The Darkest Day

by Håkan Nesser

  I’m being unfair on him, she thought. But I’m so bloody sick and tired I feel like throwing up over the whole wretched thing.

  As the seven o’clock radio news approached, Karl-Erik held forth, presenting a series of weighty and irrefutable arguments for letting Ebba and family stay in the house – and Rosemarie found herself thinking that what she actually wanted to do was go over to him, yank his tongue towards her and cut it off.

  He had made his pedagogical contribution, so now it was time.

  Followed by the automatic thought that she was being unfair again.

  ‘All right, all right,’ she said. ‘It doesn’t matter.’

  ‘Fine,’ he said. ‘I’m glad we’re in agreement. We’ll have to try to treat Robert exactly as normal, that’s all. I don’t want us to mention that – thing. I’ll discuss it with him in private, that’ll have to do. What time did he say he was coming?’

  ‘Late afternoon or early evening. He’ll be driving. He didn’t say anything more specific.’

  Karl-Erik Hermansson nodded thoughtfully, opened his mouth wide and loaded in a heaped spoonful of natural yogurt with chunky muesli, untouched by human hand and enriched with thirty-two beneficial vitamins plus selenium.

  She vacuumed upstairs. In a spirit of domestic solidarity, Karl-Erik had taken the shopping list and the car and gone off to the palatial Co-op superstore – which had opened a year before on the Billundsberg industrial estate – to buy five hundred kilos of birthday essentials and a Christmas tree. As Rosemarie dragged round the ancient Volta, bought at Eriksson Bros. Electric Machines, Home & Household back in the late winter of 1983 and presumably indestructible, she thought about the number of important decisions she had actually taken in her sixty-three years of life.

  To marry Karl-Erik Pedagogue-Pine? Scarcely. They had met in their upper-secondary years at the Karolinska Grammar School (she an unassuming first year, he a stylish, besuited, ramrod-straight third year) and he had worn down her resistance in the same way he had continued to wear her down throughout the remainder of their life together. When he proposed, her initial no had been diluted via a second maybe, but let’s at least leave it until we’ve taken our exams to a third OK then, but we’ll need somewhere to live first. They had married in 1963, she had completed the textiles course at the Domestic Science College in June 1965 and Ebba had come into the world six months later. This, too, was not the result of any decision she had made.

  She opted for a career as a needlework teacher because her best (and only) friend at upper-secondary school, Bodil Rönn, had already done so. They graduated together and Bodil got a permanent job in a school way up north in Boden, less than 500 metres from her boyfriend Sune’s parental home, and as far as Rosemarie knew they still lived there. They had written each other letters and kept in touch for about fifteen years, but the last Christmas card had been seven or eight years ago.

  Zero important decisions so far, she thought, dragging the monstrous Volta across the hall to start on the guest bedrooms. Or the former children’s rooms, or whatever you wanted to call them. Ebba’s room, Robert’s room and Kristina’s cramped little hole that wasn’t really any bigger than a cupboard – but then it had never been their intention to have more than two children, especially in view of the fact that they had achieved one of each sex after only two attempts, but things had turned out the way they had. Life went its own sweet way and didn’t always stick to the plan; Kristina was born in 1974, Rosemarie having come off the pill ten months earlier on her gynaecologist’s advice, and if the disastrous Greek holiday with the Porky Bergsons had not given rise to any happier memories, it had at any rate begotten an unplanned daughter. Karl-Erik had forgotten to buy condoms and didn’t get out in time. That was just the way it was, shit happens in this best of all possible worlds as it does everywhere else. What was this language in which her thoughts were clothing themselves, this bleak winter morning? God knows, something was out of kilter, that was for sure. What was the weather playing at? They still hadn’t had so much as a centimetre of snow in this westerly part of Sweden and when she looked out of the window it seemed to her that the daylight, too, had given up and thrown in the towel. The air looked like porridge.

  It was only when she had rolled up the long mat in the hall and started on the skirting boards with the vacuum-cleaner nozzle that she finally recalled one crucial decision. Hell, yes.

