The Half Brother: A Novel

by Christensen, Lars Saabye

  That evening something else happens. We go together to Frogner Park. It’s beginning to get dark. It’s still raining. Up by the white summer house Vivian sits down in the grass. I sit down beside her. It isn’t particularly comfortable. It’s wet. I lend her my jacket. And it’s now it happens. Vivian sits on top of me instead. I can’t move. She’s gripping me tight. I twist my head from side to side and feel the soaking grass in my hair and neck. She starts doing something. She pulls down her panties and whips them over her feet. Then she opens my fly. I don’t dare move a muscle. She fits a condom and guides me in. She just sinks down, heavy and hard. She’s utterly still. I am too. I can sense it again — the scent of musk ox — heedless and raging, that’s to be my gateway that evening, musk ox and scissors. I’ve come. It’s over already. Vivian gets up, her back to me, pulls on her panties and straightens her skirt. I lie there. I’m freezing. I shut my eyes. I don’t dare open them. There’s a stinging. I feel ashamed. I hear her moving away. By the time I get to my feet she’s gone. I tear off the condom, scream, and throw it after her. I take my jacket, stagger my way to the fence and clamber over it. I rip my pants, fall down in the bushes on the other side, and crawl out onto the sidewalk. A tram goes past. There’s a whine as it tilts at the sharp bend. I hold my ears. I could go to Peder’s. But I don’t. I’ve got nothing to say. And how would I say it? I run up Church Road. I’m glad it’s raining. I run till I don’t feel like running any more. Now I am, I tell myself. I say it again. Now I am. Now I’ve done it. I’m relieved. I’m not happy, but I am relieved. It’s not so bad. It was really me who got her. Of course it was me. It was my fault. It was me who took her with me to Frogner Park, to the summer house, to the shadows by the summer house. As if no one realizes what that means. I went so far as to put my jacket in the grass for her to lie on, in the wet grass, if that was how she wanted it. It’s not so bad. I’ve done it. Done it with Vivian. It was me. It’s my fault. I stop. I can’t remember. If I finished. If I finished completely if I did it. If I came. I search around for a bit in the grass among the bushes below the summer house. A black dog comes over to me. I shoo it away. It won’t go. It comes right up to me again. I kick out at it. But it’s to no avail. Then I find what I’m looking for. I pick up the condom. The dog whines. It’s impossible to see. It’s raining. The twisted yellow condom’s dripping. I can see nothing at the tip of it. Just water, rain and mud. I throw it away. The dog’s there at once and catches it in its jaws. Someone whistles a long way off, perhaps from the bridge, and the dog vanishes.

  I go back home. Boletta’s sitting in the living room. “At last you’re back!” she says. I stand there, in the shadows behind the stove, beside the picture of the little genius. I say nothing. Boletta stretches forward in her chair. “You’re not disappointed, Barnum?” I just shake my head. “Because you really shouldn’t be. You’re not the first to have been cut out. The Old One’s almost world famous for all the films she was cut from!” Boletta laughs. “And I’ll tell you this — even though it’s long enough since I last went to the movies, and that was back when they were using the Cinema Palace as a potato warehouse during the war — I thought it was an extremely strange film. To think that a beautiful woman like that would touch such an unkempt daddy longlegs of a man!” “It was just a dream,” I told her. Boletta falls silent for a moment and stretches out her arms. Slowly I go forward between them. It’s only now she sees just what a sight I am. I’m a mess. I’m stinking. “Have you been fighting?” she asks. I look down. Boletta holds my soaking jacket, takes a quick deep breath, and looks up at me in surprise. “No, you obviously haven’t, Barnum.” She smiles. “Where’s Mom?” I ask her. Boletta lets me go. “She’s with Willy. Willy Halvorsen.” “What’s she doing there?” Boletta sighs. “Your mother