She didn’t know how to react; she was so used to being the one who looked, the one who watched.
“Johannes,” was all she could muster.
She couldn’t even bring herself to hug him.
“Nathalie,” he said, and smiled.
He took a step forward, reached for her hand, and brought it to his cheek.
“I heard what you did,” he said. “Thank you. Thank you so very much.”
She gave a quick shake of her head and smiled. “It was… nothing.”
She realized that she felt perfectly at ease. Something inside her felt new. And quite simple.
“How’s your unfortunate joy?” she wisecracked. Then she was afraid she might have crossed a line.
Until she saw his reaction.
“Presumably it’s going to be even more unfortunate now,” he said. “Where are we going to live? In Gothenburg?”
“I don’t know where you’re going to live,” she said with a smile. “But Gothenburg is pretty overrated, isn’t it?”
Hung on the walls were black and white square images, one meter by one meter, mounted under simple mats in narrow, black-glazed wooden frames.
First there were four landscapes. Then four images of deserted, decaying houses and gardens. And finally, disjointed body parts. A foot, a hand, a turned cheek. A closed eye, the back of a neck and some hair. In the end, she had chosen to leave out the portraits of the residents of the bog.
Maya gazed out of the large window and found that soft snowflakes had started falling. Indoors, out of the cold, red wine and crackers were on offer.
But this was no typical opening, no typical exhibition. She had elected to minimize the mingling, or preferably do away with it completely—it didn’t seem of interest. She just wanted to display her photographs, her experience of the mire.
There was great interest, naturally, when the newspapers found out that the area’s biggest artist was going to have a show at the art school gallery. Then, when they learned that she was going to show landscapes from Mossmarken, with a clear reference to what had just happened out there, the interest grew to enormous proportions, even from the national media. Social media were flooded with posts, even though no one had seen the pictures yet. And opinions were divided. Many people were upset, extremely upset that she was exploiting—as they saw it—the tragedies in Mossmarken.
Maya had come to an agreement with the gallery that she would first have a personal, unannounced opening and allow the press and the general public to come the next day, when she would be far away from Fengerskog.
So now it was just her and twenty or so friends, including Nathalie and Johannes. Göran was there too; he looked worn out. Broken.
“It’s probably the wrong time to explain the Tina thing,” he said nervously, almost before he had come in.
“Okay,” she said. “It’s up to you.”
“We’ll talk about it some other time.”
“Sure, another time.”
Instead of insisting, she filled his glass at regular intervals. Until at last the words came anyway. His words. He was leaning against the wall, his glass in one hand, waving her over.
“I want to tell you,” he said, “straight out. Yes, Tina and I had an affair. She would come and visit whenever she was in Karlstad on business. The time she disappeared, we had agreed to meet out here, but she never showed up. I was shocked. I never said anything, partly out of consideration for her and her family, but I also knew I would be a suspect if I told anyone about our relationship.”
Guilt appeared to be weighing heavy on him.
“But what did you think? That the spirits took her?”
He shrugged. “We know now that wasn’t the case—with her, anyway—but…”
They were silent for a moment. Göran raised his head and looked straight into her eyes.
“But there are still lots of people missing. You’ve probably only found Peder and Yvonne’s victims.” He averted his eyes. “I’m starting to think it isn’t possible to find the others who vanish. That the people the spirits lure in just… dematerialize. They haven’t found that little boy, or Tracy, or my wife…”
Maya placed her hand on his arm and squeezed it kindly. “You know, I’m so glad you’re here, Göran. I really am.”
When the last guest had left, Oskar came home with her. Maya lit some tealights, ran a bath with lavender oil, and poured two glasses of cava. Then she undressed and got in. Oskar stood in the doorway, watching her.
“Aren’t you coming in?” she asked.
He slowly took off his clothes, approached the bathtub, and sank into the hot water.
Nathalie walked slowly up the stairs in the apartment building in Åmål and rang the bell. Her heart felt like an overworked muscle that wanted nothing more than to rest after everything that had happened. But she had to do this. This one thing. It was the last thing she would do before leaving Dalsland for Gothenburg.
The woman who opened the door was a stranger. There was nothing immediately familiar about the obese person standing before her.
