“Nobody that you know, anyway.”
“Are you coming, then?”
“No, I’m not.”
“If you don’t hop in, I’ll come out and get you.”
“Yes, you can try that!”
I thought about asking him how things had been at sea, because I wanted to know if he would continue to lie, but before I could say anything he said:
“There are rumors about you in town.”
“What kind of rumors?” I said and leaned against the front fender.
“Don’t touch the car, goddammit!” he roared.
“Well, excuse me!”
“Are you getting in or not?”
“No, I’ve already told you!”
“So I’m not good enough? What kind of a fucking star do you require to be satisfied?”
“None at all. I just wanna sit here.”
Just then, or whenever it was, Älgen and some other guys drove by, and when they hooted, Putte hooted back.
“Was he the one who took your virginity?” Putte said afterwards and glared at me again.
“Who do you mean?”
“Don’t play dumb!”
“But I don’t know who you mean.”
“Älgen, damn it! Is he the one who took your virginity?”
“Has he said that?”
“What do you think?”
“If he has said that, he was lying.”
“I surely believe him more than I believe you, damn it!”
“Well, what I have to say doesn’t make any difference, then.”
“So you’re saying you’re still a virgin?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“No, you damned sure are not! That I’ve found out by myself!”
He has not, but I didn’t think of it right then.
“You can be it anyway,” I said.
“No, you can’t. Or did you take it with a pen?”
“Sure!” I said.
Then he went off. I started to walk up the street, and by Karlsberg’s Tobacco Shop a car with two guys in a Dodge Dart stopped and asked if I wanted to go with them. But the cutest guy already had a girl, so I said no. I said no to eight offers, I think. At one point, when I stood and talked with some guys in a car, there was a line behind, and in the next car Göran was sitting. I waved when I got sight of him, but he looked away and pretended not to see me.
“Skip it then!” I shouted.
First he was angry at me because I didn’t want to kiss him, and then because I started walking on Svartbäcksgatan, and now because I drink. But what I do is none of his business. Besides, it is his fault that I started to walk on Svartbäcksgatan.
The reason why I turned down so many offers was that I wanted to go with guys who had spirits, because I didn’t want to get sober again. But I almost was, before I met two guys called Kåre and Roffe. They didn’t have a car, but they wondered if I wanted to come with them to a place where there was a party. Roffe was very cute, but he was only fifteen years old, I found out later. I don’t remember where the house we were in stood. On Ågatan, possibly. Anyway, we went up a ramshackle staircase and came first to an attic and later to a room where there were two girls and a guy who were sitting at a table drinking Koskenkorva.
I wrote in my notebook while Roffe and Kåre were out for a while. This is how it came out:
I’m so young and you’re so old, this my darling I’ve been told. I’m drunk. I’m not able to think. Oh, please stay by me Diana. Roffe has gone out. He’s cute. I have gotten his picture from him. He has a suede jacket and a mohair scarf on in the picture. It was taken at an automat. We struggled for a teddy bear just for fun. I fell down from the bed. He got on top of me. Sören and Ritva brawled. They are engaged. Ritva and Yvonne live here. Ritva ran to the window thinking she would jump out, but Sören and Kåre pulled her away. Then she cried. She is depressed and is taking a lot of pills, Roffe said. She has tried to take her own life before. When I went to the toilet, Roffe followed me there. He kissed me and put his chewing gum into my mouth with his tongue. I’m chewing on it now. I called Kicki, but she didn’t want to talk with me. She doesn’t like it that I drink alcohol. Roffe isn’t here. He has gone out. There is an attic outside this room. I don’t know where we are. I can’t remember how we got here. I’m drunk. It’s so wonderful to be drunk. I never want to be sober again. When Roffe and I lay on the bed I took off my dress and bra. I don’t know where he is. He’s only fifteen years old. I’m older than he is. I want the guy to be the oldest. Oh, please stay by me Diana! Now I’m going to drink a little more. I never want to be sober again. My cigarette will be burned out soon. Hold me darling, hold me tight, squeeze me baby. He’s only fifteen, but he has already