The Father: Made in Sweden Part I

by Anton Svensson

  On the workbench lay a huge pile of red banknotes. In front of them, lined up, stood three large metal bowls half full of clear liquid.

  ‘First you bathe them – pure acetone.’

  Yellow gloves grabbed a stack of notes.

  ‘500-kronor notes. Twenty at a time.’

  The red trickled out while Leo watched the clock. Five seconds. Then he quickly moved the money to the next bowl.

  ‘Half acetone and half water. They stay here for ten seconds.’

  The liquid turned a light pink as the last of the red dissolved, and the wet paper was moved to a third and final dish.

  ‘Clean water stabilises the bills. Three minutes.’

  They waited, mutely, studying the underwater text that read SWEDISH NATIONAL BANK. Everything seemed to be preserved. Leo fished out one of the notes and let the wet paper lie in the gloved palm of his hand.

  ‘You see?’

  He hung up every banknote after its swim in the last bowl.

  ‘Is Jasper here?’ asked Vincent, and Leo could hear worry in his voice for some reason.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Is he coming here?’

  ‘Why would he be?’

  Leo searched his little brother’s face.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  Nothing?

  This was more than nothing. He’d ask him later.

  One step back. The room full of money was a beautiful picture: he’d succeeded. Because nobody but him said when it was over. It may have taken 114,400 kronor to solve the problem, but the pinkish notes that lay in a bucket could still be used.

  ‘These got fucked up when I was experimenting, but they work at unmanned petrol stations. I’ve already tested it. We just have to be careful to spread out where we get petrol.’

  Felix stirred his hand around in the bucket full of discoloured paper.

  ‘It’s idiotic to put these back in circulation – they’ll end up with the cops.’

  ‘On the contrary, they’ll see that no matter how hard they try to stop us, they won’t succeed. Not even with dye packs.’

  He giggled, the acetone vapours wrapping his brain in drowsiness.

  ‘That fucker Jasper isn’t even coming here?’ asked Felix, glancing at Vincent.

  Leo pulled off his plastic gloves.

  ‘Why do you keep asking about him? What’s this about? He’s not here. He’s not coming here. Satisfied?’

  ‘No, I’m not satisfied. And Vincent isn’t satisfied either. But sure. Why would that idiot come here? I bet he’s fucking hungover today, he drank enough on the train journey home.’

  ‘Drank?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Leo turned to Vincent.

  ‘Vincent, was he drinking?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Around other passengers?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Fucking hell … we drink here! Afterwards. Not around other people. We don’t want to be noticed.’

  ‘He was noticed. Right, Vincent?’

  It was clear. There was a pressure behind Felix’s words trying to break free.

  ‘Right, Vincent?’

  Vincent didn’t look at Leo, or Felix. He just looked straight ahead.

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about. Knock it off.’

  Leo waited, but Felix didn’t say anything more. But he would later, Leo was sure.

  He poured the contents of the three metal bowls into the sink, flushed it clean, and filled them again, in the same way.

  ‘I’ve been thinking about the next robbery,’ said Leo.

  ‘The next robbery? We were going to stop after this. A triple robbery. Then we were done,’ said Felix.

  The yellow gloves were on again. And a new handful of red banknotes taken from the pile.

  ‘We were. But our yield wasn’t as much as we expected. What we need to wash in here, and what we have in the weapons room, will support us for a couple of years max with all the expenses.’

  ‘Then we’ll get a job, like everyone else.’

  Felix had a way of being sarcastic that pierced his defences.

  ‘We don’t need to. Because we’re going to redo it.’

  ‘Redo … what?’

  ‘Ullared. We’ll take the same banks, all three, again. A repeat. We’ve already made all the mistakes. We won’t make them again. Between ten and fifteen million!’

  The first dip. The pile contained ten 500-kronor notes and ten 100s.

  ‘I’m serious. Everything’s already planned. In a couple of months. Not a single cop in Sweden will be expecting it. The same fucking banks!’

