After She's Gone

by Camilla Grebe

  “But if we know where to start looking—”

  “And where is that?” Andreas interrupts, looking skeptical.

  “The cairn,” I say. “There’s too much pointing to that place to ignore it.”

  I pause for a moment, before adding in a lighter tone of voice:

  “And then there’s the Ghost Child to consider.”

  Andreas’s face is impossible to read.

  “What?” I ask.

  “Seriously. You don’t believe in ghosts, do you?”

  “Of course not. They’re just a form of mass hysteria. What I’m wondering is if there might be some real event at the base of that rumor. I mean, what if someone actually heard an infant crying there at some point. What if there was a child. And then the story was retold again and again until it turned into legend. I think the rumor started about twenty years ago. The timing fits.”

  I don’t say anything about Sump-Ivar, who claimed to have seen a dead infant at the cairn. I don’t want to acknowledge that I’m taking the ravings of a schizophrenic seriously.

  Andreas meets my eyes, seems to be weighing my words.

  “I guess we could search the cairn thoroughly. Considering everything that’s happened there.”

  He pauses for a moment and then continues:

  “In the spring. After the snow melts.”

  “There must be some way to do it sooner. We could shovel the snow, or maybe use some kind of heaters to melt it. Take the cadaver dogs there.”

  Andreas looks doubtful.

  “Can they even find a body after so many years?”

  “Yes. Some dogs can. I’ve looked into it. Cadaver dogs have found parts of skeletons that are over thirty years old.”

  “Okay,” he says.

  “Okay, what?”

  “We can suggest that to Manfred.”

  I’m surprised.

  I thought I’d have to work a lot harder to convince him. Wheedle more. Persuade and explain and maybe even put up with some humiliation.

  Andreas smiles provocatively.

  “Wanna get a beer after work today?”

  In just a fraction of a second, the satisfaction I felt over convincing him of my point is transformed to anger.

  He doesn’t give a shit about what happened to that child. The only thing he cares about is getting in my pants, which is never going to happen, not if he’s the last man on earth.

  When I look up, I see his self-satisfied grin. His tobacco peeks out from under his lip, looking like rat shit, and his eyes shine puckishly. And there he goes again: leaning back, his legs wide.

  As if he’s quite pleased with himself.

  “Are you a complete fucking idiot? Haven’t you noticed that I’m not interested in you?”

  “Well, well, well,” he says, still smiling.

  If I were ten years younger I would have slapped him. I would have marched right over and slapped the grin off his face. But I don’t do things like that anymore. I don’t live in Ormberg anymore, and I don’t slap people just because they’re idiots.

  Andreas stands up and looks me over slowly.

  “Gotta piss,” he says, nods at his statement, and disappears from the room.

  * * *

  —

  I stare at the computer screen, my cheeks turning hot. Take a deep breath, trying to get a handle on my feelings.

  This thing with Andreas is so weird.

  As soon as I start thinking he’s nice, he does something to sabotage it.

  My glance falls on the printout next to Andreas’s computer, the one with the results of the research he did: the names of every inhabitant in Ormberg with a police record.

  And there, somewhere in the middle of the list, I see it.

  Mom.

  Why is she there? She’s surely never done anything illegal, never even stolen fallen fruit.

  I log in to the system and search for the list. Input the data and press Enter.

  The computer starts to buzz as if I’ve just asked it to do something very strenuous. Blinks.

  And there it is.

  I click on it and open the report. Read through it, and then just sit there, unable to move.

  On a November evening three years ago, right after the death of my father, Mom was found injured and inebriated on the slopes of Orm Mountain. The officer who first arrived on the scene described her as “very depressed after the recent death of her husband.” She was transported to Katrineholm for “medical attention and suicide watch.” The officer also wrote that she absolutely did not want them to contact her closest relative, her daughter, Malin Brundin, who had recently begun studying at the Police Academy in Stockholm, saying that she shouldn’t “lose focus.”

  My stomach knots up and tears burn behind my eyelids. Poor little Mom.

  Was she so devastated by Dad’s death? And still, she didn’t want to bother me.

  It’s heartbreaking.

  I keep reading. Apparently, Mom asked the police to contact Margareta instead. It turned out Mom had fractured her ankle, and Margareta promised to help out during the time she was laid up.

  I think back.

  Of course, Mom must have mentioned Margareta visiting quite a bit when I was first at the academy.

  I didn’t think about it at the time, but now I understand.

  In Ormberg we take care of our own.

  I can imagine that Margareta must have cooked all the food. She probably cleaned and swept until the whole place smelled like soap and the windows sparkled.

  Because that’s what she does. That’s what she did after Kenny died.

  I just wish Mom had told me. I would have helped as well. And then we could have talked about what happened. Because now, I can’t even bring this up with her—it’s a privacy issue.

  I bury my face in my hands, sadness and frustration expanding inside me.

  I never should have come back to Ormberg.

  I should have stayed in Katrineholm. Steered clear of all this old bullshit, been nice to Max.

  Steps approach, and I stretch and fix my hair.

