Harbor

by John Ajvide Lindqvist

  Simon opened his mouth to shout something, but nothing suitable emerged.

  That’s not fair. That’s not a clean fight.

  He clamped his jaws together. He had made the situation perfectly clear, explained how he felt. And then she did this. It was disgraceful, it was…Simon peered at the figure on the ground and wrung his hands.

  Surely something hasn’t really happened to her?

  Anna-Greta was in good health, and was hardly likely to have a heart attack or a brain haemorrhage just because she’d been rejected. Or was she? Simon looked along the track in the direction of the old village. What if that moped came back? She couldn’t just lie there like that.

  Why is she lying there like that?

  With the taste of lead in his mouth, Simon hurried back to Anna-Greta, guided by the glow of her torch. When he was a couple of metres away from her he could see that she was alive, because her body was shaking. She was weeping. Simon went and stood next to her.

  ‘Anna-Greta, stop it. We’re not teenagers. Don’t do this.’

  Anna-Greta sobbed and curled herself into a tighter ball. Simon could feel his own eyes burning, the tears welling up, and he angrily dashed them away.

  Not fair.

  He couldn’t bear to see her like this, this obstinate, strong woman he had loved for so long, couldn’t bear to see her lying on the forest track like a helpless, snivelling bundle. He had never imagined that something he said would provoke such a reaction. He had a lump in his throat, the tears were flowing, and he didn’t bother wiping them away.

  ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘Come on, Anna-Greta. Up you get.’

  Between sobs Anna-Greta said, ‘You’re not. To say. That. You’re not. To say. That you. Don’t want. To be. With me.’

  ‘No,’ said Simon. ‘I won’t. Now come on.’

  He reached out his hand to help her up, but she didn’t see it. Simon didn’t think he could manage to bend down and lift her up; there was a risk they’d both end up on the ground.

  He had never been involved in anything like this. Not with Anna-Greta. She could be terrible if they had a quarrel, then cry for a while when it was over, but he had never seen her in utter despair like this. On the other hand he had never said, even hinted, that he wanted them to split up.

  He waved his hand in front of her face. ‘Come on. I’ll help you.’

  Anna-Greta snivelled up snot, her breathing slowed a little and she relaxed. Her breaths were slow but panting, and she lay quiet for a while. Then she asked, ‘Do you want to be with me?’

  Simon closed his eyes and rubbed them. This whole performance was just ridiculous. They were adults, more than adults. To think that everything could come full circle and end up with the simplest and most basic of questions, the one that should have been resolved decades ago.

  But it hasn’t been resolved, has it. Perhaps it never will be.

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Yes, I do. But now you need to get up. You’re going to be ill if you lie there like that.’

  She took his hand but didn’t get up, she simply let her hand rest in his, caressing his palm with the tips of her fingers. ‘Sure?’

  Simon smiled and shook his head. For a couple of seconds he walked through the labyrinth of rooms in his heart, and was unable to find anywhere the feeling that had told him he wanted to leave her, never wanted to see her again. It was gone, as if it had never existed.

  Nothing to be done. It’s over.

  ‘I’m sure,’ he said, and helped her to her feet. Anna-Greta crept into his arms and they stood and held each other for so long that by the time they let go, the light of the torch had begun to fade from white to yellow. It was over.

  For this time, thought Simon. They took each other’s hands and found their way home by the fading glow of the torch. Both were exhausted by the unfamiliar storms of emotion, and their hearts were aching with the unaccustomed exercise. They held hands and that was conversation enough, but once they had emerged from the forest, Simon said, ‘I want to know.’

  Anna-Greta squeezed his hand.

  ‘I’ll tell you.’

  When they were back in Anna-Greta’s house they flopped on the sofa for a while, regaining their strength. It was as if they were shy, and found it difficult to look each other in the eye. Every time it happened they smiled hesitantly at one another.

  Like teenagers, thought Simon. Teenagers on Mum and Dad’s sofa.