  Five seconds. The notes needed to go to the next bowl.

  ‘We were stopped at a roadblock,’ argued Felix.

  ‘Which you took care of nicely!’

  ‘And what if they’d taken out the insulation bales and realised it was a fucking fake wall?’

  ‘They didn’t.’

  ‘But if they had?’

  ‘I would have put a bullet in their legs.’

  ‘If you missed, if they—’

  ‘Felix, damn it, we rob banks, we’re armed, we have live ammunition. If they take out their guns, someone could die, and I’m gonna make damn sure it isn’t us.’

  ‘What if something happens to us, Leo, if something happens to you or me or Vincent?’

  ‘Then we’ll take over a hospital. Take control of a ward. Or we’ll take a doctor with us.’

  The third dish. He had plenty of time again.

  ‘Leo, damn it, are you high on acetone?’

  ‘Before every robbery I always check for the addresses of any surgeons living nearby, and I’ll continue to do so.’

  ‘Surgeons?’

  ‘If one of us gets shot, we can’t go to A&E, can we? So we’ll bring someone to us. We’ll go there, throw the doctor in the boot, take whatever medical supplies he has at home. We’ve always had needle and thread with us in the car, and disinfectant for cleaning entry wounds.’

  The paper had stabilised. Perfect. Again. He held out the bowl to Felix, who stood closest.

  ‘I’m not here to hang up money. Neither is Vincent. Because we’re not doing this any more.’

  Leo handed the bowl to Vincent instead, who shook his head like Felix.

  ‘What do you mean … not doing this?’

  ‘We’re not doing this. As in not a part of it,’ said Felix.

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘I was lying on a hill when we did that first robbery. I’d hardly ever held a gun before. I lay there and took aim when you went by in the security van, squeezed the trigger at the car behind you. I’d almost decided to shoot two people who just happened to be driving in the wrong direction.’

  ‘But you didn’t.’

  ‘And now … this last time, sticking out of a roof with a fucking machine gun in my hands! In the middle of the day! Everyone could see me. I was ready to shoot whoever the fuck got in my way.’

  ‘But you didn’t.’

  ‘And Vincent? Our little brother. Who almost shot an old lady who just needed help! Our little brother!’

  ‘He didn’t.’

  ‘I’m there. Vincent’s there. Right on the line. And when you’re right on the line, the next step you take … you step over it. If the cops had decided to take a long hard look behind those bales and found you there … do you understand?’

  ‘Felix? Look at me. Repeat after me. They didn’t.’

  ‘Our luck’s run out. Next time, hell, the bullet’s been on its way for so long. It’ll hit something, Leo. Them. Or us.’

  Leo still had four soaking wet notes in his hand, but Vincent stood in his way.

  ‘Leo, we – Felix and I, that is – we’re moving to Gothenburg.’

  It was so seldom Vincent looked at him that way.

  ‘We’ve rented a flat.’

  He waited for him to continue, but it was Felix who spoke.

  ‘You took the car to Stockholm. Vi
ncent was on the train with that idiot, who I am going to have words with you about later, no matter what you say, Vincent. And I flew from Landvetter Airport. I did it then. I changed my ticket. There were several flats in the Gothenburg Post. Expensive as hell, and they wanted three months in advance, but they’re in the city. A two-bedroom flat. One room each.’

  A puddle was forming on Leo’s shoes, trickling onto the floor. He hung up the last four notes from the batch.

  ‘I don’t give a shit how many bedrooms there are.’

  And as he hung them up, he was able to turn away from them.

  ‘So what the hell are you going to do in Gothenburg?’

  ‘Study. I’m going to take a few courses at Chalmers. And Vincent, he’s going to take some school courses.’

  ‘You can’t be serious?’

  ‘This weekend. We’re moving.’

  ‘Are you? Both of you? Seriously? Are you kidding me?’

  ‘We’re serious. So now you can do what you said you were going to do.’

  ‘Do what?’

