Studio Sex aka Studio 69 / Exposed

by Liza Marklund

  She walked slowly through the living room and into the kitchen. The floor space was clear as she had hardly any furniture. The floorboards shimmered in gray and the ceiling floated like a white sky high above her. She boiled some water on the gas stove, put three spoonfuls of coffee in a glass Bodum cafetière, poured the water, and pushed down the filter after a couple of minutes. The fridge was empty; she'd have a sandwich on the train.

  A torn morning paper lay on the floor inside her front door. The mail drop was too narrow for it. She picked it up and sat down on the kitchen floor with her back to the cupboard.

  The usual: the Middle East, the election campaign, the record heat. Not a line about Josefin. She was history already, a figure in the statistics. There was another op-ed article on the IB affair. This time she read it. A professor in Gothenburg demanded the formation of a truth commission. Right on! Annika thought.

  She didn't bother going down to the basement to have a shower but washed her face and armpits in the kitchen sink. The water didn't get icy cold now, so she didn't need to heat any.

  The first editions of the evening papers were just out, and she bought both from the newsdealer on Scheelegatan. Kvällspressen led with the IB story. Annika smiled. Berit was the best. Her own pieces were in a good place, pages eight, nine, ten, and center spread. She read her own text about the police theory. It was quite good, she thought. The police had a lead that pointed to a person close to Josefin, she'd written. It appeared that Josefin had felt under threat and had been scared. There were signs that she'd been physically abused before. Annika smiled again. Without writing a word about Joachim, the police theory was there. Then came the stage-managed orgy of grief in Täby. She was glad she'd kept it concise and to the point. The photo was okay. It showed a few girls next to some candles, not crying. She felt good about it. The Rival had nothing special, apart from the sequel to the piece "Life After the Holidays." She would read that on the train.

  A hot wind was rising. She bought an ice cream on Bergsgatan and walked down Kaplansbacken to Centralen, the railway station. She was in luck, the Intercity train to Malmö was leaving in five minutes. She sat down in the buffet car and was first in line to buy a sandwich when it opened. She bought her ticket from the conductor.

  Only she and three Arab men got off the train in Flen. The bus for Hälleforsnäs left in fifteen minutes and she sat down on a bench opposite the municipal offices and studied a sculpture called Vertical Tendency. It really was terrible. She ate a bag of jelly cars on the bus and got off outside the co-op.

  "Congratulations!" Ulla, one of her mother's workmates, shouted. The woman stood over by a flowerbed in her green work coat, smoking a cigarette.

  "For what?" Annika smiled at her.

  "Front page and everything. We're proud of you," Ulla yelled.

  Annika laughed and made a deprecating gesture with her hand. She walked past the church and toward her house. The place looked deserted and dead, the red rows of forties houses steaming in the heat.

  I hope Sven isn't here, she thought.

  The apartment was empty and all the plants were dead. A horrendous stench came from a forgotten garbage bag in the kitchen. She threw it in the garbage chute and opened all windows wide. She left the dead plants to their fate. She couldn't be bothered just now.

  ***

  When she went home, her mother was genuinely happy to see her. She gave her an awkward hug, her hands cold and clammy.

  "Have you had dinner? I've got elk casserole cooking."

  Her mother's latest boyfriend was a hunter.

  They sat down at the kitchen table, her mother lighting a cigarette. The window was ajar and Annika could hear some kids fighting over a bicycle in the street. She looked out toward the works and the dreary gray tin roofs that stretched out as far as the eye could see.

  "Now tell me, how did you do it?" Her mother smiled expectantly.

  "How do you mean?" Annika said, returning the smile.

  "All that success, of course! Everybody's seen it. They come up to me at the checkout and congratulate me. Great articles. You've been on the front page and everything!"

  Annika bowed her head. "It wasn't that difficult. I got a good tip-off. How's things here?"

  Her mother's face lit up. "Oh, I have to show you!" She got to her feet. The cigarette smoke eddied in the air as she moved over to the counter. Annika followed it with her gaze as her mother returned to the table. She spread a bunch of photocopies in front of Annika.

