“What kind of scamps are you associating with, Eva-Lena? What are these ’adventures’ you are having at night?”
It’s none of his business! Nothing about me is any of his business! And he could be a scamp himself!
He doesn’t want me to go out and meet guys and have fun. He begrudges me that. But he can’t stop me! The nastier he is, the less I will care about what he says. The only thing I need him for is to get food, money and a place to live, and he has to give it to me no matter what I do.
Friday, 21 February 1964
Last night I woke up when papa came home and had been drinking. He moved around swearing and muttering to himself. “No, now damn it, they are going to get it!” And then he got into one of the kitchen drawers and took out a knife and said he was going to “stab all those bastards to death.” Mamma was also awake, and we lay on tenterhooks in the dark and heard how he staggered around and bumped into furniture and swore. But he never came in to us, and after a while he dropped off on the sofa in the living room.
Once when Anita was little and papa had made a scene and acted dumb she ran away from home. She hid in a cellar in a neighbor’s house until someone came and found her. I, for my part, have never said or done anything to show that I’m opposed to his behavior. I have just endured it and been sad. I was sad when he scolded Anita and hit her. But it was mamma’s fault also, because if she thought that Anita had been naughty during the day, she wanted papa to deal with her when he came home, and then he gave her a beating.
When I stood in front of Strandberg’s Haberdasher’s Shop and waited for Kicki, Putte came by.
“What are you waiting for?” he said.
“For my pal.”
“So you aren’t waiting for Rolle, then?”
“No.”
I looked at the cars gliding around the square, and Putte pulled a packet of Marlboros from his jacket pocket and lit a cigarette.
“Have you been seeing the creep lately?” he said.
“The creep?”
“Yes, the creep!”
“I don’t know anybody who is called like that.”
“I saw you in his car.”
“When?”
“One evening.”
“What kind of car does he have then?”
“A Morris Mini Cooper.”
“Oh, you mean Hasse.”
“Stay away from him!”
“Why should I?”
“He’s hitched up and has two kids!”
“Oh, yeah? Why is he driving around town then?”
“Because he is a creep.”
But I didn’t care a shit about him. And I don’t think he was married. I think he lived alone in that room on Vaksalagatan.
“So what are you going to do tonight?” Putte said.
“I don’t know.”
“Ride in a raggarbil?”
“I don’t know.”
I didn’t want to admit that he was right, because he didn’t seem to like me doing it, and it was none of his business either, I thought.
“Come with me to my mom and have coffee,” he said.
“But I’m going to meet my pal.”
“Do you want to go with me and watch the motor race on ice in Almunge tomorrow then?”
“I don’t know…”
I felt sorry for him, but you can’t be with somebody just out of compassion.
“Where is the Dodge tonight?” I said.
Then he got angry.
“Cars are the only thing you think of!”
“No, it isn’t! I just wondered.”
A light green American car with long fins in back drove by, and when he saw it he said:
“You would give everything to get to ride in that damn carriage, wouldn’t you?”
But I don’t decide who to go with just because of the car, and I told him that.
“Sure as hell you do! Cars are the only thing you care about! A guy without a car is nobody to you! Ride about in cars is the only thing you think of!”
“No, it isn’t.”
“Sure as hell it is!”
“You can’t possibly know that!”
“Yes, you bet I can!”
It was impossible to talk with him. When I turned away and didn’t want to say anything more, he pulled out a notebook from his pocket and slapped it against the flat of his hand.
“I can call any number in this and be fixed up with a bird in no time!” he said. “So don’t you think you are the only one!”
“I don’t.”
“I can fix up with whoever I want!”
“Why don’t you then, instead of hanging about here?”
“Because maybe it isn’t what I prefer.”
I felt sorry for him, but I couldn’t go along with what he wanted anyway.
“When Kicki comes, I’m leaving,” I said.
“Yes, shove off and cruise, goddammit! Just do it! That’s the only thing you care about anyway!”
“But you do it too! Why is it wrong when I do it, but not wrong when you do it?”
“Get lost!” he said.
“Yes, when Kicki comes.”
But when she came he was already gone.
We went with two guys in a Volvo Amazon. Nothing special happened. If the guys are not stupid enough to skip and not pleasant enough to want to ride with again, everything becomes so boring, I think. It’s a waste of time to be with them then. But Kicki doesn’t mind, because she doesn’t have an equally strong need as I have that something must happen all the time.
Wednesday, 26 February 1964
“Grammofonhörnan” with Kersti Adams-Ray starts soon on the radio. I usually always listen to that program.
Today I finally bought a new nail varnish. I purchased colorless, because I think it’s neatest with natural nails without strong color. E-L has that light pink, mother-of-pearl shining one, and that’s also neat if it’s carefully applied, because it’s more noticeable if it’s carelessly painted. And she has such destroyed cuticles, poor girl, because she constantly picks at them. She pokes out small bits of skin and bites them loose so it starts bleeding sometimes.