They stood there looking at each other, but after a moment Nathalie could somehow see, deep down, the Julia who had once been her best friend. It was something about her eyes, how her high cheekbones arched up toward their corners.
“Nathalie?” Julia said.
“Julia,” said Nathalie.
She took a step forward, put her arms around her childhood friend, and hugged her hard. At first Julia stiffened, but then she seemed to relax, and soon the tears came, rising as if out of a newly discovered underground spring. Increasing gasps and sobs that drilled into Nathalie’s shoulder. Shudders that created shock waves throughout her body.
After several minutes, she wiped her face on the sleeve of her sweater and tried to calm down.
“What is there to say?” she said.
“Yes, what is there to say?” Nathalie said with a sigh.
They sat down on the living room sofa. Nathalie was still holding Julia’s hand.
“What if I knew?” Julia said. “All along. What Mum and Dad were up to. And what happened to your parents—what if I somehow knew the whole time, but I was just too close to really see?”
Nathalie shook her head. “Could you even have imagined what they were doing?”
“I don’t know. But maybe I should have… suspected something.”
“It’s still difficult to imagine something like this, Julia. They must have become really ill after Tracy died.”
Julia sighed. “Yes, our family was broken too. And I have such a guilty conscience over it, that I never realized they changed. But I was so absorbed in my own problems.”
She looked at Nathalie.
“You’re the only one I’ve talked to so far, about this. I haven’t even told the kids yet; I don’t know what to say. And I’m afraid to show myself out in the world. I’m afraid to turn on the computer. I know people are writing about Mum and Dad all over, about us. It’s horrible.”
“I know. But just hold on, and everything will calm down soon. People will find other things to write and talk about.”
“I hope you’re right. But I don’t know if I can believe it,” she said. “And what’s more, it feels like everyone’s going to judge me too. I’ll never get away from this.” Julia looked down at the table.
“What will happen with the kids?” Nathalie asked. “And will you keep living here?”
“Yes, probably.” A smile formed a tiny crack in her tense face. “The kids will live with me from now on; I should have brought them here ages ago.”
They drank coffee and ate half-frozen chocolate marshmallows straight from the plastic package. Talked. Reminisced. Then Nathalie said she should get going.
“I want to get home to Gothenburg before tonight.”
Julia drew a breath, placed a hand on her shoulder as if to stop her, and hurried off to the bedroom. She soon returned with a journal.
“There’s one more thing I want to say
. I think I need… to tell someone about this.”
She held out the book. “This is Tracy’s diary. I used to go in her room and read it in secret; we used to do that, do you remember? We read her poems too. But the diary—I read what she wrote right before she disappeared. I never told anyone about it. That’s something else I have to learn to live with. What it says in here.”
“Why? What does it say?” Nathalie asked.
“Tracy was seeing an older guy, remember him? They had a relationship. But he… he, like, didn’t want her. Or, not all the way. Only sometimes. Then he met someone else. And then… when you read what she wrote here it’s pretty clear that she didn’t want to go on living. It’s like she had truly made up her mind.”
Nathalie looked at Julia. “Was it that serious?”
“She was so different at the end. Sad. But I didn’t tell anyone.”
“You told me.”
“I did?”
“Yes.”
Julia leafed through the book. “Here. In the last week of her life she wrote a lot. Mostly dark thoughts. She wrote this final entry the night before she died. Look here. Listen to what she writes.”
Julia read aloud, carefully and slowly, with a pregnant pause between each sentence.
It’s as if I don’t exist any more. As if you left nothing behind when you went. I’m not eating. Not drinking. I just want to dissolve and disappear. Let go and fall until it’s all over. Until I’m over. Until this hell is fucking over.
Nathalie felt the memories of that night, fourteen years earlier, enter her. She remembered Tracy’s striped nightdress; she remembered muddy bodies and silent windows. The sense of reality cracking, of something bursting, a wound that would never heal.
“So it wasn’t ghosts,” Nathalie said. “She took her own life.”
“But the worst part is,” Julia said, “that none of this would have happened if I had just shown Mum and Dad this diary, if we had talked, if we had… So in that sense, it’s my fault.”
