The Glitter Scene

by Monika Fagerholm

  Coffinhell. Tom Maalamaa has given the show away, but only for a few moments, then he pulls his act together again—and forever.

  Maj-Gun gets everything, right in front of the noses of the husband’s side of the family too, who have been putting on a show for the aunt since she became a widow. Dick and Duck, amusing maybe, because against the good advice of his relatives’ and his family’s lawyers her husband had refused to sign a prenuptial agreement so everything he owned went to his wife. Properties, stocks, and what in inheritance language is called “loose money,” cash in other words.

  The significance of this inheritance for Maj-Gun should not be underestimated. Not due to any malicious pleasure in the presence of the relatives or her brother who had hidden his greediness well with his smooth walking and talking: things like this pass, are evened out. And besides, those differences of opinion they had during childhood, they really were not that bad: mutual frustration and irritation as said, like dogs and cats, which Mama Inga-Britta always used to say.

  Not to mention that Maj-Gun is going to give her brother a portion of this “loose money,” including a share of the revenue from the aunt’s home in Portugal when she sells it a few years later.

  But Maj-Gun Maalamaa is going to become respectable. A word she quickly learns to master during her law studies, which she starts a year and a half after her aunt’s passing and finishes brilliantly and quickly, with family law, inheritance law, and the like as her areas of specialization. And she finds daily use for it during those years after graduation when she works as a family lawyer at a distinguished law firm in the city by the sea.

  But financially independent, djeessuss. It will provide her with a certain freedom—and space. She will have many rooms, rooms upon rooms upon rooms. Will not have to live in an apartment, never live in an apartment again.

  •

  “Susette, wait!”

  But, still, at the cemetery, the burial: the wooden lid and the flowers, the wreaths, a sea, the ribbons: “wonderful is short,” “a final farewell.” One thing, the most important.

  Maj-Gun in a red coat, like a stoplight alone by the grave, she has stayed behind. A few others, a couple, also dawdling on the gravel path. Susette and Tom.

  “Wait! Susette!”

  Susette obeys, turns around, hesitates.

  Tom Maalamaa one step ahead of his fiancée, scarf flapping in the wind, also stops, looks back. Susette says something to him, speaks softly, he shrugs, waves to Maj-Gun “so long”; they are going to see each other at the reception. Removes himself with determined steps, perhaps a bit relieved.

  Maj-Gun and Susette. Susette on the gravel path, Maj-Gun who walks up to her. And again: how long ago. The newsstand, all the stories, an apartment, a cat. Susette, to life—an invitation, shoulder pad wearing, in smoke, at a disco. Susette now: her big eyes, eyelashes covered with mascara, but only a bit, and on her full lips, a little lipstick, coral colored, “discreet.” In nice clothes. Gray winter coat, ankle boots, dark gray suede, heels just the right height, elegant.

  Rug rags, silk velvet rag—something unexplainable that bound them together. And the District, the marshiness. Maybe it can still, faintly, be discerned, like from under layer upon layer upon layer: the smell of a winter day. Rain that became whirling snow, her wet mittens, fingers frozen anyway, blocks of ice. Wind and tight jeans. That thing inside Susette which made it look like she was always cold. And cowboy boots, boots.

  The defenselessness. And: Susette in the hangout. One moment, gone. And nevermore.

  Because now Maj-Gun says: sorry. A few times. And, well, she knows it does not make things better by saying it but is there something she can do now?

  Susette is silent, picks at the ground with the toe of her boot, globs of snow, earth. Starts, “It turned out… wrong…”

  Looks up again, as an introduction to something else, so to speak, longer. Maybe that she, so many years later when they meet again by chance, is going to mention, in passing. How depressed she was, had been. For many years, the Sorrow: over and after her mother—the words she does not have now but will have later. Has had the common sense to get therapy.

  Or maybe she, Susette, actually thought about saying something else.

  But she has grown silent again, lowered her gaze again, toward the ground and then says softly but clearly, audible and determined: “Maj-Gun. Now you have to promise me something. That you, we, will NEVER talk about this again.”

