The Boy in the Headlights

by Samuel Bjork

‘You really think that we would get it?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘And it’s not the hospital. I wouldn’t ask you to do that.’

  ‘It isn’t? Then what is it?’

  ‘He has a private practice up at Ullevaal Stadium. Only those patients.’

  Mia smiled and tilted her head.

  ‘Sure, but really, Mia—’

  ‘Thank you.’ Mia winked and stroked his arm.

  ‘Will you call me when you have it?’

  ‘Of course, but I really can’t—’ Gabriel began, but Mia had already taken her mobile from her leather jacket and was heading out of his office.

  Chapter 28

  Ellen Iversen was sitting in her car outside Morellbakken School, regretting having invited so many guests. Turning forty? Was that really something to celebrate? She glanced quickly at herself in the rear-view mirror and felt exhausted. She looked exhausted as well: bags under her eyes, her skin sallow, her eyes rather red around the rims. She looked like she hadn’t slept for a week. Shit, why had she got herself mixed up in this? After all, she was happy, wasn’t she?

  She had met him in the shop. One of the teachers from the school. She hadn’t thought anything of it: another day, another customer.

  ‘How can I help you?’

  ‘I’m looking for some dining chairs.’

  ‘Do you have anything particular in mind?’

  ‘Arne Jacobsen, perhaps. Do you stock those?’

  ‘We do.’

  ‘By the way, that chair I saw in the window, who made that?’

  ‘I designed it myself, as it happens.’

  ‘Did you now?’

  Flattery. Was it that simple? He had liked her chairs. And the dining table she had made. And the lamps. He had bought practically her entire collection. On a teacher’s salary. That had been her first thought, she had to admit it: the things she made were not cheap. But then he told her that he had inherited some money from his mother and she felt bad for having been so judgemental.

  Stop it now.

  Enough.

  This won’t end well for anyone.

  Ellen Iversen glanced at the time on her mobile and realized that she was starting to get annoyed. It was twenty minutes to two. The dental appointment was in twenty minutes and it took at least fifteen minutes to drive there. Hadn’t they agreed to meet at half past? She tried calling him. Again. Still no reply. How many messages had she sent now? Fifty? Had he replied to any of them? No.

  Teenagers.

  Ruben, her son, had just turned fourteen. He had pestered her for the latest, overpriced mobile, but could he be bothered to pick up when she rang? No. Did he remember to charge it so that she could get hold of him? No. Was he able to pay the bill himself, like they had agreed? No. Was he at least able to tidy his room, help out at home, take the bin out, do something so that she didn’t feel like an idiot when she gave him the money? No.

  She shook her head and tried his phone again, but there was still no reply.

  Teenagers.

  The dentist. Why couldn’t he make his own way to the dentist?

  ‘How was your dental appointment today, Ruben?’

  ‘What appointment?’

  Same conversation two weeks later.

  ‘How was your dental appointment today, Ruben?’

  ‘Er, what do you mean?’

  I’ll take time off work.

  I’ll pick you up from school.

  You’ll meet me at one thirty.

  Is that clear?

  Do you want me to write it on your hand?

  Ellen Iversen sighed and took out a lipstick from her bag. Was that a grey hair she spied in the mirror? Another one? Did she have to go to the hairdresser’s again? She had only just been. Now what was all that about? Surely she didn’t care about a few grey hairs? It was OK. Completely natural. The lipstick as well. She tended not to wear lipstick. Her lips were perfectly fine as they were. She saw the irony in it. I’m sitting outside my son’s school waiting to pick him up, but am I tarting myself up because he works there? It’s not like you, Ellen. You’re married. You’re a happily married woman.

  Well, there’s happy and there’s happy. Ellen Iversen got out of the car and started walking towards the school entrance. She wasn’t unhappy, no, but something was vexing her. Boredom? Was it that simple?

  Her entire life had become so … practical.

  She missed the spark, the tension.

  It started to rain as she walked across the playground and knocked on the school secretary’s door.

  ‘Hi, can I help you?’

