I feel sorry for your dad, she says, having to put up with a depressive like me. But at least I know now, she adds, that I am suffering from an endogenous depression, and that it’s incurable.
They are sitting opposite one another at the coffee table and forget to switch on the lights. Outside darkness is falling. Mom has been honest. The girl would like to continue the conversation. Surely depression can’t be incurable? Something must have caused it.
But the moment has passed. Dad arrives home with Ninne and Ia, and there is no opportunity to bring up the matter again.
Afterward she is shaken. She knows who the professor of psychiatry is. He is the father of one of her classmates. He is a kindly, absentminded gentleman who seems to be from another planet, but he didn’t want to talk to her mother. Didn’t want to listen to what she had to say about her life.
And of course if he had listened, Mom might have accused her husband of having triggered her depression through his infidelity. A colleague! The professors of Lund are above that kind of tittle-tattle. No doubt they stick together, form a scientific front against their wives. Being unfaithful is probably regarded as perfectly natural, nothing to worry about. If a woman is betrayed and reacts with rage and despair, science explains that she is suffering from endogenous depression.
But Mom hasn’t said anything about Vibeke, even though she announced not very long ago that Vibeke couldn’t be trusted. And after Mom comes home from the clinic, she and Dad are very nice to each other. The whole thing is beyond her comprehension.
She lives in a state of uncertainty, like the interface between night and day, when contours are erased. When you hear a scream and you don’t know where it’s coming from—a perfectly ordinary bird or a mask with an evil grin. You know and you don’t know.
It is possible to exist in that state for quite a long time. You are enveloped in a lack of clarity which is unpleasant, but also merciful. It makes life bearable. At least it’s not too bad, existing in this state of incompatible truths.
They say that truth is indivisible. But in fact it is incomplete, because it has nasty sharp edges.
He serves tea, fragrant tea in a pretty little cup. He sits down opposite her, his legs tucked beneath him on the sofa. His black hair is shining. The room is light and airy, with colorful oil paintings on the walls.
She contemplates his young yet slightly aged face. The teacups are on the table between them. His face—no, not aged, merely inexpressibly wise.
She trusts him. Everything is drifting, just a little.
The weeks before graduation from high school are endless. She often goes to the movies, and tonight, cycling home: a flat tire. Disaster. Mårtenstorget is deserted, apart from two cops ambling across the cobblestones. No point in asking them for help. Particularly as the light on her bicycle has also given up the ghost.
Everything is falling apart. Pushing the bicycle all the way home is too much for her; she has no strength left. Suddenly the man is standing by her side.
Short. Immensely polite. Japanese, it turns out. Unfortunately he can’t do anything about the flat tire, but may he offer her a cup of tea? She feels as if she is in the middle of a movie, she can’t describe it any other way. That’s fine. She is very happy to step out of reality and into this film. He leads her across a black backyard. Film noir, like Le Quai des Brumes.
Flickering lights, tall shadows in the stairwell.
Film clip. She steps into a well-lit apartment, the paintings on the walls are modern and abstract and the film switches to color. All the time, that slight drift. They exchange a few words. Not too many. Light sentences, weightless like everything else. His English is soft, gentle, his questions discreet.
So what is she intending to do after her exams?
Oh God. After she graduates from high school? Leave home. As soon as possible. She doesn’t say that. I’m thinking of devoting myself to art, she says.
She is a little surprised at her boldness.
She wants to make movies. However you go about something like that, she says when he seems to be waiting for a response. No, she doesn’t want to be a movie star. She shakes her head. But often she sees completely unknown people in her mind’s eye, including a woman dressed in black, calling into the wind, looking a bit like Monica Vitti.
Yes? the Japanese man says encouragingly.
She goes on to say that she would like to make movies where her inner characters can be woven into the narrative, so that she can understand what they want from her. She has read about a film school in a Polish town called Lodz. She wants to study there. She doesn’t think there’s much chance of that, but since he’s asking…That’s what she would really like to do when she graduates, she explains.
The man listens. He doesn’t seem to think she’s being ridiculous. He nods. The room shivers, as if it were in a dream sequence. As in Michelangelo Antonioni’s films, where the images are so realistic that they resemble a dream. She doesn’t understand why she feels able to confide in this man, a stranger.
But the peace in this light room is restful. She has nothing more to say.
And at that point the man asks an unexpected question.
If you could choose your life, he says. If you could choose between a life that is all mapped out, with everything running smoothly, where no major disasters occur and nothing unexpected happens. And a different life with highs and lows, a life that brings despair and devastation, but also dizzying highs, ecstasy, truth, and moments of great clarity—which life would you choose?
No one has ever asked her a question like that. She has to respond. And her answer must be totally honest. It is like a prediction, but now she is the clairvoyant. She thinks about it for a long time. This is about her life.
The spheres in the paintings turn into burning balls of fire. The violet, schizophrenic lines are coasts and shipping lanes. The paintings lead her out, away from here.
She replies that she would choose a life of despair if that is the way to clarity, ecstasy, and truth. As soon as she has spoken, she knows she is being honest.