needs friends too, Barnum.” And just then she returns home. We can hear even now, before she’s properly closed the door, that something’s up, everything’s far from well. All at once she’s there in the living room. “The ship’s come to grief,” she breathes. Boletta gets up. “What are you talking about?” “The Polar Bear. In the ice. Oh, God.” Mom sits down. She brings something from her handbag. Her hands are trembling. It’s a clipping from a Danish newspaper that she’s been given by Willy, Willy Halvorsen. Boletta puts on one of the lamps. It’s a photograph, an aerial shot, of a ship trapped in the ice. It’s the Polar Bear. The crew, ten men in all, have gone over the side of the ship and are standing in a huddle on the floe, midway between two fissures in the ice. Mom reads the accompanying text, and her voice trembles every bit as much as her hands. “On the passage back from Myggbukten at the end of July, the whaler the Polar Bear was trapped in an ice floe south of Greenland. The vessel took in water, deck planks snapped like matchwood, and the ship had to be evacuated. The crew on the ice are awaiting an American helicopter to bring them to safety. All those on board were rescued” Mom stops abruptly and searches for a handkerchief. “But then things are pretty much all right,” Boletta sighs. “If they were all rescued!” Mom shakes her head and all but tears the handkerchief in two. “But he isn’t there! Fred isn’t there!” Boletta holds Vera’s hands in her own. “Are you sure?” I pull the lamp closer and take off the shade while Boletta goes for a magnifying glass. And despite the fact that the far-off men in the photo resemble small, black marks on the ice, it’s not impossible to see that Fred isn’t among them. Fred is not there. Suddenly Mom glares at me in the sharp light, for a moment back in this world. “What a mess you are! Go and get yourself cleaned up!” I get up and go before Mom bursts into tears again. I go into my room. I call it my room now. But as I shut the door I hear a whisper. “Quiet, Tiny” I turn on my heel toward the other bed. It’s Fred. Freds lying there with one finger on his lips. He’s changed. There’s something in his face that’s different, some characteristic that wasn’t there before. Maybe it’s just because he’s tanned — his face is quite dark and his hair’s shorter. I could have lain down beside him. I don’t, though. Perhaps my lie’s over. That’s all I can think of, that now my lie’s over. Fred’s come back. He removes the finger from his mouth. He’s lost a tooth. “When did you come in?” I hiss. “While you were at the movie. So was it good?” “Yeah, sure.” “Sure? Was it good or wasn’t it?” “It was pretty average. But I liked the ending.” “How did it end?” “The main character leaves the city.” Fred looks at me. I know I mustn’t start crying. I don’t. He reaches out his hand and smiles. “Been fighting, Barnum?” “No, screwing.” Mom’s in tears in the living room. Boletta’s comforting her. It’s raining. “Good,” Fred murmurs. “And who were you screwing?” I turn in the direction of the door. “Why weren’t you there when the Polar Bear went down?” Fred sits up. He’s smiling. “I quit in Godthåb. I’d seen enough.” Stillness has fallen once more. “Go in and see Mom,” I whisper. Fred runs his hand through his cropped hair. His smile evaporates, as if his lips are sucked in through the dark gap between his teeth. “What’ll I say, Barnum?” “Just say you’re getting a sweater.” I open the door. Fred hesitates a moment; then he goes in to where they are in the living room. I’m the one who stands there watching it all. I see Mom getting up and Boletta with her hands over her eyes. I see Mom growing mad and almost ugly with joy, fury, helplessness. She doesn’t throw her arms around him. She doesn’t kiss him. She hits him. This is how I’d express it — Mom hits him in wicked joy and splendid terror. And he doesn’t put up any fight. He lets her hit him. In the end Boletta has to make her stop, and it’s only then she becomes different. She takes Fred’s hand, and I don’t hear him speaking the words but I’m sure he does: “Just getting a sweater, Mom.”

