Somebody started singing as they rose up through the friendly black skies. Somebody laughed. He put on the earphones and switched on his portable CD player and closed his eyes. A trolley arrived eventually and he asked for four of the ridiculously small bottles of whisky. He put the earphones back on and drank and tried to think of nothing, but failed. The woman next to him looked away. He turned up the sound and the trumpet of Miles Davis blew everything else out of his mind.