by Jon Fosse
You always have a show not long before Christmas, he says
Yes, I say
Because it’s easier to sell paintings then, of course, yes, during Advent, he says
and I say that’s true, at least Beyer says so, and my pictures especially are easiest to sell then, maybe Beyer means that they’re good to give as Christmas presents but he also thinks that it’s best to open an exhibition not too long before Christmas, I say and Åsleik says that that’s what he thought and then he climbs up into the cabin of the tractor and starts the engine and it makes a horrible noise, that screeching, it’s hard to believe an engine can make a sound that bad, I think and I go sit in my car and I put the brown leather bag on the passenger seat and the car has warmed up nicely and I turn the heat down a little and then Åsleik looks back at me and then forward again and then the tractor goes around the corner of the house and I drive after him and Åsleik drives the tractor out onto the country road and I follow him and it certainly has snowed a lot, there must be four inches on the ground, but it’s not snowing now, I think and I drive ten or twenty feet behind Åsleik, he’s driving slowly and steadily towards his farm, and it always takes a while to get there, and the road twists and turns a lot too, I think and I drive a good distance behind him and then Åsleik turns off and he stops the tractor and gets out and I stop the car and roll down the window
You drive carefully, now, he says
Yes, I will, slow and safe, I say
and I add that once I get to Instefjord there’ll be good roads all the way to Bjørgvin, because they always clear those roads, I say and Åsleik says that I have good tires on now, newish studded tires, plus I had enough money to buy a car with four-wheel drive and so that’s what I did, and with good studded tires and four-wheel drive my car or van is practically a tractor, he says and I answer that I’ve had enough problems driving in winter conditions in my life, experience eventually taught me something, I say and Åsleik says that’s all right then and then we each raise a hand to say goodbye and then I drive slowly on, and now it’s my car that’s leaving tracks in the snow, in front of me I see nothing but white snow, and then luckily there are all these snow poles with reflectors on them set up to mark where the edge of the road is, without them it would be easy to end up off the road, yes, it would be impossible not to, I think and I drive slowly, the way I always do, first I’ll be on the small roads along Sygne Fjord to Instefjord, and they’re not cleared, but then, after I get to Instefjord and get on the main road to Bjørgvin, it’ll be easier, because those roads will have been cleared, I think and I look at the white road and I see Asle standing in front of Mother and he’s thinking that he can’t stand going to that damn school anymore, the teachers are unbearable, why on earth should he keep going? and luckily he’s almost done with school, he thinks, and if he didn’t have so little mandatory schooling left he’d have just quit today, Asle thinks, but as it is he has to just try to stick it out, and he thinks that he still wants to drop out, even if he’ll be done soon, he thinks and he tells Mother he wants to stop going to school
Are you out of your mind? she says
Drop out of school? she says
Children have to stay in school, she says
If you drop out they’ll come and take you away to a school for delinquent boys, and it’s strict there, and the school’s on an island so no one can run away, she says
And anyway you’re almost done, she says
and Asle thinks can that really be true, that he might get sent to an island just because he doesn’t like going to school? no, he didn’t know that, Asle thinks, but he doesn’t really believe it, no more than he believes the other things Mother says, neither the stuff about Jesus and God nor that you can get sent to an island for dropping out of school, but he doesn’t give a damn, if he wants to stop going to school he’ll stop going, Asle thinks, but there’s one thing, he’s heard that to get into The Art School in Bjørgvin, and he’s gradually started thinking that maybe he could go there, if he gets in, anyway to get into The Art School in Bjørgvin you need to have gone to The Academic High School, and if it wasn’t for that he’d have stopped going to school already, then and there, no doubt about it, Asle thinks, but he’s not going to do that, he’s not going to drop out of school, it was just something he said because Mother gets so angry when he says it, no, it’s not that he has any desire to go to The Academic High School but it’s something he has to do, and he’s so clumsy that there’s hardly anything he can do, so what’s going to become of him? as Father always says, Asle thinks and I look at the white road in front of me and I drive slowly out along Sygne Fjord and I see Father standing in front of Asle and he says you’re a good kid Asle but what’s going to become of you? he says
I don’t know, Asle says
But you need to get an education, you have to be something when you grow up, Father says