  ‘I’m looking for my son, Ruben Iversen.’

  ‘What year is he in?’

  ‘Year nine.’

  ‘Let me have a look. English with Heidi Laukvang in 104.’

  Ellen Iversen thanked her and walked down the corridor to the classroom. She knocked on the glass pane in the door and waved quickly. The teacher came over and opened the door a crack.

  ‘Hi, how can I help you?’

  ‘Is Ruben here? He has a dental appointment, only I think he has forgotten.’

  Heidi Laukvang frowned.

  ‘No, Ruben didn’t come to school today.’

  ‘He didn’t?’

  Ellen Iversen felt the rage surge with such force that she had to clench her teeth.

  That arrogant little brat.

  Skiving off?

  She had had her suspicions, but even so …

  Today?

  When they were going to the dentist, and she had taken time off work?

  Who did he think he was?

  No, enough was enough …

  She spotted Martin behind the glass.

  ‘Please could I have a quick word with Martin?’

  Laukvang summoned him, and the slouching teenager shuffled out into the corridor. He was barely able to keep upright.

  ‘I thought Ruben slept over at your house last night?’ Ellen Iversen said through clenched teeth.

  ‘Yes, only he never showed up—’

  ‘Is that true, Martin?’ Ellen said, putting her hand gently on his shoulder.

  Heidi Laukvang returned to the classroom, closing the door behind her.

  ‘Yeah … of course it is. Why would I lie about that?’

  ‘But Ruben and you had arranged that he would stay over at your house last night, hadn’t you?’

  The lad nodded.

  ‘So that bit was true?’

  ‘It’s all true,’ Martin said, throwing up his hands. ‘I’ve no idea where he is.’

  ‘He hasn’t called you?’

  ‘No, I swear it. You have to believe me.’

  ‘And you’ve had no contact with him?’

  ‘I’ve tried Facebook and texting, but he hasn’t replied, so I thought that perhaps—’

  ‘What did you think?’

  ‘That perhaps you had changed your mind and said that he couldn’t go after all. You know.’

  ‘Know what?’

  ‘No, I mean, you’re cool, but his dad can be—’

  ‘Thank you, Martin, I’m sorry. It’s clearly not your fault.’

  Ellen Iversen managed to calm herself down and produce a genuine smile this time.

  ‘So you don’t know where he is?’

  ‘No idea,’ the teenager said with a shrug.

  ‘OK, but where do you think he might have gone if he and you – how shall I put it? – decided to take some time off school one day?’

  The boy looked at her warily.

  ‘Storo, maybe?’ he muttered eventually.

  ‘The shopping centre?’

  ‘Yes. But I don’t know for sure.’

  ‘Thank you, Martin, if you do hear from him, please would you tell him I’m looking for him?’

  ‘OK, Mrs I.’ The gangly teenager nodded and disappeared back inside the classroom.

  Storo shopping centre. God help us all.

  On a school day.

  He was in big trouble now.

  Elle
n Iversen felt the rage well up inside her again as she stomped down the corridor and half ran back through the rain to her car.

  Chapter 29

  By the time he reached the office block by Ullevaal Stadium, Gabriel Mørk was starting to wish that he had worn some kind of disguise. He was also wondering whether perhaps he should have told Munch about the trip after all. Typical Mia, this. Rules and regulations were for other people. Of course he should have said no and talked to his bosses. Anette, the police lawyer, for one. She would have filed a request for a warrant. Access to psychiatrist Wolfgang Ritter’s files. And the response? No way. Not a chance. Of course not. And fair enough. How many patients were they talking about? Twenty years of people pouring out their hearts. A thousand? As many as two thousand? Well, there was your answer. It didn’t matter how important it was. For all he knew, the judge could be one of Ritter’s patients.