knocked a girl up. He thought I wouldn’t want to be with him if I found out about it. The girl’s pop had scolded him. I don’t know how I am going to get home tonight. They don’t have a car. I need to go to Svartbäcksgatan again. Roffe doesn’t want me to. He wants to come along with me and fix so that some buddies of his drive me home, he says. I called Kicki. She got tired of me. Now I’m drinking. I don’t know what I’m writing. I’ll read it tomorrow when I’m sober. Now I’m not sober. I’m drinking Koskenkorva. It’s Finnish vodka, I think. Ritva is from Finland. Yvonne’s guy has overturned with his car. That’s why he isn’t here. He got a concussion and gashes on his face. The car turned into a scrap heap. Kåre and Roffe went outside to fight. They went out to find some guys they have fallen out with and beat them up. They are so childish. Roffe is cute. I’ve got a picture from him. He got one from me, too. It’s the same one I give to all the guys who ask me for a picture. I have on a black, low-cut dress, and my hair is combed to one side and hangs down over my shoulder, and I’m standing under a blooming apple tree, smiling. Everyone thinks it’s a frigging good picture of me, and it is, but I don’t know if it’s especially like me. In back the dress is fastened tight with safety pins, because it isn’t really a dress but a black cloth that I have wrapped myself in. Why aren’t they coming back? Sören and Ritva are lying on the bed, whispering. She’s still sad and he is trying to console her. Where is Yvonne? Has she gone out? If they don’t come soon, I’m leaving. The filter is burning. I turned the cigarette the wrong way when I lit it. I set fire to the tampon. Now I’m going to drink. When I’ve finished this, I’ll be off. There are probably no cars out anymore. I hate it when it’s empty in town. When everybody but me has gone home I understand that what I want doesn’t exist. Then I understand that I exaggerate. For everybody else it’s just a game they can quit whenever they want. Love me warm and tender dear, love me warm like the glow of the morning sun. Why can’t it
It’s so disgusting to wake up after being drunk and remember what you have done. You have a headache and a stomach ache and are thirsty and dry in the throat from all the cigarettes you have smoked, and you feel sick just thinking of booze. Then I have regrets and think that I will never get drunk again, but then I do it anyway.
A guy Roffe knows drove me home. Roffe also came along. Before I got out he asked if I wanted to come along with him to the movies this evening to see “Wild Young Man” with Elvis. And I had thought about seeing it, so I said yes. They have raised the ticket prices to 3.75 and 4.50 kronor, but he would treat, he said. But then I will not see him again, because I could never be together with – go steady with – a guy that is younger than me.
I’ve been to the movies with Roffe. I still think he is cute, but it’s so difficult when he doesn’t have a car. He got upset when I said I needed to catch a ride home, and he wanted to follow me over to Svartbäcksgatan to check what guy I would go with. He thought I should wait until somebody he knew came along. But nobody like that came, and as long as I was together with him, nobody else stopped, either. Finally, he had to give up and leave. I saw him up at the square later when the guy I rode with drove by.
On Wednesday Kicki and I met two guys called Svante and Ragnar in a Ford Taunus, and they had spirits which they offered us.
Kicki didn’t drink very much, but I got rather drunk, as usual. Kicki had snitched the key to her sister’s and brother-in-law’s allotment-garden cottage, because we thought we would go there if we met any pleasant guys, and when we had ridden around town with them for a while we asked them if they would like to come along with us there and have coffee.
I had been there before, so I knew it was small, with just two tiny rooms. The guy Kicki was with drove, and he had not drunk anything, but the other one was almost as drunk as I was and tumbled down on a chair at the table when we came in. His little fingernail was four centimeters long.
Nothing much happened. Svante had brought the vodka bottle in with him, and when Kicki had set out coffee cups, he poured spirits in his and asked if I also wanted some. Ragge and Kicki didn’t take any, but Svante and I drank more before we got coffee.
