The Winter War

by Philip Teir

  ‘It’s strange about people of your father’s generation, don’t you think?’ said Laura.

  ‘What do you mean?’ asked Eva.

  ‘I mean how privileged they are. They build up a myth about how they’ve made this great leap in social class, and I guess in some cases they have, but it’s really been pretty easy for them. I mean, it’s a straight climb up the ladder – they’ve never had to go through really difficult times.’

  ‘I suppose you’re right.’

  Eva didn’t understand why Laura was talking about this.

  ‘Your father too. That whole generation. In the sixties they were fighting to erase academic hierarchies, to take education out to the people. Now they complain that nobody is getting a classical education any more, that women dominate the university, and that boys can no longer read. It feels like they regret all the changes that brought us to where we are today.’

  Eva thought there was something about Laura’s analysis that didn’t really hold water, a link that was missing, angry rhetoric that lent no real coherence to her argument. But above all, Eva thought this was a strange topic for discussion at the moment. She would have preferred to talk about something else. She sighed.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Laura said. ‘I was just thinking out loud. Your grandmother is ill. I’m just so tired of the fact that certain types of people get to decide how things are interpreted in this country. So what are you working on now? Still painting, or what?’

  Eva realised that if she told Laura anything about her project, it would wreck her plan and the feeling she had about it, and then she wouldn’t be able to finish it. Talking to Laura about her art would sabotage the whole thing. She needed to hold on to the feeling she had, immerse herself in it so it wouldn’t slip away. The tram was just now passing the National Museum. Eva was getting off at Hesperia Park.

  ‘We’re having an exhibition in March,’ she said.

  ‘Want to talk about it?’

  Eva looked at Laura. ‘Not really.’

  ‘Okay. I understand. I know how it is. You don’t want to talk it to death.’

  ‘Exactly,’ said Eva.

  ‘If I was going to create a piece of art,’ said Laura, ‘I’d make something about the academic proletariat, something about temp work and the uncertainty of the job market. Nobody I know has a permanent job.’

  Eva wondered how anyone could be so annoying. She was reminded of a classmate named Anna from college who had concealed her competitive nature under a facade of hippielike love for humanity, when in reality she had dominated the social interaction in the collective where they were both living. Anna had instituted rules about how and when they could have boyfriends over, rules that were suddenly non-existent whenever Anna wanted to bring anyone home and decided to take over the living room for a party. Eva thought that Laura was a little like Anna.

  ‘This is my stop,’ she said.

  A couple of days later Katriina had arranged a dinner that would include Helen and Christian and the children. Katriina had organised the whole day, bought the flowers and set the big table in the living room.

  It was the first time in ages they were all gathered, the first time no outsiders were present, just the immediate family. Katriina cooked a roast, and Eva made a salad. They began by having a few glasses of wine while they conversed. Helen had already started crying several times. She talked about how close she felt to her grandmother, as if it was something only she understood, as if the other family members were complete strangers. Katriina seemed very taken by Helen’s emotional outpouring, and Eva couldn’t help feeling left out. She knew what was expected of her, but it wasn’t something that came naturally; she couldn’t participate fully in this familial fellowship. Instead, she felt like an outside observer. She thought this was similar to how she felt when standing in front of certain paintings. She knew they were masterpieces, and yet she couldn’t force herself to have some kind of major, overwhelming response.

  She went to her father’s study to have a talk with him. Edvard was lying on the floor outside the door and began wagging his tail as soon as she came near. Eva bent down to pet him. She’d never been especially interested in dogs, but right now it was as if she saw Edvard for the first time, as if she really connected with him. He gazed deep into her eyes, and she reciprocated.

  ‘Edvard, what do you think I should do?’

  He stared at her and wagged his tail even harder. Apparently he thought she’d asked if he’d like to go out.

  She snorted, stood up, and went into her father’s room. He was sitting at his desk.

  ‘Hi, Dad.’

