When the make-up artists had finished, Linda Hvilbjerg proceeded to offer me some of her own beauty powder, as she called it. She prepared four lines of white powder on a pocket mirror and quickly snorted two. Gripped by the mood and hoping to get my nerves under control, I took the other two. It didn’t take long before my anxiety had gone and I actually started looking forward to the interview.
We chatted and joked before we went on. I felt safe. It was as if we were sharing something important and I could tell her everything.
The studio consisted of two partitions with bookcases filled with fake book spines, a red velvet sofa for the guests and an armchair for the host. The style was elegant and subdued, with a deep carpet, standing lamps and dark colours. We sat down and while she reviewed her notes one final time, I took the opportunity to study my surroundings. Two cameramen were doing focus checks and beyond the cameras’ range there were cables everywhere and clusters of lights suspended from a grid in the ceiling. The crew seemed almost indifferent to us; as far as they were concerned we were merely part of the set.
The interview began and Linda Hvilbjerg opened by congratulating me on my success and the huge interest. Had I ever expected it? I replied – as I had done in the countless interviews I had given recently – that it was probably something you could never really prepare yourself for, but that I was enjoying it after having worked for it for a long time. We talked about the furore the book had caused and violence in the media in general. These were all questions I had been asked before and I knew the answers to them blindfolded, but even so, Linda, the atmosphere and – let’s not forget – her beauty powder made it resemble an intimate conversation rather than a hard-hitting interview. I gave more of myself than usual and felt good about it. She also flirted a little, which probably did no harm.
Halfway through the interview, she asked me how I managed to come up with all that horror and describe it in such detail that the images evoked were almost unbearable. I had answered that question before, but this time I didn’t fob her off with the standard answer.
This time I told her the truth.
Ironika was a huge part of my life when I wrote Outer Demons. My day revolved around her and, in her own way, she had been my inspiration. I would often carry her around the flat; she liked that. While she lay there, defenceless and filled with trust and love, I explored my greatest fear: what was the worst thing that could happen to her? Parenthood had changed my outlook on life, there was nothing I wouldn’t do for my daughter, and it was this total surrender that paved the way for an even stronger emotion: fear. What if anything happened to her? I conjured up my worst nightmares and examined my reaction. If I couldn’t bear to think about it happening to my daughter, I would use it in my book; otherwise I would dismiss it and carry on searching. To this end, I would wander around the flat rummaging through drawers for suitable instruments of torture and explore the most terrifying scenarios inspired by my fear.
The victims in Outer Demons were teenage girls, not infants, but the ideas behind what they were subjected to were rooted in my days with Ironika.
This was roughly the answer I gave Linda Hvilbjerg. A moment of silence followed and I detected a change in her eyes. Not revulsion or distance, but a kind of admiration or ecstasy. She carried on her line of questioning and asked about other sources of inspiration, which authors I read and who my role models were.
When the interview was over, I felt very pleased. Linda Hvilbjerg was downright elated. She claimed it was one of the best interviews she had ever done and she thanked me warmly. Her eyes had taken on a relentless aggression, a hunger that made me feel a little uneasy.
Intoxicated by her beauty powder and flattering attention, I was persuaded to go to a party with her. She had her party clothes in her dressing room and used the studio’s facilities to get ready. In the meantime I was installed in a sofa with a gin and tonic and a pile of magazines.
When Linda Hvilbjerg came out from make-up, she was transformed. The discreet bluestocking was gone and in her place there stood before me a red-carpet beauty in a clinging dark dress, white earrings and her hair piled up.
Embarrassed, I apologized for my own appearance, but she wouldn’t hear of it, grabbed me by the arm and led me to a waiting taxi.
The party was held in Nørrebro in a large artist’s studio that had been taken over by an advertising agency and turned into their offices. There wasn’t a desk in sight. The floor had been cleared and lights mounted on the ceiling beams high above us. Professional DJs created an impenetrable wall of electronic music. Linda knew many of the people there, and I could make out a few familiar faces, but it was impossible to have a conversation.
We knocked back a couple of green cocktails and tried to dance, but we soon agreed that we were in need of something stronger. Linda gestured towards the lavatories and we made our way through dancing guests and conversations being shouted between frocks and suits.
The party covered both floors of the building, so we went downstairs where the noise level was lower and there was no queue for the lavatories. A few clusters of people who had escaped the pandemonium were hanging around. They stared hungrily after Linda as we passed them by.
The lavatory was newly renovated with black wall and floor tiles and large mirrors over square sinks with brass taps. There were three cubicles, all vacant, and we chose the furthest. I locked the door and Linda took out her pocket mirror from her handbag. She set up four lines while I rolled a one-hundred kroner note into a tube. We took turns snorting the lines.
As I snorted the last one, Linda threw back her head, closed her eyes and inhaled deeply with a huge smile on her lips. She giggled, opened her eyes a little and looked at me through the narrow cracks.
‘Do you know something?’ she said, resting her hands on my shoulders.
‘You’re really a man?’
Linda Hvilbjerg giggled again. ‘You’d like that, wouldn’t you?’
‘Not at all,’ I replied quickly and placed my hands on her hips. ‘What a waste that would be.’
‘Your book is crap,’ she stated boldly.
‘OK,’ I replied and removed my hands as if I had burned myself.
She merely laughed. ‘But you know something?’ She took my hands and put them back on her hips. ‘It made me so horny.’
I let my hands glide around her back and over her buttocks. They tensed slightly as I grabbed them. I could feel through the flimsy fabric that she wasn’t wearing any knickers.
‘And what did you do about it?’ I asked in a thick voice. The drugs were starting to work; Linda seemed to glow and my penis strained against my trousers.
‘I took the book with me to bed.’ She started unbuttoning my shirt. Her hands found their way in and brushed my chest before moving down to the waistband of my trousers. ‘I lay down completely naked,’ she carried on, while her fingers undid my belt buckle. ‘And read the best sections while I touched myself.’
I started pulling up her dress, inch by inch.
‘I imagined it was me who was lying there, tied up.’ She sighed when she finally released my penis, which willingly jumped to freedom. ‘Me being fucked … everywhere … and not being able to stop it.’
Her dress was now up so much so that I could reach her groin with my hand. Her body twitched when I touched her labia and she grasped the root of my dick with a grip that threatened to cut off the blood supply.