by Sjón
I walked for several hours, got very thirsty, drank some water. When my water ran out, I went home.
In July I searched the eastern part of the lake, and I found nothing. The only thing I came upon was the remains of a half-rotted boat, a dinghy. It had been pulled a long way up on land, with its hull in the air. It must have been there for years.
I sat down on the boat. The sun was shining and it was very warm. I cupped my hands around my mouth and shouted, loudly, out across the water, “Håkan! Håkan! Håkan!”
But no answer came. No echo. Nothing at all. And then I knew, finally, that there was no trace of Håkan in the eastern part of the lake, and no trace of the man in the boat.
In September that year I searched for the last time.
September was the month I liked best. In Västerbotten’s coastal regions the cold arrived quite early, the autumnal colours started appearing in the middle of the month, and in the last two weeks you could break a thin layer of ice on the puddles every morning. The entire lake seemed embedded in a band of dark green and golden red. All the forests looked like that. Green from the conifers, golden red from the birch trees. Mist lay over the lake, and it was cold.
On one of the last days of that month, I took Grandfather’s boat and rowed out. I didn’t have permission, but I did it. It was the day of my ninth birthday.
I rowed around the whole lake. There was a thin mist everywhere, a mist that was almost transparent and only a few metres high, but which nevertheless made me feel as though I were rowing in an empty, forsaken world. As if I was completely alone. And it felt good.
I rowed around the whole lake. And then I rowed out into the middle. I pulled up the oars, settled down and waited.
It was lonely in the mist, in a very strange way; it felt safe. I thought about everything that had happened and, oddly, I no longer felt despair when I thought about Håkan’s disappearance. I just didn’t understand how it had happened, who the man in the boat was. Why had he left me behind? Where was Håkan now? Why didn’t he come back?
I must have sat there for an hour. Then I saw a boat coming towards me, out of the mist.
It was a dinghy with a man rowing. Someone was sitting in the stern with his face turned towards me.
There could be no mistake. It was Håkan. The dinghy glided slowly towards me, without a sound, straight through the mist, and I wasn’t in the least bit afraid. Håkan was sitting in the stern, looking right at me, and he looked exactly the same as before. And he smiled at me.
It was utterly silent. I sat still and watched the other dinghy glide slowly towards me, next to me, past me. The whole time Håkan was looking at me, a peculiar expression on his face. With a slight smile, he was looking right at me. As if he wanted to say: Here I am. You don’t need to search any more. You’ve found me. And now you’ve found me, you have to stop searching for me. I’m fine. You must understand that. You have to stop searching for me, because you’ve found me. And now you need to be yourself. You need to be grown up.
We didn’t say a word, but we looked at one another. And we both smiled. And then the dinghy slid away, and they were gone. And since that time I haven’t seen my only friend Håkan again.
I sat still for a long time, thinking, before I took up the oars to start rowing; but at that moment I saw something floating in the water. It was a long pole. It was the pole we used to push ourselves along on the raft. I thought: Håkan wanted to give it back. That’s good. I’ll pick it up.
I picked it up. And then I rowed back.
When I returned, Grandfather was standing on the shore. I saw him from a distance. He looked furious, which always makes his body go rigid and weird, his shoulders drop and he glares directly in front of him. I wasn’t afraid, though. I steered the boat straight for the shore, lifted the oars, picked up the pole and threw it onto the beach.
He looked at it and said, “Where did you find that?”
All I said was, “I’ve got it back.”
I climbed out of the boat and we dragged it out together. Before he had time to tell me off, I said, “And I’m just going to say, I’m not going to search any more. I’m not going to look for Håkan any more. It’s over now.”
He stood in silence, staring at me, as if he couldn’t understand what I was trying to say.
“No,” I said, “it’s over, Grandfather. Now I know.”