  ‘Sell back the weapons. You said you’d do that when this was all over. So you can get rid of that shit and get your cash and you’ll be fine.’

  ‘But we were going to do that together! That was our finish!’

  ‘Now that’s not going to happen.’

  ‘You go … behind my back? Is that what we do? We’re supposed to trust each other. Always, always tell each other everything? You go behind my back and don’t say shit and arrange everything. And then you tell me! When I can’t … when I don’t even have a chance.’

  Vincent looked down at the floor.

  ‘You would have … got in the way. Convinced us.’

  ‘In the way?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘In the way? Well in that case … what the hell, go ahead. Go behind my back! Why are you standing here? I bet you have a lot to pack, right? And I have a million more of these to wash.’

  A new pile of notes. Fifties and twenties. He didn’t hear them leave.

  60

  ANNELI HELD HER phone in her left hand and a cigarette in her right. It was nice to stand outdoors talking, the sun on her face, and if she leaned against the wall she was protected from the wind completely. And then, the echoing, gnawing hole. Every time he hung up.

  She missed him so much.

  She inhaled the smoke deep down into her chest and let it stay there, filling a void, then she felt calmer, knew that everything would turn out all right if she could just stand the waiting. Just like on the very first day. At the hospital, the fragile oxygen tube on the wall had fallen apart when the midwife pulled on it, so it was up to the woman to run down the hospital corridors with her son in her arms – not breathing, the water still in his lungs – and for several terrible minutes she was sure that he was dead. She’d smoked then as well, on the hospital balcony next to a giant ashtray filled with hundreds of cigarette butts.

  The midwife had come out on the balcony then. Sebastian had cried for the first time, taken his first breath, the water in the lungs had gone away. In the evening he’d lain next to her in a plastic box filled with oxygen, and she’d looked at him, and she was pretty sure he’d looked at her too.

  Sebastian had been everything to her. And she’d abandoned him. Now they talked on the phone three times a week and met every other weekend.

  She had met a much younger man, a 21-year-old who was everything Sebastian’s father was not, full of energy, madness, strength, a man who made other people’s dreams come true.

  She had been in love. She was still in love. And things would be like they were before, in a year, she and Sebastian together again. When this was over. Then they would be a family, a real one. She just had to be able to stand the waiting.

  ‘Hello.’

  She was blinded by the spring sun. The woman from the house next door was standing at the chain-link fence, looking through it at her. Her baby was on the grass some distance away. They’d never spoken to each other, but she’d often seen this woman from her window, and would watch her rake leaves or throw a big yellow ball with the little one.

  Like Anneli and Sebastian. Before.

  ‘Hello.’

  She put out her cigarette with the sole of her shoe, then went over to the woman, who lifted her child and held him in her arms. Anneli would be able to caress his cheek; half her hand could fit through the holes in the fence.

  ‘My name’s Stina.’

  ‘Anneli.’

  ‘I’ve seen you here for a while now, across the yard, and I thought, well, you’re our nearest neighbours, would you like to come over for dinner?’

  Sometimes it takes very little to make everything feel different. This was one of those moments. Asphalt and chain-link with barbed wire at the top couldn’t obscure the view. The person on the other side of the fence had an ordinary life, and she wanted to share it with Anneli. Maybe she would become a friend, somebody to talk to about whatever girlfriends talk about. She didn’t even need smoke in her lungs – the calm came anyway. And then, after just a few moments, she felt like dancing. No one had shut her in here. That wasn’t the case. It had been her own choice to stay in this ugly little house, she’d chosen to be here in order to be close to him, and she was prepared to wait for their ordinary lives. But in the meantime, here was something she hadn’t even thought possible! Hello, what does your husband do, oh, he’s a teacher, my husband robs banks. But it was possible. Nobody knew. Leo was in the building trade. And she could be an artist. Or unemployed. Or on disability for a bad back. They would have dinner. And then a coffee now and then. Maybe watch her kids for her. An ordinary life.

