‘Did you talk about moving in together?’
‘We live in the same building. Anna has a studio at the top of the stairs. She’s an artist.’
‘I see.’
He remembered their first meeting so well. He had distributed the day’s mail, gone home and slept for a few hours, and was on his way to Konsum to buy groceries. She was standing in the stairwell on the ground floor, busy loading cartons into the lift. They said hello to each other and he held the door when she went out to the car to fetch the last box. The similarity was striking. How was it possible for anyone to be so similar? He stood there, not wanting to leave before he had a chance to talk with her. Afterwards it was so natural that he had stayed. That he overcame his hesitation and asked whether he could help her. He didn’t recall what she replied. He only remembered her smile. A candid, warm smile that made her eyes narrow to slits and made him feel chosen, unique, handsome in someone else’s eyes.
He had helped her with the boxes and then she asked him in to her new studio, and she had shown him round, happy and proud. He had mostly looked at her. There was a kind of radiance about her. A genuine naturalness so attractive that he became quite bewildered. After only five minutes he had known that she was the one he had always been waiting for. That his whole life had been merely leading up to their meeting.
‘What did you use to do together?’
The psychotherapist’s question dragged him back to the present. He turned towards her.
‘Everything.’
‘Can you give me an example?’
They started eating their meals together. He would come home from work just in time for lunch, and she worked at home, so after a while it became a habit. One day at her place, the next at his. She was the first person he had allowed in his flat in several years. He had never been able to overcome the distaste he felt at how messy things were after someone visited. She had laughed at his systematic order and claimed that all the right angles made her nervous, finally convincing him to redecorate. She had even run up to her studio and fetched a big oil painting that they hung up in the room. It was after she left that night that he fully realised how much he loved her. He had wandered about in confusion, and yet the compulsion could not reach him. Completely unaware of her improbable feat, she had used her mere presence to neutralise the danger that threatened him.
That night he stood naked in front of the painting and traced her brush-strokes with his finger. The grooved canvas aroused a desire so strong in him that it was painful, but he would not let it go. He would save it and give it to her when she was ready.
‘Did you have a lot of friends?’
He turned back to the window and stuffed one hand in his pocket. His memory had revived the wild longing. The hunger of his skin that would drive him crazy if she didn’t touch him soon.
‘Not particularly.’
‘Relatives, then?’
‘Her parents died in a car crash when she was fourteen. She was one of those children who’s like a dandelion and succeeds in life in spite of everything. Strong and stubborn.’
‘Does she have any siblings?’
‘A brother, but he lives in Australia.’
‘And you?’
He turned his head and looked at her.
‘What do you mean?’
‘Your parents?’
‘What about them?’
‘I don’t know. Tell me.’
‘We have no contact. I moved down to Stockholm when I was eighteen, thought it was good to get away from there.’
‘Get away from what?’
‘I lived up north of Gävle.’
‘Yes, but most people stay in contact with their family even if they move away.’
‘I see.’
Nine words his mother had said to him after the betrayal was revealed. Nine words. It was on his eighteenth birthday. He was sitting in the kitchen eating breakfast, had just come home from his paper round. For three months he had done what he could to win her forgiveness, but she had not been receptive. And his father had holed up in a one-room apartment in Gävle to get away from the shame that her boundless sorrow and disappointment had created. He took his clothes and one of the twin beds from the bedroom and disappeared.
Suddenly she was standing there in the kitchen doorway. She was wearing the flowered robe that he knew smelled so good, smelled of Mamma. And he had been filled with joy and thought that maybe, maybe she was ready to forgive him now. Now that it was his birthday and she was standing there in the kitchen doorway.
Nine words she had said.
I don’t want you to live here any more.
Yvonne Palmgren shifted position in her chair once again. A couple of papers from her folder started to slip, and she caught them just as they were about to fall to the floor.
He lowered his gaze and went to sit with Anna again.
‘Why don’t you have any contact with your parents?’
‘Because I don’t feel like it.’
‘Doesn’t that ever make you feel empty?’
‘No.’
She cleared her throat and closed the folder in her lap.
‘I think that will be enough for now, but I would like to continue our conversation this afternoon.’
He shrugged his shoulders. It annoyed him that he was forced to do as they said. That he couldn’t just tell them all to go to hell.
‘Shall we say two o’clock?’
She got up and went over to the bed, looked at Anna and then at him, and moved towards the door.
‘I’ll see you then. Goodbye for now.’
He didn’t reply.
He saw the door close behind her and took Anna’s hand, placed it on his crotch, and closed his eyes.
Never in her life had she felt so alone.
He had slept on the sofa. Took his pillow and quilt and without saying a word he had left her with all the unanswered questions that she couldn’t bring herself to ask. His last words at the kitchen table had struck her dumb.
Anxiety like a cramp in her guts.
Why was he so angry? Where did his rage come from? What could she possibly have done to deserve being treated like this?
Alone in the double bed she was sorry that she had let Axel sleep over at her parents’ house. She would have given anything to have him here now, hear his breathing, reach out her hand and feel the warm back of his pyjamas.
At four o’clock she couldn’t stand it any more. With her face red and swollen and her eyes watering, she pulled on her robe and went out to the living room. It was still dark outside, but in the pale moonlight she could see that he was lying on his back with his arms behind his head. His knees a bit bent, the sofa too short to permit him to stretch out his legs. She wondered briefly why he didn’t go and sleep in Axel’s bed. A kid’s bed, of course, but surely better than the sofa.
She sat down in the armchair, at the very edge.
‘Are you asleep?’
He didn’t answer.
She pulled her robe tighter around her and shivered. The mullioned windows in the room needed to be puttied again. The electric heater couldn’t keep the room warm when most of the heat went straight out through the draughty cracks. It would be a time-consuming job, eight small panes in each window. Maybe they could hire someone and avoid wasting their time during their badly needed holiday. But maybe that was no longer so important.
She swallowed.
‘Henrik?’
Not a sound.
‘Henrik, dear, can’t we just talk a little? Can’t you explain to me what’s happening?’
He didn’t stir.
‘Can’t you at least explain why you’re so angry? What is it I’ve done?’
He turned over on his side and pulled up the covers. He must have heard from her voice that she had been sad, that she was still sad, but she realised that he was not going to answer even if he did hear her. He intended to shut her out and her questions as if she had never uttered them. She leaned her head back and closed her eyes, trying to stifle the sound of desperation that was lodged like a scream in her throat, demanding to be released. A cornered animal whose every instinct was signalling her to fight, but she didn’t know what to defend herself against. For a good while she sat there, unable to get up, but finally she managed to persuade her legs to take her back to the empty double bed.