by Agnes Ravatn
Two days later, everything arrived. Fortunately the majority of the post I received could be binned. My stomach had wound itself in knots over debt-collection letters for my newspaper subscription and various other things that Johs had forwarded to my parents, but my relief at the fact that most of the mail was about issues quite easy to deal with was greater than my anxiety. How surprisingly simple it is to leave, I thought to myself. Do people even realise? It’s not the kind of thing that should be allowed to get out.
I hadn’t heard a word from Bagge, and I stalked around the house with a creeping sense of unease. He had said he’d be late, but not that he’d be gone for this long.
The woman in the shop had placed a stand of seed packets by the till. I inspected them discreetly as I placed my items on the cash desk, but I bought nothing, having no desire to grow anything in the garden that had come from her.
You’re quite content down there with that Bagge, I gather.
She entered the items as she spoke, never once looking me in the eye.
Yes, I—
That’s good. He’d be lonely without someone there.
I paid. She turned away from me and began slicing open some cardboard boxes with a blade to indicate that our conversation was over. I made my way home with an uncomfortable feeling of being watched. How could she possibly know that I was living with Bagge? I wondered if I should mention it to him, but decided it was best to let it go.
When I let myself into the house, it was clear that he still hadn’t returned. I put the items away in the kitchen. I felt as if she was purposefully trying to put me on edge.
The letterbox. Of course. My name, taped under his.
I ran up to the roadside and ripped off the piece of tape. A thought sprang to mind: I reject you. I had no idea what it meant, but over and over again the words ran through my head – reject you, reject you – like some kind of mantra. It had been three days now. Where was he? A heavy stone of anxiety in the pit of my stomach, I knew that something was wrong. Was this just a normal part of living with Bagge, or had something happened? And the woman at the shop, what exactly did she know about me? I checked that all of the doors were locked before going upstairs. Lying in my bed, I was gripped with an intense, inexplicable anguish. I was sure that I could hear cars gliding silently along the road and down towards the house with dimmed headlights, voices and the crunch of shoes on the gravel outside. I listened and listened, hiding beneath the sheets, knowing that if someone were to come and take me now, I was enough of a coward to comply without protest; naked and feeble, I cowered beneath the sheets, hoping they’d get it over with quickly, just shoot me in the head through my covers and be done with it. I wished I had the nerve to get out of my bed and pull on the clothes I’d left draped over the back of the chair. I least I’d know then that that problem was solved, if nothing else, that I might be a little better prepared for things when they did eventually unfold. Yet I just lay there stiffly, not daring to move an inch, just listening and listening.
All throughout the following day I meandered around the house and garden, dreading the onset of evening. I listened out for Bagge, mulling over what might have happened to him. I tried to do a little work in the garden, but whenever I stood with my back to the rest of the property I was overcome with a fear that I might be attacked from behind. I tried moving slowly around the flowerbeds with authority, but my body was stiff, each heartbeat hacking at my chest. I hummed quietly as I worked with the hoe, as if trying to fool my mind into believing that I was calm.
I moved indoors, it felt safest there. I checked the doors several times before heading to the kitchen to see what I might be able to throw together for dinner. I started chopping vegetables for an oven-baked ratatouille. Courgette, pepper, onion, aubergine, all became fine, delicate slices that I arranged in rows in a dish and lightly brushed with oil.
Without warning a loud crash resounded against the veranda door.
I jerked over into a hunch, felt the stomach-churning, soft sensation of metal through skin, blood rushing from my index finger. I dropped the knife and grabbed the roll of paper towels, wrapping the sheets tightly around my finger and hurrying over to the door, eyes flashing back and forth as they scanned my surroundings, my heart in my mouth.
It had been a loud, hard crash against the glass pane, I felt certain of it. My finger throbbed gently, the blood soaking through the paper towel. I couldn’t see a thing. An attack. I quickly moved away from the window and pressed myself up against the wall, pulling my body in as close as I could, my heart thudding fiercely, my finger pulsating more aggressively, a shiver surging through me as if I were about to faint.
Pull yourself together, Allis! I reprimanded myself harshly, you can’t go around fainting over nothing!