  Perhaps teenagers didn’t behave like that nowadays, but to keep the analogy consistent Simon went into the kitchen and fetched a bottle of wine. To lighten the atmosphere. Loosen tongues and…make things happen.

  Not like that, though, no thank you. That would just be…

  He paused with the corkscrew halfway to the cork. Was it three days ago he and Anna-Greta last made love? It felt like much longer. But the fact they were behaving like teenagers didn’t mean their bodies were singing from the same sheet.

  The cork was stuck. Simon pulled as hard as he could, and realised that wasn’t actually all that hard.

  As I said…

  He took the bottle in to Anna-Greta, who sat up, pushed the bottle firmly between her thighs and managed to extract the cork. As if to excuse Simon, she said, ‘It was stuck pretty firmly.’

  Simon sank down on to the sofa. ‘Mm.’

  Anna-Greta poured and they both took a sip, rolled the wine around their mouths and swallowed. The unaccustomed taste remained on his tongue, and Simon sighed with pleasure. He didn’t often drink wine these days. He gave Anna-Greta a challenging look; she put down her glass and rested her hands on her knee.

  ‘Where shall I start?’

  ‘Start with the question I asked you. Why didn’t people move away, why don’t people move away? And what did you mean when you said you didn’t tell me for my own good? Why has no one—’

  Anna-Greta raised her hand to stop him. She picked up her glass again, took a tiny sip, then ran her finger round the rim.

  ‘In a way it’s the same question,’ she said. ‘If I tell you this, you won’t be able to move away from here either.’ She glanced out at the dark sea. ‘Although it’s probably already happened. You probably can’t leave.’

  Simon tilted his head on one side. ‘Like I said. I have no intention of going anywhere. You don’t need to scare me into staying.’

  Anna-Greta gave a wan smile. ‘It comes looking for us. If we try to leave this island, there is a considerable risk that it will come looking for us.’

  ‘“It”’, Simon interrupted. ‘What do you mean by “it”?’

  ‘The sea. It comes looking for us and it takes us. Wherever we are.’

  Simon shook his head dubiously. ‘But you go to Norrtälje, you go to Stockholm sometimes. We go over to Finland on the ferry, you and I. It’s all been fine, up to now.’

  ‘Mm. But you’ve suggested going further afield now and again. To Majorca, places like that. And I’ve said no, because…then it might think I’m trying to get away.’

  Anna-Greta licked her index finger, ran it around the rim of the glass and produced a sound. A lonely, wailing sound rose from the glass and spread through the room like the voice of a ghost. A perfect note, so pure and clear that it seemed to strengthen itself by using the air as a sound-box. Simon placed his hand on Anna-Greta’s finger to silence it.

  ‘But this sounds crazy,’ he said. ‘You mean the sea goes ashore and finds you? That just doesn’t happen.’

  ‘It doesn’t need to,’ said Anna-Greta. ‘It exists everywhere. It’s connected to everything. The sea. The water. It doesn’t need to go anywhere. It already exists everywhere.’

  Simon took a bigger swig of wine. He thought back to the experience he had had the previous day. When he held Spiritus in his hand and saw how the water ran through everything, how everything basically consisted of water. Now he widened the perspective in his mind, and saw all the seas connected by rivers, creeks, streams. The veins of water running through the bedrock, the bogs and the pools. Wate
r, water, everywhere.

  It’s right so far, but…

  ‘I’m just wondering what you mean by “take”. How does it “take” you?’

  ‘We drown. In the most unreasonable places. In a little creek. In a puddle. In a handbasin.’ Simon frowned and was about to ask the logical follow-up question, but Anna-Greta pre-empted him, ‘No. I have no idea how it happens. Nobody has. But those who…belong to Domarö and try to get away…they are found drowned, sooner or later. Usually. Those who stay, survive. Usually.’

  Simon placed his hand on top of Anna-Greta’s, which was still resting on the rim of her glass. ‘But this just sounds completely—’

  ‘It doesn’t matter what it sounds like. That’s the way it is. We know that. And now you know it too. To use a word that has fallen out of use, we are damned. And we live with it.’

