The Family Clause

by Jonas Hassen Khemiri

  She reaches the building site and parks on what should, according to the plans, be a lawn, but which is still a mixture of gravel and puddles. She hurries into the temporary conference room, which still has no spotlights.

  * * *

  A son who is a father leaves the corner table to fetch coffee and check on the one-year-old. Definitely sleeping now, he says. The mother glances at her watch. She drinks the last of her coffee. Do you have to get back? the son asks. She nods. Let me know if you need a babysitter soon. Yeah, that would be fantastic, he says. We could really do with a break. Maybe next week? The mother checks her diary. I’m in Gothenburg Wednesday to Friday, she says. Göran and I are meeting a potential client. How about the weekend? says the son. The weekend might be a bit tricky, I’m afraid. There’s an opening at Magasin III on Saturday, and on Sunday I’m going to Berwaldhallen with the girls. How about the weekend after that? We can speak nearer to the time, says the son, punishing her for having a life. But you’re coming to the birthday party on Sunday, aren’t you? Of course, says the mother. Do you want to keep the aloe vera? Sure, says the son. It’s 119 kronor, she says, handing him the tube. The son thanks her and rubs in some more of it. The lotion is green and transparent. It feels nice, he says. Cold somehow. Aloe vera is fantastic, says his mother. This stuff is imported directly. It treats all kinds of inflammation. When I worked in the shop, I used to recommend it to nine out of ten of our customers. The son thanks her. It’s 119 kronor, she says again. You can give me cash. Or just transfer it to my account. The son stares at the mother. Are you serious? he says. It’s the same price I paid for it, the mother says. I haven’t added anything. The son nods. He hands her the cash. Are you annoyed now? the mother asks. Not at all, the son says, attempting to smile. They say goodbye, she runs off to her car and is behind the wheel before the restaurant door has even swung shut.

  He stays behind with his sleeping son. Once her car has disappeared from the square, he gets up and wanders homewards. He turns left down the hill. He passes the barrier that is closed every morning between seven and nine, and again every afternoon between four and six. He tries to focus his thoughts on something, tries to come up with a mnemonic to remember when the barrier is closed. You’re seven when you start school and you finish after ninth year, by which time you’re roughly sixteen and then you turn eighteen and can get your driving licence; he watches the cars passing by and quietly says the makes to himself, a Honda Civic, a Toyota Prius, a Volvo V70, another Volvo V70, a Mazda 3. He continues, past the villas and the apple trees, the high-rises and the building site where they have started blasting rock to make room for sewerage pipes and foundations, the road gets cordoned off every day at ten, twelve and four, the loud warning sound rings out, followed by a faint rumble and one long tone to signal that the blasting is over. It isn’t much further now, he keeps his thoughts going, he thinks about parking regulations, he thinks about the old man with the little white dog that often wears a coat, but not today, he thinks about the kid from home help with the orange t-shirt and the huge keyring who always smiles when they bump into one another in the lift, he turns into the yard, he buzzes in through the door, it all comes crashing down on him in the lift, he doesn’t know why but he can’t stop, it’s like when he was younger, he makes his way into the hall, he parks the buggy, he wanders into the bedroom, he screams into pillows, kicks the duvets towards the wall, he catches sight of himself in a mirror and calms down, sits quietly on the edge of the bed and tries to work out what is going on. His son wakes in the hallway. The father goes out and picks him up. The one-year-old looks into his father’s eyes. He reaches out and touches a cold tear still clinging to the father’s cheek. Both smile as the tear bursts into nothingness.

  * * *

  A father who is a grandfather steps out of the doctor’s surgery with a racing heart. He calls his ex-wife. She doesn’t have time for him. She has houses to build, exhibitions to attend and younger lovers to dance the tango with. He calls his son instead. The son answers. His voice sounds strange. Have you got a cold? the father asks. No, says the son. It’s because you don’t wear a hat, says the father. I haven’t got a cold, says the son. What happened yesterday? We waited for you for hours. Why didn’t you come to dinner? I got held up, says the father. She was disappointed, says the son. She’d made her lasagne. I’ll talk to her, says the father. They fall silent. They’re going to operate on my eyes tomorrow. Really? Yes. Do you want us to come? the son asks. Who’s us? the father asks. I’m on paternity leave, remember? says the son. Okay, says the father. If you want to come, you can come.

