Assisted Living: A Novel

by Nikanor Teratologen

  —Is the head of the house at home?

  He had a voice like Mr. Bean’s, you know: constipated and Biblethumping.

  —Yeah, but he’s giving himself a blowjob.

  The man didn’t waste any more words, just pushed me aside, rushed in, and yanked off his caracul and galoshes. He showed himself into the living room, plopped down on a rockingchair, and stayed quiet. He looked like a normal guy, just kind of old and serious. Most of them are like that, quiet their whole lives, slaving away, faring ill.

  I’d like to be one of those.

  __________

  AUNTIES GREEN, BROWN, AND VIOLET—figures from a book by the Swedish author Elsa Beskow

  ALS SIEGER DRING ICH … —From Stefan George’s poem “Der Gehenkte” (The Hanged Man)

  XI

  I was reading Grandpa the personals from the Västerbotten Volksblad. I made sure to skip the really perverted ones, though, where someone was advertising for a person of the opposite sex. Those’ll make you sick after only a few lines.

  “A slightly bitter woman is waiting for you. I’m 19 and have 3 kids. I look 40. It all feels so strange. Why did they do this to me? I’ve done my best, but I simply can’t go on …”

  Or: “Skinny white guy, 24 years old, short, with everyday interests, seeks girl with special interests. I don’t think I’ve ever done it, but I’m willing to give it a try. I’ve got a pretty secure job and I’m happy to share. Everything we’ve pent up needs to come out. I’m living with Aunt Sigris right now, but am looking for my own place..

  But Grandpa was only interested in the homoads. Unfortunately, all the ones who wrote in to Gay Guy Contact were too far away. Southerners seem to be gayer Nonetheless, the locals did seem to be getting gayer by the hour. Grandpa was lying on the ribbackedsetee and sucking down some Johnny Walker Black Label, and I was reading the ads in the order they were printed.

  —“Shy, incontinent Sävarbugger, who’s usually a wallflower at dances, wants to find a fellow he can snuggle with. You are laid-back, nice and sweet, inmates preferred. I’m bald and nervous and only smoke at parties. I work at a daycare center. Desire is driving me wild. Especially interested in illegal immigrants! Respond to: ‘Got that spring feeling down in Obbola.’”

  —Damn, what a repulsive pig! Onto the next one …

  —“Horny guy, 39 years old, small and dark, looking to find a sex-hungry backseatjockey in a preppy cardigan and berretta. You are 67 years old, deaf and dumb, suffer from psoriasis, and preferably live in Vuollerim. Extra plus if you’re bitter, angry, and have a chronic smoker’s cough Reply to: ‘We two in in the old jalopy, Wilmar.”’

  —Go on …

  —“Crabby sanatorium dweller, 29 years old, with a thin blond mustache wants to be slapped around by a wellhungguy. I have an appetite for most things that make life a party, and I’ve hung out with Etienne Glaser and Hans Werthén, to name a few. Interests include: casualsex, emptyshells, the vermiformappendix. I’ve got AIDS and the guardianship of an autistic child. Respond to: ‘If there’s no time, there’s no time.’”

  Grandpa sighed dejectedly, and I knew what he meant.

  —“Sallow, fat, cowardly man in upper middle age seeks contact with a flexible snugglebunny with huge manboobs. I’m bulimic and want you to cum inside me while I puke. Respond to: ‘Churchwarden who believes in truelove.’”

  —Well cut the dick off that one, Grandpa swore.

  —“I am who I am and I’ve been paid back with interest. It’s good to walk a straightline. How we can meet. Take a car if it’s too far. I live alone. Drink and jack off. Us men should stick together. Like those young guys too shy to try a smokesucksmutyourselfup session in Kusmark. Whats the big deal. That’s all. Respond to: ‘Bertil.’”