  Simon folded his arms over his chest and flopped back against the sofa. It was a lot to take in at once, to put it mildly. The answers he had been given led to even more questions, and he didn’t feel as if he could cope with much more tonight. The small amount of wine he had drunk was enough to make him sleepy, since he wasn’t used to it.

  He closed his eyes and tried to see everything in front of him. The fishermen who had made their pact with the sea, how it had continued and propagated itself over the years, continued and spread like the sea itself, seeping into every crack.

  Seeping into…

  He smacked his lips as he thought about the water he had drunk from the well at the burnt-down house. The faint taste of salt, the sea that had found its way in. The taste was gone now, replaced by the biting sweetness of the wine. Without opening his eyes, Simon asked, ‘Do I belong to Domarö as well now? Am I also…damned?’

  ‘Presumably. But only you can know that.’

  ‘How do I know?’

  ‘You just know.’

  Simon nodded slowly and took a sounding in the very depths of himself, let the plumbline sink down through the darkness, the unspoken, the things he knew without being able to put them into words, and found that he reached the bottom sooner than expected. The knowledge was there, but he had not had the tools to find it. He belonged to the sea. He also belonged to the sea. Perhaps he had done so for a long time.

  ‘Something has happened,’ said Anna-Greta. ‘That’s what we met to talk about today. This business with Sigrid. As far as we know, no one has ever…come back.’

  ‘But she was dead.’

  ‘Yes, but even so. It’s never happened before.’

  ‘So what does it mean?’

  Anna-Greta stroked his knee. ‘Well, that’s what we were discussing. When we were interrupted.’

  Simon yawned. He tried to put into words one of the many questions writhing around in his head like indolent serpents, but before he managed it Anna-Greta said, ‘There’s something I want to ask you as well.’

  ‘Oh yes?’

  Simon yawned again, he just couldn’t help it. He waved his hand in front of his mouth to indicate that he would have taken away this yawn if he could, but it just wasn’t possible.

  Anna-Greta tucked her legs up on the sofa and wrapped her arms around them. Simon sat there blinking, amazed at her suppleness and agility as she built her own little fortress around her like this. It must be fifteen years since he’d been able to do that, if then.

  She leaned her chin on her knees and looked intently at him. Then she asked, ‘Will you marry me?’

  Despite his best efforts Simon was overcome by yet another enormous yawn which broke his eye contact with Anna-Greta. He held up his hands as if to say No more, no more, and said, ‘That. Is the limit when it comes to what I can cope with during the course of one day. We can talk about that tomorrow.’

  What are you looking at?

  Anders woke to an unfamiliar aroma, unfamiliar sounds. The aroma was coffee, the sounds were someone moving around in the kitchen, opening drawers and cupboards. He lay in bed for a while and pretended that everything was normal. That the person who had made the coffee and was busy in the kitchen was someone he loved and wanted to be with. That it was another beautiful morning in a good life.

  He folded his hands over his stomach and looked out of the window. A cloudy sky with patches of blue, a lovely and probably quite cold day in the middle of October. The smell of coffee was tempting, and he heard the clink of china from the kitchen.

  Cecilia is making breakfast. Maja is sitting at the kitchen table, busy with something. I am lying here, ready and rested in…Maja’s bed…

  The fantasy was fraying at the edges. The dirt in his body after yet another evening’s drinking and smoking made its presence felt. He looked at his fingers. They were slightly yellow, black beneath the cuticles, and they stank of tobacco. His mouth felt sticky and he leaned over the edge of the bed, found a plastic bottle a third full of diluted wine. He picked it up and drank, hair of the dog.

  OK. Back to reality.

  The excitement of the previous evening had faded. What Elin had told him about Henrik and Björn’s disappearance had seemed feverishly promising at the time, but in the cold light of morning he could see that this wasn’t necessarily the case. The two events were separate. There wasn’t necessarily any connection, and even if there was, what could he do? Nothing.