and Asle says that the only thing he’s good at is drawing and painting and then Mother says well then he’s probably going to become an artist, even if there are hardly any jobs for artists, still there must be some work for people who know how to draw, at the newspapers for instance, newspapers have a lot of drawings, and there are a lot of drawings in advertisements, someone has to draw them, so it must be possible to make a living by drawing and painting, Mother says, but you can’t get into The Art School unless you go to The Academic High School, she says and Father says that true, to get into The Art School you need to have graduated from The Academic High School and Asle thinks that he doesn’t understand why someone has to learn not just adding and multiplying but also what they call mathematics to be a painter
Drawing and painting aren’t the same thing as doing maths, Asle says
No, no, Father says
and Mother says she doesn’t understand why it’s like that either, but the people in charge have decided that you have to go to The Academic High School and then you can go to The Art School, if you get admitted, she says and Asle says that he’s no good at anything but drawing and painting, okay well he can read, obviously, and he likes to read sometimes, and he even thinks he can write pretty well too, well enough, but the Norwegian teachers at his school don’t think so, so he has bad marks in writing, yes, same as in all the other subjects, he says
You never do your homework, Mother says
That’s true, Asle says
And now you’re sorry, she says
Yes, yes, Father says
and Mother says that he’ll need to do something in the future, he can’t just sit at home and paint, she says and Asle doesn’t say anything
And if you start at The Academic High School you’ll need to move into an apartment, Mother says
and Asle thinks that it sounds like Mother’s glad he’ll be moving out, and that makes sense, he thinks, he is sure looking forward to getting out, leaving home, getting away from Mother and her constant nagging and whining about how he needs to cut his hair or needs to paint pictures that people can understand, where you can see what it’s a picture of, or about how he needs to do his homework, she nags him about absolutely everything
I want to go to The Art School, Asle says
But then you need to paint like you used to, so that it looks like something, Mother says
Yes, Father says
Not those pictures that don’t look like anything at all, she says
If you keep painting those you’ll never get into The Art School, no matter how much high school you’ve had, she says
Yes, Father says
and I look at the white road and I think that I still haven’t driven that far along Sygne Fjord so it’s still a long way to Instefjord, I think and I see Father standing there and he says he can call The Academic High School right now and find out what Asle’s chances are for getting in and Father goes out to the hall and Asle can hear him talking on the phone and then Father comes back in
It’ll be fine, he says
There’s a spot for you at The Academic High Sch
ool, he says
On what they call the Modern Languages track, he says
and Asle hears what Father’s saying and he thinks that’s good isn’t it? because what else could he have tried to do when he grows up? he thinks
And so you’ll need to get a room in Aga, Mother says
Yes, Father says
But there are lots of people from Barmen who’ve gone to The Academic High School in Aga and rented a room there, so I’m sure it’ll work out, he says
I’ll put an ad seeking a room in The Hardanger Times, Father says
and Asle says he’d be grateful if Father did that and I look at the white road and I drive toward Instefjord, and it’ll be good to get there, because then I’ll be on the main road that’s been cleared already and then I can start driving south to Bjørgvin, I think, and I don’t think that I’ve ever, in all the years I’ve lived in Dylgja, driven to Bjørgvin so many times so close together, I think, and I look at the white road and I see Father standing there and he’s saying that an older woman has called and said that she has a room I can rent, it sounds like it’s a hayloft that used to be a shoemaker’s workshop, a room up in the attic, and the shower and toilet are downstairs, on the ground floor, she said, Father says and he says that it sounded good, all things considered, and the rent wasn’t so bad, he says, so he agreed on the spot, he says and they arranged for Asle to move in when The Academic High School starts, Father says and Asle says that’s great, all things considered, and he thinks it’s good he’ll be living in a house by himself, not in a room in a house where other people live, Asle thinks and he sees Mother stand there looking at him
But you’ve painted pictures of so many people’s houses and you’ve never painted your own, she says
Don’t you think you should do that before you move out? she says
That’s true you haven’t, Father says
and Asle thinks that now he’ll have to paint The New House and The Old House too, and The Barn and The Shed and all the fruit trees and The Boathouse and The Dock and The Rowboat and The Shore and The Fjord and everything, can he really bring himself to do all that? he thinks
No you haven’t, she says
You’ve painted pictures of almost every single house in the whole town, and some in Stranda too, but never your own, she says
Yes well then I guess I should paint the farm then, Asle says
With everything, he says
Yes, The Old House, The New House, The Barn and The Shed and The Boathouse and The Dock and The Rowboat, The Fjord too, not leave anything out, he says
I’m really looking forward to seeing that picture, Mother says
and she says that she’s been thinking about it for a long time but she hasn’t brought herself to ask him about it, because he’d been having a hard time since, Mother says and she breaks off and then there’s a long silence and Asle thinks why did Mother have to remind him about Sister again, about how she was gone so suddenly, how she just died, was just lying there dead in her bed one morning, yes, the thought of his sister Alida just lying there and dead he can’t take it