The Japanese man nods again. He would make the same choice.
And a feeling of happiness creeps in. He accompanies her back down to the street and bows to her as they stand by her bicycle. I wish you luck, he says, you will make it. And she pushes her old bicycle all the way home without even thinking about how far it is. Happiness?
That’s not the right word. She no longer feels splintered.
Whole. It gives her a spurt of life. She never sees the Japanese man again. Afterward she isn’t even sure where the movie began, outside which door. Maybe she was dreaming. But she chose the unforeseen, the unpredictable.
Devastation, perhaps, but also high points of great clarity. She knows her choice was true. It is one of the rare occasions when this is the case.
The day before her final exam she gives blood at the hospital in Lund; she needs the money. For once she feels so light-headed afterward that she has to prop her bicycle against a lamppost, sit down on the curb, and put her head between her knees.
Then she looks up. Strong wind.
Ragged clouds, scudding across the sky.
She has refused to buy a special dress for the end of the semester. Her confirmation dress, which Ninne also wore for her confirmation, will do perfectly well. It is raining in the morning, and she chooses her ugliest shoes—cheap, made of grayish plastic.
She just wants the whole thing to be over.
Three external examiners dressed in dark clothing are waiting in the classroom. She couldn’t care less. Like most of her classmates she is given a pass and is allowed to place the student cap on her head. She stands on the steps with everyone else, gazing out across the sea of families and well-wishers in the schoolyard. Dad isn’t there. He works as an external examiner in other towns. Mom isn’t there either, she’s involved in preparations for the party.
However, she unexpectedly spots Granny and Granddad.
Have t
hey come all the way to Lund for her sake? They look as if they belong in a different century. Little, dark-skinned Granny in her full-length coat and a hat with a veil. Tall, well-built Granddad in a suit, something she has never seen him wear. She is on the verge of tears. They really could have saved themselves the trouble.
So many garlands are draped around her neck that she can barely hold up her head. She is transported home in a wooden cart, pulled by some of Ninne’s classmates.
OUR PRIMA DONNA, it says on a piece of cardboard.
Three boys walk in front of the cart, blowing trumpets. Progress is nerve-shatteringly slow. Angry squalls of vicious rain. This journey home is lonely and desolate. She must show gratitude. For the fact that they are there. For the flowers. The music.
She doesn’t want to. She is playing a role, but in contrast to the role of prima donna, this one has been forced upon her. She stood on the stage because she wanted to be there. Now she feels as if she is stuck fast in a pot of glue. Like everyone else around her. They are stuck fast in an empty ritual, and no one can break free.
Back home Mom has made hundreds of sandwiches and there are lots of people, most around her own age. She hardly knows some of them. She doesn’t want to be the reason for all this fuss, but she is. She is given a small white radio by Granny and Granddad, who are staying at the Grand Hotel. Granny pushes her lips forward in a little pout, which means they are proud of her. Proud? There’s nothing to be proud of.
She plays her role. She hugs her grandparents and thanks them effusively for the radio. The punchbowl empties and the sandwiches disappear. She knows that Mom is just as unhappy as she is. Jazz and rock music boom from the phonograph, and all those high heels are ruining Mom’s newly polished parquet floor.
She is the reason for all of this. And she has to look happy, just as Mom, who organized everything, has to look happy. This is the communicating vessel. The game. The mendacity. No one can be honest, or else the entire structure will collapse.
So she dances. She laughs and says thank you. She accompanies her grandparents down to the cab, waiting outside. They get in, the cab turns the corner into Tellusgatan and is gone. The rain is taking a break.
Above the roof of the apartment block next door she sees the flashing lights of a plane on its way to Kastrup. And she cycles into town.
They move through the streets like swarms of grasshoppers. They call in at one student party after another. Laughing and singing. She does her best to get drunk, but a nail of sobriety has been hammered through her body.
School is over. Now she is faced with a black tunnel. She must enter it, and it grows narrower. She crawls along on her knees, hoping to see a light that will show there is an end to the tunnel. Then once again eyes, bodies, mouths.
As dawn breaks she wanders along beneath trees and streetlamps.
Someone is walking beside her. She knows him. She slips her arm around his waist and looks up at the lamps, which are crowned with halos of light. The gaps between the leafy branches of the trees shift and change. She and her friend climb over the fence into the Botanic Gardens.
The lilac is in bloom. The dawn chorus is striking up. His mouth is deep. His tongue tastes salty. Whatever is on the other side of graduation is shapeless.
I’m scared of the future, she says. He laughs at her, what is there to be scared of? He’s intending to apply to Chalmers in Gothenburg.
After his compulsory military service—she should be glad she doesn’t have that to contend with.
I’m going to Paris, she informs him. He pulls her close, still laughing. She slides her hand under his jacket and feels the warmth of his back. The sun rises higher, and the tops of the trees look as if they are on fire.
He gives her a ride home on his bicycle. She sits on the parcel shelf with her head resting on his back, feeling the movement of his muscles as he pedals along. The birds, they’re singing like crazy now. From the sky: light pouring down.