I took a deliberate, deep breath and stretched my head out again to look through the glass. On the veranda lay a tiny bundle, rust-red and grey. I took a step closer; a robin. I should have recognised the crash against the door straight away, the same thing had happened so many times throughout my childhood, birds always flying into window panes, I couldn’t count how many little funerals I’d held as a child with psalms and processions for the feathered deceased.
I slipped on a pair of shoes and walked down to the tool shed to look for the shovel, then pulled on my gloves and picked up the robin, turning it over gently in my hands; it weighed nothing at all. It lay in my hand with its eyes closed, a poor, tiny, lifeless body. I dug a hole by the woodpile and carefully placed the feathered bundle inside. Thank you for the birds that sing, thank you God for everything, Amen, I said, then filled the hole with earth once again.
When evening fell, I drew the curtains throughout the whole house. The reflections in the windows were making me jump; I was constantly convinced that I could see pale faces gliding by outside. I cursed my own cowardice. By the time it was dark, I realised that I needed a weapon to keep at my bedside. I pulled on my shoes, unlocked the door and hurried down the steps, across the garden and into the tool shed. I stared at the alternatives on the wall before me. Axe or hammer, axe or hammer. Defending myself with an axe would be a messy affair, so I took down the hammer from where it was hanging on the wall, closed the door behind me and charged back across the garden, up the steps and back inside. I locked the door and stood there, bolt upright with the hammer in an outstretched hand, thinking for a moment about how foolish I was being, yet just how little choice I had in the matter.
I went to bed fully clothed, the hammer on the bedside table.
Where is he? He must realise that I can’t be here without him. My fourth night alone in the house, more afraid now than I had been yesterday. I lay back and closed my eyes.
For a long while I listened to the sound of my own breathing, slowly feeling calmer, then my eyes flew wide open: I could hear the sound of orchestral music outside. I didn’t dare move, but lay perfectly still, all of my senses alert, listening. Quietly from the forest, strings and trombones, a symphony. My heart hammered, I wished that I were dead. I exhaled with relief when I realised that I was hearing the bubbling of the stream that ran along behind the house.
Cold with sweat, I took a deep breath and closed my eyes once again.
I was woken by noises downstairs and, having forgotten my night-time terrors, I immediately recognised the footsteps as his. Oh! Oh, God! I trembled with delight, sprinting out of my room and downstairs in the clothes I’d fallen asleep in.
It’s you! I almost screeched the words, unable to keep my delight in check.
He was standing in the hallway. He looked different, his face wan, dark rings under his eyes. He looked terrible.
Hello, Allis.
Hello, Allis? Was that it? I stood there alert, gazing at him, my whole face frozen in an open-mouthed, over-the-top grin that I couldn’t suppress.
I was worried about you.
Things took a little longer than expected.
He said no more, slung his leather satchel over one shoulder an
d headed for his bedroom. Perplexed, I watched him go. I had invested so much fear and emotion into his disappearance, and this was my only reward.
I placed the items on the cash desk, bristling, ready for some ambiguous comment or another. She entered each item into the register by hand, knew the prices of everything off by heart, keying them in and passing them along the cash desk when she had finished with them.
Oh, he’s certainly lucky to have you, she mumbled softly, almost silently.
I looked up at her, yellow-grey, woolly hair, eyes squinting, the indistinct outline of her figure concealed behind her red apron. She continued tapping in the items.
A bit of dinner will be nice. A bit of dinner with something nice for after, I’m sure.
I had nothing to say. I took my items and returned to my bicycle. I wanted to scream, but instead I channelled my energy into pedalling all the harder. Something nice for after. I felt insulted, but I couldn’t help but wonder how this woman, with her tragic appearance and her pathetic little shop on the brink of closure, how she could make me feel that way. The fact was I had allowed her to make me feel this way; I was too easily offended. I had every reason to feel insulted by her calculating insinuations, uttered in hushed, scornful tones. Lucky to have me. She might as well have carved the word ‘harlot’ across my forehead.
