There’s a knock at the front door of the recreation center. It’s not a civilized hour, so Britt-Marie assumes that it’s one of the children who’s forgotten something. She opens with a:
“Ha?”
Then she sees that it’s the policeman standing outside again. He smiles awkwardly. Britt-Marie immediately changes the tone to a:
“Ha!”
Which is something quite different. At least the way Britt-Marie says it. The policeman swallows and seems to be drumming up some courage. A little too abruptly he whips out a bamboo curtain, almost smacking it into Britt-Marie’s forehead.
“Sorry, yes, well, I just wanted to . . . this is a bamboo screen!” he says and almost drops it into the mud.
“Ha . . .” says Britt-Marie, more guarded now.
He nods enthusiastically.
“I made it! I did a course in town. ‘Far Eastern Home Design.’ ”
He nods again. As if Britt-Marie is supposed to say something. She doesn’t. He holds the bamboo screen in front of his face.
“You can hold it against the window. So no one sees it’s you.”
He points cheerfully at the police car. Then at the bamboo screen.
Then at the rain that has started falling again. As rain does in Borg. Which must obviously be quite pleasant for the rain, not having anything better to do with its time.
“And you can keep it over your head when we go out to the car, like an umbrella, so you don’t ruin your hair.” He swallows again and fingers the bamboo.
“You don’t have to, of course, of course. I was just thinking that you have to live somewhere while you’re in Borg. I was thinking, so to speak, well, hmm, you understand. That it’s hardly suitable for a lady to live in a recreation center, so to speak.”
They stand in silence for a long time after that. Britt-Marie switches her hands the other way, and then at long last exhales deeply with immeasurable patience. Not at all a sigh. Then she says:
“I need to get my things.”
He nods eagerly. She closes the door and leaves him out there in the rain.
That is how it goes on—the thing that has started.
12
Britt-Marie opens the door. He gives her the bamboo screen and she gives him the balcony boxes.
“I was told there was a large flat-pack from IKEA in the backseat of your car, should I load it into my car?” he asks helpfully.
“You certainly shall not!” answers Britt-Marie, as if he had suggested setting fire to it.
“Of course not, of course not,” he says apologetically.
Britt-Marie sees the men with the beards and caps leave the pizzeria. They nod at the policeman; he waves back. They seem not to see Britt-Marie at all.
The policeman hurries off towards his patrol car with the balcony boxes, then he hurries back to walk alongside Britt-Marie. He doesn’t hold her arm, but he does position his arm a few inches under hers without actually touching her. So he can catch her in case she slips.
She holds the bamboo screen like an umbrella over her hair (because in fact bamboo screens work quite brilliantly as umbrellas), and keeps it in a firm grip over her head throughout the journey, so the policeman doesn’t notice that her hairstyle has been ruined.
“I should like to stop by a cash machine on the way, so I can pay for the room,” she says. “If it’s no bother to you. I obviously don’t want to cause you any bother,” she adds in a bothered tone of voice.
“It’s no bother at all!” says the policeman, who seems free of any kind of bothered tendencies. He doesn’t mention the fact that the nearest cash machine is actually a twelve-mile detour.
He talks all the way, just as Kent used to do when they were in the car. But it was different, because Kent always told her things, whereas the policeman asks her questions. It irritates Britt-Marie. You do get irritated by someone taking an interest in you, when you’re not used to it.
“What did you think of the match, then?” he asks.
“I was in the toilet,” says Britt-Marie.
She gets incredibly irritated when she hears herself saying this. Because anyone making hasty conclusions might believe she has serious intestinal problems. The policeman doesn’t answer straight away, so she comes to the conclusion that he is indeed sitting there making hasty conclusions, and she doesn’t at all appreciate that he is doing so. So she adds sharply:
“I actually don’t have serious intestinal problems, but it was important for me to be in the toilet, otherwise apparently something would have gone wrong in the match.”
He laughs. She doesn’t know if it’s at her expense. He stops when he notices that she doesn’t much appreciate it.