  And before Maj-Gun has a chance to answer, say that she promises because she does of course (she promises something else at the same time in silence: that they, she and Susette, will never ever again under any circumstances whatsoever hang out in any way shape or form), Susette has looked up again and pointed at her stomach. Smiling, in the midst of everything, brought her finger to her mouth: “Sshhhhhh…”

  And Maj-Gun, who idiotically, but almost as a reflex, thinks in that moment about pointing at her own stomach as well.

  Oh no, still not. Remains an idea and then Susette says, “It is more than a month now. Tom and I. We’re going to get married and have a baby.”

  Tom. That rascal—

  But at the same time. Maj-Gun remembers. Solveig on the square. In Solveig’s eyes. “A wild pain.”

  “Djess… Wow, Susette,” Maj-Gun quickly corrects herself, now you can say whatever you want, came pouring out like from “The Book of Quick-Witted Sayings,” almost grotesque but still. “Moving fast. At least he shaved off those awful cones on his cheeks, what were they—sideburns?”

  Susette laughs. Yes yes, her suggestion, terrible, she has to admit.

  And then in the middle of everything, an even bigger smile on her face, and it comes suddenly, almost like an exhalation.

  “Oh, Maj-Gun. I remember you in the newsstand. Starling darling. How cuckoo so to speak.” She never forgets, she adds, with delight. As if it were a thousand years ago—“And how did it go again? Just because you’re a count—”

  Maj-Gun thinks, hardened. She had reeled Susette in, on the square. Did not know what she was going to do with her. “It turned out wrong.”

  “The Angels of Death,” “I’m fascinated by the Death inside her.” Tom Maalamaa, the rectory, their childhood. Then—rug rags…

  She does not answer. What should she say? Cuckoo?

  “Maj-Gun you could. Say everything so well. Starl—”

  And then there is not much more, Susette suddenly grows quiet, they have started walking.

  “My deepest condolences,” Susette says later, serious again.

  “Me too,” Maj-Gun replies. “So Susette,” she has gotten ready, because the bad conscience has hit her again and hindered other thoughts, “you remember—how I could carry on. But I just wanted to say. That she, Liz, my aunt, was actually quite okay.”

  “You’ve gotten thinner. Red suits you. I’m going to sell the apartment—”

  But then they were already at the gate, had left the cemetery behind them.

  And her brother there, Tom Maalamaa by his dark car in the parking lot. Regardless of how stupid it looked when he leaned against it, Maj-Gun is not able to contain herself; in the middle of everything she runs away from Susette, up to her brother, and practically throws her arms around his neck. “Congrats congrats, she told me,” whispered this, as if for that reason, that is, in other words, what the hug looks like.

  “Hey, hey, Sis, careful…” But in reality, something else. Maybe like this: that both siblings, Maj-Gun, Tom, suddenly know something else too. Two children from the rectory, siblings, ruffled hair, uncomfortable wrinkled brows in the sun, pulled from inside the house, a summer day. Recently pulled from their activities inside the house. “Out into the fresh air, out out!”

  After Hamba Hamba, the docklands in Borneo, hey Harlot there aren’t any harbors here, Hamba Hamba, anyway, clap clap, the Girl from Borneo—

  Like a farewell, an end to childhood, farewell to this: that childhood, it stops here.

  And Liz
Maalamaa, the mask, it belonged here. Death, the Angel of Death, all of it. But still, is Maj-Gun the only one?—maybe, leads over into something else—

  At the same time, a feeling, inexpressible: away, do not look back, pushes her face against Tom’s throat so long that it almost becomes cuckoo.

  “Are you coming with us?” Susette is suddenly asking, is standing behind them.

  “Nah,” Maj-Gun jumps back, shakes her head.

  “I’m going with…” Whom is she going with? She will certainly get a ride from one of the other relatives and friends and so on to the reception in the fellowship hall.

  “See you.”

  “See you.”

  And Maj-Gun is standing alone in a pretty much empty parking lot.

  On the other hand. In a way too: idiot. Everyone has already left. But of course there is always, as her aunt Liz used to say, “the apostle’s horses.”

  The apostle’s horses. Comfortable shoes. Missionary boots. You certainly get around that way too. Half a mile to the reception, the fellowship hall, she has started walking.

  •

  A few weeks later Maj-Gun travels to Portugal where she gives birth in September. She calls Solveig. Solveig comes, with her daughter Irene. She cannot keep the child. Solveig gets the child.