  He was called Göran, went round in sandals without socks, and had been the stand-in school counsellor one autumn term. It was her third term at the school, five years after she had Kristina, and she simply couldn’t get her head round the idea that a thirty-six-year-old mother-of-three really was what this beardy charmer needed, so as a consequence she had said no. And in all probability, it was this no that comprised the most important decision of her life. Turning down a broad-shouldered, freshly divorced school counsellor who had the hots for her. It had all happened on a staff training course held in the conference suite on board a ferry to Finland; the pedagogue pine had been ill for only the third time in his life (if you didn’t count the congenital umbilical hernia), and the counsellor had sat in her cabin half the night, pouring out his passion. He had pleaded, he had begged. Offered her duty-free Wolf’s Paw cocktails. But no. Offered her duty-free cloudberry liqueur. But no.

  She wondered what had happened to him; he had suntanned toes with interesting little tufts of hair and had presented an opportunity to change her life – but she had let him slip through her fingers. Just as well, perhaps; only one man had ever gained access to her most private regions, now desiccated and closed forever – but to be fair, as far as she knew, Karl-Erik’s dick had never once strayed in their forty-two years, either. Before they got married he confessed that he was once together with a girl called Katarina at an all-night Saint Lucia party in the second year of upper secondary, but she wasn’t really his type, a fact underlined a few years into the 1980s when she enjoyed brief notoriety as a hostage taker in the course of a bank raid in Säffle. Though why anyone would raid a bank in Säffle, of all insignificant places . . .

  Anyway: the number of important decisions taken remained at the uncomfortable total of one. Rosemarie decided she’d done enough sucking up for now and wondered whether there was any justification for the optimistic thought that she might be strong enough for decision number two. The house was in both their names, she knew that. Without her signature on the documents on Wednesday, the whole sale would fall through. The buyers were a couple called Singlöv, currently living out in Rimminge; all she knew about them was that he was an electrician and they had two children.

  But there was absolutely nothing she could do about the fact that a non-refundable down payment of a hundred thousand kronor had been made on a small house in Spain. Costa Geriatrica, wasn’t that what they called it? For a painful second, another potential headline flashed into her mind’s eye: WANKER ROB’S PARENTS FLEE TO COSTA GERIATRICA!

  If only I weren’t so dispirited, she thought, switching on the coffee machine again. If only everything didn’t feel so horribly pointless. Where can I find strength to draw on?

  A Needlework Teacher’s Demise, she thought a minute later as she sank down at the kitchen table with her third cup of the day. That would make a pretty passable title for a book or a play, in her judgement, but being stuck in the middle of the action herself was no fun at all.

  Humph, came a protest from some as yet unordered corner of her brain, I don’t normally let myself get this overwhelmed by so many disconsolate thoughts. Could I possibly have had a little stroke this morning? If only I were a smoker, I would at least have the option of a quick drag.

  What on earth is up with my brain today, thought Rosemarie Wunderlich Hermansson. It was only ten o’clock. There were still a good twelve hours to go before bedtime, and tomorrow children and grandchildren would come streaming in like . . . well, like what?

  Press-ganged soldiers for a cancelled war?

  O life, where is thy
sting?

  2

  Kristoffer Grundt lay in his bed, wrestling with a curious wish.

  He wanted to skip the next four days of his life.

  Perhaps it wasn’t such a curious wish for other people, he didn’t know, but for him it was a first. He was fourteen years old, and he wondered if it was a sign that he was starting to grow up.

  Of course, there were things he dreaded. Maths tests. PE lessons at the pool. Finding himself stuck in a quiet corner of the school with Oscar Sommarlath and Kenny Lythén from 9C.

  But above all, the hardest thing of all to bear: his mother’s look when she saw right into him and exposed what miserable stuff he was made of.