I set off up towards the farm, over the meadow. It was September, frost on the grass and brittle underfoot; it crunched where you walked. Grandfather was still standing down there by the boat. And I thought how odd it all is: you get knocked back, but nothing is ever hopeless. Sometimes you just want to die, but when everything seems at its worst, there is still a way out. You get knocked back and it feels bad, but you learn a great deal. And if you didn’t learn, you would never grow up, never understand. I thought about the Flying Dutchman and the story about the Snow Queen and all the other stories I’d heard. And I thought about the man in the boat taking Håkan away from me, and never again would I be ill like I’d been that summer.
I wouldn’t play in the same way as before, not believe the same kinds of tales, not try to avoid things; nothing would be the same as before. It was September: Håkan would have been ten years and one month, if he had lived. I walked up to the farm. Grandfather stayed by the boat. I remember I was crying, but at the same time I felt very peaceful. The air was cold. It was the last time I went out searching. I finally knew who the man in the boat was. I walked home. It was crunching under my feet. It was cold. And that was it, the whole story.
TRANSLATED BY DEBORAH BRAGAN-TURNER
IN A DEER STAND
DORTHE NORS
IT’S A QUESTION OF TIME. Sooner or later, somebody will show up. Even dirt tracks like these can’t stay deserted forever. The farm he walked past when he entered the area must be inhabited. The people who live there must go for walks sometimes, right? And the deer stand is probably the farmer’s, and it’s just a question of time before it starts raining. The vegetation down on the ground is dry. Some twiggy bushes, some heather too. To the right, a thicket; to the left, the start of a tree plantation. The sunken road leads in there for some reason, so it’s just a question of time before someone comes. Take him, for instance; he came this way. Just yesterday, even if it feels longer. The circumstances make it feel longer. It’s likely that his ankle’s broken, though it’s also possible that it’s just a sprain. The pain isn’t constant, but there is some swelling. Now he sits here and he has no phone. She must be in pieces back home. He can imagine it. Walking around with his phone in her hand, out in the utility room. She’s standing there with it in her hand. She stands and curses him for not taking it with. And it’s only a question of time before the police are involved. Maybe they already have been for some time now. It’s probably been on the local radio; that he’s forty-seven, that he drives a bmw, that he left home in a depressed state. He can’t bear the thought of them saying those last words. He isn’t depressed, it’s just that she wasn’t supposed to win every battle.
Last night there was screeching from inside the forest. Some owls, foxes perhaps. There was someone who’d seen wolves out here, and no doubt Lisette has come by the house. She’s probably sitting on the couch with her wide eyes, eating it all up. He’s so tired. His clothes are damp, and last night he froze something terrible. There are some black birds overhead, rooks he thinks, and his wife’s pacing around in the yard, restless. He painted the eaves last spring. It’s a nice house, but now she wants to sell it. He really likes the house, but now she wants something else. When she wants something else, there’s nothing he can do. He’s lost every battle. As recently as the day before yesterday, he had an urge to call his brother, but he’s lost that battle. She doesn’t like his brother, though Lisette’s welcome to visit. Lisette often stands in their kitchen-dining area and calls up her network. Lisette’s got a big network, but mostly she hangs out with his. And in principle, he’s only got the kids left. It’s a long
time since his wife stopped taking part in the gatherings on his side of the family. There’s something wrong with both of his parents, she says. Something wrong with his brother’s kids, his brother’s girlfriend and especially his brother. She says that his brother sows discord. That’s because his brother once told him he ought to get divorced. And because he loses all battles, he went straight home and told her: My brother thinks I should get divorced. So this isn’t the first time he’s driven out to some forest. He’s done it a fair amount over the years. Sometimes to call up his folks on the sly, or his brother. He also calls them when he’s down washing the car. He doesn’t dare call from the house. Then she’d find out, or Lisette would, and he’s pretty sure that Lisette tells tales.