  Come and see my gallery. A white wall in Portugal.

  And then she studies law and is accepted into law school.

  THE GLITTER SCENE, 2006

  (The new songs)

  The new songs had no humility. They pushed past the veil and opened a window into the darkness and climbed through it with a knife in their teeth. The songs could be about rape and murder, killing your dad and fucking your mom, and then sailing off on a crystal ship to a thousand girls and thrills, or going for a moonlight drive. They were beautiful songs, full of places and textures—flesh, velvet, concrete, city towers, desert sand, snakes, violence, wet glands, childhood, the pure wings of night insects. Anything you could think of was there, and you could move through it as if it were an endless series of rooms and passages full of visions and adventures. And even if it was about killing and dying—that was just another place to go.

  (MARY GAITSKILL: Veronica)

  The Glitter Scene, “Ready to be gone”

  Ulla Bäckström has now opened the door to the Glitter Scene, the drapery, which is like a curtain, has been pulled to the side.

  She is standing on the edge, white skirts, swaying.

  In the wind, her hair, her teased hair, insects glittering.

  In the wind, glittering in the glow from the Winter Garden, the darkness, the fire, the wind

  THE SILVER PARTY SHOES

  To the Winter Garden (Liz Maalamaa’s things): the Silver Party Shoes, made of strass, with a brooch. Purchased in Rio de Janeiro, 1952. She loved the shoes. Her party shoes. Liked dancing too. Sometimes.

  Come and see my gallery. A white wall in Portugal. Liz Maalamaa’s gallery. Everything she held dear on the wall. Photographs, a brother, a family on a farm, a map of China. Portraits of her idols, black-and-white pictures, with autographs. Ingrid Bergman, Ava Gardner.

  A postcard, two swans among other swans. Dick and Duck. And the godchildren, her brother’s children, several photos. Maj-Gun on a boat. Majjunn, as Liz Maalamaa always called her niece, in a sun hat, dress, laughing, looks happy. A child’s drawing. A woman with a mask. Represented her, the children’s aunt Liz. “To Liz from Majjunn.” The dogs of course. Handsome, Ransome: she had two. Expensive lapdogs, the first one died almost right away from a congenital condition, the other died ten years later after securing a happy life and old age under the aunt’s jacket.

  The silver shoes on a podium. They are a memory, not even particularly worn. Liz Maalamaa, who comes from simple circumstances, is careful about dealing with things carefully.

  TO ROSENGÅRDEN 2

  (Tom Maalamaa, 2006)

  THERE IS A CAR on its way into Rosengården 2. It has stopped at the gate, the chauffeur rolls down the window, punches in a code on the keypad, the right number, they are expected guests, okay okay, green light, the gate opens. Entrance road, November 2006, dark car, strong headlights that light up the deep, dark fall night.

  “Courage.” Tom Maalamaa is the one who is driving, his wife is sitting next to him, just the two of them. Both children who are still living at home are home, with the aupairgirl Gertrude. In the new service residence on the other side of the city by the sea, a suburb, the diplomats’ area. They have recently arrived, just a few weeks ago, back in their homeland again. They are going to stay for a while, maybe even a few years; this appointment. The family has not lived in the house for many days, yet the husband, who is otherwise always a pillar of patience with his wife and the family in general, despite the fact that he has a lot on his mind when it comes to his job, had time to get irritated about the fact that the unpacking was taking so long, going at a snail’s pace, mess everywhere.

  So it is nice to get out a bit, away, on an invitation. Maybe Tom Maalamaa says “courage” to his wife in the car for exactly that reason. His wife does not always like going out, spending time with other people, acquaintances, strangers, “keeping up appearances” or, like now, meeting some of his friends from way back when, during his time at university. Peter and Nellevi, both architects, whom it will be really nice to meet up with after so many years, now, here in the homeland where Tom Maalamaa with family has not lived in seventeen years. Even if it cannot be seen on her, the wife, that is. Susette Maalamaa never complains; that she can feel uncomfortable in the company of others is something only he, Tom, her husband, knows. Or feels, because they have not spoken about it very much.