  Not the same stuff as Henrik. Not by a long way. Something had gone wrong when it came to Kristoffer. They had the same genes, the same parents, the same brilliant inbuilt advantages; no, the problem was the tiny detail that was himself. Kristoffer Tobias Grundt and his backbone. No, wrong, Kristoffer Tobias Grundt and his lack of backbone. The hole he carried about with him at the centre of his soul where normal people had their character.

  That was exactly it. That was how bad it was when you took a really close look.

  But skipping four days? Deliberately shortening your life by ninety-six hours? Wasn’t that an affront to the whole . . . concept?

  The time was half past nine. It was Sunday. If it were Thursday tomorrow instead, it would be the twenty-second and two days to Christmas Eve. If he ever reached that point, he promised himself to break off and send a grateful thought back to now. To think backwards and remind himself that time, whatever else you might imagine, does move forward in spite of everything.

  The problem was that it often passed so horribly slowly, and never skipped anything.

  It wouldn’t skip the unbearable car journey to Kymlinge.

  It wouldn’t skip Granny and Granddad and the other clueless relations.

  It wouldn’t skip the hundred-and-fifth birthday party and the equally unbearable car journey home.

  And, thought Kristoffer, closing his eyes, above all it wouldn’t skip the conversation with Mum.

  ‘I realize,’ she had said from the dark depths of the living-room sofa last night, just when he thought he’d crept in unseen and unheard. ‘I realize that to you, this seems about the right time to get back. It’s two in the morning. Come here and breathe on me.’

  He’d gone over to her and blown a thin jet of air over her face. He hadn’t been able to see her eyes in the dark, and she had offered no immediate comment. But he was under no illusion.

  ‘Tomorrow morning,’ she said. ‘I expect an explanation. I’m tired, Kristoffer.’

  He sighed, turned over in bed and transferred his thoughts to Linda Granberg.

  It was Linda Granberg’s fault he’d had six beers and a glass of red wine and smoked ten cigarettes last night. It was Linda Granberg’s fault he’d decided to go to Jens&Måns’s party at all. Jens&Måns were twins, fellow Year 8s but in a parallel class, and they had parents who were lax about their responsibilities. Who, just to take one example, went out to a party of their own in town and promised not to be back before three. Who admittedly wouldn’t buy alcohol for their offspring, but who had quite generous supplies down in the basement and didn’t do much stocktaking.

  There were supposed to be eight of them, but Kristoffer counted at least fifteen. People came and went. He downed four beers within the first hour; Erik told him it had more effect if you got well stoked up to start with, and it had worked reasonably well. Linda looked to be keeping pace with him, and he had been bold enough to squeeze in beside her on the sofa and chat to her in a way he’d never brought himself to try before. She laughed at him and with him, and just before eleven she took his hand and said she liked him. Half an hour later, after another beer each, they started kissing, the very first time in his case, and she tasted so gloriously of beer and crisps and fresh tobacco and something soft and warm and delicious that was simply her. The very . . . what was it called? . . . essence? . . . of Linda Granberg. Lying there in bed ten hours later, he could still run his tongue round the inside of his mouth and detect lingering traces of the taste.

  But it was a sad and swiftly evaporating memory. Mainly sad. After the kissing, they’d eaten pizza straight out of the box with their hands, one of the twins brought round acidic wine-box wine in plastic cups and then Linda started feeling sick. She stood up, swayed around a bit, and promised to be back soon. Staggered out in the direction of where you’d expect the toilet to be, and half an hour later he’d found her in a completely different room, sleeping in the arms of Krille Lundin from 9B. He’d begged a beer off Erik, smoked another three cigarettes and gone home. When he came to think of it, it wasn’t just the next four days he felt like erasing from history, he rather wanted to include yesterday as well.

  Linda Granberg, fuck you, he thought, but they were just empty words, because in the most literal sense that was exactly what he wanted to do. If he was being honest. And if he’d just played his cards a bit better, it could have been him and not Hockey-Krille Lundin lying there with his arms around her, he knew that. What a bloody lottery life could be, but of course a fifteen-year-old TV hockey jock had odds a thousand times better than a . . . well, what? Doughball? Mega-loser? Zero, nerd, nada? There were plenty of names to choose from.