Anyway, Mother says
and Asle notices that Mother is about to start crying
I have a good photo of the farm you can paint from, she says
and Asle thinks that it’s too much, that Sister was gone so suddenly, and then Mother goes and gets a photo and hands it to Asle and it’s a good photo, it looks very nice, Asle thinks and Father says that he’s thought the same thing, that it’s really too bad that almost every home in Barmen, practically all of Stranda too before long, has a painting that Asle’s painted of their house hanging in the main room, while they, his parents, don’t, he says, because Asle still hasn’t painted a picture of his own childhood home, he says
Yes yes, Asle says
You really haven’t, Mother says
So before you move out you need to paint one, she says
and then they stand there silently and then Mother says yet again that his hair has grown so long now that it’s high time he gets it cut, it’s shameful, for him and for her and for Father, that he’s going around with that long hair, hanging straight down his back, it’s too awful, she says
I don’t know how many times I’ve told you you need a haircut, she says
And you don’t do it, she says
But now that you’re starting at The Academic High School you’ll have to cut your hair, she says
and she looks at Father and she says can’t he say something too
Yes you need to cut your hair, Father says
I’ve never seen a man or boy with such long hair, he says
Me neither, Mother says
and after that it’s silent and then Mother says that he doesn’t want to get confirmed and he doesn’t do his homework and he gets such bad marks that she’s sure he’ll end up on the waiting list to get into The Academic High School and on top of all that to run around with long hair hanging down his back, she says, yes, that shaggy brown mess, she says and again she says that Father should say something
Yes you need to cut your hair, Father says
and Asle thinks that he’s had enough of all this nagging, ever since he started growing his hair out and refusing to cut it Mother has been harping on at him, you have to cut it, you can’t go around looking like that, they’ll talk about you in town, no man in Barmen has ever had hair as long as yours, she said and Asle answered that he’ll wear his hair however he wants to, it’s his hair, and those curls Mother does her hair in look totally awful, that’s what he thinks, if you want to know the truth, but still he doesn’t go around saying over and over again that she has to get a new haircut, what if almost every single time he talked to Mother he said that she should go get a new haircut, he said, Asle thinks, but still he had to listen to her constant, never-ending nagging, she hardly ever talked to him without telling him he had to get a haircut, didn’t she ever think about anything else? was there not one single other thought in her head besides his needing to cut his hair? he thinks
I don’t want to paint that picture, he says
You don’t want to paint your very own childhood home, Mother says
and then Asle just leaves the room and he thinks about the time when he was in primary school and Mother took him with her to a hair salon and when he went he had nice hair, a little long, and then The Hairdresser Lady cut almost all his hair off, she practically shaved him bald it was so short, and it was like both Mother and The Hairdresser Lady were glad they’d done it, yes, it was like cutting off all his hair gave them both a kind of evil pleasure, Asle thinks and the next day he didn’t want to go to school, he looked so horrible and humiliated that he was ashamed to go to school, it was totally awful how he looked, Asle thinks and he said he was sick and that he didn’t want to go to school but he went anyway, but he wore a hat pulled down over his ears, he thinks and no he doesn’t want to think about that anymore, Asle thinks, and no one was going to give him such a short haircut ever, ever again, that’s for sure, fucking never again, he thinks, and it was so horrible going to school the next day, Asle thinks and I look at the white road and then I see some snowflakes hit the windshield, one by one, snowflakes, then it starts snowing more and more and it gets even harder to see where the road is, and I have to drive even slower, but it’ll be much better after I get to Instefjord, or Øygna, where the woman Åsleik calls Sister but who’s actually named Guro lives, I think, because then I’ll be on the cleared main road that runs south to Bjørgvin, I think and I look at the falling snowflakes, and now they’re falling so thickly that you can’t tell one flake from the others, and I look at the white road and I see Asle sitting there on the floor of the main room in his house and he’s looking at a white canvas and he’s thinking that today they found Sister dead in bed and just now they’ve left and taken her away in an ambulance to get an autopsy, they say, because they need to cut Sister up to try to find out why she died so unexpectedly and suddenly and since it isn’t ever