  VII. TUESDAY

  A daughter who is a grandchild who is a football pro who is a dragon tamer who is a ninja with firepower is four years old but nineteen million-strong. No, not four years old. Four and a half. No, four and so many months that she’s almost exactly five. She’s better at football than Zlatan. She’s the fastest runner on earth, almost as fast as space rockets, except nothing is faster than space rockets. Only Lightning McQueen, because he has flames on his sides, real flames, which are hotter than lava. Lava comes from volcanoes. There aren’t any volcanoes here, and no dinosaurs and no sabre-toothed tigers either, though there are tigers that live in the zoo, but they can’t come over here at night because they don’t know the code and they can’t take the lift by themselves and even if anyone did open the door, they wouldn’t get into our flat because they don’t have any keys or pockets. Lions are faster than rhinos. Zinkensdamm is called Zinkensdamm and not Stinkensdamm, but that does rhyme. Other things that rhyme are ball and rubber ball, sandy and Andy, cool and not cool, nice and really nice. You aren’t allowed to get angry with one-year-olds because they’re only one, and when you’re one you don’t know why you aren’t supposed to bite balloons or tear up space books or eat Lego wheels or put yellow crocodiles into bins. One-year-olds can’t do anything, they can’t talk, they can’t ride balance bikes, can’t play football, they just eat things and drool and get snot everywhere. You aren’t allowed to bite one-year-olds, even if you feel like it. You aren’t allowed to hit them in the tummy or on the head. You aren’t allowed to kick one-year-olds, not in the head, not on the back, not even gently on the foot. You can only kick one-year-olds sometimes, really gently, when they’ve done something really, really stupid, like thrown a pencil topper troll down the toilet, even though it wasn’t their troll. Four-year-olds don’t wear nappies. Four-year-olds go to playschool and play football and like balloon baseball. On Saturdays, four-year-olds are allowed sweets but one-year-olds aren’t, they might get some sweetcorn, the one-year-old once got to try a raisin. But one-year-olds don’t get Pez or raspberry gummies, they aren’t even allowed to try M&Ms, and definitely not liquorice. Four-year-olds like liquorice and cornflakes and mandarins and brown pears that are hard, especially if they’ve been in the fridge, and ice cubes in their mouths if they’ve bitten themselves, and ice cream, different flavours, but especially pear and chocolate. You can get ice cream that has sweets inside. You can’t get sweets that have ice cream inside. The ice cream would just melt inside the sweet. Mummy doesn’t like ice cream. Mummy likes chocolate, nuts, dates and those green pumpkin seeds that you sprinkle on yoghurt. Daddy likes ice cream, sweets and wine and hotdogs. Mummy drinks a bit of wine and says it tastes disgusting. Mummy never wants to try hotdogs. Mummy says that she likes other things more than hotdogs. What’s nicer than hotdogs? Halloumi, for example. Four-year-olds like halloumi and hotdogs. But mostly hotdogs. Because hotdogs are the tastiest things on earth. Hotdogs. Halloumi. Sweets. Ice cream. And hotdogs. One-year-olds aren’t allowed hotdogs. They can have them, but only if the hotdog is cut up into tiny tiny tiny tiny tiny pieces. Tiny pieces like this. So small that they’re smaller than fingernails. So small that you can hardly see them. Especially when Mummy cuts them up. When Daddy does it the pieces are bigger. Mummy says that hotdogs can get stuck in babies’ throats and that if they can’t breathe then they have to go
to hospital and they might die. Leo’s grandpa is dead. Squirrels can die, but not elephants, unless they fall into a volcano. Four-year-olds are always really nice to one-year-olds. One-year-olds get to borrow toys. One-year-olds get to stand in goal. One-year-olds get very good at ducking when four-year-olds kick their hardest. When four-year-olds are full, one-year-olds get some hotdog. But the one-year-old is too stupid to realise that the hotdog is hotdog. The one-year-old throws the hotdog onto the floor twice. The four-year-old has to pick it up and give it back to him over and over again. Mummy and Daddy don’t notice because they’re talking by the stove. Mummy says: why did you offer? and Daddy says: I don’t know, and Mummy says: if you want him to cope on his own you need to take a step back, and Daddy says: he was having an operation. They say they’re having a discussion but they’re actually fighting, you can tell from their voices. Eventually, the one-year-old realises that the big piece of hotdog is also hotdog. The one-year-old laughs. He has teeth in his mouth, but not everywhere. The four-year-old has more teeth and her teeth are twice as strong. The one-year-old shoves the whole hotdog into his mouth. The one-year-old laughs. The one-year-old coughs. The one-year-old looks funny. The one-year-old’s face changes colour like a chameleon, which is a prickly dinosaur that can change colour. The one-year-old is pale brown, then blue, then purple. Mummy says that Daddy has to take responsibility, Daddy says that’s exactly what he’s doing. The four-year-old says: look, the one-year-old looks funny! Really funny! Look how funny! Not now, says Daddy. We need to finish