  He heaved himself out of bed. The floor was cold beneath his bare feet, and he pulled on cold socks and a cold T-shirt. The headache began to pound at his temples. He dragged on his jeans and went into the kitchen.

  Elin was just putting bread and cheese on the table. She looked up and said ‘Good morning’. In the bright morning light from the kitchen window she looked fucking awful. He grunted in reply and got a new carton of wine out of the larder, opened it and took a couple of big gulps. Elin was watching him. He didn’t care. The headache was getting worse and he screwed up his eyes, massaged his temples.

  ‘You’ve got a pretty big problem with alcohol, haven’t you?’ she said simply.

  Anders grinned as a quip he’d heard from a stand-up comic shot out of his mouth, ‘I’m a drunk and you’re ugly. I can stop drinking.’

  Silence fell, and that was the way Anders wanted it. He poured himself a cup of coffee and looked at the clock. It was after eleven. He had slept longer than usual. Despite Elin’s escape attempt during the night, perhaps her presence had given the room some kind of security that had enabled him to sleep.

  He took a couple more swigs of coffee and glanced at her. The headache was easing slightly and his conscience pricked as he saw her sitting there breaking a cheese sandwich into tiny pieces so that she could get it into her mouth. He wanted to say something, but while there are plenty of nasty, smart-arse remarks, the kind that can put something right are harder to come by.

  He finished off his coffee and was about to pour her a cup when it occurred to him that she probably wouldn’t be able to drink something that hot. She’d made it for him. He put the cup on the draining board and said, ‘Thanks for the coffee. That was kind of you.’

  Elin nodded and took a cautious sip of juice from her glass. The wounds must have healed a little, since she didn’t need to use a straw. What she had done to her face was incomprehensible. She was thirty-six, like him, but was starting to look like a sixty-year-old who’d had a difficult life.

  ‘I’m going to check the post,’ said Anders.

  He hurried out of the kitchen and pulled on his Helly Hansen top, fleeing the agonising desolation that lay like a fog around Elin.

  Down below the porch stood the GB-man, wrapped in the plastic sack. He couldn’t understand why it had frightened him so much. He picked it up and carried it over to the woodpile, where he kicked it and made it fall over.

  ‘Not so fucking tough now, are you?’ he said to the prone figure, which had nothing to say in its defence.

  The air was clear and cold, the demons of the night were dispersing. He looked with satisfaction at the well-filled wood store, pushed his hands into his pockets and set off towards the
village. It was as if he had two different states. One which was comparatively clear and lucid and could chop wood, think sensible thoughts, and was on the way up. And then there was the other, the night side, which was in the process of getting lost in a labyrinthine darkness of fear and speculation, and was on the way down.

  At least it’s a fight, he thought. In the city there was nothing but apathy.

  That’s how he chose to see it at the moment, at any rate, as he approached the shop with his work-worn hands in his pockets. When the rays of the sun broke through the cloud cover at irregular intervals and made the sea sparkle, when he was in the light of the new day. When the night came no doubt everything would look very different.

  He opened the old mailbox he had been given by Simon, expecting to find nothing as usual, but today there was a yellow envelope in the box. The films. The pictures had been developed.

  He weighed the envelope in his hand. It was thinner and lighter than usual, because he had only taken a few pictures before his photography stopped for good. But they were in there. The last pictures. He picked at the flap of the envelope and looked around. Not a soul in sight. He ripped it open.

  He didn’t want to go home because Elin was there, he wanted to be in peace with this moment. He sat down on the steps of the shop and pulled the smaller folder out of the envelope, weighing that in his hand as well. How many pictures were there? Ten? Eleven? He couldn’t remember. He took a deep breath and carefully fished out the little bundle of photographs.

  My darling…

  First of all a couple of bad pictures of the Shack, and then there they were, on the way up to the lighthouse. Maja in her red suit, ploughing ahead through the snow, Cecilia right behind her, straight-backed despite the difficult terrain underfoot. There they were in front of the lighthouse, side by side with rosy cheeks. Cecilia’s hand on Maja’s shoulder, Maja pulling away, off somewhere else as usual.