A creeping nausea rose up within me as I entered the house and carried the bags into the hallway. Just as I was passing his bathroom, the door opened and he emerged. He looked as if he wanted to say something, but I quickly hurried past him and into the kitchen. Typical, I thought to myself, feeling upset as I lingered by the kitchen worktop, typical for common people like her to pick on others who have made something of themselves in life. Working hard, dedicating oneself to something and finding success, these were things common people always found hard to swallow – it just serves to remind them of their own insignificance. Just one small slip-up and they tear you down with howls of glee. Ugh, no. Working the earth was having an unfortunate effect on me; I had started to feel as if I was some kind of superwoman.
He had hardly stepped out of his room since his return. I had only caught the muffled sound of footsteps as he made his way from his bedroom to the bathroom and back again. He had asked me not to make him any breakfast or dinner until he instructed me otherwise. I understood little of what was going on, but I had no authority to probe. But he had to eat. And wasn’t that my responsibility, wasn’t that precisely what I was paid to do? I decided to smoke him out with the scent of freshly-baked bread. I knew that he insisted on my buying the dense, dark, bitter, plastic-wrapped pumpernickel loaves from the shop, but there was a recipe for rye bread in the book I’d found that I was sure would bring him around.
I combined the wholemeal and coarse rye flour with the treacle and other ingredients to form a sticky dough. It was only after I’d placed the bread tin in the oven that I spotted the fact that it had to stay there for fifteen hours; goodness me, it was to be steamed, not baked. Fifteen hours. It was five o’clock now. The bread wouldn’t be ready until breakfast the following morning.
At around midnight I started dusting the bookshelves in the living room. I didn’t want him to think I was the kind of person to sleep on the job, couldn’t bear the idea. The loaf tin was engulfed in steam. I was afraid that he would leave his room to find the oven switched on in the middle of the night – it was tantamount to handing in my resignation. Obviously there’s no harm in just going to bed, I thought to myself, but what should I do? Write him a note in case he gets up in the night? What purpose would that serve, other than to reveal the time and effort I had put into mulling over the whole issue? At around two o’clock in the morning, I lay down with a book on the tiny couch behind the table.
I awoke to the sound of him stepping out of his room. The bread! I had drifted off. What would he think, what was the time? No, it was completely dark, I had only nodded off briefly. I stayed where I was, stretched out on the sofa behind the table, and he walked through the hallway and into the bathroom. Four o’clock. I considered hurrying up to my bedroom but he could emerge at any moment, so I stayed where I was, stock-still. I heard a faint humming sound, a mysterious thrum over and over again, then after a few minutes it stopped. I heard the sound of fumbling, then the flush of the toilet. He stepped out of the bathroom; I lay as flat to the couch as possible, my heart thudding, reverberating through the walls around me. He stopped by the kitchen door, where the oven glowed like an old atomic reactor, then returned to his room, and just before he closed the door I caught a glimpse of him. I should never have seen what I did. If just one thing in this world was certain, it was that I ought never to have seen what I did. His head was bare. He had shaved off all of his hair. His cranium was white but for a few stripes of dark hair that had been missed.
I heard footsteps outside as I stood in the kitchen early in the morning, preparing to slice the steaming-hot loaf of bread. I hurried to the outer door and peered out through the film of condensation that covered the glass pane, spotting his outline as he passed through the gate and continued along the drive with long, swift strides. Silently I turned the key to unlock the door and gently gripped the door handle, pulling it ajar. I saw the back of his head, so pale, growing steadily smaller as he made his way up to the main road all dressed in black. How had he managed to make it out of the house without me hearing him? The image of him during the night returned to me over and over again, like a knife to my stomach each time, I felt queasy. There might be plausible explanations for a lot of things, but not for that.
I went into his bathroom. He had done a good job of tidying up, not a single stray hair to be found. Back in the kitchen I cut the bread into quarters, wrapping each in cling film and popping them in the freezer. This wasn’t right. I walked out into the garden and stood there for a while, perfectly still, gazing in the direction of the road. Nothing. He was gone. I hesitated for a moment then scurried over to the tool shed. I opened the door and brought out the ladder, laying it on the grass at my feet, then filled a bucket with warm, soapy water in the kitchen, grabbed a cloth and returned outside.