talking, love, says Mummy. The four-year-old goes over to the one-year-old. His mouth opens like he is about to be sick, but nothing comes out. He’s making really strange noises. Mummy turns around. Jesus Christ, she shouts. Daddy runs over and tears the one-year-old out of the high chair. The plate falls onto the floor, the four-year-old gets ketchup on her football shorts, Mummy turns the one-year-old upside down, Daddy hits the one-year-old on the back, the hotdog comes flying out and lands on the floor, it’s got little bite marks on it, but not very big ones. Did you give him this? says Daddy. No, says the four-year-old. Tell the truth, says Mummy. I’ve got ketchup on my football shorts, says the four-year-old. Did you give this to him? says Daddy, except he doesn’t say it because he shouts it so loudly that the four-year-old’s ears break. The four-year-old is never scared, but right now she is a bit scared. Daddy holds up the hotdog in front of her. He shakes it so hard that it breaks and falls to the floor. You aren’t allowed to throw food on the floor, says the four-year-old. Daddy grabs the four-year-old firmly by the arm, he drags her out of the kitchen, he shouts that four-year-olds have to be nice to little brothers, that he goes crazy whenever anyone tries to harm his family. When they get to the children’s room, Daddy says that he is tired of being a daddy and would rather be a child. Enough now, love, shouts Mummy. Enough yourself, says Daddy. Take a break, says Mummy, who comes running in with the one-year-old in her arms. Daddy lets go of the four-year-old and goes into the bathroom, Mummy goes back to the kitchen with the one-year-old, there are strange noises coming from the toilet. The four-year-old stands outside. She knocks on the door. Not now, says Daddy. He sounds like he’s on his knees, trying to undo a tight screw. He sounds like he does when he pumps up the buggy tyres using the pump with the wrong bit on the end, meaning you have to push really hard, harder than any child can push. Mummy comes back. She hugs the four-year-old. Were you scared? says Mummy. No, says the four-year-old. I’m not scared of anything. I’m just a little bit scared of sabre-toothed tigers, slime and Taurus the robot from TV. Mummy smiles. You know that there’s a real person inside the Taurus costume, don’t you? No, says the four-year-old. Taurus is a robot. He’s a real robot. That’s why he slimes children that are too slow. Yes, but there’s an ordinary actor inside the costume, says Mummy. No, says the four-year-old. Bill from playschool says he’s a real robot. Okay, says Mummy. But you don’t need to be scared of Taurus, because it’s just a normal person. You don’t know anything, the four-year-old shouts, running into her room. She slams the door behind her. She takes out crayons and draws on the table, even though she isn’t allowed. She sticks dinosaur stickers on the walls. She pulls out the dressing-up box and tips it upside down. No one comes in. She puts on a Spiderman hood, a Pippi Longstocking wig, a tiara round her neck like a necklace, a dark brown pirate belt, with a plastic clothes hanger as a bow and four straws as arrows. She sneaks out into the kitchen. The one-year-old is back in his high chair. He is eating a mandarin. Each segment has been cut into tiny tiny pieces, so small that they look more like small balls than segments. He laughs. Mummy and Daddy are standing by the hob. They’re hugging. They’re several miles tall, but Daddy is the tallest because he can reach up and touch the ceiling. Mummy isn’t as tall, but she is still taller than most of the teachers at playschool, other than Karro. Daddy notices the four-year-old. He picks her up. He says sorry for using such a harsh voice. He tells her that he went with Grandpa to have an operation today. A real operation? the four-year-old asks. Mmm, says Daddy. They operated on Grandpa’s eyes. You’re joking, says the four-year-old. No, it’s 100 per cent true, says Daddy. Was it dangerous? asks the four-year-old. No, not really. Grandpa thought it was dangerous, but it was a routine operation. What’s a routine operation? Something they do every day. Like brushing your teeth? Yes, kind of. But do you know what they did before the operation? They took a super photo of Grandpa’s eye with a special super camera that zoomed right in on it, they wanted to see it really, really close up because they were looking for something called the macula, which is the thing that makes us see. And do you know what the macula looked like? No, says the four-year-old. Like space. It looked like a volcano on a big green planet. It looked like a star in a solar system, except it was deep, deep inside Grandpa’s eye. Then they put drops into Grandpa’s eye and cleaned it with a laser, and now Grandpa can see almost as well as you and me. The four-year-old smiles. She snuggles into the fold between Daddy’s upper and lower arm. Really? How? Did he have space in his eye? Mmm. The four-year-old laughs. Daddy laughs. Mummy laughs. The one-year-old lifts his pink plastic plate of mandarin. He holds it out to the four-year-old. He wants the four-year-old to taste. The four-year-old takes two pieces and swallows them. Thanks, she says to the one-year-old, thanks for letting me taste. Shall we pretend you’re a target? Mooo, says the one-year-old. It’s bedtime, says Daddy.

