by Alex Dahl
‘Why did you come to my school?’
‘To pick you up, sweetheart,’ I say.
‘No, I mean before.’
‘Before… when?’
‘You came to my school once, before.’
‘No, sweetheart, that must have been someone else. Someone who looks a bit like me, maybe?’
‘But I saw you. And it was the same car.’ I pull away from the junction too hastily, tires spinning on the icy ground, clutching hard at the wheel. She didn’t see me that day – she can’t have. I watched her the entire time, and never once did our eyes meet.
‘Sweetheart, it wasn’t me.’ I smile reassuringly at her, but she’s upset, her eyebrows are tightening in a frown and she’s placed the iPad face down in her lap.
‘But I saw you!’
‘Okay, Kaia, that’s enough. Lots of people look alike, okay? I can think of so many times I thought I spotted an old friend in a crowd and it turned out to be somebody else. Happens all the time, I’m afraid.’
‘Remember the first time you came to Mamma’s studio and I was there and I said I knew you? It was because I saw you at my school.’
‘Here we are,’ I say, too loudly in the sudden absence of the fan as I switch off the engine. ‘Don’t forget your iPad, sweetheart.’
Kaia looks at me, first defiantly, then seems to remember the iPad and the nice day we’ve had, and her expression softens. ‘You know, you shouldn’t be sad. I can be your girl, too.’
‘What… What do you mean, Kaia?’
‘You said you were sad. And that you wish you had a little girl of your own.’
‘Yes… Listen, I know I said that, but what I meant was that I was sad in that moment. Not all the time. I’m okay, I promise.’
‘Okay. If you’re sad you can visit me.’
‘That’s sweet of you to say, Kaia.’ I glance at the house, but Iselin most likely hasn’t heard the car pulling up. ‘I think it’s best that we don’t tell Mamma I was a bit sad today, okay?’
‘Okay,’ says Kaia, gathering her things. ‘Mamma is sad sometimes, too.’ I nod and then we walk the few steps to the door of the basement unit, Kaia smiling sweetly at me, clutching her new iPad.
*
At home, I call Sindre’s name even though I know he’s out late. I head straight to Amalie’s room and shut the door behind me. I begin to remove the sheets from her bed, throwing them into a pile by the door. When I finish, I open the curtains wide, then the windows, letting the freezing night into the room. I pick up the discarded piles of toys from the floor and put them in the toy boxes. I take the folded clothes that have sat on her dresser since that July morning which started off much the same as other summer holiday mornings. I place them in Amalie’s clothes cupboard, resisting the urge to press my face to the little T-shirts and cardigans for a trace of her scent. I close the window again and walk backward out of the room. It no longer looks like Amalie just left her room and may come back at any time. For the first time since July, I leave the door wide open.
It’s past midnight when the phone rings. I was dozing, but the repetitive vibration of the phone against the wooden floor jerks me awake. It’s Monica, Sindre’s ex-wife. I sit up, fast, and my finger slips on the screen and I miss the call. My fingers tremble as I fumble to unlock the phone and call back.
‘Alison,’ says Monica, ‘I need you to come here.’
Chapter Forty-Six
Alison
Monica’s face is scrubbed clean and weary-looking when she opens the door. She shows me through to the kitchen where Sindre is sitting on a bench by the window, scrolling on his phone.
‘What’s going on?’ I ask, looking from Monica to my husband, but neither of them will meet my eye.
‘I thought Sindre needed a ride home,’ says Monica.
‘What are you doing here?’ I ask.
‘I was out running and my mind got muddled, that’s all.’
‘Sindre tried to unlock my door with the key to your house and it seems like maybe it’s all been a little much.’
‘I’m fine,’ says Sindre.
‘I didn’t think he should drive back home,’ says Monica, the harsh light above the sink turning the papery skin underneath her eyes a deep blue.
‘No,’ I say softly. ‘Thank you for calling me.’
‘Also… I feel concerned. For both of you. Because I care. Of course, you know how much I feel for you both. But… But my son spends half his life with you, and I’m wondering whether it would be a good idea for us to rethink that for a while. Until things get easier.’