  "I like this one," she said, rapping her knuckle on the tabletop. She sat down and took a deep drag on the cigarette.

  Sighing lightly, Annika looked at her mother's papers. They were prospectuses from various real estate agents in Eskilstuna. On the one that her mother had indicated with her knuckle she read, Exclusive splitlevel house w/ high standard, sunken bathtub in a tiled bathroom, L-shaped living room, den w/ fireplace.

  "Why do they abbreviate with?" Annika wondered.

  "What?"

  "They've abbreviated about the shortest word of the sentence. It doesn't make sense."

  Annoyed, her mother waved aside the smoke between them. "What do you think?"

  Annika hesitated. "It seems a bit on the expensive side."

  "Expensive?" Her mother snatched the Xerox copy from the table. " 'Marbled hallway floor, tiled kitchen floor, and a basement bar'- it's perfect!"

  Annika heaved another silent sigh. "Sure, I was just wondering if you can afford it. One point three million is quite a lot of money."

  "Look at the others."

  Annika leafed through the sheets. They were all monstrosities on the outskirts of Eskilstuna, situated in districts with names like Skiftinge, Stenkvista, Grundby, Skogstorp. All with more than six rooms and a big garden.

  "You don't like gardening," Annika remarked.

  "Leif is a nature person." Her mother put out the half-smoked cigarette. "We're thinking of buying something together."

  Annika pretended not to hear. "How's Birgitta?" she asked instead.

  "She's okay. She gets on really well with Leif. I think you would like him too, if you met him." A tone of accusation and injury was in her mother' voice.

  "Will she get to keep her job at Right Price?"

  "Don't change the subject." Her mother straightened up. "Why don't you want to meet Leif?"

  Annika got up and walked over to the fridge, opened it, and had a look inside. The shelves were clean but almost empty.

  "I don't mind meeting him if it makes you happy. But I've been so busy this summer, as you can imagine."

  Her mother disregarded the tone in her voice and also got up. "Don't rummage about in the fridge. We'll be eating soon. You can set the table."

  Annika took a small pot of low-fat yogurt and closed the fridge door.

  "I don't have time to stay for dinner. I'm going out to Lyckebo."

  Her mother's mouth became a thin white line. "It'll be ready in a few minutes. You could wait."

  "I'll see you again soon." Annika hung her bag over her shoulder and hurried out of the apartment. Her bicycle stood where she had left it. The back tire was flat. She pumped it up, fastened the bag to the rack, and pedaled away toward Granhed. She cycled past the works and glanced at it out of the corner of her eye. The works- beating heart of the small community. Forty thousand square meters of deserted industrial park. Sometimes she hated it for all it had done to her during her youth. Twelve hundred people had worked here when she was born. By the time she left school, that number was down to a few hundred. Her father had had to go when they cut it to one hundred and twenty. Now there were eight workers. She cycled past the parking lot. She counted three cars and five bicycles.

  Her father couldn't deal with being unemployed. The lousy job had been his life. He never got a new one, and Annika had a feeling she knew why. Bitterness is hard to hide and unpleasant to hire.

  She cycled past the entrance gate to the canoe club and automatically speeded up. That's where they'd f
ound him, half an hour too late. His body temperature was too low. He survived for another twenty-four hours at the hospital in Eskilstuna, but the alcohol did its part. In her darkest moments she felt it was just as well. And if she thought about it, which she rarely did, she suspected she had never allowed herself to mourn him properly.

  A thought entered her mind. He's the one I take after. Immediately she brushed the thought aside.

  After the turning to Pine Lake, the road became narrower and full of holes. It weaved through the trees. She didn't like the late-summer color of the trees. The dense vegetation was so sated with chlorophyll that it was no longer breathing and was exactly the same shade all over. She found it monotonous.

  Forest paths crisscrossed the road from the right and left. Locked barriers blocked off all the roads on the left-hand side; this was the perimeter of the Harpsund compound.

  The road climbed and she breathed heavily as she stood up and pedaled. The sweat ran down from her armpits; she'd need a dip in the lake after this.