“How did you end up here in Borg?”
“I was offered employment here.”
She has her feet semi-buried among empty pizza boxes and paper bags from the hamburger place. In the backseat is a painter’s easel and a jumble of brushes and canvases.
“Do you like paintings?” the policeman asks her, in an upbeat mood, when he sees her looking at them.
“No.”
He fidgets with embarrassment at the steering wheel.
“I mean, I don’t mean my own paintings, of course. I’m just a bit of a happy amateur. I’m doing a course in watercolor painting in town. No, I mean paintings in general. Real paintings. Beautiful paintings.”
There’s something inside Britt-Marie that wants to say, “Your paintings are also beautiful,” but another more down-to-earth part of her answers in its place:
“We don’t have any paintings at home. Kent doesn’t like art.”
The policeman gives her a silent nod. They drive into town, which is actually also more like a large village than a proper town. Similar to Borg, just a bit more of it. Heading in the same direction, but not as quickly. Britt-Marie stops at a cash machine next to a tanning salon, which Britt-Marie doesn’t find so very hygienic because she’s read that solariums cause cancer, and you can hardly say cancer is hygienic.
It takes a bit of time to get her money out, because she’s so careful about hiding her code that she ends up pressing the wrong buttons. She is also hardly helped along by the fact that she still has a bamboo screen on top of her head.
But the policeman doesn’t tell her to hurry up. She realizes to her own surprise that she likes this. Kent always told her to hurry up, however quickly she was doing something. She gets back into the police car, and starts feeling she ought to say something sociable. So she takes a deep breath and points at the empty takeaway boxes and bags on the floor, and says:
“I don’t suppose they were offering a cooking course in town, oh no.”
The policeman lights up.
“Yes, as a matter of fact, I did a sushi-making course. Have you ever made sushi?”
“Certainly not. Kent doesn’t like foreign food.”
“True, true, well, there isn’t much cooking when you make sushi. Mainly just . . . cutting. And I haven’t done it so many times, actually, to be honest with you. I mean since I did the course. It’s not much fun cooking for yourself, if you understand what I mean?”
He smiles with embarrassment. She doesn’t smile at all.
“No,” she says.
They drive back into Borg. Finally the policeman seems to build up enough courage to bring up another subject:
“Well, anyway, it’s nice of you to take on the youngsters like you have. Borg is not an easy place to grow up in these days. The young people need someone, as you know, to see them.”
“I have not taken anyone on. They are certainly not my responsibility!” protests Britt-Marie.
“I don’t mean it like that, of course, I just mean they like you. The young people. I haven’t seen them liking anyone since their last coach died.”
“What do you mean, their ‘last coach’?”
“I, well, yes, I suppose I just mean they are very glad you moved here,” says the policeman, opting for “they” when really he would have prefe
rred to say “we,” and then he asks:
“What did you do before you came here?”
Britt-Marie doesn’t answer. Instead she glares out of the window at the houses they are passing. Outside almost every one of them, a “For Sale” sign has been hammered into the lawn, so she states drily:
“There don’t seem to be many people living in Borg who want to stay in Borg.”
The corners of the policeman’s mouth do what the corners of mouths do when trying to overcome wistfulness.
“The financial crisis hit hard here, after the trucking company laid off all the drivers. Those who have signs up are the ones who still have hopes of selling. The others have given up. Young people escape to the cities, and only the oldies like us stay on, because we’re the only ones who still have jobs.”
“The financial crisis is over. My husband told me that, and he’s an entrepreneur,” Britt-Marie informs him, keeping both her hair and the white mark on her ring finger well hidden under the bamboo screen. He looks away, awkwardly, while she firmly stares out of her window at a community in which even those who live there would rather not.
“And you’re also keen on soccer, I understand,” she says at last.
“I was once told that ‘You love soccer because it’s instinctive. If a ball comes rolling down the street you give it a punt. You love it for the same reason that you fall in love. Because you don’t know how to avoid it.’ ” The policeman smiles, slightly embarrassed.