‘No,’ says Sindre. ‘Monica, please. Look. I know things have been unstable. But please let him stay with us.’
‘Yes, please,’ I say, and catching Sindre’s eye, a feeling of complicity and solidarity passes between us, the first in a very long time. ‘Oliver is grieving, too. What Sindre and I are going through is part of Oliver’s history, too. I don’t think it’s the right thing to remove him, even if it’s difficult now.’ Monica looks from Sindre to me and back. She nods, then stands up.
In the car, Sindre stares out the window, and there is something dejected and humble about the way he holds himself.
‘Did you say you were going away again this week? You can’t, Sindre. Not like this. You’re not in a position to travel.’
‘Reykjavik. And yes, I have to.’ I don’t answer – I learnt a long time ago that there is little point in telling my husband what he can and cannot do.
‘Where were you last night?’ I ask as I pull into the driveway.
‘Does it matter?’
‘Doesn’t it?’
‘I… I’m not well, Ali. It’s like my skin is on fire, like I’d do anything to get away from home and from myself.’
‘I know the feeling.’
‘I slept in the apartment in Skovveien, okay?’ Sindre bought the apartment in his twenties, before he’d married Monica, and we use it occasionally for Airbnb.
‘Alone?’ Sindre stares at me, then opens the car door. I follow him into the house, my heart beating so hard he must be able to hear it. The moment of empathy I thought passed between us at Monica’s is entirely gone. He goes straight into the living room and sees Iselin’s drawings, rehung.
‘Are you completely fucking insane?’ he shouts right in my face. I make myself calm, looking him straight in the eye.
‘I want you to tell me what the hell is going on,’ I say.
‘You want me to tell you what’s going on? How about this – how about you tell me what the hell is going on, Alison!’
‘Where were you last night?’
‘I’ve seen your search history. What the fuck are you playing at?’ Sindre whispers, and this is more frightening than a moment ago when he was bellowing in my face. He begins to pace around the living room, rushing from one side to the other, bumping into furniture, knocking books off the shelves, and comes to a stop in front of Iselin’s drawings.
‘Oh, God,’ he says, his voice hollering again. ‘Did that woman draw these? Answer me! Answer me, goddamn it!’
‘How… How do you know?’
‘I said, answer me!’
‘Yes.’
‘Jesus Christ.’ Sindre raises his hand and slams it into the wall next to one of the drawings. ‘What the fuck, Ali?’
‘How did you know?’ I need to know what he knows exactly.
‘I found the article. About the girl. I googled the mother and these same drawings came up. This is completely crazy. Have you been in contact with her? Answer me, Ali!’
‘Only to buy the drawings, obviously,’ I say, softly.
‘But why?’
‘I liked them.’
‘You liked them. Can you even understand how fucked up this is?’
I nod miserably as Sindre slides to the floor and sits slumped over, holding his head in his hands. When he speaks again, the fury has gone from his voice and it comes out as a meek whisper.
‘I’ve tried, Ali. I’ve reall
y tried. I’m trying every day to forgive, or at least to understand, but the truth is, I’m not sure I can. I… I just can’t believe she isn’t coming back.’ I walk over to him and sit down on the armrest of the sofa next to where he is on the floor.
‘I’m sorry,’ I say. And then my husband says the words that will echo inside my head for the rest of my life.
‘Sorry isn’t enough, Alison. I’ve tried so hard not to blame you, but the truth is, I do. She was five years old! Five! What the hell were you thinking? Tell me what you were thinking! Fuck! Alison, goddamn it, how could you…’ He begins to sob and pummels the floor with his fists. When I approach him and place my hands on his shoulders he leaps up as if he’s been touched by a ghost, and then he spins around and stares at Iselin’s drawings with uncensored hatred. He unhooks one and flings it across the room where the glass shatters against the piano. I lunge toward him to stop him from doing the same with the second, but Sindre shakes me off twice, and the second time I fall and strike my face against the side of the coffee table. Sindre stands above me holding the framed drawing high above his head, his arms trembling, its chrome frame glinting in the low light. Then he brings it down onto me, smashing the frame to splinters against my arms, the glass slicing into me, as I try to protect my face.