  She went over and sat down on his lap. Max put his arms around her, and she leaned her head on his shoulder.

  ‘Is dinner ready soon?’ he asked.

  ‘I think so.’

  ‘Great. I’m hungry.’

  For a moment neither of them spoke. Max smelled good. When Eva was a child and lying in bed, she would notice the scent of his aftershave when he came in to say goodnight. She associated it with his writing. She’d always pictured him sitting at his desk and writing after she’d gone to bed, slipping out of her room to go and work on his books.

  ‘Eva, sweetie. Is everything all right? Are you doing okay in London?’

  She pressed her face against his neck.

  ‘I’m doing great, Dad.’

  They went into the kitchen, but the food still wasn’t ready.

  ‘Could someone make the gravy? There should be some chanterelles in the freezer,’ said Katriina.

  Helen opened the freezer and took out two packages. She opened one of them and poured the contents into a bowl. Then she looked at Katriina in surprise.

  ‘What’s this?’

  thirty-three

  EBBA’S CONDITION SLOWLY IMPROVED, and she was moved to a rehab ward. Max travelled back and forth between Kristinestad and Helsinki. One day in early March he found himself in Matti’s big office at the publishing company. He was trying hard not to jump up and strangle his editor. Matti had just told him that his book about Edvard Westermarck was not going to be on the autumn list.

  ‘I don’t know, Max. I think it’s going to be difficult to fit your book in. The lists have basically already been decided, and you still have a lot of work to do. You have the biographical details more or less under control, but there’s still something I’m missing.’

  ‘What do you mean? His moral philosophy?’

  ‘You’re the expert. I’m just saying that there’s … something missing. It needs to be more anchored in the context of the era, or maybe there should be a little more about the fact that he was probably gay. That might be a possible thread to follow. I don’t know.’

  The tone of Matti’s voice hinted that the whole topic had begun to lose its appeal, and his interest was waning. He seemed restless and kept rearranging the papers on his desk, trying to look pressed for time, as if he wanted to dismiss the whole matter as quickly as possible.

  It was Thursday, and Max was taking care of Amanda, since her school was closed for teacher meetings. Max had brought his granddaughter to the publishing company, and right now she was sitting on the sofa next to him, looking bored. Amanda seemed to regard other grown-ups as minor players in her life, and therefore not worthy of attention. She was fiddling with the zipper of her jacket, sliding it up and down, up and down.

  ‘And one more thing,’ said Matti. ‘It’s not really relevant to what we’re discussing, but I thought I’d tell you – since it sort of concerns you – that I’ve been talking with Laura about a book manuscript. She sent me a synopsis that I think sounds tremendously promising. It’s partly autobiographical, about how a young woman gets into the patriarchal world of newspaper reporting …’

  But Max had stopped listening.

  When they were back outside, he asked Amanda what she’d like to do.

  ‘Could we go to a café? Please?’

  ‘What would you like to have?’

  ‘A bun.’r />
  They went to the Café Esplanad, and Max ordered buns for both of them. As he sat there, he pondered whether to give up the whole book project. Maybe Matti was right, maybe it just wouldn’t interest anyone. Amanda started a running commentary about the way he was eating, like a sports announcer doing a play-by-play of a football match.

  ‘Now Max Paul takes another bite of the bun. Hey, that piece was a little too big, but he gulps down some water, and now he seems to have swallowed it.’

  Max looked at her. When she saw his surprised expression, she continued with even greater enthusiasm.

  ‘Max Paul has had a tough day. He’s been to see his publisher and received some bad news. His book isn’t going to come out this autumn. There was no room for it on the list.’

  Max was amazed that Amanda had paid such close attention. In Matti’s office she had seemed bored, staring off into space. The café was packed with people, and now Amanda had started her spiel over, looking even more eager.

  ‘Max Paul has had a very, very tough day.’

  ‘Amanda, could you stop that?’

  But that just seemed to encourage her.