  Andreas returns to the room and sits down at his place. Manfred is a few steps behind him. His cheeks are rosy, and there’s a new spring in his step.

  Luckily, he doesn’t seem to notice how upset I am, because this is not something I want to discuss with him.

  “I spoke to the woman coordinating our forensic analyses at NFC,” Manfred says, sitting down. The chair totters for a moment.

  He continues:

  “They’ve examined the clothing Hanne was picked up in. They found soil and plant residue, as expected, since she’d been wandering through the forest for twenty-four hours. But they did a chemical analysis as well and found traces of…”

  Manfred puts on his reading glasses, flips through his notepad, wipes some stray crumbs from his mouth, and continues:

  “Silicon dioxide, magnetite, and carbon.”

  “Chemistry isn’t my strong suit,” Andreas says.

  Manfred bends his head forward and looks at me over his glasses.

  I shake my head. “Sorry. Not mine, either.”

  “Magnetite, also called black ore—it’s an iron oxide,” Manfred says quietly, and leans forward. “It’s used in the production of iron, if I understood correctly. Silicon dioxide is a waste product from the production of iron. And carbon…Well, carbon is coal. Pyrolyzed biological material, to be exact.”

  The room falls silent. The only sound is the drone of the heater.

  “Well, I’ll be damned,” Andreas drawls.

  “The ironworks,” I say. “Hanne must have been there.”

  Jake

  The snow’s at my knees as I drag the moped in under the small tin overhang on the short side of the large red building, then press
my way through the opening in the wall.

  It’s dark and cold inside. I sense, more than see, the large concrete pillars and the crane that runs the length of the ceiling. My phone is warm from being in my pocket. I scroll through my messages and see that Melinda has texted me twice. Apparently, some old lady from social services has been by, and she’s going to take care of us until Dad comes home.

  She doesn’t mention finding me dressed up in women’s clothes.

  I know I have to go home sooner or later. But I just can’t be around Melinda right now. Can’t stand to see my shame in her eyes. So I send her a short text, write that I’m sleeping over at a friend’s.

  Where I’ll actually sleep I have no idea. I can’t go back to Saga’s, because she hates me now.

  The machine hall is dim; shadows hover behind the large steel beasts that stand scattered across the concrete floor. My steps echo through the silence, and one of the chains that hangs from the ceiling rattles, as if an invisible hand were pulling on it lightly.

  Brogrens Mechanical was the only place I could think of. I have nowhere else to go.

  I head for the foreman’s desk and sit down on the old stained mattress on the floor. Light one of the candles there, open my backpack, and take out a Coke and Hanne’s diary.

  Lunch.

  Andreas & Manfred have gone to Stockholm. They’re meeting with someone at immigration and some officials at the Bosnia and Herzegovina Embassy. They’ll be back tomorrow evening. Malin is at her mother’s, eating lunch.

  Just before Malin left, I asked her about Margareta and Magnus Brundin, why they lived together, even though Magnus is past forty. She said that Magnus is all that Margareta has left. Her husband, Lill-Leffe, left her for a hairdresser from Flen when she was pregnant with Magnus. It’s apparently a very sensitive subject, and no one in the family is allowed to mention Lill-Leffe by name, even after more than forty years.

  It’s not easy being human.

  A few things have happened.

  First: I went to the bathroom and didn’t recognize myself in the mirror.

  I was terrified! It took me several minutes to calm down.

  How is that even possible? How could you not recognize your own mirror image? The face you’ve stared at year after year. The wrinkles you saw coming, the hair that turned gray before your very eyes.

  I know that the disease affects my face memory. I have difficulty recognizing people.

  But MYSELF?

  Second: P dug up an old police report from November 1993. The staff at the refugee camp saw a brown van on the road outside on several occasions. They were having problems with vandalism (someone kept lighting the bushes on fire), and they suspected the van could be connected to the fires.

  We’re interested for completely different reasons.

  The report was made in November, not long before Nermina and her mother disappeared.

  There may be a connection between the van and their disappearance.

  P’s checking to see if someone in Ormberg owned a vehicle matching that description at the time. (There was no information about license plate number or make, but there aren’t so many people here, so it’s surely possible to go through the lists.)

  Evening.

  I’m lying in bed at the hotel. P’s in the bathroom.

  It’s raining and howling outside, and I feel down.

  I despise Ormberg. I just want to leave here and never come back.

  Besides: P is so silent and cold again.

  I felt so furious with him that I had the impulse to grab onto the handbrake and jerk it as we were driving home.

  Imagine if I were to hurt P! Imagine if I made us drive off the road or pushed him into a creek!

  I don’t want to, but it feels like I’m no longer in control of my feelings.

  It feels like life is running out of my hands.

  It feels like everything is coming to an end.

  I’m awakened by the sound of steps echoing in the machine hall, and then a dull bang, as if somebody kicked one of the old metal plates that are lying around here and there.

  It’s darker now—I’ve slept for several hours. My body feels stiff and sore as I put the diary back into my backpack and peer out into the gloom.