We have eyeliner on our eyes. Now I have a pen, but before I had liquid eye liner, and it became so black, so help me God! It can’t be good for your eyes, either, because it’s so strong. So now I have a pen. I only make a mark down to my eyelid with a little feather stitch on the sides. I seldom do anything with the downside of my eyes and I don’t use eye shadow very often, either. If I do, I use blue. Though I once had something green and glittery. It was one of those advertising samples that I got somewhere, which looked like a lipstick in a cap.
I don’t highlight my eyebrows, because I already have such dark eyebrows. I think it becomes too black and sooty if I highlight them. Once papa said about my eyes that he didn’t understand why I must fill them in when they are already so beautiful. And secretly I agreed with him, but I do it because everyone else does it. But I don’t use that disgusting stuff you are supposed to put on your skin. No brown cream and no powder and no rouge; I just do a little makeup on my eyes and lips.
On Saturday Solan and I intend to go dancing at the Star. If E-L could (or would dance, because I think she would be able to do it if she wanted to), I would rather go with her, but I don’t mind going with Solan, either. I feel a little sorry for her, since E-L got tired of her and started being with me instead. I’m glad that E-L prefers me, but sometimes I feel sorry for Solan when E-L is nasty to her. Or, she isn’t exactly nasty, but grumpy. But she can be that way to everyone. Before lunch, when she is hungry, she is almost always very grumpy and sullen. It’s impossible to talk with her then. I can’t do it either, but I don’t worry about it, because I don’t take it personally. But in those situations, I feel a little sorry for Solan, because she takes it personally when E-L takes her bad mood out on her. So-lan wants for E-L and her to go to eat, but E-L perceives Solan as a burden, and then she can be very unpleasant. But I never say: “No, now you listen, Ev
a-Lena, if you are going to be so bloody mean and dumb, then I’ll go with Solan, instead!” I never say that, because I think it depends a little on Solan as well.
Kicki intended to go out dancing, but we met for a while in town first. Then a guy came up and started talking with us. It was in the newspaper that sixteen drunks were caught by the police last weekend, and he was one of them, he told us.
“Do you think that’s something to brag about?” Kicki said
Then he got surly and left. She doesn’t like drunk guys and I don’t either, but I would never dare to say something like that to somebody who is drunk.
When Kicki had left, I bought a hot dog at Stora Torget and went down to Radiohörnan and smoked. After a while I caught sight of a policeman who came down the other side of the street. I got uptight and hoped that he wouldn’t see me, but the next time I looked he was on his way across the street in my direction. My face felt totally petrified when he came up and stopped.
“Hello,” he said and stared at me.
“Hello,” I said.
“Why are you standing here?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“It doesn’t matter?”
“No, I don’t think so.”
He had pressed pants and his black shoes shined in the reflected light of the store window.
“Isn’t it so that you are standing here waiting for a lift?”
“No, it isn’t.”
I don't know why I lied, because it isn’t forbidden to do that.
“I have seen you here before,” he said.
“Yeah?” I said and blew out smoke.
“You act hard and cold and try to play tough, but I don’t believe that you are that way inwardly.”
But just because you stand in a place and smoke doesn’t necessarily mean that you try to look tough.
“Do your parents know that you are hanging about here in the evenings?”
“I don’t know.”
“Do you think it’s difficult to talk with them?”
“Maybe.”
“Do you think it’s easier to talk with a policeman like this?”
I didn’t know what to say and looked out over the street without revealing that I noticed him watching me.
“A young girl like you, with attractive looks and a fine figure… Don’t you think it’s below your dignity to stand here?”
It felt unpleasant to be observed. I didn’t dare to look at him. The only thing I saw was the sabre that hung against his thigh.
“What do you do otherwise, when you are not standing here? Do you work?”
“No, I go to school.”
“Where?”
“At the community girls’ school.”
“Is that so?” he said and sounded surprised. “Is it common for girls from that school to hang about here?”
“I have no idea.”
I squashed my cigarette butt with my foot and tried to relax, because it’s ridiculous to be uptight just because someone comes over and starts talking.
“Listen to my advice now and walk away from here,” he said. “I know what can happen to young girls who hop into cars with unknown guys. I have opened car doors occasionally and seen...”
“Everyone is not the same,” I said.
“No, but the girls are not accepted if the guys don’t get what they want.”
They aren’t?
“Go stand at the square instead.”
“Why?”
“Because it doesn’t look as bad.”
“But I don't care what it looks like.”
And you can’t stand at the square, because nobody stops there.
Some guys in a car that drove by stared, and one of them held up a bottle of liquor in the back window behind the cop’s back.
“If you ever have a problem you can always come and talk, but listen to a policeman’s advice now and go away from here,” he said.
“No, I won’t.”
“You are going to stay here and wait for a raggarbil?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“But that’s what you are doing, isn’t it?”
It was like a frigging interrogation. Why couldn’t he just go and leave me alone? At the same time as I wanted him to go, I hoped that he would stay.
“We could go to the station and continue talking there,” he said. “Would you like to do that? My shift ends at…”
When he stopped himself and glanced at his watch, I felt totally empty. I thought I had misheard. Why would I come along with him to the police station? I hadn’t done anything. What would we talk about there?
But he changed his mind.
“Remember my words now, and don’t do anything you will regret,” he said.
