I don’t know if I dare let him go. If I do, I will feel naked and cold and lost in this world.
Somewhere a clock is ticking. I see the sign for the Skoglund grocery store, I have seen it a thousand times before, but never like this in the midst of a silence. Outside the silence a car comes to a halt and sets off again, and then I hear quick footsteps, someone is moving up behind me and says:
‘Hey, I followed you,’ and little by little I release him. I don’t know how long we have been standing like this, but my arms ache, and I realise that I have been squeezing him as hard as I can. In my chest there is a pain, and Arvid straightens up and takes a deep breath, there is a whistle in his throat, and I see what caused the pain: it’s the NLF badge on his lapel. I lean towards him and whisper:
‘Forget what I said about your beret, it’s just fine.’ But he looks at me as though he has never seen me before, I could have been Christopher Columbus and he my first Indian, his face is flushed and his eyes are shiny. I turn, and it’s Tommy’s sister standing there.
‘What’s your name?’ I say.
‘What?’
‘What’s your name, for Christ’s sake?’ I’m almost yelling, but she answers calmly:
‘Rita. Didn’t you know?’
‘No.’
‘Right. Well, anyway, I heard what you said at the club. It’s true that it was Dole and a few others. Willy just stood watching. Dole’s in there,’ she says and points. We are standing outside Geir’s bar. I look through the window. Dole is sitting at the nearest table with a beer in front of him, it has a golden gleam from the lamp above, and I can see the bubbles from here, and he has a crew cut, like an American marine. He was the first to have long hair at school, and now he has no hair at all. His head is large and round, and he is laughing and telling something funny to someone I cannot see. I turn to Arvid.
‘Right, shall we go in then?’ I say a bit roughly, but he just looks at me and has no idea what I am talking about.
‘What’s up with him?’ Rita asks. ‘Did you have a fight?’
‘He’s upset about his dad. Don’t come with me now.’
I walk towards the bar door. As I’m about to go in, it’s pushed open from the inside, and one of the local drunks comes staggering out. I stand back, and Dole looks up and sees me through the window. He knows who I am, but not what I want. I push the drunk aside and clear the way, and inside I head straight for the table where Dole is sitting. He is pretty hammered, he grins and says:
‘Hello, Audun, old boy,’ but I don’t answer, I just go up to him, lean down and grab his leg and pull. He hits the floor with a bang, the chair tips forward and hits him on the back of the head, the glass is knocked over and all the beer splashes down on his crew cut. He lashes out with the other leg but I skip to the side, and with his ankle in a firm grip, I drag him to the door.
‘Fuck you, Audun! Have you flipped or what!’ he yells, and I say nothing, for there is nothing to say, I just drag him along the floor. He flails out on all sides, crashes into chairs and tables, holds on to someone’s foot and shouts:
‘For fuck’s sake, help me!’ But no one lifts a finger. I bang open the door with my back, and outside in the square I let go of his leg. He gets to his feet with a groan. Once he has straightened up, I punch him hard in the stomach. I know what I’m doing. I have seen it before. He jack-knifes, and all the beer spurts from his mouth, and it floods out on to the ground between us, and I step away. I stand at the ready. But he coughs and splutters and stares at the tarmac.
‘You know what, Audun?’ he mumbles. ‘You’re a dead man.’ And then he opens the bar door and walks in bent double.
I turn back to the square. Rita is there alone, watching me with a look in her eyes I could have done without.
‘Where’s Arvid?’ I say.
‘He took off. The wrong way, I think.’
Right. I don’t know why I did what I did, but I don’t think it was for his sake.
‘Right,’ I say, running my fingers through my hair. I look at her. ‘How’s Tommy doing?’
‘Fine. He’s much better now. He really is.’
‘Good,’ I say, and start towards the stairs.
‘Audun?’ she says behind me. I turn round. She is wearing a brown leather jacket that must have been passed down from her father, that’s how it looks, and she seems older now than I’d thought before.
‘Nothing. It’s nothing.’
‘OK, that’s fine then.’
I walk down the spiral staircase and down the slope by the post office and the music school and along the terraced houses in Grevlingveien. It’s so quiet. I am breathing calmly. I just feel a little warm in the pit of my stomach. I cross Veitvetveien without looking left or right. A car brakes suddenly, but my eyes are fixed ahead, and I walk the footpath between the houses until I come out on Beverveien and down to the block where I live.
My mother’s in the living room. She is watching TV. On the table there is half a bottle of Upper Ten whisky, and she has her fingers round a glass while she watches Fred Astaire dancing solo across the screen. I have never seen her drunk, but I know she drinks. There are empty bottles stacked behind her winter boots at the back of the cupboard in the hall.
‘Hi,’ she says without taking her eyes from the TV. ‘You’re home early. I thought you were going to the youth club?’
‘It was boring.’
I’m about to go to my room, but I change my mind and plump down on the sofa. Fred Astaire is sitting in a telephone booth now, talking to Ginger Rogers. He has turned on the French accent, and she doesn’t know it’s him she is talking to. He gives her some good advice with heavy French ‘r’s. He pouts. I don’t see the point. I get up from the sofa and go over to the cabinet beside the TV and fetch a glass. On the wall above the cabinet is the signed photograph of Jussi Björling.
‘Don’t mind if I do,’ I say in a straight voice. Now she looks up.
‘Don’t you think we’ve had enough of that?’
‘You’re drinking.’
‘It’s Friday. I’ve earned it. Well, you’re eighteen. You have to find out things for yourself. But be careful. Have some water in it. Here,’ she says, pushing over a jug of water. I pour myself a fair amount of Upper Ten and add some water.
‘That’s Fred Astaire,’ she says. ‘He could dance with the phone book, and I would watch.’ She smiles. She likes having me there. When I am not out, I usually sit in my room listening to records or reading, and she watches TV or listens to an opera in the living room. If she has her music on loud, I turn up the volume as well. I lean back and take a sip. I have never tried whisky before. It doesn’t taste good, but it does warm you right down to your feet. I shiver a little. I could get used to this, I think, and then I watch the film. It’s completely without meaning, but Ginger Rogers is attractive. She looks intelligent, much more intelligent than the stupid part she is playing. The glass is empty. I am fine now, the shivering has gone. I carefully reach for the bottle and pour myself another one, and she just watches the film. I may as well tell her now.