“Who made this suggestion?”
“The children’s old coach said it once. Lovely, isn’t it?”
“Ludicrous,” says Britt-Marie, although part of her wants to say “poetic.”
He grips the steering wheel even harder.
“Probably so, probably so, I just mean that . . . I mean everyone loves soccer, don’t they? So to speak?”
She doesn’t say a word.
They pass the corner shop, carry on for a few moments, then stop outside a small, gray, squat house built on two floors. In a garden on the other side of the road stand two women who are so old that they look as if they lived in this community before it became a community. Leaning on their walkers, they cast suspicious glances at the police car. Sven waves at them as he and Britt-Marie get out of the car; they do not wave back. It has stopped raining, but Britt-Marie is still holding the bamboo screen over her hair. Sven rings the doorbell of the house. The blind woman, no less cube-shaped than the house itself—although Britt-Marie would never dream of referring to her as fat—opens the door.
“Hi, Bank,” says Sven cheerfully.
“Hello, Sven. So you’ve brought her along?” says Bank indifferently, waving her stick towards Britt-Marie. “The rent for the room is two hundred and fifty kronor a week, no credit. You can only rent it until I get the house sold,” Bank goes on, grunting, and stomps back into the house without inviting them in.
Britt-Marie enters behind her, slightly on her tiptoes because the floor is so dirty that she doesn’t even want to walk on it in her shoes. The white dog lies in the hall, surrounded by carelessly packed moving boxes in an utter disarray. Britt-Marie assumes this is all because of carelessness, not the fact that this “Bank” person is blind. Although Britt-Marie doesn’t have preconceived opinions, she’s quite convinced that even blind people can be careless.
All over the house are photos of a girl in a yellow soccer jersey, and in a few of them she is standing next to the old man who is also in the photos at the recreation center. In these pictures he is younger. He must have been about Britt-Marie’s age when they found him on the kitchen floor in that house, Britt-Marie realizes. She doesn’t know if that makes her old. She hasn’t had so many people to compare herself to in recent years.
Sven stands by the door with the balcony boxes and her bag in his arms.
He’s about the same age as her, and this feels rather old when she looks at him.
“We miss your dad very much, Bank. All of Borg misses him,” he says wistfully into the hall.
Bank doesn’t answer. Britt-Marie doesn’t know what to do, so she snatches the balcony boxes from Sven. He takes off his police cap, but remains on the threshold as men of that kind always do because as far as they are concerned it is not appropriate to go inside a lady’s home without an invitation.
Britt-Marie doesn’t invite him in, although it irks her to see him standing there on her threshold in uniform. She sees the ancient women on the other side of the road, still standing in the garden glaring at them.
What will the neighbors think?
“Was there anything else?” she says, although what she really means is, “Thanks.”
“No, no, nothing at all . . .”
“Thank you,” says Britt-Marie so that it sounds more like “Good-bye” than “Thanks.”
He nods awkwardly and turns round. When he has got halfway to the car, Britt-Marie takes a deep breath and clears her throat and only raises her voice a little:
“For the lift. I should like to . . . well, what I’m saying is: I should like to thank you for the lift.”
He turns around and his whole face lights up. She quickly shuts the door before he gets any ideas.
Bank goes up the stairs. Seems to use the stick more as a sort of walking cane than for orienting herself. Britt-Marie comes stumbling after with the balcony boxes and the bag in her arms.
“Toilet. Sink. You’ll have to eat somewhere else, because I don’t want the smell of frying in the house. Make yourself scarce in the daytime, because that’s when the estate agent brings buyers over,” she snorts and starts moving off towards the staircase.
Britt-Marie goes after her and says diplomatically:
“Ha. I should like to apologize for my behavior earlier. I was unaware of your being blind.”
Bank grunts something and tries to go downstairs, but Britt-Marie hasn’t finished.
“But I’d like to point out that you actually can’t expect people to know you’re blind when they have only seen you from behind,” she says helpfully.