  The turning to Lyckebo appeared as unexpectedly as it always did. Almost every time she nearly missed the side road in the sharp bend and skidded slightly as she braked. She unhooked her bag, leaned the bicycle against the barrier, ducked under it, and waded through the tall grass.

  "Whiskas!" she called out. "Little kitty!"

  A few seconds later she heard a distant meowing. The ginger cat emerged from the grass, the sun glittering on its whiskers.

  "Whiskas, sweetheart!"

  She threw the bag in the grass and let the cat jump up into her arms. Laughing, she lay down among the ants and rolled around with the cat, tickling its stomach and stroking its soft back.

  "But you've got a tick, you little rascal. Hang on, let me pull it out."

  She took a firm hold of the insect that had bored into the cat's fur and pulled. She got it out in one piece. She smiled. She still had the knack.

  "Is Grandma home?"

  The old woman sat in the shade under the old oak tree. Her eyes were closed and she had her hands clasped over her stomach. Annika picked up her bag and walked over with the cat bouncing around her legs, rubbing against her knees and meowing; he wanted more cuddling.

  "Are you asleep?" Her voice was no more than a whisper.

  The old woman opened her eyes and smiled. "Not at all. I'm listening to nature."

  Annika gave her grandmother a long hug.

  "You're thinner every time I see you. Are you eating properly?"

  "Sure." Annika smiled. "Now look what I've got for you." She let go of the woman and rummaged around in her bag. "Look at this," she said brightly. "For you!"

  She held out a box of handmade chocolates from a small factory on Gärdet in Stockholm.

  Her grandmother clapped her hands together. "How sweet of you! I'm touched."

  Grandmother opened the box and they had one piece each. It was a little too rich for Annika, who didn't like chocolate that much.

  "So how are you?"

  Annika looked down. "It's hard going. I'm really hoping they let me stay on at the paper. I don't know what I'll do if they don't."

  The old woman looked at her, a long warm gaze. "You'll make it, Annika," she said in the end. "You don't need that job. You'll see it will all work out."

  "I'm not so sure."

  "Come here."

  Grandmother reached out and pulled Annika down onto her lap. Gingerly, Annika sat down and placed her forehead against the woman's neck.

  "You know what I think you should do?" Grandmother said in a serious tone. She held her grandchild and slowly rocked her from side to side. The wind rose and the leaves on the aspen tree next to them rustled. Annika saw Ho Lake glitter between the trees.

  "You know I'm always here for you," Grandmother said. "I'll be here whatever happens. You can always come to me."

  "I don't want to drag you into it," Annika whispered.

  "Silly girl." Grandmother smiled. "You mustn't talk like that. I've got nothing to do these days. Helping you is the least I can do."

  Annika kissed the woman's cheek. "Are there any chanterelles yet?"

  Grandmother chuckled. "All that rain in the spring and now all this heat- the whole forest is golden yellow. Take two bags with you!"

  Annika leaped to her feet.

  "I'll just go for a quick swim first!"

  She tore off her skirt and top on the way down to the jetty. The water was lukewarm and the bottom muddier than ever. She swam over to the cliffs, pulled herself up, and lay breathing deeply for a while. The wind tore at her wet hair, and when she looked up, the clouds were flying past at a good speed several thousand feet up. She slid into the water again and slowly floated back on her back. Dense forest surrounded the lake, and not a living soul was to be seen apart from Whiskas, waiting for her on the jetty. You could get lost in these woods. She had once as a child. A search party from the local orienteering club had found her in a forest clearing, frozen blue.

  She started sweating as soon as she got up on land. She pulled on her clothes without drying herself.

  "I'll borrow your rubber boots," she called to her grandmother, who had picked up her knitting.

  She tucked one plastic bag in her waistband and carried one in her hand. Whiskas followed in her footsteps as she strode into the woods.

