by Isa Hansen
“Sten?” Henrik said. “Oh, he was a radiologist. Was actually considered an expert back in the day.”
Radiologist? She wouldn’t have thought it. So much for her fantasy of him being an evil lawyer out to ruin the world.
“Thanks for this.” Henrik started down the hall but rounded back to her after a few steps. He lowered his voice. “You know, I think one of the reasons he’s so mean to us nurses is because he’s retired from the medical field. Because of his past career he thinks he still holds rank over us.”
***
At home, standing in the bathroom down the hall from her room, Celia brushed her teeth while she considered Alex. She’d thought about him sporadically throughout her shift at the Warbler, but now her thoughts were centered solely on him.
She couldn’t get over his blatant disrespect toward her. How he went through her stuff and even answered her phone. That would have to be a deal breaker as far as their friendship was concerned, wouldn’t it?
Was this the end of it then?
Could she simply no longer trust Alex?
The girl in the mirror with her dark probing eyes gazed back at Celia. She rinsed her toothbrush and set it back into its caddy. The voice of Viveca Sörensson echoed through her head: What does the feeling in your stomach say?
The answer to that was clear.
All was not right with Alexander Rosensköld.
CHAPTER 25
The first snow of the year was falling.
Ebba and Celia were on a walk between classes, on one of the trails in the woods behind campus.
Heavy formless snowflakes floated down, dissolving the moment they hit the ground. Dry leaves crinkled under their feet as they walked.
Ebba’s voice from behind Celia: “Have you talked to Oskar?”
“No, why?”
“He’s pretty upset.”
Celia waited for Ebba to catch up with her. “Why?”
“He called you and Alex answered your phone. Alex seems to think the two of you are together.”
“We are absolutely not. Alex said that?”
“Yeah, he said: ‘sorry my girlfriend can’t take your call right now.’”
“Why would he say that?” Celia spat out. It seemed that her growing wariness of Alex was completely justified.
Ebba lifted her shoulders. “Who knows why Alex does the things he does … forget about him. You need to have a talk with Oskar.” She went quiet for a beat. “He’s up over his ears in love with you.” She held her eyes steady on Celia. “Did you know that?”
“Did he tell you that?”
“He didn’t have to. I’ve known him since we were this tall.” Ebba leveled her hand to indicate a very short person. “Well, he was more like this tall.” She adjusted her hand by about a foot. “The point is, I’ve known him long enough to know when he’s in love.”
“Well, I guess I have sensed vibes from him.”
“And how do you feel about him?”
“I have feelings for him, too,” Celia said quietly. “But it’s complicated.”
“Complicated how?”
Celia gazed through the trees toward campus. They were far enough away from school where she could just barely see the main building between the conifers. She could no longer hear the students on the school grounds, just the wind in her ears.
She took a deep breath and let it out with the exhale: “I don’t get sexually attracted to people. That’s not something I’ve ever experienced.”
There.
She said it.
It was finally out.
Ebba said, “So you’re asexual?”
“Probably, yeah.”
“Well, that’s cool.”
Celia eyed Ebba. “Is it? Really?”
“There’s nothing wrong with it.” Ebba’s face was honest and sincere.
“I’ve never said those words out loud before.” She shuffled some leaves away with her foot. “If I’m asexual, then what?”
“You’ll still be the same person you’ve always been,” Ebba said.
Celia drew off her mitten and reached over to feel the prickle of one of the pine branches. With everything that had been going on, it had been easy enough to keep her thoughts away from the growing revelation. But now it could no longer be ignored.
Before Ashton, she hadn’t even considered asexuality as an identity. Ashton was a soft-spoken kid from back home. They’d never been close, but they were friendly and would nod hello in the halls. During their sophomore year, Ashton came out as asexual. People at school, even Celia’s own friends, had whispered and rolled their eyes behind his back. Yeah, whatever, he’s just trying to be remarkable. But Celia had swooped up the word: asexual. Something about it spoke to her, stirred through her, even though she had yet to embrace its meaning.
Celia snugged her hand back into her mitten. “Part of me doesn’t even mind. It’s kind of fine.” She worked through her thoughts before continuing. “But I feel stuck, because here I am liking Oskar, and I don’t know what to do. You know, about relationships. And sex. I’ve never wanted to have sex, and I don’t know that I ever will. So then what? Do I stick to dating other asexual people? And to be honest, I don’t know how much I even care about dating. I might have thought I were aromantic as well, if it weren’t for my feelings for Oskar.”
“Are you going tell him?” Ebba wondered.
“I think so,” Celia said, “but I need to figure things out for myself first. I’m assuming he’s very much not…”
“Very much not,” Ebba agreed.
She turned to Celia. “You should never do anything that you don’t want to do, that goes without saying. And it’s up to you what you tell people—if and when you want them to know your orientation. Just don’t play with Oskar’s emotions.” Ebba’s tone had taken on a guarded edge. “He doesn’t deserve that.”