  Actually, Tom Maalamaa thinks in the car in Rosengården about his wife Susette, that there is a lot he does not know about her. But that is okay, as it should be. There are mysteries, air between people, especially the ones who are closest to you. He has a habit of saying that to his wife sometimes. She agrees, nods, smiles, looks at him, her beautiful eyes. Which he cannot “read”; her look. Still, even though it was many, many years ago, he can remember the time she came to him in his tiny bachelor pad in the center of the city by the sea. It was that year, 1989, when they met again after having been together for a short period as teenagers when they were both living in the District. That fall, somewhat earlier, he had, after many years, run into her anew at a disco in the city by the sea. Actually that time he had only seen her at a distance but it stirred something old in him to life. Strongly.

  He called her a few times that fall and they had seen each other, fleetingly, at a café. She had been evasive, distant, and he already had time to think: disappointment. But then in November, that same fall, November 1989, one night, a telephone call from her: “You have to come.” And he had come, he had found her, picked her up. So still, because she was the one who had called, because of that attraction in her, in the end it was still she who had come to him.

  Moving. Those eyes, of course. But also something else. There was, in other words, in all of her something appealing, in general. Had been there from the beginning, as a teenager. And at the same time, when you thought about it, with that word, determined it in that way in your head, it still turned out wrong. It was still something else.

  Which maybe was something that could not be expressed in words, and it had always existed between them.

  She and he, Susette and Tom: what had really started as a game during childhood, and not even an innocent game, one she really had not wanted to get involved in. But a game he had played with his sister Maj-Gun, in the rectory. A restless childhood, not on the outside, but maybe exactly for that reason, in peace and quiet, a certain frustration. They were two children who had, in some way, not really done themselves justice; there were growing pains of course, because it passed later. But there are children who are not in step, not with other children or with their childhood in general. In step with their childhood the way they expect it to be: often intelligent children, sensible—be
cause only intelligent and sensitive children clearly sense such expectations from their surroundings. Especially unspoken expectations, and they can, these children, if they are keen, receptive, be petrified by them. Not difficult children, but calm ones: children without all that energetic spring inside them that would make it possible for them to rush away from all thoughts, feelings, revelations.

  “That old age in us,” as his sister Maj-Gun said on the telephone later, when they had gotten back in touch with each other a bit. No intensive socializing, but sometimes telephone calls, sporadic. “Old age.” Hm. His sister Maj-Gun had, in and of herself, always been the older of the two of them, and far more dramatically minded. In that childhood, youth, she also had a way of going whole hog, trucking on until the bitter end. For example, a chapter, which the siblings had not touched with a single word afterward, also belonged to that time. The Day of Desire. The Happy Harlot. Hamba hamba. How his sister danced for him in his room in the rectory, hot summer days, inside, where it had been quiet and pleasant and cool alongside the hot, taxing summer day. Been the Happy Harlot from the docklands in Borneo. “There aren’t any docklands in Borneo, it’s just jungle,” he had of course soberly, precociously pointed out to his sister then already but still played along: clapped his hands in the dance, whistled, “like a sailor,” hamba hamba.

  As a game it is silly, especially described in this way, in hindsight. But on the other hand, children, even siblings, sometimes play lightly erotic games with each other, that is normal. But he had, of course, felt ashamed afterward even back then, during his childhood, youth. And actually sometimes already while the game was going on thought it felt good to leave it behind and get out into the summer day—even if he later did not really know what he should help himself to there. Consequently, since an adult had literally chased both obstinate siblings from the room out into the fresh air: their mother, sometimes Aunt Liz who was often visiting at the rectory during that time despite the fact that she was married and living with her husband in another city. But her husband was violent, had drinking problems, and the aunt sometimes needed to get away and “rest.” The mother or the aunt would tear open the door to his room where he and his sister Maj-Gun were spending their time: “and now children out into the fresh air!” Well, as said, the irresoluteness continued out there in the yard but it still was not entirely stupid leaving the game and he had even been able to enjoy carrying out some punishment tasks he was allotted if he snuck in again, which he often did. Back to his room, alone, with a book. Closed the door, even for his sister then. Wanted to be alone, read Gustav Mahler’s biography. Cuckoo. He had not understood a bit of it of course: Mahler’s music says more about the nature of emotion than all philosophers.