The Friend

by Joakim Zander

  He’s so absorbed by his daydreams and his indefinable longing that he doesn’t notice someone standing beside him until he sees a hand pluck up one of the unread books about Lebanon that sit on his desk.

  ‘The Tragedy of Lebanon,’ a soft, brisk voice reads aloud. ‘Still the only book you need to read on the civil war.’

  In front of Jacob, flipping amusedly through the book, there stands a tall, fit man in his forties, dressed in a perfectly tailored, dark-blue suit. He’s wearing an expensive-looking light-blue tie that’s tied in an intentionally sloppy way. The man looks up from the book and stares at Jacob with piercing eyes. Jacob has never seen anyone who looks more like a diplomat than this man.

  ‘So,’ he says. ‘What do you think? Were the PLO trying to get Gemayel killed in the spring of 1975? Or was it some other militia? Maybe the Phalangists themselves?’

  Jacob reddens immediately. Gemayel, Gemayel, Gemayel. Where has he heard that name? Why didn’t he read the book?

  ‘Gemayel?’ he says and his voice is so croaking, weak and uncertain that he wishes he’d just kept his mouth shut.

  ‘Yes,’ the man says. ‘Pierre Gemayel? The attack that led to the bus massacre on the afternoon of 13 April, which caused the whole bloody thing to explode? The PLO were suspected, but that always seemed a little too obvious. Don’t you think?’

  ‘Well…’ Jacob begins, searching feverishly through his memory for anything he might have learned over the summer, anything at all.

  But his mind is completely blank.

  ‘It was a terrible war,’ Jacob says instead. ‘All those factions that…’

  The man just looks at him as if completely indifferent to Jacob’s dodges. Jacob doesn’t know who Gemayel is, and now he’s worthless.

  ‘That what?’ the man says.

  ‘That were fighting,’ Jacob says.

  He wants to die now, just sink into the ground and disappear. His career is going up in flames faced with a man whose name he doesn’t even know, but who is probably a diplomat and therefore influential, exactly the kind of person he needs to impress.

  ‘It was a terrible war because so many different groups were fighting?’ the man says. ‘Yes, that’s also one way of summing up Lebanon itself.’

  At least he’s smiling a little now. Not in a friendly way, but still. And he stretches out his hand. ‘Lars Vargander,’ he says. ‘I’m the ambassador here. Or in Damascus, but we’re not there any longer.’

  Jacob jumps up, his whole body trembling. Vargander. The ambassador. This can’t be happening. His hand trembles as he stretches it out. ‘Jacob Seger,’ he says in a wavering voice. ‘I haven’t had time to read the book yet. Agneta just gave it to me.’

  The ambassador looks at him indifferently. But there’s a twinkle in his eye and a smile beginning to spread on his lips. ‘I’m just screwing with you, Jacob,’ he says, and gives him a friendly punch on the shoulder. ‘I don’t expect you to have read Randal’s book or know all the details of the civil war on your first week, okay?’

  Jacob is overcome by enormous relief. Then hit immediately by another wave of humiliation at being played like that, like he’s a beginner. He knows he’s blushing again. ‘Okay,’ he says. ‘I…’ He stops himself, shakes his head.

  ‘Yes?’ Vargander says with a smile. ‘What is it?’

  ‘You know I did actually know that Gemayel was president. I just got flustered.’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ Vargander says. He turns his wrist to check his watch, which is steel-grey and compact. A Rolex Submariner, Jacob thinks, stifling a sigh. That’s where he wants to go. That’s where he’s been heading.

  ‘I apologize,’ he continues. ‘But I just got back from Stockholm last night, and I’m headed to a meeting in Ankara for the rest of the week. I think we’ll have to catch up when I get back after the weekend. Agneta can take care of you, right?’

  ‘Yes,’ says Jacob and nods. ‘Of course.’

  ‘It’s pretty dead around here right now, and it’ll probably stay that way for a while. Everyone’s busy. But you’ll just have to amuse yourself, discover the city.’

  He looks around and when he realizes they’re alone he bends over conspiratorially towards Jacob. ‘You don’t have a girlfriend, right?’ he says. ‘I mean… Well, you know what I mean?’

