Aino hesitates. “Our son is over there. We can’t do it where he can see us.”
The boy’s sandcastle is now several metres tall and wide. Olli realizes that it’s going to be a copy of Notre-Dame cathedral in Paris. What marvellous arches and ornamentation their child has built out of sand!
Then Olli notices something in the water. A school of bare-breasted mermaids has appeared among the waves, close to the shore. They’re playing with something that looks like a plastic boat.
“He can go and play for a little while with the mermaids,” Olli suggests, kissing his wife’s breast, which tastes like chocolate. “I saw on a nature show that they like human children and are happy to suckle them.”
Aino smiles, now obviously aroused. “Well, perhaps just for a little while. But if he starts to smell like fish, then you have to scrub him with soap and a brush…”
Aino gets up and leads their son by the hand into the waves, encouraging him to go in deeper, like a good boy—the mermaids are waiting for him. He obeys and the mermaids take him with them. Aino turns and looks at Olli, and Olli becomes frightened.
Her face is chalky white and registers a bottomless sorrow. Olli feels deep horror. The weather has turned dark and cold. Snow is falling.
The mermaids escape beneath the sea. Their son is nowhere to be seen. Aino shrieks like a bird, falls into the waves, and vanishes from sight.
Olli can’t move. Little by little the snow blocks his nostrils, his mouth, until his breathing finally stops.
When he woke up, Olli went to read his new instructions on Facebook.
Anne was happy to report that she had arranged for Aino to have an unpaid holiday lasting until Christmas, so Olli didn’t have to worry that the school was wondering where she was.
It goes without saying that we will reimburse your wife for all the income that she loses being away from work because of our little project, and we’ll pay her an executive level per diem as well. A sum has also been deposited into your account which should admirably cover any costs the project entails for you.
Anne assured Olli that he didn’t need to worry about anything, and that their collaboration seemed to be going swimmingly.
Olli tried to believe her, nodding to himself reassuringly. But he started to feel faint and had to go curl up on the sofa for a while before he felt able to look through the Facebook profiles of his wife, Greta and the Blomrooses.
Aino’s status said:
Aino Suominen is on holiday! Greetings to everyone in Mäki-Matti!
There was a new photo on her profile. A picture of the boy sitting on the beach building a sandcastle—though not a cathedral—and Aino rubbing suntan lotion on her legs. She was looking straight into the camera. Her mouth smiling, her eyes empty. Maybe they were feeding her tranquillizers, or maybe she was just stressed.
Olli wrote a comment under the photo:
Greetings from Jyväskylä. Don’t worry, I’m taking care of everything.
He would have liked to write his wife a long letter and apologize for the way that his past had been mixed up in their present and turned her life into an incomprehensible nightmare. He felt vaguely guilty. When exactly had the Blomrooses decided to meddle in the lives of Greta and the Suominen family? Had it only been once Facebook had thrown them all together?
Clearly the Blomrooses were in control of Aino’s Facebook account, and he definitely shouldn’t do anything to upset Anne as long as his family was at the mercy of her whims. So he always gave brief, businesslike answers to the Blomrooses’ messages and was careful what he wrote to Aino.
Greta’s status said:
Play it, Sam. Play ‘As Time Goes By’.
Leo and Richard’s status hadn’t been updated for a long time. There were a couple of mentions of “meeting old friends” in posts from months past. Anne was a more diligent Facebook user. According to her most recent post she was “atoning for youthful sins before it was too late” and sorry for “any discomfort this is causing for those not involved.”
Olli clicked the Like button.
For the past few weeks Olli had, with the help of some acquaintances of his, found out what Anne Blomroos had been doing over the years. It was obvious that she was a charming but dangerous sociopath. Of course, Olli knew this already from his days with the Tourula Five, and in particular from the day that the Blomrooses, led by Anne, had destroyed Greta. Anne’s Facebook profile said only that she worked in “a leadership position in business”.
More thorough research—mostly Googling and enquiries to friends in the business world—told him that Anne Blomroos was a senior executive and leading shareholder in a chemical company. Olli knew a Dutch publisher who had connections to the firm. According to him, the stock value of the company had been falling lately, because of rumours that Anne Blomroos had incurable cancer that had spread to her brain. A brain tumour would certainly explain many things, and make the situation even more to be feared. A person with a terminal disease had nothing to lose.
Olli returned to his wife’s profile and stared at the blank picture attached to Karri Kultanen’s profile. He had spent two days not daring to click on it. His testicles had gone cold when he thought about what he might see.
When he finally did look, Facebook coolly notified him:
Karri only shares some of his profile information with everyone. If you know Karri, send him a message or add him as a friend.
He wasn’t sure if he was relieved or disappointed. Probably both. If you know Karri… Yes, he knew Karri. Or had known him decades ago. Before the boy disappeared into the secret passages. And he did need all the information he could get. So he made himself move his mouse, and Facebook-friended Karri.
He waited for his former friend to confirm, although he wasn’t sure what would happen next.
After looking at Facebook a little longer, Olli went downstairs, wrapped himself in a blanket, and started watching old movies, because he couldn’t go to sleep. Casablanca, The 400 Blows, The Bridge on the River Kwai. At some point he closed his eyes and let the sound of the film recede behind the hum of sleep. Just before he dozed off, Colonel Saito told the men building the bridge: “Be happy in your work.”
The next meeting would be at the river. Wait on the bridge at 7 p.m., Anne’s message said.
When Greta arrives, rush up to her and kiss her. This time you have to shift the friendship to romance! That is what she hopes and expects. Be brave and make the first move. Kiss her in a way that removes all ambiguity. Read the chapter on stolen kisses in A Guide to the Cinematic Life and you’ll know what to do.
28
THE RAIN WASHED over the river valley, which looked like an old sepia-toned photograph.
Olli stood on the bridge. He thought about his recent dream, and the dedication on the first page of Greta’s book: For the love of my life, from the girl in the pear-print dress. The same message in millions of books sold all over the world, and no one knew that the love of Greta Kara’s life was Olli Suominen, from Jyväskylä. The mystery had even been discussed in women’s magazines.
Olli leant against the railing and watched the footpath that passed under the bridge. Raindrops pattered on his umbrella. He was nervous and anxious. He tried to shake off the feeling the Guide called slow continuum attachment—he had a task to accomplish. It was hard not to think about where his family might be right now and what Aino was thinking and feeling about all this.