  —That must be Hilding Henning up in Sälgdal. He hasn’t fucked anyone in over fifty years. And he isn’t going to fuck me, none of them are …

  __________

  ETIENNE GLASER—actor, producer, and scriptwriter

  HANS WERTHÉN—Swedish industryman

  XII

  — Sweden’s only had one writer worth his salt and that was Elfred Berggren from Furuögrund. I’ve read God of Robots over a hundred times. He was the same age as me and Himmler, but died at thirty-two when he was raped by a ringedseal …

  Grandpa poured himself some more smallbeer. He was trying to crush a whole bottle of Veronal into his mug, and he was stirring with the stick normally used for mercykillings. He was wearing a T-shirt with the words “Adolf Hitler European Tour 1939–1945,” a warharness, and Israeli commandoboots with Hushalongs. I was wearing my culturalrevolutionary outfit and a black skimask. We were getting ready to go out. We’d made quick work of newlyhatchingeggs, newbomkoalas, and teutoburgers. For dessert, Ibiza cream and Pat-pong dates. Grandpa had spent the morning reading Deschner’s The Criminal History of Christianity and Villeneuve’s The Torture Museum. Now he was going on and on about the stagparty literaturi.

  —A knife blow to an old woman’s back’s got more culture than anything those scribblescrabbling morons will ever come up with … belleslettresloving cuntlickers … that’s what they are …

  XIII

  Yesterday we played games until our eyes bled and our brains boiled: the first World Cup in sprinting, eighteen teams in three divisions, twelve branches per year; then the World Cup in skiing with twelve legendary competitors in different places around the world and with different distances and styles, also with eight teams, four from each team in the individual runs; then a little boxing and wrestling to wind down. All it takes is dice, a will of iron, some schizofantasy, and paper and pen. Then we played soccer with a hundred and twenty-eight teams; a hockey tournament with sixty-four teams—tabletop, of course—then the World Cup ’90 and tennis on the Sega; then Risk, chess, and Beat the Homo; and, finally, a homemade game involving exterminationcamps, where each of us plays a different commander. And now for the rest. We played Dragons and Demons, Lords of the Rings, and an awesome wargame Grandpa dreamed up about Diadochi. Now that I think of it, a few days and nights must’ve passed …

  We heated up sandwiches in the microwave … with tonsils, two jars of bustedappendices, and the dailynews …

  We drank beer from casks and then pissed in them so we wouldn’t have to get up … To play like we played, you’ve got to forget everything else … You’ve got to have a nativebestiary, a true cornucopia to populate your teams with … You have to like protocol … talking big and talking small … simulation … When Grandpa and I play together, I feel there’s a bond between us … No one else could’ve done it … When we play, it can sound like this—it was the ninth-year A-division, I had cerebralpalsy-women, Kåge-Suburbs, and Schools, and Grandpa had the Bush, Kåge-women, and Finland …

  —Who’s running for the CP-whores in the marathon?

  —Who ran last year?

  —Let’s see … They were in B then … Konda Forssell … time was three hundred and fifty-six … three points …

  —Nah, I don’t trust her … Has “The Ant” run yet?

  —Nope … she’s just sitting there scratching the skin off her nose to make it smaller …

  —Then we’ll take “The Ant” … she’s a fighter …

  —I’ll take a wild stab … I’m bringing in “Sinbearer”!

  Then Grandpa took his sweet time telling me about “Sinbearer” a nasty old tramp who’d lurked around Skellefteå in the ’20s …

  —He was big and fat and popeyed … not to be confused with “The White Boss,” who was another guy entirely, had dandruff for eyebrows … but everyone was terrified of “Sinbearer” … he wasn’t right … He limped along with a sack bearing all the world’s sins … He didn’t say much, but when he talked, his words were both timid and perverse …

  —“You don’t eat pork, witch?!” he’d laugh, or: “Badluck and pigslop! that’s all I’ve ever met with!” or: “Best meat’s between the legs, best sausage between the stones!” That’s what he’
d say, when he got someone alone. He had a coarsemade pillory and testes like pitepalt.