Nathalie swallowed. “In that case, it’s just as much my fault. I saw Tracy in Åmål right before it happened, while she was fighting with that guy. I knew how sad she was too, how desperate she was, but I didn’t know what to do, if there was anything I could do.”
She fell silent for a moment before going on.
“We were kids, Julia. You don’t deserve to bear the weight of all this.”
Julia nodded, her eyes full of tears. “We were kids,” she repeated.
EPILOGUE
The temperature had been rising for a while. The past weekend had spoiled the area with warm spring days, and Maya had discovered that buds were starting to appear on the birches by her house.
She hadn’t been to Mossmarken since late last year. Now she was ready. They had buried her dad the day before, and she needed a long, fortifying walk. Maybe she could stop by Göran’s place. They had seen each other a few times during the winter, tried to come to terms with all the misunderstandings, and she felt like their relationship was getting back on an even keel again.
Now she was walking briskly along the walkways that criss-crossed the bog. This was the first time she had experienced this place in spring light, which was completely different from the drabness of autumn—the decay that ruled then, the thriving mushrooms.
The fragile things were waking now. The bushes were starting to come into leaf in a tender shade of green. The grass tussocks were changing color. She could hear birds everywhere.
She followed a few thrushes with her eyes. They hopped from branch to branch, then flew off.
The wind had blown up a little bit, but now it seemed to have died down once more.
She continued over the bog, but didn’t notice that one of the thrushes had lagged behind the others. It fell to the ground behind her; it seemed almost lame and cried out in pain. At the same time, there was a flash across the dark mirror of the water and an image seemed to appear under the surface. If Maya had seen that image, she likely would have described it as a glimmering mosaic of a young woman with a gray and white striped nightdress and brilliant blue eyes.
The bird on the ground flapped its wings.
An instant later, it was gone.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Helene, Jacob and everyone else at the publishing house, as well as Astri, Christine and Kaisa at Ahlander Agency for kind guidance in a new world.
Everyone who has read and shared opinions in various phases: Carina, Pelle, Kerstin, Elin, Cissi B, Jenny, Camilla, Cissi F, Göran, Daniel, Lisa, Annika, Andreas, Pia.
Ingrid, Gullmar and Susanne for childcare and lovely writing time in the chaise longue by the fire out in Romelanda. Thanks too to Ingrid for answers to bird questions.
Maria, for all the good lunches. My turn soon?
Viol och David, for letting me use your cabin to write in.
Cultural journalist Erik Schüldt and science historian Per Johansson for incredibly engaging, inspiring radio programs and podcasts—perhaps, above all, the pioneering podcast Myter och Mysterier—which have been invaluable companions during the creation of this book. Thanks also go to Per Johansson for his readthrough.
Mukti, Adyashanti and Open Gate Sangha, for the clarity you uncover.
For clever answers to dumb questions and for patient fact-checking, thank you to the following eminent experts:
Martin Cederwall, professor of theoretical physics at the University of Gothenburg and Chalmers
Mats P. Björkman, biogeochemist at the Department of Earth Sciences, University of Gothenburg
Christian Fischer, archeologist and former director of Museum Silkeborg, Denmark
Elisabeth Nordbladh, professor of archeology at the University of Gothenburg
Per Möller, medical doctor
Anne Majakari, forensic photographer with the Örebro Police
Louise Larsson, forensic photographer with the Karlstad Police
Carl-Erik Steen, detective inspector with the Karlstad Police
(Any remaining errors are completely and fully my own.)
Finally,
Edvard and Alma—for all the times you asked me to write while I was putting you to bed, “It’s so cozy.” And Anders—for everything. We share this story. Too.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
SUSANNE JANSSON was born in 1972 in Åmål, Sweden. She later moved to Gothenburg to work in advertising and then to New York to study photography. After returning to Sweden, she worked as a freelance photographer while studying journalism, and for the past twenty years she has been combining her work as a photographer with being a freelance journalist focusing on reportage and profile stories in areas such as arts and culture. She has also written crime short stories for weekly magazines.
The Forbidden Place is her debut novel.
Susanne Jansson lives with her family in Lerum outside Gothenburg.
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