4
Linda flew to Stockholm a few days later. Zeba had helped her make a dress for the cadet ball. It was light blue and cut low across her chest and back. The class organizers had rented a big room on Hornsgatan. All sixty-eight of them were there, even the prodigal son of the group who had not managed to hide his drinking problem. No one knew who had blown the whistle on him, so in a way they all felt responsible. Linda thought he was like their ghost; he would always be out there in the fall darkness with a deep-seated longing to be forgiven and taken back into the fold.
On this occasion, their last chance to say good-bye to each other and their teachers, Linda drank far too much wine. She wasn’t a novice drinker by any means, and she could usually pace herself. This evening she knew she was drinking too much. She felt more impatient than ever to start working as she talked with student colleagues who had already taken the plunge. Her best friend from the academy, Mattias Olsson, had taken a job in Norrköping rather than return to his home in Sundsvall. He had already managed to distinguish himself by felling a bodybuilder who had taken too many steroids and run amuck.
There was dancing, speeches, and a relatively amusing song roasting the teachers. Linda’s dress received many compliments. It would have been an altogether enjoyable evening if there hadn’t been a TV set in the kitchen.
Someone heard on the late-night news that a police officer had been shot down on the outskirts of Enköping. This news quickly spread among the dancing, intoxicated cadets and their teachers. The music was turned off and the TV set brought out from the kitchen. Afterward Linda thought it was as if everyone had been kicked in the stomach. The party was over. They sat there in their long gowns and dark suits and saw footage of the crime scene as well as images of the officer who had been murdered. It had been a cold-blooded killing that occurred while he and his partner tried to question the driver of a stolen car. Two men had jumped out of the car and opened fire on the policemen with automatic weapons. Their intention had clearly been to kill. No warning shot had been fired.
Everyone went home late that evening. Linda was on her way to her aunt Kristina’s apartment when she stopped at Mariatorget and called her father. It was three o’clock in the morning and she could tell from his voice that he was barely awake. For some reason that made her furious. How could he sleep when a colleague had just been killed? That was also what she said to him.
“My not sleeping won’t help anybody. Where are you?”
“On my way to Kristina’s.”
“You mean the party went on until now? What time is it?”
“Three. It ended when we heard the news.”
She heard him breathing heavily, as if his body had still not decided to become fully awake.
“What’s that noise in the background?”
“Traffic. I’m trying to catch a cab.”
“Who’s with you?”
“No one.”
“Are you crazy? You can’t run around alone in Stockholm at this hour!”
“I’m fine, I’m not a child. Sorry I woke you up.”
She hung up on him. This happens way too often, she thought. He has no idea how infuriating he is.
She flagged down a taxi and was driven to Gärdet, where Kristina, her husband, and their eighteen-year-old son lived. Kristina had made up the sofa bed in the living room for her. The room was partly lit up from the streetlights outside. There was a photo of Linda and her father and mother in the bookcase. She remembered when the picture was taken; she was fourteen years old, it was sometime in the spring, and they had driven out to her grandfather’s house in Löderup. Her dad had won the camera in an office raffle and then, when they were about to take a family picture, her grandfather had suddenly balked and locked himself in his studio. Her dad had been extremely upset and her mom had sulked. Linda was the one who tried to convince her grandfather to come out and be in the picture.
“I won’t have my picture taken with those two people and their fake smiles when I know they’re about to leave each other,” he said.
She could remember to this day how that had hurt. Even though she knew how insensitive he could sometimes be, the words still felt like a slap in the face. When she had collected herself she asked him if what he had said was true, if he knew something she didn’t.
“It won’t help matters if you keep turning a blind eye,” he said. “Go on. You’re supposed to be in that picture. Maybe I’m wrong about all this.”
Her grandfather was often wrong, but not this time. And he had refused to be in the picture, which they took with the self-timer on the camera. The following year — the last year her parents lived together — the tensions in their home only escalated.
That was the year she had tried to commit suicide. Twice. The first time, when she had slit her wrists, it was her dad who found her. She remembered how frightened he had looked. But the doctors must have reassured him, since he and her mother said very little about it. Most of what they communicated was through looks and eloquent silences. But it propelled her parents into the last series of violent disputes that finally persuaded Mona to pack her bags and leave.
Linda had often thought how remarkable it was that she hadn’t felt responsibility for her parents’ breakup. On the contrary, she felt that she had done them a favor and helped catapult them out of a marriage that in all but name had ended long before.
He didn’t know about the second time.
That was the biggest secret she kept from her father. Sometimes she thought he must have heard about it, but in the end she remained convinced he had never found out. The second time she tried to kill herself it was for real.
She had been sixteen years old and had gone to stay with her mother in Malmö. It was a time of crushing defeats, the kind only a teenager can experience. She hated herself and her body, shunning the image she saw in the mirror while she also strangely enough welcomed the changes she was undergoing. The depression hit her out of nowhere, beginning as a set of symptoms too vague to take seriously. Suddenly it was a fact, and her mother had had absolutely no inkling of what was going on. What had shaken Linda the most was that Mona had said no when she pleaded to be allowed to move to Malmö. It wasn’t that there was anything wrong with her dad; she just wanted to get out of Ystad. But Mona had been surprisingly cool.
Linda had left the apartment in a rage. It had been a day in early spring when there was still snow lying on the ground here and there. The wind blowing in from the sound had a sharp bite. She wandered along the city streets, not noticing where she was going. When she looked up she was on an overpass to the freeway. Without really knowing why, she climbed up onto the railing and stood there, swaying slightly. She looked down at the cars rushing past below with their sharp lights slicing the dark. She wasn’t aware of how long she stood there. She felt no fear or self-pity; she simply waited for the cold and the fatigue spreading in her limbs to get her finally to step out into the void.
Suddenly there was someone by her side, speaking in careful, soothing tones. It was a woman with a round, childish face, perhaps not much older than Linda. She was wearing a police uniform and behind her there were two patrol cars with flashing lights. Only the officer with the childish face approached her. Linda sensed the presence of others farther back, but they had clearly delegated the responsibility of talking that crazy teenager out of jumping to this woman. She told Linda her name was Annika, that she wanted her to come down, that jumping into a void wouldn’t solve anything. Linda started defending herself — how could Annika possibly understand anything about her problems? But Annika hadn’t backed down, she had simply stayed calm, as if she had infinite patience. When Linda finally did climb down from the railing and start crying, from a sense of disappointment that was actually relief, Annika had started crying too. They hugged each other and stood there for a long time. Linda told her that she didn’t want her father to hear about it. Not her mother either, for that matter, but especially not her dad. Annika had promised to keep it quiet, and she had been true to her word. Linda had thought about calling the Malmö police station to thank her many times, but she never got further than lifting the receiver.