  They’ve sat at the kitchen table all evening. Finally Fred comes in and lies down himself. Mom stands there between us. Shell keep this moment. She is a squirrel. Shell hide her happiness and spread it through her forest, as if she knows too in her heart of hearts that Fred’ll soon be gone again. Her voice is almost as it was before. “Good night then, boys.” We are kids;
the clock with the money in it has started again, but it’s going the other way, it’s going backward. The coins are clattering down, and each coin is a memory that Mom can polish and with which she can buy time. She kisses Fred on the brow. “Tomorrow you’re going to the dentist!” she tells him. She leans over me and whispers, “The movie would have been a whole lot better if you’d been in it.” After that we hear the washing machine, its quick whirring; we lie awake in the dark and listen to Mom washing Fred’s clothes. Now and again she sings to herself, it’s the middle of the night and she washes Fred’s clothes and sings. “Evalet,” Fred says slowly, letter by letter. “Washing machine,” I say, equally slowly. We laugh together there in the dark. “I bet your Dad swiped it,” Fred whispers. Stillness falls. Mom hangs up the clothes to dry on a line suspended over the bath. “What was it you’d seen enough of?” I ask. “The same as great-granddad saw. Ice and snow.” “Wasn’t there anything else?” “I saw a glacier calving.” “Calving?” “All at once half the mountain slid down into the sea. Right in front of us. You should have heard the noise.” “What do you mean?” “Did you think ice was quiet? Ice makes one hell of a noise, Barnum. The whole time. When you’re going through ice in a ship no one can sleep.” “Didn’t you see any musk oxen?” Fred rummages around for something. I hear several clicks. He swears. “Did you get the card?” he asks. “Yes, Peder came with it.” Fred bursts out laughing, and his laughter is low and deep. “Why did you send Mom straight to Willy, Barnum?” “I didn’t send Mom straight to Willy.” “Yes, you did. You said I’d been at his place. And Mom went to Willy’s. Do you really think Mom’s likely to take up boxing, Barnum?” “Mom was frightened. She wasn’t sleeping.” “But next time I won’t go to Willy’s first.” Finally Fred gets a light; a flicker spreads over his dark, rough skin; he lights the cigarette and locks the flame in the shiny Zippo lighter. “I don’t think it’s the letter you’re looking for,” I breathe. “And what do you think I’m looking for then, Barnum the wise?” “Your father,” I answer, very quietly, as if I almost hadn’t spoken the words at all. Fred sucks the glowing cigarette end down to nothing. The glow of it is all I can see. “Who was it you screwed?” he asks. I close my eyes. “You remember what you said when I started dancing classes? That I should see what everyone else was doing and then do the exact opposite?” Fred doesn’t reply. I open my eyes. The glow hovers still in the air. I wait. “So?” he says in the end. “What if you did the opposite of what you yourself want?” “It’d be a fucking mess, Barnum.” Fred gets up, opens the window, and flicks out the cigarette butt. It’s like a tiny firework extinguishing in the dark rain. Then he turns around and comes closer. “Don’t you have the guts to say who it was you screwed?” I look up at him. “Lauren Bacall,” I breathe. the middle of the doggone afternoon.” He considered things, buttoned up his burgundy uniform and locked the door again with both keys. “Well, well, well see what we have.” We went with him up to the projection room, that cramped space where projectors were ranged like cannons in front of embrasures, ready to bombard the screen with light when it was dark enough. There was a packet of sandwiches on the seat; the paper that wrapped them had been partially removed and one cheese sandwich had been half-eaten. The projectionist searched through some reels of film that were piled in a corner behind his desk. He gave a sudden groan and pulled out one of them — a flat, shiny box — a wheel. “Good Lord,” he groaned. “This one here should have been sent back.” “That’s the one we’d like to see,” I told him. The projectionist straightened up. “You can’t.” “Why not?” “It’s an over-18.” Vivian laughed. “Barnum’s over eighteen,” she said. “Anyway, there’s no one to see us,” I put in. He opened the lid and took out the reels of film. “All right, but hurry up so we’re done before the evening performance!” And we went down the stairs to the main part of the theater, which seemed much bigger without people coughing, whispering, stamping, taking off chocolate wrappers, blowing their noses and crunching. We ran down between the rows, Vivian and me and no one else, entranced, searching for seats — at least now I wouldn’t have to end up behind somebody who was six feet tall with an Afro and ears sticking out. “Where do you want to sit?” I called out. But Vivian couldn’t make up her mind and neither could I. We had 600 tickets between the two of us and didn’t know which to choose. The projectionist shouted something from his room and finally we sat down in row 14, seats 18 and 19 — naturally enough. I put my hand in her lap. She took off her mitten and carefully laid her hand on mine. The lights dimmed — not softly and slowly as with a sunset, like we were used to; no blue and gradual twilight in which we could get ready for the darkness and the trailers — but abruptly, and all we heard was the heavy curtain sliding to one side and then the movie began. And it was as if time threw a noose about me and pulled it tight. It was Days of Wine and Roses. I remembered the title, the posters in the rain, the projectionist who carried them in, the steps I counted, someone following me and Fred coming out of the round lavatory by the church. Was this also a mark on Barnum’s ruler; time that catches up with you again? And how long does such a moment last, a moment that doesn’t set its mark in the door frame with a knife but cuts free a point in time in your memory? I only know that Days of Wine and Roses lasts one hour and fifty-seven minutes, and I’ll never forget the scene when Jack Lemmon’s on his way into the Union Square Bar and stops abruptly when he glimpses his own reflection in the window. And he thinks, for just a split second before it’s passed, that it’s a stranger standing there instead — a tramp, a ruined and pathetic drunk — until he realizes it’s none other than himself.