And that was all. As soon as he was gone a car with two guys inside stopped, and the guy behind the wheel rolled down the window and moved his head, requesting me to walk up to them.
“What’s up?” he said and pulled out a cigarette from a pack of Princes with his lips.
“Nothing special,” I said.
“I saw a cop talking to you?”
“Yes.”
“What did he want then?”
“Save me from depravity.”
They wanted me to go with them and I hopped in.
Watch now, you frigging cop! I thought. Watch now that I climb into a raggarbil!
But he wasn’t there.
The guys were called Bosse and Gurra. When we had picked up Gurra’s girl, Bosse came over to the back seat and put his arm around my shoulders.
“So you need to be saved from depravity?” he said.
Sunday, 1 March 1964
The cover charge for the Star was seven kronor, so now I’m poor again. Jerry Williams and The Violents entertained. Jerry jumped up and down on the stage so sweat just splashed from him, and I thought he was so disgusting. Ooh, how disgusting I thought he was! I didn’t have anything against his singing but I didn’t like his performance style at all.
Yes, and I danced, and I was nervous, as usual. I was tense in my whole body. “You are shaking!” somebody said. “Are you freezing?” “Yes, I’m so chilled,” I said, even though it was red hot in there. Oh, it was tough! I try to work with myself not to be tense, but it just makes it worse. It’s doomed to fail. It isn’t until near closing time, when I begin to be in full swing, that it disappears, but then it’s too late. The ones you dance with in the beginning don’t come back when they realize how tense you are. I always hope that somebody ugly and dumb, that I don’t want to dance with again, will ask me to dance first, so that I can be warmed up before the interesting ones come, but it seldom turns out that way.
So it isn’t so fun all of the time! It’s just as tough as being in school. And it’s worse to go out dancing than to hang about in town, because in the dark in the cars you aren’t observed so closely. But I do like dancing, so it’s a shame that I almost can’t do it. I think that dancing and music is fun. Solan and I said before that we ought to start dancing in Ungdomsringen dance club, and that’s something I actually want to do, because there you can do folk dances and high jinks, and you don’t have to feel the pressure to be to your advantage all the time.
Yesterday evening when E-L was standing in front of Radiohörnan, a police officer came up to her and wondered what she was doing there, she told me today when she called. He thought she should go away from there, or whatever it was. We decided to hitch hike to Stockholm this evening. It was her idea, because she felt that she needs to go away someplace. And it could be fun to see how it is in Stockholm. We have talked about it before that we should go there some time.
I can’t stop thinking of that policeman. Why did he change his mind? Was it because he noticed on his watch that there wasn’t time for us to talk before his shift ended, or was it because he couldn’t take me in without cause? I don’t know.
Yesterday Kicki and I hitch hiked to Stockholm. We got to ride with a man in a delivery van from Bladin’s Painting Company the who
le way. We had intended to go to Kungsgatan and watch raggarbilarna, but when we got there we went into a café and had coffee instead and sat there until it began to get dark. Then we hitch hiked home again. It took two hours to get to Märsta, and we were stiff with cold when we got there, and we just went up to the first car that came along at a gas station and asked the driver sitting in it if we could ride with him. It had snowed a little when we were outside, and after a while the smell from our hair spray and smoke from the cigarettes we had lit filled up the whole car. It was so cosy to sit there in the warmth and see the dashboard glow in the dark and listen to music from the radio while the car hissed forward on the road.
When it gets warmer outside we intend to hitch hike to Stockholm again, and then we are going to walk on Kungsgatan.
Tuesday, 3 March 1964
This evening it’s “Perry Mason” on TV. I usually watch it when I don’t have anything else to do.
Yesterday Barbro said to E-L: “Do you know what the girls are saying?” (The girls in class, that is. “No, what?” “That you and Kicki ride with guys you don’t know.” (Yeah right, how terrible!) “They do?” “Yes, they say that you usually walk on Svartbäcksgatan.” So obviously, they talk about us in class. It’s Inger and her mates, for sure, who have happened to mention that there is no bus service to E-L’s home on Saturdays and Sundays, and then the other girls have put two and two together and come up with four. (Or with sex, maybe?)
Ooh, mamma drives me crazy! I can’t stand looking at her when she sits and pulls her hair! She twists it until she gets ahold of a hair strand, which she then wraps around her finger and pulls out. And it’s a nervous behavior, so it doesn’t help that I say: “Don’t do like that! Don’t sit there and pull out your hair!” It only helps for a moment, because as soon as she stops thinking of it, she starts pulling it out again.
They are perhaps going to tear down Järnbron. If they do, Järnbrogatan will be called St Olofsgatan instead and the new bridge they build will be called St Olofsbron.
Last lesson Kicki and I skipped school, and she came along with me to look at shoes. We went to Öberg’s on Svartbäcksgatan, and a salesclerk got me some shoes that I tried on. There was a pair of “Katja of Sweden” with medium heels that I wanted, but they costed 57.75 kronor and I only had 50 kronor, so I couldn’t purchase them. When we were leaving without buying anything, the salesclerk became cross with us and said:
Hop in Then! Page 4
