‘OK,’ Josefin says. ‘I want to know what happened.’
You’re not the only one, Malin thinks.
50
The memory of violence.
It’s somewhere inside you, Josefin.
Synapses need to be connected to synapses, and then you’ll remember. But do you really want to remember?
We remember. We can see what happened to us, how we disappeared, we’d rather call it that, a disappearance, then how, after a lot of loneliness, we found each other in our shapeless space.
Sofia and I have each other.
Perhaps we’re in the beautiful place that exists before consciousness, unconsciousness? Before everything that human beings mistake for life?
We can just make out the people we once were, our space can assume whatever colour we like, and we can be exactly the people we want to be, wherever we like.
We’re with you, now, Josefin, in the lady psychologist’s room.
We need your memories.
Because somehow we need the closure provided by the truth in order to achieve real peace, to stop being scared of the dark. Because that’s what our space is like, it can adopt a colour that makes black seem like white.
Don’t be scared.
It’s just memories.
Of course. They’re your life, in one way, and we need them.
But remember one thing, Josefin. The only thing us summer angels really have is each other.
The pendulum in front of my eyes.
The curtains, the leather-bound volumes in the bookcases, the etchings of rural scenes. This room is like England.
The pendulum.
Isn’t that just something they do in films?
It smells stale here, couldn’t she have aired it first? Or maybe put some perfume on?
This peculiar sofa is comfortable, Josefin thinks, trying to concentrate on the pendulum, but her thoughts keep wandering off, her eyes flickering around the people in the room.
The woman police officer.
Malin.
She’s standing behind the psychologist lady.
What’s her thing? She seems calm, but anyone can see how twitchy she is under the surface. Well, maybe not twitchy, exactly, but definitely pretty manic or something.
She’s staring at me. Stop staring! Maybe she can read my mind, because she’s stopped staring now.
The policeman with the shaved head is sitting on the black, lacquered chair by the window. Calm, but dangerous. He’s the dad of that hockey player. And then Mum, terrified. I’m not scared, is she scared that her little girl is going to get dirty? I’m no angel, Mum, stop thinking that.
And the psychologist lady.
Looking irritated. She’s noticed I’m not concentrating.
‘Look at the pendulum and listen to my voice.’
What, has she said something? Josefin thinks, and says: ‘I’ll try harder.’
The psychologist lady says: ‘Take deep breaths,’ and I take deep breaths, ‘follow the swing of the pendulum,’ and I follow the swing of the pendulum, ‘feel yourself drifting off,’ and I feel myself drifting off.
Eyelids closing.
Dark, but still light.
But hang on.
Where am I now?
At last, Malin thinks, as she sees Josefin Davidsson disappear inside herself, responding to Viveka Crafoord’s commands.
She’s written a list of questions for Viveka, who has made it very clear that she, and she alone, would talk to Josefin during the session. That it could be difficult otherwise, and that this wasn’t like an ordinary conversation, you had to follow images and words instead of subjects.
Viveka puts the pendulum on the desk.
The sound of cars out in Drottninggatan seeps into the room.
You can hear the five of us, our breathing, Malin thinks, how they are becoming one. Zeke’s face is expressionless, Malin knows how sceptical he is about this, even if he’d never admit that now that it’s happening.
Viveka takes down the list of questions from the top shelf of the bookcase.
‘Can you hear me, Josefin? I’d like to ask you some questions. Do you think you might be able to answer them?’
A white, echoless room.
A strange voice, my own voice.
‘Ask questions if you want.’
‘I’ll ask questions.’
‘I’m tired, I want to sleep.’
‘The Horticultural Society Park,’ the strange voice says, and a pure white light shines in through a hole in the wall, the windows go black and then disappear.
‘I woke up there.’
‘What happened before you woke up?’
‘I was asleep. Before I was asleep I was at the cinema.’
The light is fading now, the room turns grey and a dark figure is coming towards me, it might be a wolf or a dog or a hare or a person, but what sort of person walks on all fours?
‘Take the dog away.’
‘Was it a dog that put you to sleep?’
‘It’s gone now.’
‘Who put you to sleep?’
‘Mummy.’
The room is white again and I am alone, and up in the ceiling there are storage shelves, like giant lights. I see myself sleeping there, a pair of floating hands are patting me on the back, it smells like a swimming pool, like a dewless summer’s morning.
‘A pair of hands.’
‘Put you to sleep?’
‘Yes.’
‘A man’s hands, or a woman’s?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Do you remember the start of the evening?’
The walls of the room disappear, I see myself cycling through a small piece of woodland, on a tarmac path, on my way through the forest in Ryd down into the city, I don’t know why I’ve chosen that route, why?
‘I went through a forest.’
‘Which forest?’
‘The wrong forest. Why?’
The strange voice, the nuisance voice, a woman’s voice, older than most.
‘Why was it the wrong forest?’
‘Because something was lying in wait for me.’
‘What was in the forest?’
‘Something.’
‘Which forest?’
A force pushing me down, there’s only me now, and I fall asleep, wake up to the rumbling sound of a car.
‘Then I went in a car.’
‘Where?’
‘To the storage shelves that were in the ceiling just now.’
‘You got to a storeroom?’
My body on a bunk. The scrubbing, it stings, and it stinks. And what is this body doing with me, its teeth are shining, it’s cutting and my whole body hurts, stop pressing, stop pressing.
‘Stop pressing, STOP PRESSING, STOP PRESSING, STOP DOING THAT.’
The voice, the stranger: ‘It’s all right, you’re safe here, you can wake up now.’
I’m back in the white room, the dark figure disappears and I creep out, wandering through the wall, waking up in a summerhouse, it’s morning, and a nice person wakes me up, even though I’m not asleep. Is the person nice?
‘I fled, I was awake, but I didn’t see anything.’
‘Who found you in the park?’
‘Maybe a person. WAS IT A PERSON?’
‘You can wake up now. Wake up.’
Black.
Open eyes.
The police officer, the police officer, Mum with gentle eyes and the psychologist lady. They all have one thing in common. They all look confused.
Josefin Davidsson and her mother have left the clinic. Zeke has stretched out on the chaise longue and he looks ready to begin the first of many therapy sessions.
Viveka is sitting behind her desk, Malin by the window. She’s looking down at the cars on Drottninggatan, as they seem almost to dissolve in the dull light.