  Grandpa told one tramptale after the next …

  —A good story is always sterile, monotone, he liked to say. Spleen and ennui are all you can hope for … Then it got even more longwinded …

  I got to hear about “Five-Penny Jonas,” a sullen little caramel and thimblehawker, who liked to eat live colts … about “ByeBye,” also known as the “Gypsy Dancer,” who was beautiful as a näken and liked to seduce young men with his accordion and then slit their throats … about Åkerström, who drank more than a hundred liters of water per day and had a habit of suffocating snakes by sticking them up his ass … about “The Hobo King,” who worked the roads and never stopped crying … about “The End Times,” who ran steelwire at faceheight across the road and killed forty-three cyclists … about gypsy Karlsson-Tydén, who made whisks but couldn’t bear to part with them … he wandered between Skellefteå and Ume his whole life and never got anywhere … about Lejonberg, the frowner, who fenced with pigs using his stiff, naked cock … about “Neerdowell Fredrika,” who had more lice than all the Croats in the Thirty Year War combined … about “Sitting Pretty,” a rickety bowlegged tramp who liked to enjoy a smoke dangling over a great height … about “The Big Scare,” “Finn-Pavola,” and the sweet and mild Sehlstedt, a fervently religious tramp with a holy medallion around his neck …

  Later he talked about Augusta Hamberg and “Poas,” who wandered around Storberget in Lycksele … about the English disease, about huge, hairy warts, and about the poisonous tallowcandles that wereused to get rid of stomachparasites … a driedup old mocassin if ever there was one … about “The Black Girls,” Jonas and Johannes Södermark, who played bedandbordello with every gypsy to cross their paths … they were dark, had rings in their ears, and blowjobs dancing in their eyes … and in their mouths and their bellies, by God … they’d sell out their own grandpas … so long as they didn’t quit … yes, Grandpa realized he’d lost contact with the trampworld …

  —Who wants Sub in the marathon?

  —Johan Westermark … he got full points with three hundred and seventy-eight last time …

  —And I have Kåga-Women … by Satan … for lack of anything better, it’ll have to be “The Stork” Sundqvist …

  Then we were finished with rolling dice and writing stuff down … the marathon was played with ten times ten dice, you start at the top of the list and go down one roll at a time … At three throws, “The Ant” Greenland slipped … she was thirty points behind the nearest challenger … The others were close, between a hundred five and a hundred ten … After five throws, half the marathon, the positions were:

  “The Ant” Greenland

  160

  “Sinbearer”

  193

  Johan W.

  178

  “The Stork”

  189

  “SATO”

  166

  Rockojärvi

  175

  It looked like I had two losers to deal with … “The Ant” and “SATO” were the haircurdling showstoppers … Moronic Greenland threw a 24 in the seventh. The tramps and “The Stork” caught up to the leaders. It was starting to look like a triple for Grandpa …

  —Noooo! Looks like Johan, the bastard, can’t even get his cock blue! I groaned when he threw 27 in the ninth.

  Grandpa took the ten small white dice with black pips and rolled them imploringly over his open palm … Then he tossed them onto the felt cloth with a sly look … A quick glance revealed: 36 … fair, but nothing to holler about. The last roll was anticlimactic. Grandpa rolled a three-double: The Bush 6p., Kåge-Q 5p., and Finland 4p., Sub. 3p., CP-q 2p., and Skola, the old master-team, 1p. “Sinbearer’s” winning time was a nice 384 … 6 of 10 rolls of 40 or better … But the ten-time runner scored over 400, so he’d averaged above 40.

  The World Cup ran two “days” with six meets per day. A runner could only participate in one race a day.

  100,400, 1500, 5000 marathons and 4×100 the first day …

  3×3, 4×4, 4×5+1×3, 6×8, 10×10 and four stretches with 3×3 dice …

  The second day: 200, 800, 3000, 10,000, half-marathon and 4×400 …

  2×6, 4×5, 5×6, 8×8, 9×9, and four stretches with 4×4 dice …

  When we played “Lord of the Rings,” Grandpa wanted to be Sauron. When I said it was against the rules, he beat me with Bolshevism from Moses to Lenin. He refused to trade down to a balrog, and waved his hands dismissively when I read the racial descriptions of the Uruk-hai, Huorns, dragons, and Nazgul. On a whim, he let himself be persuaded by what I read aboutthe Nazgul in the rulebook: “If revealed with the aid of magic, they appear in the guise of great, haggard kings with cold, evil eyes..

  —Okeydokeysmokey, I’ll be a ghost, then … and I’ll be a black Numenörean … and an Uruk-hai … You’ll be a fallohidehobbit … a hummerbagge … a buggerwoser …

  We made up our own rules this time … We said you didn’t have to die if you died in the game … Grandpa won … he always does … he makes the rules … he pulls the strings … he’s behind it all …

  __________

  NÄKEN—a water sprite

  XIV

  Grandpa was in bed with his cock wrapped in a wet, warm towel, reading aloud from Geronto-Eroticon by Ernst Carson, the Skråmträsk devil.