y day that someone dies all of a sudden so young they have to try to find the cause of death, they said and Asle sits and looks at the white canvas and he thinks that now, no, it can’t go on, he can’t anymore, he thinks, now it’s just, he thinks, now he doesn’t want to paint from photos anymore, he doesn’t want to paint any more rooms and barns in the sun with a flagpole flying the Norwegian flag, and birch trees in blossom, and a still blue Fjord, now he doesn’t want to paint house and home anymore, now he wants to paint just his own pictures, because his head is full of pictures, it’s a real torment, yes, pictures get lodged in his head all the time, not as things that have happened but like a kind of photograph, taken right there, right then, and he can kind of flip from one of the pictures in his head to another, it’s like he has a photo album in his head and the strangest things are there as pictures, like Grandpa’s black boots in the rain one time, one day, or Father stroking him on the head, just there, just then, or the light coming down from the sky over the Fjord, just there, just then, and now a whole bunch of pictures of Sister dead have lodged in there and it’s like they follow one another like a series of magic lantern slides in Asle’s head, one after the other, and he raises his hands to his eyes and pushes on his eyes but the pictures don’t go away, they just get stronger, and he takes his hands away from his eyes and now, he thinks, instead of painting pictures from photographs of house and home, yes, now he’ll paint away the pictures he has in his head, but he doesn’t want to paint them exactly how he sees them in his head before his eyes, because there’s something like a sorrow, a pain, tied to every one of those pictures, he thinks, but also a kind of peace, yes, that too, yes he’ll paint away all the pictures he has collected in his head, if he can, so that only the peace stays behind, Asle thinks and he looks and sees his sister Alida’s white face just there, just then, and he sees the stretcher halfway inside the ambulance, with Sister’s face covered, just there, just then and he looks at the white canvas and he thinks he’ll start painting the pictures he has in his head soon, he’ll paint them away, but he can’t manage to paint the worst of them, it’s too painful, it’s like they’re tearing him apart, everything he is, that’s how bad it is, but even the pictures that aren’t so hard have something about them, something sad, yes, a kind of grief, he thinks, but also a kind of peace, yes, that too, in addition to the pain, anyway there’s a kind of peace in the pictures he has lodged in his head of his sister Alida, Asle thinks and then he suddenly thinks that now, no, now he doesn’t want to see pictures anymore, he simply can’t deal with all these pictures, not the ones in his head and not the ones there on canvas, now he wants to be done with pictures, so now he doesn’t want to paint any more pictures, he wants to listen instead of seeing, yes, now he wants to listen to music, Asle thinks and he gets up and now it’s decided, he wants to play music, and he wants to play guitar, a guitar makes a lot of noise, he wants to play electric guitar, loud, with distortion, he wants to play loud loud loud, Asle thinks and I look at the white road there in front of me and now it’s stopped snowing, so it’s much easier to see where the road is, I think and I feel white and empty, and now I’ve driven all the way down along Sygne Fjord and I’m about halfway from Dylgja to Instefjord, I think, and I’m driving slow and steady, I think and I look at the white road and I see Asle there on his knees and the white canvas is on the floor in front of him and he’s thinking that he doesn’t want to see anymore, see all these pictures, he wants to hear now, he wants to hear the pictures away now, and for that to happen he has to make a lot of sound so he wants to buy an electric guitar, Asle thinks and I look at the white road and then I see a herd of deer standing in the middle of the road and I start driving even slower and the deer look at me and then they hop off, away from the road, but one is still standing there looking at me, and I think that I’ve seen a lot of deer, they’ve leaped right across the road many times, so it’s pure luck that I’ve never hit a deer in my car, I think, but I usually see deer after it’s dark or around sunrise or sunset, never during the day, but then again at this time of year it’s never really light out, not even during the day, I think and then I drive carefully closer to the deer that’s still there and then he too bounds away and I drive on and I look at the white road and I see Asle standing there on stage in the Youth Centre, his brown hair is hanging down in front of his face and hiding him, he is standing there bent over a black guitar that’s hanging on him and he’s playing all kinds of chords and Terje is on the drums playing everything he can play without any rhythm at all, it’s just noise, and Geir is thumping the bass strings totally at random and Olve’s standing there screaming and then he starts playing something kind of like a solo on his guitar and they all stop for a bit and then Olve calls out now they need to pull themselves together and play a real song, because what we just stopped playing was nothing but noise, he shouts, it’s no good just making noise like that, you need to be able to play one decent song, Olve says and then Geir says that we can’t play even one decent song but we’ll be a band anyway, he says and Terje says that we all play terribly, not one of us knows how to play, or actually Olve can play a little but no one else can, he says, so we might as well give up on the whole band, he says and Asle just stands there with his guitar on and says nothing