  He felt a tingling under his collar as he entered the building and took the lift to the third floor. Shared consulting rooms. Dentist. Gynaecologist. And Ritter. A receptionist behind the glass door. Gabriel quickly scanned his surroundings. There would appear to be a shared waiting area a little further down a corridor. Some chairs. A small sofa. He took a deep breath, opened the glass door and smiled at the receptionist, an old woman with white curls and glasses far down her nose. Just act normal. Once again, he wished he had something to hide behind as he coughed lightly and headed for the waiting area. A man with a hat on his lap. A stack of magazines on the table. Posters on the walls. A stand with leaflets near one wall. He nodded to the man, who ignored him, and took his MacBook out of his bag. He sat down with it on his lap and tried to blend in. Whatever that meant.

  He had debated various ways of doing it but had concluded that this was his only option. In order to get into Ritter’s computer, he needed access to a network. It boiled down to three options: Ritter’s home? Oh, no. Follow Ritter and hope he connected to an open network? He didn’t have time for that. Ritter’s private practice was his only option. He turned on the Mac and looked around quickly. The man with the hat continued to ignore him. The receptionist glanced briefly in his direction, but then looked back at her desk without appearing to think anything was amiss. And why would she? Gynaecologist. Dentist. Psychiatrist. People came and went all the time.

  He waited for a few seconds.

  Wi-Fi. Searching for network …

  A long list came up. That was the problem, obviously, with being in an office building. His laptop picked up every network on the floors above and below him. He scanned the list and found the one he thought it must be. Shared3. A shared network for all the offices on the third floor? Excellent. Nothing could be better. Plenty of traffic. Less risk of anyone discovering that he had been in there. He opened a program he had downloaded on his way out of the office.

  John the Ripper.

  He wondered if people knew that these programs existed. Open access online for anyone who might be interested. The ability to hack without having any skill at all; it was just a question of turning it on. Connect it to a network, press the button and it did the work for you. It would take a little time, of course, and he began to feel nervous as the receptionist glanced at him again over the rim of her glasses.

  The logo in yellow on red, with a drawing of Jack the Ripper in the background. Macabre, perhaps, but it would do the job. He was about to double-click on the icon when it occurred to him that there might be a simpler way of doing it. The Ripper was great, but no programs could do this in just a few seconds; it would take at least ten minutes.

  He quickly made up his mind, put the Mac on the table and went up to the receptionist.

  ‘Excuse me.’ He cleared his throat and put on his most innocent expression. ‘I’m waiting for my girlfriend. Would I be able to log on to your network?’

  ‘Of course.’ The receptionist smiled and scribbled something on a piece of paper.

  Kindness personified.

  ‘It’s Shared3.’

  A yellow Post-it note across the counter.

  ‘We’ve had a few problems with it, but I think it’s OK now.’

  ‘Thank you so much,’ Gabriel said, and almost felt a little guilty.

  Such a nice woman and there he was lying right to her face.

  But it couldn’t be helped.

  The end justifies the means, wasn’t that what they said?

  He walked back to the sofa as calmly as he could and entered the code.

  Shared3.

  JgFrPh45

  At least they had had the sense to pick a password that was difficult to crack. If only they didn’t give it out to just anybody.

  He dismissed the thought and couldn’t help smiling when the Wi-Fi icon on the screen showed him that he was logged on. The excitement from the old days returned. He couldn’t put his finger on what it was, but it had always fascinated him. He didn’t want to destroy anything, that had never been his thing; it was purely the knowledge that he could do it. Get into places where he shouldn’t be. Use his head to outwit them. The thrill. He was startled when someone came through the door. A mother with her child. He was used to the safety of his basement; this was completely new. Suddenly he felt strangely vulnerable as he downloaded the connection protocol. Five machines were logged onto the network, including his. He wondered whether he should have made more of an effort to hide, to make himself completely invisible, but it was too late now. It would take a professional to see that he had been there, and even then it would be very difficult to find him again.

  The signs on the doors.

  Marit Eng, gynaecologist.

  Mrit_Eng.

  Gert Oversjø Vik, dentist.

  Gover_V.

  Wolfgang Ritter, psychiatrist.

  Wolf_Ritt.

  He double-clicked on John the Ripper and entered the information the program needed.