  The steps get closer, stop, then start again. A shadow expands from out of the darkness.

  My stomach knots up when I realize who it is.

  How could I be so stupid? I knew he hung out around here. And still I came back.

  As if I was begging for a beating.

  “Well, fuck, it’s Ya-ke. I didn’t know you were here!”

  Vincent stands with his legs wide, a plastic bag from the gas station in his hand. His downy upper lip curls, like he’s about to start laughing at something.

  He walks toward me slowly, until he’s standing just a few meters away.

  I sit on the mattress and stare up at him. Maybe it’s the fluttering light of the candle, but for some reason he looks even more insane than usual. His jeans are wet, and his old winter coat is dripping. He reminds me of a ghost from the sea that was in one of the horror films Saga and I watched a week ago. The ghost had been killed by his own pet—a dog that was really a werewolf—and fell off a cliff.

  After watching that movie, Saga said she never wanted a pet, even if it was the cutest thing in the world, because you’d never know when it might turn into a monster.

  “Ya-keee. Where did your emo girl go? Did the retard get tired of you already?”

  He leans his head back and spits his tobacco over my head. It lands somewhere in the darkness behind me. Then he squats down so his face is in front of mine.

  He’s so close I can smell the snuff on his warm, damp breath and see the sparsely placed strands of hair that are growing on his pale, pimply chin.

  “You know you’re named after a fag, right?”

  I swallow hard.

  “I’m named after an actor,” I say, looking down at the fraying edges of the mattress, stains from beer and wine and other disgusting God-knows-what on the fabric.

  Vincent pushes me so hard I fall onto my back.

  “Bullshit. That actor, Jake Gyllen-something, he was a fag in the faggiest movie ever made. About two cowboys who fucked each other and really liked it. Didn’t you know that? Didn’t your mother tell you that before she up and died?”

  I roll aside and stand, a few meters from Vincent.

  “His name is Jake Gyllenhaal,” I say quietly.

  Vincent takes a step toward me.

  “And he’s a fag. Just like you, Ya-ka. Love the pink sweater, by the way. Did you get a new boyfriend?”

  Something cold drips from the ceiling into my hair. A chain rustles somewhere in the distance. I wish I’d gone home. Anything would have been better than this. Even Melinda’s disgusted look as though she thought I was sick and mentally disturbed.

  Vincent takes another step closer.

  “Blow me, faggot!”

  “I’m not…”

  Pow.

  The punch hits my stomach, and I fold over in pain. Sink down and have to brace my hands against the cold, damp concrete to keep from falling over. It feels as if all the blood has run from my head and gathered near the glowing ball of pain in my abdomen. I gasp, struggling to keep my balance.

  What would Hanne do? Hanne who’s so cool and strong: She’d never let anyone treat her the way Vincent treats me.

  “Admit you’re a fag!”

  Something happens inside me. I can’t explain exactly what, but it’s like something falls apart.

  Images of everything he’s done to me flicker through my mind. I see him rubbing yellow snow into my face, see him pushing my head into the seat of the school bus, and I see the Eiffel Tower lying on its side on the concrete floor just seconds bef
ore Vincent ordered Albin, “Crush that piece of shit!”

  I see all of it, and something inside me breaks and makes room for another feeling, one so strong I’m afraid to lose control of it. As if Vincent’s blow released a wild animal inside me.

  I rise slowly, bend my knees, take a deep breath, and fling myself at him.

  Totally surprised, Vincent falls back onto the concrete floor with me on top. We land with a thud.

  “You fucker!” I scream, and I can hear how strange my voice sounds. I don’t recognize it, it’s so husky and hateful.

  I grab his blond hair and slam his head against the floor over and over again with a strength I didn’t know I possessed.

  “You fucker. You fucker. You fucking twisted fucker.”

  “What the hell,” he whimpers. “It was just…a…joke.”

  I let go of his head and pull my hands back, as if I’ve burned them on his pale skin.

  “If you ever touch me again, if you even get anywhere close to me, I’ll tell every single fucking person in Ormberg what your dad did. Tell them he’s a disgusting pedophile who went to prison for groping little boys in Örebro. Do you understand me?”

  Vincent’s eyes are wide, and his face is stiff with fear. A thin string of saliva runs down his cheek from the corner of his mouth.

  And it feels as if I’m watching all of this happen from above, still trying to make sense of one simple fact: Vincent is afraid of me.

  How could that be possible?

  Vincent is afraid of Ya-ka, his favorite person to hate. The guy he loves to punch and kick and spit at.

  We’re both completely still for a moment, I don’t know exactly how long, until I become aware of both our breathing. Of the cold in the machine hall, the wind howling outside, and the slight rustling of chains near the ceiling.

  I stand up. Staying in front of him without backing down. My eyes pinned to him.

  Vincent shuffles backward, away from me. His expression is like a hunted animal; it reminds me of Hanne’s eyes that night in the woods.

  “You’re completely cra…cra…zy,” he stammers quietly. “Totally fucking…”

  His voice fades away.