“I would never try to hurt him,” Celia protested. “I care about him, you know.”
“Yeah. I know you do. Sorry. I didn’t mean it like that. It’s just—he’s been through a lot.”
Celia wanted to ask Ebba what she meant but didn’t feel right prying.
The girls walked again, following the trail deeper into the woods.
Ebba leaned down for a fallen branch and tossed it into the brush. “By the way, you know how we talked about finding out stuff from the past. About Liv.”
“Yeah?”
“Well, you could probably order a copy of the police report from when she died. And I was also thinking … my sister works at the hospital in town. I could talk to her. Maybe we could find Liv’s patient journal.”
“Her patient journal?”
“Her files. They could still be around: documentation from her death, old hospital records. Stuff like that.”
“Could we get a hold of them?” Celia stopped to face Ebba.
“Maybe,” Ebba said. “I’ll talk to my sister.”
“OK, but maybe just ask in a general way. Like not Liv specifically.”
“Of course,” Ebba said. “Actually, it’s been a while since we hung out. Let me see if she has time to get together.” With a swift motion, Ebba was on her phone, texting.
Celia fished out her own phone from her coat pocket. She decided to give Alex a piece of her mind. She wrote a text, short and straight to the point: Why did you tell Oskar we’re together? Just leave me alone, OK?
Normally Alex would text back straight away, but nothing this time. Which Celia was perfectly happy with. She was better off going about her life without him.
***
A few days later, on a bitter cold Sunday morning, Ebba called Celia with some news. Celia had been out running. It was harder to keep up a routine with the dark lingering so late into the mornings and creeping back again so early in the afternoons. So she’d resorted to running on the weekends.
Today it was cold enough that she felt a burn in her lungs while she was out. When she got back to the house, her legs were bright red and tingly.<
br />
She was sitting on her bed rubbing her legs back to warmth when Ebba called.
“You’re going to like this,” Ebba said, her voice eager. “Major breakthrough: they’re stored at journalarkivet.”
“Say what?” Celia pulled a sock off with her free hand.
“Old records. Björkby keeps all their medical records. Once they’re over ten years old, they’re taken to journalarkivet. They’re stored in the city archives building behind the hospital.”
Celia sat up straight, shifting her attention away from her chilled bones.
“How do you know this?”
“My sister of course.”
“We can see them?”
“So, patient files are held under a privacy law for 70 years. After that, they’re available to the public. Now that means that Liv’s file is still protected by law.”
“OK,” Celia said, sensing from Ebba’s quick speech pattern that there was more info to come.
“I used a school project as an excuse to find out how it works. I interviewed Magda—” Ebba stopped to take a breath. “Since you’re a blood relative you might be able to order a copy, but that would first have to be assessed by a doctor, or group of people. Something like that. And your name would become registered as having read Liv’s files.”
Celia got up from her bed, taking careful steps, listening by the door: she could faintly hear Anette and Erik talking from another room.
“I’m not sure I want my name registered,” she said.
“That’s what I thought,” Ebba replied. “And you probably wouldn’t even get access. So, we need to find a way in.”
“I’m not following.”
“Once we find a way in, we’ll be able to access Liv’s medical records.”
“Once we find a way in? You mean we’re going to sneak in?”
“That’s what I mean.”
Celia was quiet for a moment, her pulse quickening. “If we can get in there, that could give us some answers,” she said. “Finally some real answers.”
There was crinkling on Ebba’s end of the line, as if she were unfolding a paper or a wrapper. “That’s the idea. But first we go scope out the place. I’m forming a plan…”
“OK,” Celia said. This was crazy. Absolutely crazy. And yet she wasn’t turned off by Ebba’s idea.
“When are we going?”
“Tomorrow. So get ready.”
CHAPTER 26
Ebba and Celia embarked on their fact-finding mission in the afternoon. They entered the hospital through automatic sliding glass doors at the front and followed the interior signs to the back of the building. After heading down a tunnel corridor that took them away from the busy hustle of the medical center, a room opened up before them with a help desk in the front corner.
They had arrived at the archives building.
Two staff members worked behind the help desk; a woman in a headscarf sat behind a computer, and a twiggy man with round glasses helped a lady with a request.
The area beyond the help desk took on the appearance of a waiting room and was geared toward study and research. The room held multiple round tables circled by plastic chairs. Potted palm trees and glossy wood benches stood alongside the walls, and a workspace stretched along a wall of windows like window seats in a coffee shop.
During visiting hours, people could order files by contacting staff members at the reception. Ebba had found out from her sister that one could gain immediate access to public medical records. Private files that belonged to oneself or to close relatives needed to be ordered in advance.
Moving down the room, Ebba tilted toward Celia, nodding to a robust metal door. “I’m pretty sure that’s where the records are stored,” she murmured.
They sat down at the table closest to it, about seven feet away.
From there, they had view of the electronic entrance pad.
The crude version of Ebba’s break-in plan was this:
Step 1. Get the access code to the records storage room.
