They conferred for a while through the locked door. Linda tried to follow the instructions she was given, but nothing helped, the door was and remained jammed. Everyone in the flat was aware of the situation now, the mood was both amused and excited, a whole flock of people were in the hall giving advice to Linda while Cora, flummoxed and anxious, kept saying that Linda was heavily pregnant, we had to do something now. In the end the decision was taken to ring for a locksmith. While we waited for him I stood by the door talking to Linda inside, unpleasantly conscious of the fact that everyone could hear what I said and of my own helplessness. Couldn’t I just kick the door in and get her out? Simple and effective?
I had never kicked a door in before. I didn’t know how solid it was. Imagine if it didn’t budge. How stupid would that look?
The locksmith arrived half an hour later. He laid out a canvas bag of tools on the floor and began to fiddle with the lock. He was small, wore glasses and had the beginnings of a bald patch, said nothing to the circle of people around him, tried one tool after another in vain, the damned lock wouldn’t budge. In the end, he gave up, told Cora it was no good, he couldn’t get the door open.
‘What shall we do then?’ Cora asked. ‘She’s due soon!’
He shrugged.
‘You’ll have to kick it in,’ he said, starting to pack his tools.
Who was going to kick it in?
It had to be me. I was Linda’s husband. It was my responsibility.
My heart was pounding.
Should I do it? Take a step back in full view of everyone and kick it with all my might?
What if the door didn’t give? What if it swung open and hit Linda?
She would have to take shelter in the corner.
Calmly, I breathed in and out several times. But it didn’t help, I was still shaking inside. Attracting attention like this was anathema to me. If there was a risk of failure it was even worse.
Cora looked around.
‘We have to kick the door in,’ she said. ‘Who can do that?’
The locksmith disappeared through the door. If it was going to be me, now was the time to step forward.
But I couldn’t bring myself to do it.
‘Micke,’ Cora said. ‘He’s a boxer.’
She swivelled to fetch him from the living room.
‘I can ask him,’ I said. In that way I wouldn’t be hiding my humiliation at any rate, I would tell him straight out that I, as Linda’s husband, didn’t dare to kick in the door, I was asking you, as a boxer and a giant, to do it for me.
He was standing by the window with a beer in his hand chatting to two girls.
‘Hello, Micke,’ I said.
He looked at me.
‘She’s still locked in the bathroom. The locksmith couldn’t open the door. Could you kick it in, do you think?’
‘Of course,’ he said, eyeing me for a moment before putting down his beer and going into the hallway. I followed. People moved to the side as he made his way to the door.
‘Are you in there?’ he asked.
‘Yes,’ said Linda.
‘Stand as far back from the door as you can. I’m going to kick it in.’
‘Right,’ Linda said.
He waited for a moment. Then he raised his foot and kicked the door with such force that the lock was knocked inwards. Splinters flew.
When Linda came out, some people clapped.
‘Poor you,’ Cora said. ‘I’m so sorry. Subjecting you to that, and then…’
Micke turned and went.
‘How are you?’ I asked.
‘Fine,’ Linda said. ‘But I think maybe we should go home soon.’
‘Of course,’ I said.
In the living room the music was turned down as two women in their early thirties were about to read their gushing poems. I passed Linda her jacket, put on mine, said goodbye to Cora and Thomas, my shame seared inside me, but the last duty remained, I had to thank Micke for what he had done. I made my way through the poetry audience and stopped by the window in front of him.
‘Thank you very much,’ I said. ‘You rescued her.’
He blew out his cheeks and shrugged his shoulders. ‘It was nothing.’
In the taxi on the way home I hardly looked at Linda. I hadn’t risen to the task. I had been so cowardly as to let someone else do the job, and all of that was visible in my eyes. I was a miserable wretch.
When we were in bed she asked what was wrong with me. I said I was ashamed that I hadn’t kicked in the door. She looked at me in astonishment. The thought had not even occurred to her. Why should I have done it? I wasn’t the type, was I.
The man sitting on the opposite side of the table radiated some of the same vibes the boxer in Stockholm had. It didn’t have anything to do with the size of his body or muscle mass, for even though several of the men here had well-trained powerful upper bodies they still made a lightweight impression, their presence in the room was fleeting and insignificant like a casual thought. No, there was something else, and whenever I met it I came off worse, I saw myself as the weak trammelled man I was, who lived his life in the world of words. I sat musing on this while taking occasional peeps at him and listening to the ongoing conversation with half an ear. Now it had turned to various teaching styles, and which schools each of them was considering for their children. After a short intermezzo in which Linus talked about a sports day he had attended, the conversation moved to house prices. There was agreement that house prices had soared over recent years, but more in Stockholm than here, and that presumably it was just a question of time before the tide would turn, maybe they would even fall as steeply as they had risen. Then Linus turned to face me.
‘What are house prices like in Norway, then?’ he asked.
‘About the same as here,’ I said. ‘Oslo’s as expensive as Stockholm. It’s a bit cheaper in the provinces.’
He kept his eyes fixed on me for a while, in case I might exploit the opening he had given me, but when this proved not to be the case, he turned back and continued chatting. He had done the very same thing at the first general meeting we had attended, though at that time with a kind of critical undertone, because, as he had put it, the meeting was drawing to a close and Linda and I still hadn’t said anything, the point was that everyone should have their say, that was the whole idea of a parents’ cooperative. I had no idea what to think about the matter under discussion, and it was Linda who, with a faint blush, weighed up the pros and cons on behalf of the family, with the whole assembly staring at her. First on the agenda was whether the nursery should get rid of the cook who was employed there, and instead go for a catering firm, which would be cheaper, and second, if they did that, what kind of food they should opt for: vegetarian or the standard? Lodjuret was actually a vegetarian nursery, that was the principle on which it had been founded in its day, but now only four of the parents were vegetarians, and since the children didn’t eat much of the numerous varieties of vegetables that were served up, many parents thought they might as well dispense with the principle. The discussion lasted for several hours and scoured the subject like a trawl net on the seabed. The meat percentage in various types of sausage was brought up; it was one thing that the sausages bought in shops had the meat percentage printed on the label, but quite another what catering companies did with their sausages, because how could you know how much meat they contained? To me sausages were sausages. I didn’t have the slightest idea about the world that was opening before my eyes that evening, least of all that there were people who could delve so deeply into it. Wasn’t it nice for the children to have a cook who made food for them in their kitchen? I thought but didn’t say, and I was beginning to hope that the whole discussion would pass without our having to say anything, before, that is, Linus fixed his astute and naïve eyes on us.