“Goddamn it, woman, I’m not blind!” roars Bank.
“Ha?”
“I have impaired vision. Close up I can see just fine.”
“How close?”
“I can see where the dog is. The dog sees the rest,” says Bank, pointing at the dog, about three feet away on the stairs.
“Well, then you’re practically blind.”
“That’s what I said. Good night.”
“I’m certainly not the sort of person who gets hung up on semantics, I really am not, but I did certainly hear you say ‘blind’ . . .”
Bank looks like someone weighing up the possibility of causing damage to the wall with the front of her head.
“If I say I’m blind, people are too ashamed to ask any more questions, and they leave me in peace. If I say I have impaired vision they want to prattle on endlessly about the difference between that and being properly blind. Good night now!” she concludes, and moves on down the stairs.
“Might I ask why you have a stick and a dog and sunglasses if you’re not even blind?”
“My eyes are sensitive to light, and I had the dog before my eyes started acting up. It’s a normal bloody dog. Good night!”
The dog looks as if it has taken offense at this.
“And the stick?” Britt-Marie asks.
“It’s not a blind stick, it’s a walking cane. I have a bad knee. And it’s also quite convenient when people don’t get out of the way.”
“Ha,” says Britt-Marie. Bank shoves the dog out of the way with the cane.
“Payment in advance. No credit. And I don’t want to see you here in the daytime. Good night!”
“Could I ask when you expect to sell this house?”
“As soon as I find anyone balmy enough to want to live in Borg.”
Britt-Marie stands at the top of the stairs, which seem desolate and very steep as soon as Bank and the dog are out of sight. A moment later the front door slams and the
house drowns in the silence that follows.
Britt-Marie looks around. It’s raining again. The police car has gone. A lone truck goes by. Then more silence. Britt-Marie feels cold on the inside.
She takes the bedclothes off the bed and covers the mattress in baking soda.
She gets her list out of her bag. There’s nothing on it. No items to tick. Darkness comes sweeping in through the window, enveloping Britt-Marie. She doesn’t turn on any lights. She finds a towel in her bag and weeps into it, while standing up. She doesn’t want to sit on the mattress until it has been properly cleaned.
It’s past midnight by the time she notices the door. It’s next to one of the windows, facing out onto nothing. Britt-Marie has difficulties at first believing what she is seeing. She has to go and fetch a bottle of Faxin, then clean all the window glass in the door, before she can even bring herself to touch the door handle. It’s stuck. She pulls at it for all she’s worth, wedges herself against the doorframe and uses her body weight, which admittedly isn’t much. For a fleeting moment she sees the world through the glass and thinks about Kent and all the things he always said she couldn’t do and, in that moment, something makes her gather all her strength in a furious show of defiance that finally overpowers the door. She flies backwards through the room when the door opens wide. Rain falls in over the floor.
Britt-Marie sits leaning against the bed, breathing heavily and staring out.
It’s a balcony.
13
A balcony can change everything.
It’s six in the morning and Britt-Marie is enthusiastic. It’s a new experience for her. Somebody’s state of mind would rather have to be described as the hungover, irascible kind. Britt-Marie has woken her by knocking on the door of the pizzeria at six o’clock to ask her, excitedly, for a drill.
Somebody grudgingly opens up and informs Britt-Marie that the pizzeria and all its other financial activities are closed at this time of day. Britt-Marie then questions why Somebody is there at all, because, as far as Britt-Marie can see, it can’t possibly be hygienic to live in a pizzeria. Somebody explains as well as she can in her condition—eyes half-closed, with various scraps of food on her jersey that never quite made it to her mouth or for one reason or another came back out again—that she was “too much drunk” after the soccer match last night to make it home. Britt-Marie nods appreciatively at this, and says she thought this was a wise decision, because one really shouldn’t drink and drive. She doesn’t look at the wheelchair at all when she says it.
The Fredrik Backman Collection: A Man Called Ove, My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry, and Britt-Marie Was Here Page 70