  He gave a start as he saw his mother at the door.

  ‘We’re just off to the shops. Perhaps you could make sure you get up and eat breakfast, and we’ll have that talk when we get back.’

  ‘Sure,’ he said. He meant it to sound bright and accommodating, but the sound that issued from his throat had more in common with the cry of a very small animal that happens to get in the way of a lawnmower.

  ‘Perhaps we could start by establishing who this conversation is going to be about?’

  ‘It’s about me,’ said Kristoffer, trying to return his mother’s steely blue gaze with a green-flecked one of his own. It didn’t seem to go all that well.

  ‘You Kristoffer, yes,’ she said slowly, folding her hands in front of her on the kitchen table. It was just the two of them. The time was half past eleven. His father Leif had gone out on fresh commissions. Henrik had got home late yesterday evening after a demanding first term at university in Uppsala. Both doors were shut, and the dishwasher was grumbling to itself.

  ‘Go ahead,’ she said.

  ‘We had an agreement,’ said Kristoffer. ‘I broke it.’

  ‘Uh huh?’

  ‘I should have been home at twelve. I didn’t get back until two.’

  ‘Ten minutes past.’

  ‘Ten minutes past two.’

  She leaned a little closer to him. Imagine if she gave me a hug, he thought. Right now. But he knew that he wouldn’t get one until all this had been looked into. And it hadn’t been looked into yet. Far from it.

  ‘I don’t like having to keep asking questions, Kristoffer. Is there anything else you want to tell me?’

  He took a deep breath. ‘I lied. Before, I mean.’

  ‘I don’t follow.’

  ‘Before. I never planned to go to Jonas’s.’

  She indicated her surprise by raising one eyebrow by a couple of millimetres. But she didn’t say anything.

  ‘I said, didn’t I, that Jonas and I were going to watch some films round at his place, but that was a lie.’

  ‘Ah?’

  ‘I was at the twins’.’

  ‘Which twins?’

  Why do you keep interrupting me with questions if you don’t like asking them? he thought.

  ‘Måns and Jens Pettersson.’

  ‘I see. And why did you need to lie about that?’

  ‘If I’d told the truth, you and Dad wouldn’t have let me go.’

  ‘Why wouldn’t we have let you go?’

  ‘Because it isn’t . . . a good place to be on a Saturday night.’

  ‘What would be wrong with going to the Petterssons’ on a Saturday night?’

&nb
sp; ‘They drink . . . we were drinking. There were ten or fifteen of us and we were drinking beer and smoking. I don’t know why I went there, it was rubbish.’

  She nodded and he could see he had caused her great pain. ‘I don’t really understand. Why did you go there, then? You must have had some reason.’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘So you’re telling me you don’t know why you do things, Kristoffer? That really worries me.’ She looked concerned now, genuinely concerned. Give me a hug then, for Christ’s sake, he thought. I’ll never be good enough for you, whatever happens. Give me a hug and then let’s forget this.

  ‘I just wanted to see . . . I suppose.’

  ‘See what?’

  ‘What it was like.’

  ‘What what was like?’

  ‘Smoking and boozing, for heaven’s sake! Can’t you stop now, you can see I’m not up to it . . .’

  The tears and feeling of hopelessness came welling up all of a sudden and much sooner than he had expected, and in a way he was grateful for that. It felt good to just give up. His head slumped to the table and he hid his face in his armpit and let the sobs come. But she didn’t move, or say a word. The sobbing ebbed away after a minute or two and then he got up, went over to the draining board and tore off a generous length of kitchen towel. He blew his nose and came back to the table.

  They sat in silence for a while longer, and it gradually dawned on him that she had no intention of hugging him.

  ‘I want you to tell Dad about this as well, Kristoffer,’ she said. ‘And I want to know if you are planning to lie to us again, or if I can rely on you. Perhaps you’ll decide to spend more time with the Pettersson twins in future? We’re your family, Dad and I, and Henrik, but if you’d rather—’