He’s sitting in a deer stand, his ankle is definitely sprained, and something’s happened to the light. A mist is rising. It creeps towards him across the crowberry bushes. Which means that evening is closing in on the deer stand again. Perhaps he should try to crawl down, but she wins every battle. He no longer calls his brother, for instance. The distance between them has become permanent, and when he drove off, he deliberately didn’t bring his phone with him. He wanted to be alone, so that’s what he is now. He stepped on a tussock wrong, in the strip between the wheel ruts, some seventy metres from the deer stand. First the pain, then off with the sock; he was pretty sure he could already see it starting to swell. Did he shout for someone? Well, he shouted a bit the first hour, then darkness began to descend and he set about reaching the deer stand. Now he’s inside, and from up here he can see the plantation, some undergrowth and withered heather, mist.
He tots up the distances between towns. It must be about seventy-nine miles home. That’s how far he is from the utility room, where she’s standing and staring at his phone, though no doubt Lisette’s there. Lisette’s playing the role of comforter, co-conspirator and slave, yes, Lisette’s her slave too, but a slave with privileges. While he sits somewhere deep inside a West Jutland tree plantation. He heard something shrieking in the forest last night. Probably a fox, but wolves have been sighted here too. The hunters set up game cameras to get a glimpse of the animals they hope to shoot. Or else it’s farmers wanting photos of whoever’s eating their turnips, usually red deer, he supposes. Then one morning this wolf is standing there, staring straight into the camera. He’s seen it in the newspaper, but wolves can’t climb, and he managed to haul himself up into the deer stand last night before darkness fell. The pain isn’t too bad, and it’s just a question of time before she sits down next to the washing machine. Her hands cupped over her knees, and he hasn’t seen her cry in years. She didn’t cry when her mother died. Her face can clap shut over a feeling like the lid of a freezer over stick insects. He had some in eighth grade, stick insects, in a terrarium. They weren’t much fun, and then his biology teacher said that putting them in the freezer would kill them. He peered at the insects for a long time before he placed them in the freezer. They stood there rocking, looking stalk-like. When he took the terrarium out the next day, they stood there stiff. They didn’t suffer, he supposed, they just stiffened in position. Thinking back on them now, they looked like someone who’s achieved complete control over their own stage illusion—and she’s been successful that way too. Maybe she doesn’t have any feelings at all. She’s got lots of hobbies, but it isn’t clear that she has feelings. She’s got Lisette, but she has no feelings, at least not for him. She hates his brother and the rest of his family, but even though hatred’s a kind of feeling, it doesn’t count. He told her one time that he missed his brother. He shouldn’t have said that, and he’ll never say it again; he’s lost all his battles, he knows that. He also knows that this is retreat. He has the clear sense, for instance, that Lisette’s standing in the kitchen area at this very moment. Lisette’s become more and more a constant presence—driving their daughter to handball, joining them during the holidays and attending the kids’ graduations; sitting in the bedroom on the edge of the bed. Lisette’s her representative, a subject like himself, but with privileges. Lisette’s got short legs and a driver’s licence, and by now the police must have been brought in. He’s right here, of course, half lying, half sitting. It’s been more than a day since he drove off. In a depressed state of mind, though that’s not true. He just wanted the feeling of winning, and now he has a view of a landscape at dusk. His trousers are green from moss and something else, extending high up his legs. The boards he’s sitting on have been attacked by algae. If she saw this sort of algae on the patio, she’d have him fetch the poison. What hasn’t he done on that house? And now she wants to sell. She wants to move into something smaller, though it’d be good to have an extra room. An extra room? he asked. For Lisette, she replied, and then he took the car and left his phone behind. His family’s grown used to his absence, and besides, he isn’t the same any more. Actually, he’s sensed that for a long time. How something has clapped shut over him. First she won all the battles, then he positioned himself squarely on her side. In that way, he stopped losing, and she tired of scrutinizing him. That was the logic behind it, but now he’s sitting here. In a deer stand, deep in the forest. A mist has risen, the night will be cold, and a wolf has been sighted.
