He patted her on the arm. She glanced up at him, on the alert as always when someone touched her. Registered that it did not irritate her. Not even that sloppy ‘dear Liss’, which he always reeled off and which she had always hated, seemed to bother her this time. From the very beginning Tage had wanted to get to know them both, Mailin and her. During all the years they had lived together under the same roof, he had put up with being ridiculed and rejected. It was more or less to be expected, he seemed to think, when you appeared as a replacement for an absent father. After the wedding, he had taken their family name, and his devotion to Ragnhild was so great that he put up with everything. Like a well-trained dog, thought Liss, but then for a moment had to abandon the contempt with which she had always treated him, and was suddenly grateful to this man who had found his place in a home with women who didn’t love him, not any of them.
She let herself into the room that had once been hers. It was tidy and clean. No posters on the walls, but they were still crimson red and the doors and frames black. At the age of sixteen Liss had finally got her mother to give in and allow her to paint the room in these colours, and for some reason or other she had let it stay like that, even seven years after Liss had moved out.
She switched off the light and lay naked under the duvet, rubbing her feet against one another for warmth. Still freezing, she drifted into a state that was halfway between waking and sleeping. She sees someone there, a man in a long coat climbing some steps. His name is Wouters, Liss. You will never be able to forget it. She runs into the dark room. Bends over Zako and listens to his breathing. It is deep and irregular.
There is a knock on the door.
Don’t open it, Liss. You mustn’t open it.
Mailin is standing there, in the middle of the room. She isn’t wearing the blue pyjamas, but yellow ones that glow in the dark. And she has cut her hair.
Liss leapt out of bed, stood there listening out in the dark, certain that someone had just knocked.
Her back felt clammy; she opened the window and turned on the light. Found the notebook in her handbag and took it back to bed with her. Sat for a long time stroking the plush cover before opening it and starting to write:
Did it happen several times, Mailin, that you came here and locked us in? Got into bed and put your arms around me. Held your hands over my ears so that I wouldn’t hear the hammering on the door. So I wouldn’t hear the voice out there, what it was shouting in to us.
9
Thursday 18 December
Liss let herself into Mailin’s office and switched on the light. She didn’t know exactly what she was looking for this time either, but she had an idea where to start. She walked over to the shelves and took down the three folders marked PhD. Two of them were full of articles, many printed from the internet. She put them to one side and opened the third. This contained documents that appeared to have been written by Mailin herself, systematically arranged with numbered dividing sheets. There was a list of books at the front. Then a title page: Victim and perpetrator. A study of eight young men who were subjected to sexual abuse. She flipped through several pages of notes, some handwritten. On the back of the next divider she came across what looked like the draft of a more extensive text:
Starting from Ferenczi’s thesis (cf. ‘Confusions of tongues between adult and child’, 1933), two points will be illustrated in the introduction. (1) The child’s search for tenderness can contain infantile erotic elements, but these will be pitched in the direction of play, security and contentment. The adult’s passionate sexuality on the other hand exists in the tension between love and hate; it is the urge to transgression, which also includes destructive elements. (2) Abuse occurs when the child in search of tenderness and care encounters the passion of the adult. Passion can take the form of sexual desire, but can also be aggressive/punitive, and involve the child being compelled to bear the adult’s feeling of guilt.
She flipped forward to the third divider:
In this chapter I will describe eight male patients all of whom have been subjected to sexual abuse. As far as possible it has been ascertained that they have not themselves subjected others to abuse. The eight will be interviewed before the treatment begins, and thereafter every six months over a period of three years. Evaluation criteria for aggressive behaviour, depression, anxiety and general quality of life will be employed…
This was followed by several pages describing methods, but in these papers Mailin had obviously not included any information on the eight patients. Maybe the rest of the thesis was in the archive safe she shared with the others who had offices there.
Liss looked out at the wet snow melting against the grey wall on the other side of Welhavens Street. Outside of town, in the surrounding forest, it would definitely be cold enough for the snow to lie. She could take the bus to Lørenskog and fetch the skis from her mother’s garage, take a ski trip out in the forest. Until the silence wrapped itself around her. She decided that she would go out to the cabin the next day.
Again she looked at the postcard from Bloemenmarkt, the one she had sent to Mailin. Resisted the temptation to take it down. Always embarrassing to read something she had written herself. Instead she tugged at the Post-it note hanging below it. Ask him aboutdeath by water, Mailin had scribbled on it. In haste, by the look of it, a thought that had struck her while working on something else, and which for some reason or other she wanted to remember. She stuck it into the notebook she’d taken the last time she was there.
As she let herself out of the office again, the door at the other end of the room opened. The man who emerged was of medium height and narrow shouldered, wearing a suit jacket and blue jeans.
– Well if it isn’t you, he exclaimed, and stood there looking at her. Then he approached until he was suddenly much too close. She took a step back, towards Mailin’s door.
Older now, Pål Øvreby had grown a thin beard, but he smelled the same. Tobacco and something vaguely rubbery, mixed with Calvin Klein deodorant.
– I heard you were here a couple of days ago, he said quietly.
– Wanted to see her office, Liss managed to say.
Pål Øvreby shook his head. – This business with Mailin is of course… It looked as though he were searching for the right word to use. – Actually just beyond comprehension.
She didn’t reply. It struck her that talking about Mailin was merely an excuse for him to intrude. But she couldn’t bring herself to raise her hands and push him away.
At that moment the door to the waiting room opened. Pål Øvreby stepped back, startled. Liss recognised the woman who put her head round the door: Torunn Gabrielsen, whose office was on the floor below.
– I’m waiting, she said impatiently, and from the way she said it, Liss knew that Pål Øvreby was her property. – Oh, it’s you, she added to Liss, and then sniffed, as though to find out what had been happening in the room.
Only now did Liss realise how irritated she was. – I was looking for something I forgot last time, she said brusquely.
– It’s terrible, Torunn Gabrielsen said, and suddenly the suspicious note was gone from her voice. – To carry on like this and not know. I’m hardly getting any sleep at night.
She didn’t look as if she was suffering from lack of sleep.
– Sit down, Liss. We ought to take the time to have a little chat.
– Weren’t we going to…? Pål Øvreby interjected.
– It’s worse for Liss than for us, Pål. The least we can do is find out how she’s coping.