  Anneli hurried inside. She threw open the front door and ran into the kitchen, threw her arms around Leo’s neck, making his coffee splash onto the table, but she didn’t care and hugged him even tighter.

  ‘We’re going out to dinner!’

  He looked at her; he’d been somewhere else.

  ‘There! The woman there, see, the woman on the lawn, she’s invited us to dinner. On Friday.’

  ‘Dinner?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Anneli … I have no interest in neighbours with buggies and small dogs. I’m here for other reasons and … do you even know their names?’

  ‘Her name is Stina and her son is Lucas and her husband is—’

  ‘I don’t care what their names are.’

  He knew he was hurting her. But he wanted to finish things, not start them.

  ‘They invited us. You’re out there in that garage all the time! I need to meet people!’

  ‘Anneli? Look at me. Stina will understand. When I’m done, when I’ve fixed what I need to – then we can start thinking about whether or not we’ll have dinner with people I don’t care about.’

  Anneli let him go.

  She looked at this man sitting in the kitchen with his back to her, and wished he was still beside her in a car on their way to Farsta, that they’d never robbed a bank, and she realised that at that moment she’d crossed a line and would now always be on the other side of it.

  ‘Should I go over there now, do you think? And say what? That we can’t come next Friday because my husband has a little problem he needs to solve, that his brothers don’t want to rob banks with him any more? Your brothers … your fucking brothers, it’s always about them!’

  She’d crossed that line because she thought it was better to be a part of it, to be there and to know. But her fear hadn’t diminished, it had got worse – every time they took a risk and managed to succeed, she knew they’d take another risk.

  ‘Don’t you understand? I have no friends any more. I don’t socialise with anyone.’

  ‘Is that really my fault?’

  ‘I can’t invite anyone here. I can’t … hell, not even my own son.’

  He didn’t understand fear, didn’t carry it around like everyone else. Leo was never afraid. Or, he never allowed himself to be. Like the time she’d lost sight of Sebastian �
� the only time it had happened – in the middle of Sergel’s Torg, Stockholm’s biggest square. Her little son had been next to her and then he suddenly wasn’t. That’s how quickly he had disappeared. That’s how fast you lose control over time and space. She’d trembled, run around and shouted, picturing Sebastian somewhere by himself, or walking into traffic, or next to a stranger holding his hand on the way somewhere else – a single image that meant she’d never see her son again.

  ‘I do things for you, Leo! All the time! Every day! Things I might not want to do. I do it – for your sake!’

  Leo didn’t work that way. Leo had grabbed her there in the middle of the crowd and said you go that way, I’ll go the other way, we’ll meet here in five minutes and split up again. He’d transformed fear into action – searching became his ‘now’ instead of letting it take over space and time as it had for her. That’s what he did, every time. And that’s probably why he didn’t really understand the need to have dinner with the neighbours; for him ordinary life was just a façade. He saw the practicality of everyday life but not the need, because he’d simply decided there was no room for it, just like he’d decided that there was no room for fear.

  ‘I’ve never forced you to do anything.’

  ‘I want you to do this for my sake!’

  ‘If you don’t want to do something, Anneli, just tell me. If it’s not convenient – don’t do it. Just like I’m not doing this.’

  ‘Did you ask me if I wanted to live in this house? I hate it! This ugly stone house and those fucking barracks where you practise robbing banks all day and …’

  She didn’t cry often. Now she did. Anger turned to tears.

  ‘You’d already decided that you were going to live here because it suited you – not us! The cave in the guest room that reeks of gun oil, and this fucking kitchen where you have more meetings than we have real dinners! The only positive thing about this house, this fucking house, is that fence, because on the other side of it lives a normal family that’s invited us over for dinner because they want to get to know me. Us! Don’t you understand that?’

  She stood in front of him crying and he ought to comfort her, but he couldn’t. Not now. Felix had moved to Gothenburg. Vincent was on his way. And Jasper was about to come through that gate any moment. He’d comfort her later.