  He stares calmly into Jacob’s eyes. Jacob can feel himself blushing again, shocked by the turn in the conversation towards such a personal question. He’s heard there’s nothing unusual about his situation, being gay in the Foreign Service, and in fact it can even be an advantage, since it’s easier to move if you don’t have any children. But what is this about? Did he misunderstand?

  ‘No,’ he says. ‘I don’t have a girlfriend.’ He gathers his courage. Perhaps this is the moment to take some revenge on the ambassador for what just happened. He looks straight into Vargander’s eyes. ‘I have no partner at all.’

  Vargander pulls back slightly and stares at him calmly. ‘A car will come and pick you up outside Saliba Market at nine on Friday,’ he says. ‘I think it’s time for you to see a part of Beirut that you might not discover on your own. That is if you want to?’

  Jacob feels his excitement growing. Whatever this is, it’s definitely not something you say no to. He’s ready for anything. ‘Absolutely,’ he says. ‘Sounds exciting!’

  21 November

  Sankt Anna

  It’s dark by the time Gabriella pulls her shiny, black and practical company car into the parking lot in front of Båtsholm’s hostel. Even though the wind’s died down, the snow is still falling with undiminished intensity. Still large, wet flakes of snow mixed with rain.

  ‘Lucky we didn’t drive to Stockholm tonight,’ Klara says when Gabriella stops the car. ‘Even if we have to stay at Bates Motel for a night.’

  She nods towards the run-down wooden hostel. The hostel is dark except for a weak yellow light streaming from the lobby window.

  When Klara was little they ate lunch here sometimes in the summer, and she remembers the dusty, old-fashioned interior, the creamy gravy and homemade strawberry juice. It must be ten years since she was here last, but not much has changed.

  Gabriella nods absentmindedly and takes her phone out of her pocket, throws a stressed glance at it, and then pushes it into her pocket again.

  ‘Are you waiting for something?’ Klara says. ‘Did you have somewhere you needed to be tonight?’

  ‘No,’ she says. ‘It’s just the usual. You know.’ But she sounds somewhat hesitant and evasive.

  ‘We’ll leave as soon as we wake up tomorrow,’ Klara says.

  Gabriella nods and throws her a look with that stiff smile on her lips again. ‘Of course,’ she says. ‘No problem.’

  Gabriella bends to open the door, but Klara stops her with a hand on her arm. ‘Gabi,’ she says. ‘What is it? Are you okay?’

  They stare at each other for a moment as newly fallen, wet, thick snowflakes melt on the car’s hood. Klara sees a gleam of something in her friend’s eyes, something she’s not used to seeing: a flash of irritation.

  ‘Yes, Klara,’ she says. ‘Stop worrying. I came to the funeral, but I can’t turn my whole life off for you, okay?’

  Klara trembles a little, as if a tiny, tiny bomb has exploded in her chest and left a jagged crater behind.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Gabriella says quickly. ‘I didn’t mean to sound so…’

  ‘It’s fine,’ Klara says. She turns away and opens the car door. The wet air hits her as she puts her feet into the slush.

  ‘I really didn’t mean for it to sound like that, Klara,’ says Gabriella, rounding the other side of the car hood. ‘Things are just kind of messy right now.’

  ‘How did you mean it to sound, then?’ Klara says, as she walks around the car and up the stairs to the hostel. She immediately regrets her tone. She has no right to sound like that, to be so touchy. But she’s too tired to hold back any more. An incredible wave of exhaustion has flattened all of her
defences. She doesn’t even have time to turn the doorknob before she hears Gabriella’s quick steps behind her, and feels her put a hand tenderly on her shoulder.

  ‘Well, I definitely didn’t mean it to sound like that,’ Gabriella says. ‘Please turn around, Klara.’

  Reluctantly, with a sigh, Klara turns around and looks at her friend from beneath her bangs. ‘I’m sorry,’ Klara says. ‘I’m just too tired for any bullshit tonight.’

  Gabriella nods and keeps her hand on her shoulder. ‘I get that,’ she says. ‘The thing is…’ She falls silent.

  ‘Yes?’ Klara says. ‘What?’

  ‘Well,’ Gabriella says. ‘This isn’t the night to talk about it. But it’s the job, Klara, not you. Come on, and let’s go inside. I’m freezing.’