TRANSLATED BY MISHA HOEKSTRA
THE WHITE-BEAR KING VALEMON
LINDA BOSTRÖM KNAUSGAARD
THE HOUSE I LIVED IN with my parents stood on a dingy piece of land at the edge of the forest, between the forest and the road leading to the city. The road construction was still going on, advancing steadily, consuming the earth bit by bit. Men wearing headlamps toiled in the night with crowbars and pickaxes. In the daytime they burnt everything away with their fire cannon. There was always something ablaze somewhere nearby and the soot got in everywhere, sticking to the walls and windows, the glasses from which we drank.
Mother cleaned from morning till night. Scrubbing, wiping cloths over panels and windows, tables and chairs. All the way up her arms she was covered in the soot. The sheets could no longer be washed white. Hers was the generation of cleanliness and poverty. She battled the dirt and counted the money we received for giving up our land and supporting the expansion of the city, as it said on the certificate that hung in a place of honour in our front room.
Father lay in his room, drinking and smoking the cigarettes he rolled. He called for me on occasion whenever he wanted company. It wasn’t often, but when he did he would talk about the olden days. He got the albums out. His photographs and autograph book. He’d been an autograph hunter once, later a tank driver in the northern regions, where mantles of snow covered the firs, the roads, the boglands.
If he was in a good mood, he would take out the maps. He kept them rolled up under the bed and would spread them out on top of the army blanket that was stiff with dirt and coffee stains. Mother never ventured to his room with her cloths and cleaning.
Here I wallow in my shite, he would say, inhaling and then blowing out the smoke that filled the cramped space like a fog, as if to give atmosphere to the stories of his army days. He reconstructed various operations, his ruler passing over differently shaded areas on the map.
Not getting lost, that was my talent, he said with a laugh. Burträsk, he went on, jabbing a yellow-stained finger at the spot. Burträsk, Råneå, Jukkasjärvi. And that dump Karesuando. He laughed again, a mouthful of brown teeth.
Sometimes I went with the workmen into the city, climbing up into the cab of the orange earthmover and drinking the alcohol they passed around. It was like death itself, they said. Better than death. We drove with the windows down and took potshots with rifles, or let rip with the fire cannon, setting the ditches aflame, the sprawl, dogs.
My name is Ellinor.
You were born lucky, my father said.
You slid out of me like a seal, my mother said. You stared at me all night. You didn’t sleep like other infants. Your eyelashes were curled together. I saw the way they dried and unfolded like the petals of a flower stretching out to the sun.
My name is Ellinor and I have a wish. The crown of gold I see in my dreams at night. I want it.
It’s the only thing I want.
*
I heard his voice all through my childhood. It was a voice I knew as well as my own. It could speak from the drinking glass when I brushed my teeth, seep down through the ceiling crack in the front room or mingle with my mother’s voice when she asked me to wash the dishes. It was a hum in the walls and a whistle in the wind when the trees swayed and creaked. A dark and yet immaculate tone that fluttered and tingled inside, wrapping itself around the bones of my body, as substantial and nourishing as the food I ate. Wordlessly it told me I was taken care of, provided for, protected. It made my steps more intrepid than they ever would have been. I knew all this inside. The way you know you breathe and live on in the night when you’re asleep, without ever giving it a conscious thought.
I remember the first early winters when the sea froze at the shores and the children congregated like dark little birds on the grey slabs of ice that scraped their open edges against each other, forcing us to quickly shift our weight from one slab to another so as not to fall into the freezing water. I could run across the cracking ice without being afraid. I didn’t think about it much, the tone that kept my back straight and put a spring in my step.
The ice disappeared, and the cold of winter. Summer came, and the sun warmed up the earth, the soil breathed out its smells, its innermost aromas. I climbed the trees and looked out across the land, at the machinery waiting in the turning area. All the children and their parents who had ridden the machines into the city with their pots and pans, clothes, shoes and armchairs, departed in their little flocks, there to split up and be spread like flower seeds, absorbed by asphalt and buildings, installed in flats to live new and better lives by new, metropolitan principles. I sat in a tree and watched their worldly goods being driven away and those I had called my friends vanish, and the abandoned properties and emptiness that spread in their absence became mine alone.