  Afterward we went to Kr0lle’s. We sat right down all the way at the back. “One hell of a movie,” I said. Vivian unwound her scarf. “A shit movie,” she said. I found a cigarette in my pocket. “Shit? Why do you say that?” Vivians face was pale with the cold; her mouth was small and slow. “I don’t like movies with sad endings.” The waiter had stopped at our table. “A pint,” I said quickly. He bent right down to my level. “Very funny.” It was now I should have responded with a reply from another movie entirely, our movie: What’s wrong with you? “Tea” said Vivian. “Same for me,” I whispered. The waiter drew himself up. “And what will you have to eat?” “Nothing,” I told him. “We don’t serve drinks only here, littl’un.” He really was starting to get on my nerves. “Then I’ll have some lemon in my tea,” I said. The waiter looked down. “So you have a sense of humor too. Perhaps you’d like to eat your packed lunch outside?” “Some apple cake,” Vivian said. “Ill have the same,” I breathed. “With whipped cream.” The waiter went over to the hatch through to the kitchen and turned twice in the course of the short walk. “Jerk-off waiter.” I held my hand over my mouth. Vivian was thawing; a warmth was rising from her throat, and her lips became soft. I didn’t say any more before the waiter returned with our order. We had to pay there and then. I treated her. I gave the waiter a fistful of coins I’d found in the drawer under the dead clock. It took about a quarter of an hour for them to be counted. When he’d finally left, I leaned over the table. “Why don’t you like movies with sad endings?” I asked. “Because it makes me think of my parents,” she replied. I ate whipped cream with my fingers and considered my response intently. “There’s a difference between film and reality,” I explained. Vivian started laughing. “My, you’re clever, Barnum.” I blushed and went to the bathroom. Someone had hidden a hip flask behind the toilet bowl. It wasn’t empty. I locked the door and drank what was left. My head burned quickly and quietly I looked at myself in the mirror above the basin, pulled my curls down over my brow and went back to join Vivian. “Happy endings are a load of crap,” I said. “Why do you think that, Barnum?” “Because there’s no such thing as a goddamn happy ending! We’ll all die anyway, won’t we?” Vivian smiled. “Perhaps it would have been best if they’d died in the accident,” she said. “Who?” “My parents.” I drained my cup. The flames in my head were going down and down. Soon there�
��d just be ash left on my tongue. “You don’t mean that,” I whispered. Now it was Vivian’s turn to lean over the table. “They don’t think about anything else but the accident, Barnum.” “Maybe it’s no surprise,” I said. Vivian looked at me a long time. “They’re self-obsessed and selfish bastards,” she breathed. “And the accident lets them be like that. They worship that accident. They love it.” I no longer knew what to say I’d never seen such anger in her; even though she was whispering her voice shook as if any moment it might crack and become a scream. “You want more tea?” I asked. Vivian shook her head. “Let me tell you something, Barnum. Mom got rid of every mirror in the apartment. From the bathroom, the living room, the hall — she threw away every pocket mirror and wouldn’t use silver dishes because she could see her face in them too. Dad went down to the yard and got rid of them there — not even he could bring himself to look at her. And one day the doorbell rang. It was Mom who went to see who it was, and outside there were some kids holding out a mirror — a beautiful, framed oval mirror that used to hang in the hall. They thought it had been thrown away by accident and wanted to do her a favor. But Mom saw her reflection in it, smashed the mirror with her fist, and chased those kids down the steps and terrified the living daylights out of them.” Vivian pushed her empty cup toward the side of the table, the very edge. The waiter was keeping a weather eye on us. “She thought they’d done it out of sheer devilment,” I said. Vivian looked at me. “What’s so special about the face? It’s just a mask, isn’t it? Does it really matter if it’s beautiful or ugly?” I took her hand before the cup went tumbling to the floor. “If they’d been killed, we wouldn’t be sitting here,” I murmured. Vivian smiled. “No, only you. Shall we go to Peder’s?”