  Their adjoining rooms look exactly like Klara had imagined them. White walls, soft mattresses, thick blankets with starched duvets and bedside lamps with bulbs missing. The sea lies no more than fifty metres away, but the darkness and snowfall make it impossible to see anything through the windows.

  *

  ‘It’s off-season,’ says Gertrud, the hostel’s owner, while she turns on the radiators and checks to make sure all the faucets are working. If only she’d had a little more notice, she could have made it more comfortable, she complains. But Klara assures her that a bed is all they need. They’re getting up early in the morning again. Gertrud continues to apologize while putting a couple of ready-made liver pâté sandwiches into the ancient refrigerator in the restaurant’s kitchen and shows them how the coffee maker works. Finally, she’s done prepping, and as she turns on the last of the heaters and makes sure all the windows are shut tight, she tells them that payment is out of the question.

  ‘Out here we take care of each other,’ she says, narrowing her eyes at Gabriella. ‘It’s not like up in Stockholm, where people only think about themselves.’

  Klara notices Gabriella trying to catch her eye, sees the shadow of a smile on her lips. She smiles back but the crater in her chest makes it hard for her to give in to their usual level of mutual understanding.

  ‘I’m so unbelievably tired,’ she says. ‘I think I have to head to bed right away, Gabi.’

  *

  Klara sits on the twin bed in her room, staring at her reflection in the dark window. Her blue eyes seem pale now, rather than intense as she sometimes hopes. The black eyeliner around her eyes, her sallow, autumn complexion. It’s been a long and terrible day. At the same time, she feels like somehow things will get sorted out. Maybe they’ll even get sorted out for her after all the shit she’s been through these past few years.

  She turns off the lamp, stands up and walks over to the window. Wet flakes swirl in the wind. She puts her forehead against the cold glass and tries to catch sight of the sea and the islands with no success. But just as she’s about to climb back into bed, she hears something that makes her stop cold. The muffled sound of an engine, dampened by snow and wind, almost imperceptible.

  Someone is driving on the road out there, and it’s getting louder. It sounds like someone is approaching the hostel.

  14 August

  Beirut

  It’s a few minutes to nine, and the evening is in full swing on Armenia Street, just outside Jacob’s apartment building. Dressed to the nines, people wander with drinks in their hands through honking traffic, between restaurants and bars where the music is turned up to the max.

  It’s been a hot day, and the stink of garbage is as overwhelming as it is inescapable, no choice but to get used to it, then forget it. As Jacob exits into the somewhat cool evening air of the street in front of Saliba Market, the smell hits him again, forcing him to suppress his queasiness.

  A car should be picking him up here in a few minutes. It feels so strange. Was Vargander really serious about this? On the other hand, what does he have to lose if no car shows up? It’s not as if he knows anyone here or has made any plans.

  It’s been over a week since Alexa’s rooftop party and his meeting with Yassim, and since then he’s basically spent all of his time at home, at the embassy, or at a few local restaurants. He’s almost in shock from Beirut, its chaos and messiness, that indeterminate menace that seems to rise from the asphalt and ooze out of every bullet hole on the buildings’ facades. He’s attracted to it, wants nothing more than to throw himself straight into it. But he doesn’t quite dare.

  And then there’s Yassim. Just the thought of his name, his hands, his mouth, makes Jacob almost pant with desire. How could he feel like this after just a few hours in a dark garden late at night?

  Maybe this is good for him, to get out a little, focus on something other than his suffocating worry that Yassim might never get in touch with him again.

  He’s wearing jeans and a dark-green Ralph Lauren shirt with neatly rolled-up sleeves. One of three identical shirts in various colours that he bought on sale two years ago, which he now switches between for special occasions. He has a tote bag carrying his keys, phone and wallet on his shoulder. He takes a deep breath and fishes out the wallet to flip through his confusing mix of dollars and Lebanese pounds. How much is this night going to cost? His student loan money hasn’t come in yet, and the little he managed to save from packing ulcer medicine in Fyrislund for two months at the beginning of the summer has to last him all the way to Christmas. So far Beirut has been much more expensive than he imagined. He needs to be frugal. Even if he’s used to stretching to make ends meet, the thought of money always fills him with piercing anxiety.

  ‘Mr Seger?’