Step 2. Search for a way into the space from the outside.
Step 3. Return at night. There was a night receptionist who worked behind the help desk after visiting hours. The idea was for one of them to distract the receptionist while the other would sneak in to the records storage room. Then the person inside would let the other in through an exterior point of entry.
Just the thought of it had Celia’s emotions twirling. The danger of what they were about to do ignited a thrill that both frightened and elated her.
She unpacked the books and notepad that she’d brought along to appear busy.
Around them, a dozen or so other people occupied the lobby—reading and studying documents. The room held the muted studiousness of a library, which only heightened Celia’s anxiety.
Only a few minutes had passed when a scrubs-clad woman approached the metal door with swift steps.
Celia observed her movements. Ebba angled her head, too.
The woman tapped numbers into the keypad—too quickly to follow—and pushed the door open. She entered a room with long rows of folders on shelves.
Ebba and Celia exchanged glances. That was it.
That was the space they needed to get into.
Now they needed the code.
Celia snuck a glance at the receptionists who were occupied with their paperwork and computers.
She and Ebba pretended to study again. They waited for the next employee to come by which happened around 45 minutes later. This time it was a younger male, and he hesitated by the entrance pad.
They watched.
He tapped the numbers, slower than the woman, and pushed through the door.
To Celia it looked like he typed in 6332.
She wrote the number down on a paper with a question mark and slipped it over to Ebba who responded with a half nod.
They casually packed up their bags.
“That’s it?” Celia asked when they were back outside. The sharpness of the cold air prickled her skin. She zipped up her coat and pulled her hat over her ears. “I didn’t think it’d be that easy.”
“We’re not done yet,” Ebba said. “It’s too soon to celebrate.”
But they were ready for the second part of their survey.
They moved to a visitor’s parking lot to the side of the hospital that was shaped like a caterpillar and lined by bare trees. Ebba and Celia waited for an elderly couple to get out of their car and amble out of view.
The archives building—only one story compared to the six-story structure of the hospital—backed into a ravine that in turn sloped down to the river. Celia could hear the hushes and whisperings of the water beyond the trees.
They followed a trampled-down pathway from the parking lot and trailed along the hospital perimeter until they hit the archives building. They were looking for a window or a door, preferably one to the wood side that wasn’t viewable from the street.
Turning the corner, they were at the back of the archives building, on a narrow dirt path that extended between the wall and the woodsy brush. The murmuring of the river was louder now.
“Look there,” Celia exclaimed. Up ahead there was a clearing between the trees and a green light illuminating a door.
“Aha!” Ebba picked up her pace.
They stopped directly underneath the light.
“Perfect.”
“So this is where the second person enters,” Celia said.
Ebba stood back and surveyed the door. “We’ve got a way in.”
“So how do we distract the receptionist?”
“I think you should be the distracter. You can do the whole American thing, act confused or maybe sick. It’ll be easier for you to distract without seeming suspicious.”
“And then you’d sneak in and wait for me.”
“You’ve got it.”
“Wait—” Celia said. “What if opening the door sets off an alarm?”
“Then we run.”
“OK.” She thought a
bout it, nodding.
They had their plan, now they just needed to set it in motion.
***
They took Ebba’s Volvo to the hospital already that night. It was just past midnight when they arrived. Ebba parked at the far end of the caterpillar-shaped parking lot. Most of the cars parked there earlier in the day were now gone; only two lone vehicles remained. They walked through the visitor’s lot toward the hospital’s front entrance.
The hospital was lit up like a crown diamond in an otherwise dark and sleepy part of Björkby. Most of the city’s health care facilities and medical centers were there: dental care services, pharmacies, rehab centers, and daytime doctors. The buildings around the hospital all appeared closed for the night.
Celia’s nerves were taking over, making her head dizzy and her heart stutter.
By contrast, Ebba looked completely calm and collected—strolling toward the entrance with her shoulders back, hands in her coat pockets—as if late night storage coups were a regular part of her weekly routine.
They entered the same way as before.
To Celia it seemed that every doctor and hospital personnel they passed in the halls eyed them with suspicion.
When they reached the corridor that led up to the city archives, Ebba turned to Celia. “You ready for this?”
“Yeah,” she said. A warning signal flickered in her mind that their plan wasn’t foolproof or safe enough, but she wasn’t going to surrender now.
Ebba stayed back, and Celia walked down the corridor, her pulse throbbing in her ears. Up ahead, the night receptionist was working behind the help desk, just as she expected. The front desk worker was a man; he looked big and burly. That didn’t help anything.
She trotted up to the desk, her hands behind her back to hide her trembling.
The man glanced up at her. “Sorry, we’re closed,” he said. His face was round, sporting a thick beard underneath a button nose. Up close he looked less intimidating.
“Oh, sorry,” Celia said, playing at anxious American student. “I just … I need to find out how to get to…” she made a helpless little gesture with her head.