  Thirty minutes later he was back in the street with his MacBook in his bag and his heart pounding under his jumper.

  He glanced up at the third-floor windows one last time before pulling his hood over his head. He found Mia’s number on his mobile and walked briskly towards the cab rank.

  THREE

  Chapter 30

  Early morning. Not even six o’clock yet. It might be the most boring route in the world, but thirty-two-year-old Jonas Olsen was behind the wheel and grinning from ear to ear. Thinking about last night still made him feel warm all over. He could barely believe it was true. That it had gone so well.

  It seemed almost unreal.

  April. Spring was really happening now; it was still dark outside, but even so he could just about make out the green leaves on the trees. Normally it made him sad, triggering a feeling of loneliness. It always seemed to get worse at this time of the year. Funny when you thought about it. Surely it should be the other way round and the dark winter should be the hardest time of the year? But no, he didn’t think it was like that. He had read about it in an article online. There were more than six hundred suicides in Norway every year, and most of them occurred in the spring. He hadn’t completely understood the article, but it was about how, during the winter, everyone was depressed and you only realized you were different when the sun came out. Once it got light outside, you discovered that the darkness was inside you, or something along those lines.

  Jonas Olsen leaned forwards and turned on the radio as dawn began to break around him. The route that included Kjelsås, Grefsen and Maridalen was regarded as a job for older security guards. Great if you were the lazy type; it was a cushy job with only a few places to check and quite a distance between them, at least where he was going. Camp Skar. A former army camp, now a further-education facility. It always felt like an unnecessary trip. It was far from town. Off the beaten track. He couldn’t imagine that anyone would be bothered to go all the way out there to nick pens and a few outdated computers. But this was what he was paid to do and today it didn’t matter anyway. He found a radio station that was playing a song he liked and
sat humming to himself and drumming the steering wheel with happy fingers.

  He had given up hope of getting himself a girlfriend. He was too odd. Too shy. Too awkward. He cringed when he remembered his schooldays. His budding attempts to attract the opposite sex had been pretty disastrous. He had spent most of his time at home, his nose in books. But then? No, he could hardly believe it. Linda. A temp in reception. The usual one had been on maternity leave. There had been something about her, something he couldn’t put his finger on. And he had known that her time with the company would come to an end, that the usual receptionist would soon be back. He had wanted to stop the calendar in the break room. Stop the days from passing. As long as time stood still, she wouldn’t be going anywhere.

  But then, quite out of the blue, she had said:

  Fancy going for a coffee sometime?

  He had been so flustered he had barely been able to open his mouth.

  Yes … why not?

  Or dinner, if you fancy it? On Saturday? Is that convenient? Or perhaps you’re busy?

  Busy? No, absolutely not. Saturday would be great.

  And then her smiling eyes looked at him as she slid a note across the counter. Her phone number.

  In the car afterwards he almost couldn’t get the key in the ignition. His initial joy, however, was soon replaced by his usual fear. It just came over him; it was like drowning slowly in ice-cold water. No, no, no. What had he just let himself in for? It would be a disaster. He had to cancel. What would he say? She would start to hate him when she realized how stupid he was. Nervous. Frightened. Unable to string a sentence together. Only nonsense came out of his mouth. He had heard it so many times before: the laughter, the whispering behind his back when he passed someone in the school corridor, or at work, for that matter.

  But she had liked him.

  ‘I really like you, Jonas.’

  Linda.

  ‘Do you fancy doing something tomorrow as well?’

  He couldn’t believe his luck.

  And as if the world had decided to send him yet another little token of joy, the sun suddenly rose and erased the darkness from the forests around Lake Maridalen. Another morning in the kingdom of spring. Strong, glorious colours all around him now. What a difference it made, he thought to himself as he drove towards the car park at Camp Skar. Nature in the dark. Nature in the light. Life on your own. Life with … He didn’t dare complete that last thought. They had only had one evening together. The chance that he would make a fool of himself again was great. It was about not having expectations. Enjoying the moment, this lovely feeling in his body.