  Her grandmother was right- the chanterelles grew in clusters alongside the path, as big as the palm of your hand. She found some cèpes as well, parasol mushrooms, and hoards of little pale hedgehog mushrooms. All the time, Whiskas was dancing around her feet, chasing ants and butterflies, jumping after mosquitoes and birds. Annika crossed the road and walked past Johannislund and Björkbacken. There she took a right and walked in the direction of Lillsjötorp to say hello to Old Gustav. His beautiful little house stood in the sun, a wall of huge fir trees behind it. The silence was absolute and she didn't hear the sound of the ax from over by the woodshed. That probably meant that the old man had gone out into the forest, probably for the same reason she had.

  The door was locked. She continued up toward White Hill, where she climbed a hunting tower and sat down for a rest. The forest clearing stretched out below her. She'd hear an echo if she called out. She closed her eyes and listened to the wind. It was loud and hot, almost hypnotic. She sat like this for a long while, until a sound startled her. She carefully looked out over the edge.

  A stout man came cycling from the direction of Skenäs. He was breathing heavily and wobbling somewhat. A dried pine twig was stuck in his back wheel. The man stopped right underneath the tower, pulled out the twig, mumbled something, and continued on his way.

  Annika blinked in astonishment. It was the prime minister of Sweden.

  ***

  Christer Lundgren stepped inside his overnight apartment with a feeling of unreality. He had a sense of impending catastrophe. Hot winds were blowing in his face. The electrically charged air made him realize the inevitable: the storm was blowing his way. He was going to get drenched.

  The heat in the small apartment was indescribable. It had been exposed to the scorching sun all day. He was annoyed. Why weren't there any blinds?

  He dropped his bag on the floor in the hallway and opened the balcony door wide. The ventilation system in the backyard was roaring.

  Damn that hamburger chain, he thought.

  He went into the small kitchen and poured himself a big glass of water. The drains smelled of old yogurt and apple peel. He flushed away what he could.

  His meeting with the party secretary and the undersecretary of state had been dreadful. He had no illusions about his position. It was crystal clear.

  He took the glass of water with him and with a heavy sigh sat down on the bed with the phone on his lap. He took a few deep breaths before he dialed his home number.

  "I'll be staying here for a while," he said to his wife after the initial small talk.

  His wife paused. "For the weekend?" she eventually asked.

  "You know I don't want to."


  "You promised the kids."

  He closed his eyes and held his forehead in his hand. "I miss you so much I feel sick."

  She became worried. "What's wrong? What happened?"

  "You wouldn't believe me if I told you. It's one big nightmare."

  "Jesus, Christer! Tell me what's happened!"

  He swallowed and braced himself. "Listen to me- take the kids and go to Karungi. I'll follow as soon as I can."

  "I won't go without you."

  His voice acquired a hard edge. "You must. I'm telling you all hell's about to break loose. You're going to be besieged if you stay there. It would be best if you could leave tonight."

  "But Stina isn't expecting us until Saturday!"

  "Call her and ask if you can't come earlier. Stina's always willing to help."

  His wife waited in silence. "It's the police," she then said quietly. "The thing with the police calling."

  He heard the twins laughing in the background.

  "Yes," he said. "Partly. But that's not all."

  ***

  Annika returned home just in time for the quarter-to-five Eko.

  "Guess who I saw in the forest? The prime minister!"

  As she tipped the contents of the two plastic bags on the table, the opening chimes of the news pealed from the transistor radio.

  "He's got it into his head he should lose some weight," her grandmother said. "He often cycles past here."

  They sat down opposite each other at the kitchen table and cleaned the mushrooms while the radio voices droned on. Nothing was happening.

  "So, you still keep in contact with people at Harpsund?"

  Grandmother smiled. She had been the housekeeper at the prime minister's summer residence for thirty-seven years. The local news came on and she turned up the volume.

  Annika cut the chanterelles in pieces and placed them in the bowl next to her. Then she let her hands drop and eyes rest. The wall clock ticked and the minutes went by. For Annika, her grandmother's kitchen was the very home of peace and warmth. The iron range with its white plaster hood, the linoleum flooring, the plastic tablecloth, and the wild meadow flowers in the windows. This was where she'd learned to live without hot running water.