  ‘Now Max Paul is getting annoyed. He asks his granddaughter to stop. He picks up his coffee cup and raises it to his lips. He swallows some coffee. For Max Paul, life seems to be causing him a lot of trouble. And the newspapers print nothing but stupid articles.’

  ‘Come on, Amanda, could you please stop?’

  People in the café were looking at them. Max took Amanda’s hand and leaned close to whisper, ‘I’m not really in the mood for this at the moment. You need to stop.’

  But his words only seemed to spur Amanda on to push the boundaries. She saw how uncomfortable he looked and sensed the power she had over him. Now she was sitting across from him, with her arms folded.

  ‘Max Paul is a great writer. But his new book isn’t going to be published. Max Paul is sitting in a café, brooding about life. What should someone do when he gets old? Now Max Paul takes another sip of coffee. Now his face is red. Now he almost drops the cup …’

  ‘Shut up, Amanda!’

  The words flew out of his mouth much louder than he’d planned. His hand was shaking, and he spilled some of the coffee on the table.

  Everyone nearby was staring at Max. A young father who was there with his family got up and came over to the table.

  ‘Is there a problem here?’

  Amanda looked up at the man, but didn’t say a word. She was both fascinated and amused. Max could feel himself sliding down on the bench, wanting to explain, but realising how stupid any explanation would sound. He looked around and realised that now everyone in the café was staring at them.

  ‘No, there’s no problem,’ he said.

  ‘You let me know if there’s a problem, okay?’ said the young father to Amanda.

  She just looked at him, her eyes wide, delighted by the chain of events that she’d started. Max stood up, gathered their coats and took Amanda by the hand. Then they left.

  That evening, after Katriina had driven Amanda home, Helen rang, sounding very upset. She hadn’t spoken to her parents in two weeks. She phoned Max on his mobile.

  ‘Amanda says that you told her to shut up in a café today. Is that right, Dad?’

  ‘Well, er … you know, I was having a really bad day. And she kept on teasing me. It wasn’t as bad as it sounds.’

  ‘Kept on teasing you? Are you ten years old, or what? Apparently it was bad enough for a complete stranger to come over and talk to you.’

  ‘Okay, okay. But she just wouldn’t stop …’

  ‘So now you’re blaming Amanda? A nine-year-old?’

  ‘No, no, but … you know how kids can be.’

  ‘Let me talk to Mum.’

  Max handed the phone to Katriina. They’d been conducting a silent form of trench warfare all week. Max had a feeling that Katriina was watching every step he took to see what he was doing and where he was going. Max had responded by retreating to his study to sleep and surf the forums on the web. Eva had gone back to London, taking along a big box of branches and sticks and other materials, but she refused to say what they were for.

  When Katriina had finished talking to Helen on the phone, she turned to her husband and said, ‘Max. Two things. I want a divorce. And we have to sell Råddon.’

  The next day Katriina handed him a printout of several emails. Apparently she’d been in touch with a lawyer. Max read phrases such as: ‘Concerning the previously shared residence, there is a statute in the marriage laws that makes it possible for the party who is viewed as having a greater need for the property to be allowed to stay there until a legal settlement has been reached and instituted, although for no more than two years.’

  ‘What does all this mean?’

  ‘It means I want the flat. You’ll have to move out.’

  ‘But I have nowhere to go.’

  ‘You should have thought of that before you started having an affair with a twenty-five-year-old.’

  ‘Twenty-nine,’ Max corrected her, but Katriina wasn’t listening.

  ‘Because you didn’t think about the consequences, did you? You should have realised that this would happen, sooner or later. Or weren’t you planning on telling me?’

  Max hadn’t told her a thing, but somehow Katriina had known all along. Max missed the quarrels they used to have. He would have preferred to get everything out in the open once and for all.