There isn’t a sound at home. In the kitchen she finds piles of plates waiting to be washed. Another day. Tomorrow. The bath is full; Mom has put all the flowers in there. They’re dying. She feels terribly sad for them.
The flowers are dying, and all for nothing. She fishes out a few of the cards floating among the bouquets and places them on the laundry basket to dry. She opens the door of her room. Dad is on a mattress on the floor. He’s home. He’s pulled her quilt over him.
He’s asleep. He has no pillow. He is lying on his side.
He is snoring softly. Why is he there? She doesn’t have the energy to think about it. She crawls into bed and gazes down at him. His hand is resting on his cheek, the palm half-open; it looks like a child’s. The daylight chisels out the lines on his face. She doesn’t want to wake him. She curls up, supporting her chin on her fist, gazing down at him. She is suffused with love.
She loves him. Utterly. She is filled to the very brim with love.
To the tip of every single finger. She falls asleep in the midst of her immeasurable love for her father. When she wakes, he is gone. It turns out this was his last night at home. He has left them, and he doesn’t come back.
4
an unfinished epilogue
Write.
I can’t.
No one can.
It has to be said: we can’t.
And yet we write.
It is winter. I took the car and drove here. The house is freezing. No ice covering the Sound, just assiduous efforts on the part of the water to solidify. And meanwhile: a faint jangling, tinkling, like crystal.
Pitch dark outside by three o’clock in the afternoon.
I open the front door and the darkness faces me like a wall. No lights. Not a sound, just that tinkling in the background, and the almost inaudible moaning from trees I can’t see. It’s not easy to write about this. So why am I trying? I take my flashlight and march over to the woodshed in my boots.
Then I get the food and whiskey out of the car. Some people say they prefer to drink in company, but for me the opposite is true. I would rather drink my whiskey alone. I started writing this a long time ago. Gather some memories, I thought at the time. Gain some clarity. They are dead. These days I usually think of them with affection. It’s as if we have become the same age over the years.
Writing is challenging. It is also difficult to give up. See for yourself—look in your family albums. There are secrets preserved from one generation to the next.
And lies that help the descendants to feel proud.
But I don’t want to lie. I stoke up the fire until the tiled stove is red hot. It’s too cold to use the upper floor. I sit beneath the old lamp with the green beaded shade. All I can see outside is the light from the neighbor’s greenhouse on Blidö.
I’ll give it another try. One last try. Dad had left us.
It was only to be expected, I guess. But it was unexpected. No one had expected it. It was expected and unexpected. Mom plunges headlong, with no safety rail to save her. The three sisters are confronted by their mother’s bottomless grief and rage.
Mom spends hours on the phone, they don’t know who she’s talking to. Dad isn’t worth a candle. Nor is Vibeke. There are no words in any language to describe Vibeke’s perfidy. But she is a side issue.
This is about Dad’s betrayal. Mom paces around the apartment, shouting out horrible things about him. She screams and bangs her fists on the walls; they don’t answer. She sits on the bed and contemplates her grazed knuckles: drops of coagulating blood. There is a hole inside her. Those injured hands cannot match the extent of the hole. She relives her life in a retrospective.
It passes before her in jerky sequences. The music she abandoned. Everything she set aside in order to support him. She bore him three children, moved house, ran the household. Mom plunges right back to the beginning of her marriage.
Was he deceiving her from the start? Has he always hidden his true feelings beneath that charming, courteous veneer? Were his daughters born against his w
ill? Has their entire marriage been a long drawn-out sham?
In spite of everything, Mom believed they belonged together. She trusted that feeling, and him; most of the time she thought they were rock solid. That’s why she often allowed herself to show her impatience, her discontent, her sense of failure.
She did it so that she could reach him behind that closed facade! As the girl listens, her parents’ marriage unravels like a badly knitted sweater. It seems to have been as lacking in content as Peer Gynt’s onion.
Ninne and Ia have several weeks left until the summer vacation. She is home alone with Mom. She was intending to head off to Paris after graduation. Soon she will start work at the Grand Hotel to make some money. It is as if she is standing with one foot in the air, as if she has stopped midway through a step.
She hears more than she wants to.
As she listens Dad is turned into a pathetic worm, a bootlicker, and a common liar. A flunky fawning around Mom. He went along with her wishes out of fear and to make life easier, which led to a deeper and deeper tangle of lies. Mom tried to talk to him. Pleaded with him to be honest with her.
He never responded. Not even when she produces the hotel bill that she found in his jacket when she took it to be dry-cleaned. That was before he went to America. A double room in Copenhagen. She puts the bill on the table in front of him.
Tell me the truth. Let’s try and sort this out.
But he turns his face away, stares out the window, then he gets up and leaves. He doesn’t even answer her! Mom thinks she is going mad. She doesn’t even consider that it might be Vibeke. They are just about to start rehearsing for the St. John Passion. They all accompany him to the airport together when he flies to America.
During the years that follow, Mom realizes that something is wrong, although she has no idea how serious it is. One day, quite recently, she is told the truth. A friend in her musical circle draws her aside after a dinner.
A Fortune Foretold Page 14