I cleaned the other windows first – it would look less suspicious if he were to return all of a sudden. My heart thumped as I leaned the ladder up against the wall on the other side of the house from my bedroom. The top rung rested beneath the window of the locked room. I trembled as I climbed the ladder, it was high. The window was filthy, like gazing into the contents of a vacuum cleaner bag. I wiped the cloth across the pane and moved closer, peering through the glass. I spotted a few boxes stacked up against the wall across the room. Women’s shoes and boots. More cardboard boxes lined the other wall, some filled with folded garments; it wasn’t difficult to see they were women’s clothes. So this was where he kept his wife’s things. But why? – Was she going to be away for so long that her belongings needed to be packed away like this?
So she existed. Nor. For a while I had come to think of his wife as nothing more than a mere fabrication. Clearly not, after all. I felt relieved, in a way. If he had been lying about his wife, what else might he have lied about? I wiped the windowpane clean and cautiously climbed back down to solid ground.
I carried the ladder around the house and leaned it up against the wall beneath the window of his workroom. My stomach was in knots. I walked a little way towards the road to check if I could see him there, but there was no sign of him. I returned to the ladder, squeezed out my soapy cloth and climbed the rungs, wiping the cloth over the glass to reveal white crocheted lace curtains on the other side of the pane. I rested my forehead against the wet glass and peered inside. My focus shifted around, but it was impossible to see anything.
After returning the ladder to the tool shed, I felt hollow. The wife who existed, who could return. I hardly dared dwell on it, I couldn’t be here when that happened.
I didn’t know what to do with myself. Would he be gone for as long as last time? Couldn’t he give me some idea of his plans, at
the very least? Should I start absconding on a whim, too? I brewed a pot of coffee and took a seat under the cherry tree, which bustled with the same chalk-white blooms as the other fruit trees. The sun danced pleasantly on my skin. A glorious sense of chaos reigned in the garden, increasing steadily, spreading and unfurling with every day that passed. Each and every bout of rain and the ensuing sunshine inspired something new to spring from the earth, demanding space to sprout and grow.
After taking the coffee pot back into the house, I returned to the garden with the gardening book and a pad of paper, determined to approach things systematically and with renewed perseverance. I stopped at each and every plant that I couldn’t identify with certainty, leafing through the pages one by one until I found it listed there, comparing stems and petals and everything else that I could see until I could make a note of the species without any lingering doubts, then carefully taping the note to a branch or wrapping it around the stem, or affixing it to a stone in front of the more rambling species.
After a few hours I had looked up almost thirty different species, which left me feeling proud if vaguely exhausted. If nothing else, I had gained a new appreciation for language. In my notebook I had scrawled the names of various plant types: bloody crane’s bill, wood avens, St Patrick’s cabbage, hairy rock-cress, yellow pimpernel, endless inventive combinations of words. In every bed there was a blissful mix of splendid, solemn garden plants and unruly wild flowers that had wilfully and independently put down their roots. A dense hedge of sweet briar sheltered the garden from the cool fjord breeze. How could I have remained so ignorant about plants for so long? I had lived in the city for years and had hardly seen any private gardens, just the odd, half-hearted communal park. But as I thought about it I realised that I had grown up in a garden. It only occurred to me then that my parents would spend every weekend outside, always working on something or other. With hindsight I saw it all – my mother on her knees by the flowerbed along the wall, gardening gloves on, bucket and trowel and fork to hand. My father’s all-consuming composting project. My mother’s herb garden. The pots of chives that gave every kid in the local area bad breath all summer long. Rhubarb by the corner of the lawn, gooseberry bushes over by the spruce trees, long stalks laden with pea pods, vegetable patches teeming with carrots and potatoes. Raspberries and blackberries, and blueberry bushes in the forest that backed onto the house. Yes, the forest, my God, I grew up in that forest, it had been where we had spent most of our time, sprinting around in the sheltered woodland all summer long, now all but forgotten. Nowadays the forest, the natural world, it all felt foreign to me, it had come to represent a lack of control where it had once felt like home.