  That night he was sitting at the computer in his study, and he Googled Laura’s name. There turned out to be an entire thread about her on the discussion site Hommaforum. Lots of comments about her appearance and her newspaper columns. Someone had written that she was a ‘typical politically correct journalist who took up space bemoaning the fact that she couldn’t get laid’. Somebody else wrote that Iltasanomat was being taken over by ‘leftist feminists who hate the nuclear family and their native country’. A third person said that Laura ‘looks like she has nice boobs’.

  Max got up and closed the door to his study.

  He could hear Katriina in the kitchen. She’d started putting all the plates and other dishes into boxes, after informing him that it was time to redo the kitchen. Max had seen the plans that she’d commissioned, but had merely nodded without comment and then retreated to his room.

  Now he poured himself a whisky and again opened the browser on his computer.

  Then he started writing.

  thirty-four

  HELEN AND CHRISTIAN DID NOT have a summer cottage of their own. The one that belonged to Christian’s family was located almost on the Russian border, and it wasn’t really a cottage. It was more of an old farmstead, the place where his paternal grandmother had grown up. He spoke nostalgically about the house and had suggested many times that they ought to start using it, since none of his relatives ever spent more than a couple of nights there each year. But Helen thought it was much too remote to stay at the place for any length of time. And it wasn’t on the water. It was just a shady plot of land filled with mosquitoes and tall grass at the end of a tractor path with a huge rock that they almost always ran into when they went there. In reality, Helen had gone out there only twice: once when Amanda was a toddler – the first thing they’d had to do was clear away all the mouse droppings and dead mice – and once last summer. That was when they’d had a free weekend and Christian had persuaded his family to drive out to the cottage.

  ‘Mum, I don’t want to go to that place. I want to drive to Flamingo,’ Amanda had complained.

  For Christian, the summer place was a personal obsession, and he talked about it the way someone might tell an old family story that just got funnier the more often it was repeated and enhanced. Christian had so many memories linked to that place, although they seemed inexplicably boring whenever he tried to talk about them to anyone else. His biggest dream was for his children to develop a similar emotional attachment to the cottage the way he had done, or the way Helen had grown fond of Sideby.


  On a Saturday morning in June they had driven out to the cottage. The drive took three and a half hours, which really wasn’t that long, through the beautiful landscape of eastern Finland. Helen actually caught herself thinking that it wasn’t so bad – maybe the house had potential, maybe she would change her opinion once she saw it again.

  They certainly couldn’t afford to renovate an old family farm, since any extra money went towards work on their own house. But maybe the place only needed a few basic repairs.

  When they arrived, they discovered that it was impossible to drive into the yard because the grass was two metres high. They had to get out and wade through the grass to reach the front steps. As Helen was walking, she pictured a snake biting her. Amanda shrieked and said she could feel ticks jumping on her legs.

  ‘Why did we have to come out here to this damn house?’ asked Lukas.

  Christian found the keys under a rock and opened the door. The whole place smelled of mould. Helen noticed it at once. There was nothing really wrong with the house itself. It was spacious, with high ceilings, and the floor was covered in a lovely linoleum from the early 1900s. But everything looked worn, lifeless and crude, with visible damage from moisture. This time there were no dead mice or voles lying about, but the air smelled foul and dead, like an old doper’s den that just happened to have furniture from the 1930s. Christian quickly stepped inside to give an enthusiastic tour to his extremely sceptical audience. He showed them everything – from the kitschy painting depicting an old fence to a little suitcase which he claimed had come from America. He spoke about everything as if they were magical objects, as if they possessed powers that only he could see.

  ‘When can we leave?’ asked Lukas, and Amanda nodded that she, too, wanted to know.

  ‘We don’t have to stay long, do we?’ she asked.

  ‘We could spend the night,’ suggested Christian. ‘There must be some bed linen in the cupboard.’

  Helen gave him a stern look.

  Half an hour later, when they were back in the car, Lukas solemnly declared that the house ‘was worse than I ever imagined’. Amanda, who was always trying to be the dutiful daughter and who liked to side with her father, said, ‘It was sort of yucky, but I’m sure it was nice enough, in its own way.’