Then he leaves.
Chapter Forty-Seven
Alison
I wake on the sofa, and it’s already morning, the blazing sun framed in the floor-to-ceiling window and sending shimmering shards of light onto the parquet. It picks up the broken glass scattered across the floor, and then I remember last night. I clutch at my head; it’s hurting terribly, like my brain has swelled up overnight, pressing against my skull. It’s Friday, 10.25 a.m. I have nothing left and nothing to lose. Sindre is gone and there is no one to stop me or all the crazy thoughts rushing through my head. I don’t even have Karen anymore.
If I turned up, would Karen Fritz still see me? I could tell her everything and then surely, I’d be protected from myself and what I have become. She’d make some calls, and I’d have to go somewhere – a hospital where calm strangers know how to deal with someone like me. Or maybe she will say something that will give me some clarity; after all, that is what therapists are supposed to do. I’m still wearing the jeans and mohair sweater I had on last night and decide not to change, but in the bathroom I wipe the smudges of blood off my face and hands and apply some concealer to the dark bruise on my jaw.
I drive down past the ski jump glittering in the sunshine, past Slemdal, past Majorstuen Station where my eyes linger on the bakery where I sat that day all those weeks ago, warming my hands on a cappuccino before walking over to Trudvangveien, where I came face to face with Kaia Berge for the very first time. I try to keep my thoughts on that moment and away from last night and how chaotic everything is now. Kaia, little beautiful precious Kaia, a vessel for the purest heart I’ve ever known. I’m doing this for her.
*
The look on Karen’s face when she opens the door to find me standing there belongs in a horror film.
‘Oh, Alison,’ she says, her face half-obscured by the doorframe.
‘Can we talk?’
‘Of course we can talk. Have you been receiving my calls? Will you take a seat? I can be with you in half an hour or so.’
‘But my session is at eleven,’ I’m aware that my voice is louder than it needs to be, and Karen glances discreetly back in the direction of whoever is in the room.
‘You’ve been absent for a long time, Alison. But I will find you a new session, okay? Just sit down over there and I’ll be with you in no time.’ I stare at her, then nod, but as soon as she closes the door I turn and walk back down the corridor, then outside.
I leave the car where it is and walk up to Uranienborg church and around the little park – it is such a beautiful day. I walk aimlessly back toward Solli Plass, then sit on a bench outside Kaffebrenneriet at the bottom of Skovveien in the cold sunlight, watching the blue trams hurtle past. What will Karen do when she opens the door and finds me gone? Why did I even go back there? She couldn’t help me before, and she can’t help me now – she just wouldn’t understand what is happening with Kaia. How could I expect her to understand that it is a miracle – the universe’s way of returning Amalie to me.
Two hundred and forty-five days without her. How many breaths have I taken since the moment she took her last breath? There is a number for it, and I’ll never know it. How many times has my heart beaten? I think about all the tiny, minute things I still do – the things that we just keep doing, even after the entire world has ground to a halt: going to the bathroom, dressing, undressing, drinking coffee, changing lightbulbs, going to the bathroom, dressing, checking my phone, driving, going to the bathroom… Every single thing I do without her is another little betrayal. The fresh green buds shooting out on the branches of the tree next to where I’m sitting are a betrayal. The sun, shining – a betrayal.
It’s too cold to sit still for long, so I begin to walk up Skovveien, and as I pass number 51, I stare up at the windows of the fourth-floor apartment. It’s where my husband says he spent the night. I blame you, he said. What the hell were you thinking? She was five! Five…
My husband is right, of course. He didn’t say a single word I didn’t already know.