  —“…let men protect their sweet flesh from sexual intercourse with sundrenched whores—hair like frostbitten chaff, asses like rusty, sooty, greasy burntout ovens” … bring me my munchies, you little rat!

  I sat in my dogcrate gnawing on the corn growing on my largest foot.

  —Bring me my special brownies and buttermilk!

  I went to get his snacks. Down in the kitchen, a feral cat was raping a cacklingtease of a laughinggull. I walloped them both with a firepoker and went back upstairs with Grandpa’s evening snack. When I got there, his hoarse wheezing voice washed over me like the scent of pigs roasting near Smammarn.

  —“…Augustine already wrote about how nasty, dirty, sleazy, and queasy a womans embrace can be … Kill the firstborn of her loins! Let a cry be heard from every sty! For every killingblow, a man goes free! As long as a single motherwomb exists, we’ll never find our way back to Our Father! We’ll be nothing but wideeyed little boys when Doomsday’s Bloody Sunday strikes! On that day, magisters will roll up the starry skies! The earth will swaddle us like a rotten mummy’s bandages or a stinking, unchanged diaper, hail big as horseballs will beat the recreant earth blackandblue … Copperbright bikers with awful hygiene will wander cold waiting rooms with shaking voices: ‘How odd that mommy’s late

  Grandpa put the thick leatherbound book away when I crept close to the bed.

  —Ernst was a fellow with the right attitude, he said. He could tear the throats out of a hundred and fifty chickens a minute and never show a trace of remorse … the guy was icecold … But his writing is as bad as a cop’s.

  Grandpa opened the box and crammed his mouth full of special brownie. I poured his buttermilk into a mug.

  —I could tell you things about Ernst and his life that would make Unicef and those Save the Children queers look for a nice quiet corner to curl up in and die … But I think I’ll give you an oraltest instead!

  His sharp, level gaze turned Latinate.

  —What are the sevendeadlysins?

  —Humility, generosity, chastity, modesty …

  —More!

  —Uhhhohhh … bulimia! meekness and productivity!

  —Bravo, boy, you’re the slowest of them all … And my totem is …?

  —The brown rat.

  __________

  SMAMMARN—small lake in Lappland

  SKRÅMTRÄSK—village in the Skellefteå

  XV

  —I owe all I know to the Herrey Brothers, Grandpa said, looking embarrassed and taking a drag from his Kent ciggibutt.

  —All too often the all too many assume it was Nietzsche himself who transformed
me into natures stroke of luck, which is what you could say I am. But no! it was the Herreys!

  —What about Basedow and Bekhterev?

  —I met them when life had already used and abused me until I felt like Sigge Fürst trying to blow Satchmo. Of course, Hegel’s Phenomenology and Schreber’s Memoirs served their purpose, when I decided to dynamite my brain so it became as small as a strandloper’s. Think and feel as little as possible, always be happy and kind! he commanded and speared a titmouse with a dart.

  __________

  HERREYS—a Swedish pop group made up of three Mormon brothers

  BASEDOW—Karl Adolf von, a German physician who studied Graves’ disease (also known as Basedow’s disease)

  BEKHTEREV—Vladimir, Russian neurologist who studied what came to be called Bekhterevs Disease

  SCHREBER—Daniel Paul Schreber, author of Memoires of My Nervous Illness.

  SIGGE FÜRST—Swedish film actor, known for appearing in the films of Ingmar Bergman, among others.

  STRANDLOPER—Afrikaans, “beach walker,” name for a native bushman

  XVI

  —You may think you’re a boy, but you’re just a fuck, my own dear Grandpa said, laying it all out for me. Anyway, the one measly adventure I remember was taking the bus to Auntie Eskil’s out in Tåme. He was gentle as can be and always offered you a mix-edracejuice and priestscurfpowdered kannibiscroissants stuffed with livelampreys. Weather willing, we’d look out onto his grisly little courtyard. He’d also turn on the radio, which must’ve gotten screwed up somehow, because it was always playing the same program.