And he had enjoyed the camaraderie with the other seasonal workers, who were equally homeless and flitted from summer to winter.
Almost as if he’d had a family.
On the main street he met an elderly lady with a dog. She gave him a fleeting glance and he broke out in a big smile. She hurried on with her eyes lowered, and Kristoffer continued in the opposite direction. He’d done it to amuse himself really. A friendly smile from a stranger always seemed to arouse confusion. But no good person thought that way. And he was good. Nowadays.
Years had passed and finally it had begun to gnaw at him, an uneasy feeling that something important had passed him by. The nagging thought he had every time he served an overbearing party of customers with reliable credit cards and receding hairlines. The reminder that genuine success also took time, at least if it was going to survive the in-crowd list on the slate behind the bar.
And the nagging feeling had spread. Not even alcohol had been able to drive it away, when he was drunk and in some strange way was able to talk to himself in a voice that came from somewhere else. The voice had suddenly begun to wonder where he was headed. Is this really me? it had asked. Was it really me who just got up from the table, and if so, why did I do that?
Up until now he had regarded his life as a temporary arrangement. Whatever was going to make it start for real had not yet happened. His naïve belief that he didn’t have to initiate anything himself, that everything would fall into place if he just waited long enough. But then, when he began questioning this attitude, he had realised that this makeshift arrangement was not so easy to get rid of. Maybe it was the anonymous money that had been sent to him every month that had lured him into the delusion that his real life was actually going on somewhere else. During the black anxiety of his hangovers he had come to the conclusion that his life resided in the vacuum that existed inside the atoms of his body.
And no one, not even himself, knew where this body had come from.
It was the need for an answer to this mystery that legitimised his diversionary tactics during the waiting period. The monthly payments that proved there was somebody out there who knew.
He stopped at the window of Pet Sounds. He usually allowed himself a CD now and then, even if the price in his new life without tips was a bit steep for his wallet. Downloading music for free was not part of his world-improving ideology. The door opened and a guy in his twenties came out holding a chocolate bar in his hand. As he passed by he threw the colourful wrapper on the street.
‘Excuse me, you dropped something,’ said Kristoffer.
The guy gave him a quick look. ‘It’s just rubbish.’
‘Yes, I can see that, but who do you think is going to pick it up for you?’
The guy stopped short. He looked about and gave Kristoffer an uncertain smile, as if to check whether he was kidding. Kristoffer stood there waiting, looking him straight in the eye, but this time he wasn’t smiling. A few seconds passed before the guy bent down and picked up the wrapper, shamefaced. Only when he’d left did Kristoffer smile, pleased with himself and his action.
Nowadays these were the types of kicks he sought, since the ones he’d been getting from sex and alcohol were suddenly gone. Tortuous anxiety had already crept in before the new kicks had managed to soothe him. In despair he’d realised that he’d reached a blind alley, that the cost of the only thing that helped actually scared him as much as what he was trying to escape. Only then had he understood how hard it was to change his behaviour. How the alcohol and the other drugs demanded their place even though he didn’t want them any more. What he’d thought was voluntary had proven to be a necessity. His most dangerous enemy lived inside him, feeding on his brain and preventing him from making his own decisions. The air that no longer reached down into his lungs, the restlessness that demanded constant motion even though he didn’t dare. The longing for relief, to escape from his own thoughts, but at the same time the fear of what it would cost – the life-threatening anxiety of the hangover. The fee for a few hours of grace. He’d no longer had any defence against what was tearing at his soul. The panic of feeling something slowly break down, letting something ghastly force its way out.
He had left his place behind the bar and gone home to the cubby-hole he shared with another seasonal worker. He had sat for hours on the unmade bed, having a hard enough time just breathing. The thought of what his parents would think if they could see what he’d become.
The shame he felt. Over what he’d done, how for so many years he’d humiliated himself. The experience of being in debt, both to himself and to all existence. He had felt utterly flayed, lost and alone.
He had packed his bags and taken the train to Stockholm. Made use of his many contacts after his years in the pub business and managed to find a flat. A sublet contract for an indefinite period; the owner was doing research abroad. Kristoffer didn’t know what sort of research except that the books on the shelves suggested it was something in the natural sciences. The first few months he had locked himself in the flat and didn’t dare go out. The days he’d been forced to go grocery shopping had been a nightmare. At least he had enough money in his bank account, after saving up all his tips, since his food and drink had been free. In the hope of leaving everything behind, he had broken all contact with his old life and alone had begun to fight his inner demon. One by one he had browsed through the books on the shelves, often incomprehensible, but at least they offered some distraction. At night he sat at the computer. He found an Alcoholics Anonymous chat room in and got help making it through the small hours. He had woken up each morning with the choice of giving in to his all-consuming longing, or making up his mind to get through another day. Tiny, tiny steps, which taken together led him forward.
After six months he ventured outside to take long walks around Stockholm. He walked endless distances as if trying to leave something behind.
He was standing on Fjällgatan when it happened. Enjoying the view. It was springtime and the shimmering green shifted in endless nuances. The white ferry to Slussen sliced through the water, which glittered as though strewn with diamonds. All this beauty had surprised him. An unexpected wonder. It couldn’t have been there before, could it, since he’d never noticed it? It had come from deep inside, a tingling, dazed sense of joy, impossible to resist. Even though there were people all around him, he had let his laughter echo across the street and further out over all of Stockholm, and he had felt that finally, finally he was free. That everything before him held possibility. He’d always felt that he was meant for something great, and now the time had come. He would make a contribution, do something significant. Everything had now acquired a meaning. From the moment his consciousness opened, there was no turning back. Then each waking moment became a struggle for change, an eternal refusal to adapt or accept the way things were. The world was a swamp, and it was the responsibility of everyone to drain it. To become, like him, an advocate of humanity’s self-defence, a champion against everything shallow.