I keep looking up at the red-brick facade, imagining Sindre moving around behind the gray gauze curtains. Maybe she is there with him, because why wouldn’t she be? I have turned it over and over in my head. At first I felt nothing, except relief that Sindre has had something that has kept his attention away from me. But now, I feel angry, too. He’s probably been screwing her in Geneva and wherever the hell else he’s gone since he went back to work. Not that it matters much – it means I could spend all that time with Kaia.
I pull my phone out.
Where are you? I write, but as I press ‘send’ I remember he’s traveling.
My phone bleeps almost immediately.
Hey you. I’m in Reykjavik until Tuesday, but we need to talk… Where are you? I’m so sorry. S x
Fuck you, I write back, my hand trembling. My head aches.
Of course he isn’t here. I ring the doorbell several times in case his girlfriend is there, but no one answers. It occurs to me that of course she’s gone to Reykjavik with Sindre. I’ll go up for a moment, collect my thoughts. I could just turn around, get the car and go somewhere. Anywhere. I could drive up to Blåkroken. I could take the ferry to Denmark and then just drive and drive, heading south, to France or maybe Spain. I could build a little life there, renting a studio apartment and writing features and walking on the beach – I’ve lived that life before. But I can’t go anywhere without Amalie.
I close the door behind me and stand a moment in the hushed hallway. I could trash this apartment if I wanted to. I could hurl the furniture around and smash the bed and break all the windows. I could dismantle this little love nest my husband has enjoyed while I have mourned our daughter. I walk into the living room. It is just a normal, sparsely furnished room, and looking around, all I can feel is sadness that Sindre has come here, in secret, with someone else while I was across town, alone, wild with grief.
In the kitchen, there’s an empty wine glass in the sink. I open the fridge and notice a couple of beers and an open bottle of prosecco, a spoon emerging from its neck. He’s been drinking here, with his whore. I take the prosecco from the fridge and sit down at the kitchen table and drink it straight from the bottle. Is it hers? It must be. I imagine them together, my husband’s broad, strong body enveloping her in bed, her thin, pale hands clutching at his neck.
She’s the one who’s made him laugh late at night on the phone behind the closed door to his office. She’s the one he asked, So, what are you doing today? Every time I’ve asked who he was laughing with he just muttered ‘work’, as if running a home security company could possibly be that fucking hilarious. Just thinking about my husband makes my mind recoil. I don’t know what ‘Si
ndre’ means anymore, or who my husband has become. He’s a broken man. Dangerous, even. He hurt me, and I never thought he would. But anyone can be dangerous, every one of us can be driven to madness, I know that now, too. The realm of possibility has been extended for both of us, and I don’t yet know where the limits to our potential for destruction lie. I wonder if he has that woman with him now, some stupid bitch who thinks she can piece my husband back together, and realize I don’t give a fuck whether he does.
The prosecco is flat, but it doesn’t matter to me. I get up and stand by the window, looking at normal, uneventful life playing out down there: a black car inching into a tight spot outside the grocer’s, a couple of teenage girls walking from school and laughing together at something on a phone, a sparrow pecking at crumbs in the last of the patchy brown ice outside Baker Hansen. I sit back down and drink some more, closing my eyes against images of my husband standing over me, screaming in my face. I see him in the garage, with his gun. I see him standing over me, holding the framed drawing, then bringing it down onto me as I raised my arms to stop him. Afterward, he stared at his own hands as though they were capable of anything at all.
This must be it, the end of us, because where could we go from here? My phone vibrates in my pocket.
‘Ali? Hey, it’s me. Issy.’ Iselin’s cheerful voice fills my ear.
‘Hey,’ I whisper.
‘Are you okay?’
‘Yes. Just a little out of breath. I’ve been out. Running.’
‘Great. Such a beautiful day. It actually feels like spring! So, I’m going in to speak with them at Speilet on Monday.’
‘Oh. Okay. Yeah, that’s great.’
‘And I was wondering, I mean, I know it’s probably a big ask, and you might not have anything that would work anyway, or of course you might think it’s really weird that I even asked, but—’
‘Iselin, slow down. What do you need?’
‘I was wondering if I could borrow a dress?’