  * * *

  A one-year-old who is a grandson who is a little brother who is the youngest in the family clears his throat and says: mooo. Mooo? You’ve got to be kidding me. Does it look like I have four stomachs? Can I swat flies with my tail? Do I ruminate my food? Is milk my absolute favourite thing? Okay. I’ll admit it. I like milk, milk is good, milk is healthy, you can drink milk warm, cold, lukewarm. But honestly. Who on earth (aside from Mummy) doesn’t like milk? It doesn’t make me into a mooing idiot. I’m small. I wear nappies. I don’t have many teeth. I can’t really walk properly yet. I’m fascinated by my own fingers and laugh loudly on the changing table when I realise that I’ve got a willy. BUT! Considering I’m one, I’m actually incredibly self-sufficient. Things I’ve done while you weren’t watching over the past week: eaten soil from the plant pot in the bedroom. Torn out three pages from a book on Daddy’s bedside table. Eaten a black rubber cap from a pair of headphones. Then another. Thrown my big sister’s yellow plastic crocodile in the bin in the kitchen. Put a remote control in with the recycling. But you don’t notice any of this because you’re too busy replying to messages or arguing with each other about who emptied the dishwasher or watching my big sister as she kicks the same rubber ball back and forth in the living room.

  If you would just look at me the way you looked at my sister when she was younger, you’d realise that there are hundreds of nuances of moo. One moo means: I’m not tired at all. Another means: no, sorry, I haven’t seen any yellow plastic crocodiles. A third moo means: it wasn’t me. A fourth moo means: LOOK OUT, THERE’S A BEAR! And a fifth moo
means: oh, sorry, I was wrong. A sixth moo means: okay, clearly I’m expected to kiss this strange man everyone calls Grandpa on the cheek, even though he’s about two hundred years old and has rotten teeth and a prickly beard, I’ll do it now, I’ll kiss him on the cheek and drool on his shirt, but I want you to remember, remember that I stepped up, that I took one for the team and that it should count in my favour when we’re picking bedtime stories tonight.