Svante smoked Kool and offered me one. I sat on his lap and picked at his little fingernail. He was employed at SGS as a slaughterhouse worker, he said, and asked what I did.
“I’m going to be a journalist,” I said.
“Yes, if you don’t become an alcoholic,” Kicki said.
But just because her dad is a boozer doesn’t mean that I will become one. But I probably won’t become a journalist, either.
Ragnar worked at SGS too, at the intestine cleaning center. It smells so bad there, that those who work there are paid extra, he said.
Then I started to feel ill and almost thought that I would puke. Svante had to help me out. But fortunately, I didn’t throw up. I felt better when I got out in the fresh air. But I didn’t dare to drink more after that.
Sunday, 16 August 1964
Before E-L and I went into town we were at Gunnar’s and had coffee, and there (in the washroom) we drank a little booze (cognac) that E-L had snatched from her papa’s cellar. (“Should it be cognac or whisky?” “Cognac… with a little whisky!”) It wasn’t so that we got drunk, because we didn’t drink that much, but we could feel it at any rate. And so out into town to look for boys! And then HE turned up. But at first I didn’t know that. Then I just knew that two guys came by in a white Saab and asked if we wanted to go with them. One was called Arne and he wasn’t particularly handsome, but the other one, named Kjell, looked really nice and pleasant. They drove off to an apartment in Eriksberg, and we went in with them. In the living room there was a record player to the left on a shelf and a sofa, which you could fold out to a bed, with a coffee table in front. And we accepted both cigarettes and vodka with lime juice, and true to her habit, E-L drank more than she could handle and got drunk. She half lay on the floor and clung to Kjell’s leg and tried to get his attention, because she (as well as I) preferred him. But I realized that he didn’t care about her and actually thought she was a little awkward and that it was me he was attracted to. So when the other guy had dragged E-L away somewhere, we started hugging and kissing. We also talked, and he asked me if I had a picture of myself he could have. Before we parted he said he would call me today, and I actually believe he will. But if he wants us to go out this very evening I won’t be able to, because mamma will say no. I have a cold and fever. I was a little snotty already yesterday, and I had a fever when I woke up this morning. But on Wednesday, I think, we can go to the movies or something else. If he calls, that’s what I will propose. Not that we go to the movies possibly, but that we can meet.
And then you have the immediate problem of what to wear. I think I have it really bad with clothing and I never know what to put on. I could possibly use my red twist skirt and white blouse. Those clothes I usually wear when we go to the theater. I can also have my white, acrylic cardigan on. But what should I have for a purse? A white purse would be most appropriate, but I don’t have one. I have to take my beige-brown one.
And my poor hair! It needs to be washed and put up in curlers, and then I can sit in mamma’s hair dryer. Afterwards I brush it so that it lies flat and neat, but as soon as I come outside, it becomes quite frizzy on top. And then I think everything has gone to hell because my hairdo is ruined immediately. I backcomb my hair (though not as much as E-L), and then I put on hairspray to keep the hair in place, but it doesn’t help, because if there is the least bit of humidity in the air, it frizzles all the same.
It’s really strange that we always meet guys who offer us booze now, I think. We never did before. But it’s fortunate, because I don’t know how we would get our hands, on spirits, otherwise. We could possibly ask someone to buy it for us, but that’s so unreliable and would also be expensive in the long run. And I have the spirits in the basement that I can take some of if I want to.
Yesterday evening, we drank vodka and lime. That’s what two guys in a white Saab offered us. When they drove by us on Svartbäcksgatan they signaled us that we should go into St Persgatan, and then they turned in there and stopped. Only one of them was cute, and he seemed to be most interested in Kicki, so at first I thought of saying no, but when they asked us to follow them home for a grog I changed my mind.
They lived in Eriksberg. The cute one, called Kjell, sat next to Kicki on the sofa, and the other one, named Arne, sat beside me. We smoked and drank and listened to music. They had “The Gate Coin” by Sten and Stanley and “No Particular Place to Go” with Chuck Berry.