  Jacob jumps a little, pushes his wallet back down into his tote, and turns in the direction of the voice who said his name. A midnight-blue Volvo SUV with blue diplomatic plates is sitting in traffic right in front of him, with the window of the passenger door rolled down. The driver is trying to get his attention. Jacob goes over to the car.

  ‘I’m Jacob Seger,’ he says in English.

  ‘Ambassador Vargander asked me to pick you up,’ the man says. ‘I’m a driver for the Swedish embassy.’

  Vargander has sent a diplomatic car. Jacob tries to hide his widening smile as he opens the back door, jumps in and settles in on the light leather seats. The air is cool and dry inside; it doesn’t even smell like garbage.

  ‘There are refreshments,’ the driver says. ‘Just help yourself to whatever you want.’

  The driver stretches a hand back between the seats and taps on what turns out to be a built-in refrigerator on the floor at Jacob’s feet. Jacob bends over and opens the door. Two bottles of white wine are cooling inside, along with a few bottles of beer and four wine glasses.

  ‘I…’ he begins. ‘I don’t even know where we’re going, I hope you do?’

  The driver nods calmly. ‘Trust me. Also, the ambassador wanted me to tell you tonight is on him. He was very specific on that point. He’s paying for everything. There’s money in an envelope over there.’

  He points to the fridge again and Jacob opens it. Sure enough, a white envelope is tucked between the wine glasses. He plucks it out and opens it. A small bundle of twenty-dollar bills – he counts ten of them. In Beirut, he’s learned, US dollars are as useful as Lebanese pounds.

  He bends down and takes out one of the bottles of Lebanese wine. The traffic is almost completely still. He pours himself a glass and sinks down into his seat, watching the people and the lights and the chaos on the narrow sidewalks outside. Feeling equal parts calm and expectant as he takes his first big gulp of cold, dry wine.

  They drive slowly eastward along Armenia Street, and the bars eventually become sparser and are replaced by stores selling lamps and wall clocks and refrigerators standing on the sidewalks. He sees older men in small holes in the wall sweating and welding in the dusk.

  ‘Where are we going?’ Jacob asks. He’s on to his second glass of wine now, and he’s enjoyed his ride in the diplomatic car so much that he completely forgot that he has no idea where they’re going.

  ‘Burj Hammoud,’ the driver
answers.

  Jacob’s heard of the Armenian district beyond Mar Mikhael, and his curiosity is piqued again, along with a gnawing nervousness. Burj Hammoud is the neighbourhood with the highest concentration of gay culture, though nothing happens openly there either. Apparently he didn’t misunderstand Vargander’s hints.

  After they cross the highway the traffic lets up a little, and the character of the neighbourhood becomes something completely different from his own. It looks poorer, more like he imagined Beirut. Run-down houses and dirty neon signs, power lines that turn and twist like spider webs over streets and buildings.

  The car turns off the main street and stops at what must be one of the older houses in the area. A modest and worn brass sign hangs on the door: Hammam Oriental.

  ‘Well,’ the driver says, staying where he is, with his back to Jacob. ‘We’ve arrived. I’ll wait close by and pick you up when you’re ready.’

  A hammam? A bathhouse? Jacob knows what that means and he can feel his pulse start to race. It was more than a little forward of Vargander to arrange this. He takes a deep breath, swallows hard and opens the car door.

  *

  ‘Welcome,’ a boy says to him in Arabic when he rings the bell. The boy, who can’t be older than fifteen, shows him into a hall with green, blue and black mosaic tiles in intricate patterns on the walls and floor. On the benches lining the walls some men sit drinking tea from glasses. They study him with interest as he walks over to a small counter in the middle of the room where a stout woman in her fifties asks him for twenty dollars and hands him a towel and some lavender soap in exchange. She says something in Arabic, but when Jacob stares at her doubtfully she switches to English.

  ‘The locker rooms are that way,’ she says, pointing over her shoulder. ‘We have three saunas. Firas will show you.’

  The boy smiles at Jacob and gestures for him to follow. They go through the hall, deeper into the building, which is much bigger than it appeared to be from the street.

  In the dressing room, Jacob puts his towels and soap on a bench and stares questioningly at the boy who is standing in the door, looking at him invitingly.