It’s so wonderful to sit like that and know that you’ll soon be drunk. Just thinking of it makes me wanna do it again. I will probably never be able to stop drinking.
Arne was the one who was supposed to drive later, so he didn’t drink very much. Neither did Kicki and Kjell. I was the only one who got really drunk. I tried to get Kjell to choose me instead of Kicki, but it didn’t work, and I didn’t want to be with the other one, so I tried to push off. It was such a hassle. Kicki tried to talk to me and said that I couldn’t go out into town when I was drunk, and Arne and Kjell held me back when I tried to slip away. Then I started feeling ill, and they dragged me to the kitchen and gave me water. There was a glaring light there and a cold sink which I leaned my head against. When we were about to leave, I told Kicki that I needed to wait until I had sobered up a little more before I could go home, and then she went along with me jumping out into town. While I was wiggling out of the car, Kjell said:
“Well, anyway, you were the evening’s entertainment!”
And Kicki said:
“Try not to do anything stupid, now!”
And then they went away.
I didn’t try to pull myself together anymore after that. I walked along the street, staggering and thinking how wonderful everything was. I didn’t want it to end.
When you are drunk, you only see the nearest things, for example the cobblestones in front of your feet where you are walking, or the wall surface if you are leaning against a house, or a cigarette butt on the ground if you have fallen over. You only notice details and have no general picture. There was somebody, for example, who threw out a burning cigarette butt through a car window, and I saw how it gave out sparks when it swirled around in the air and rolled down into the gutter, but I didn’t see the car it came from.
I didn’t go with anyone, even though there were a lot who stopped. I didn’t even walk up to some of them.
“Watch out for the cops!” somebody shouted from a car.
It feels good when they warn you like that, because then you know that they are on the same side as you – against the cops anyway – but I wasn’t able to watch out for any cops.
I don’t know how long I walked around in town. It became sparser and sparser between the cars, and I got more and more tired and started getting headaches. Finally, a car with two guys inside pulled over, and the back door opened. It was Putte and another guy.
“Come here!” Putte shouted and leaned out the door.
“We’re driving you home.”
The guy who was driving turned around and glared at me when I had got into the car, but then he put on a record and didn’t pay me any more attention. Putte didn’t either, at first. He just sat there and stared out
the window.
“Are you angry?” I said and lit a cigarette.
“You have lost your style,” he said without turning his head.
“Have I?” I said. “Where?”
But there was no point in trying to make fun of it.
“Birds aren’t supposed to booze!” he said.
“No? So it’s only guys who can do it, you mean?”
“Don’t play dumb!”
“But that’s what you’re saying.”
Then he turned his head around and stared at me.
“This isn’t the first time I have seen you reeling around dead drunk in town.”
“So what?”
“You’ve lost your style, I’m telling you!”
“Oh, I get it! But I may not have had any before, either. I may have never had any style! I could have been worthless the entire the time although you haven’t noticed.”
“At least you didn’t booze before.”
“That’s something you wouldn’t know.”
“Yes, I do! But I don’t give a shit about what you do! Drink yourself into the gutter, if that’s what you want! Just do it! I don’t give a damn!”
“That doesn’t seem true.”
“Yes, it is!”
“Then why are you carrying on like this?”
“Because I get pissed just looking at you!”
“Why did you pick me up then?”
“Because you were so damned drunk that you couldn’t even walk.”
“I was not!”
“Yes, you were, and it was damned disgusting to see!”
“But I’m not drunk now.”
“No, but two hours ago you were crawling.”
“Were you in town two hours ago?”
“Yes, I was. And I saw you!”
Then I didn’t know what more to say, so I just laid down and put my head on his lap. His legs were warm. Street lights shined in through the window and glided away over the backrest of the front seat as the car moved. The music blared and Elvis sang.
“Don’t you let me catch you messin’ round that apple tree, oh yeah, ever since the world began,” he sang.
Hop in Then! Page 14
