‘And how can you be so sure I was the one who leaked it?’
‘It does look that way, doesn’t it?’ Anders said. ‘Either way, it might be a good thing it came out. Don’t look at me like that,’ he went on. ‘You know I’m only looking out for …’
‘The investigation?’ Charlie sipped her coffee; it burnt her tongue.
‘You,’ Anders said. ‘I’m looking out for you, Charlie.’
‘Thanks for your concern,’ she said and stood up.
‘Are you going back to Stockholm?’
‘I don’t know. I don’t know anything any more.’
‘Where are you going now, then?’
‘Upstairs to pack my stuff.’
Charlie tossed the clothes strewn all about her room into her suitcase. Under a rumpled cardigan, she found the bag with Annabelle’s library books. She put it in her suitcase, thinking she could stop by the town library before she … Yes, what was she going to do now? She thought about her messy flat in Stockholm, the thirsty plants in the windows, the heat. What on earth was she going to do in Stockholm if they wouldn’t let her work?
I can’t go back there, she thought. Not today.
When she got down to reception, Anders was waiting on one of the sofas.
‘I thought you had to work?’ Charlie said.
‘I figured I could give you a ride to the train station?’
‘I’m not going to the train station,’ Charlie said.
‘Then where are you going?’
‘To an old friend’s house.’
‘I’ll drive you,’ Anders offered.
Charlie was just about to say there was no need, but then she realised she couldn’t possibly walk the three miles to Lyckebo with her suitcase in all that heat, so she accepted.
They said nothing in the car. Charlie wanted to talk about the case, about Svante who was detained, about the video, about whether new information had surfaced since last night, but she didn’t dare risk having Anders remind her that she had been taken off the case, having him make it clear yet again that they were colleagues first and friends second.
She showed him where to turn off. The forest grew denser. The spruce branches reached far into the poorly paved road.
‘Where are we going?’ Anders asked.
‘Home,’ Charlie replied.
‘Home?’
‘In here.’
‘Is that even a road?’
‘Just drive.’
‘I don’t see a house,’ Anders said when they reached the end of the narrow gravel road.
‘It’s further on,’ Charlie said.
‘Lyckebo,’ Anders read on a white wooden sign that was sinking into the ground. ‘Who’s waiting for you at Lyckebo?’
‘I don’t know. That’s what I don’t know.’
‘Is this where you lived?’
Charlie nodded. She opened the door and climbed out of the car.
‘Oh, but surely you’re not going to …’ Anders called after her. ‘I don’t know if it’s such a good idea to … I mean, for me to leave you here, alone in the middle of nowhere, when you …’
She turned around, squinting at him in the sunshine.
‘I don’t care what you think.’
She’d just got through the first thicket of undergrowth when she heard him calling again.
‘And how am I supposed to turn around?’
‘I guess you’ll have to reverse,’ she shouted. ‘Good thing you’re such a fucking outstanding driver.’
Charlie was almost surprised the house was still standing. The garden was completely overgrown. It was as if the forest had rushed back in to reclaim the land.
Lyckebo. Betty had picked this house for three reasons. First, she loved the name. Second, it was in an ideal location, at a perfect distance from the town. Betty had never understood why people wanted to cram houses together and live cheek by jowl with neighbours they hadn’t chosen. And then, there was the water. It was a dream, Betty felt, to live so close to water.
If you didn’t know, it would have been hard to tell the house had once been red. The paint had started peeling pretty badly during their last years there, and Betty used to joke about how it would have been better if it were wood-coloured so you didn’t have to worry about it.
Now, the facade was grey; green damp had spread along the edge of the foundation and thistles and nettles had completely overrun Betty’s spot in the sun. The climbing roses, the ones Betty had loved, had spread and now covered the windows on the south side. The swing in the old oak tree was moving gently in the breeze.
There was a stabbing pain in the left side of her chest. Is this for real now? Charlie thought. Am I having a heart attack? Am I going to die when I’m this close? She had to sit down on a rock. She put her head between her knees and tried to just focus on breathing. Breathe in and out, she thought. In and out. It’s just a regular panic attack. I’m not going to die. I’ll survive.
When her breathing returned to normal again, she looked over at the cherry tree forest and could almost hear the music Betty had used to play.
There and then
They’re in the tree house. During the day, the sun seeps in between the planks, but now only the faint light of the moon reaches them ‘These are the rules,’ Rosa says. She’s sitting cross-legged on the floor of the tree house, warming the glass over the candle. ‘You can’t ask about death and if you come into contact with the devil, you have to smash the glass and burn the board. Got it?’
Alice looks down at the piece of brown cardboard with circles, numbers and letters and asks how you know if you’ve made contact with the devil.
‘You can tell,’ Rosa says. She points to the number six and says that if the glass ends up there three times, you can be sure he’s got involved.
‘How do you know it’s a he?’ Alice says.
And Rosa retorts that everyone knows the devil’s a he. What else would he be.
‘Are you scared?’ she asks.
Alice shakes her head.
‘Let’s get cracking then.’ Rosa puts the glass down on the board. It’s all sooty and too hot to touch. ‘You’re supposed to only just touch it. The spirit will do the rest.’ She picks up the glass and whispers something, then they both put their index finger on the sooty surface.
Alice’s stomach flips when the glass slowly starts moving from letter to letter. They read each letter out loud: ‘B-e-n-j-a-m-i-n.’
‘What did you ask?’ Alice wants to know.
‘I asked who the stupidest person on our street is,’ Rosa laughs. ‘Your turn.’
Alice thinks to herself that she’s going to ask about her mum, about her fingers. She wants to know if they’re ever going to straighten out, if the pain will ever go away. But then she thinks about something she heard somewhere, something about how you shouldn’t ask questions you already know the answer to. Rosa shoots her an impatient look so in the end she just whispers some nonsense words and puts the glass down.
‘What did you ask about?’ Rosa says when the spirit spells out s-o-o-n.
‘I asked when we were going to become famous.’
Rosa finds the question ridiculous. She snatches the glass from Alice and whispers something short.
‘Fuck,’ she says when the glass flies through the letters, forming her name. ‘Fucking shit.’
‘What?’
‘I asked which one of us is going to die first.’
‘But we weren’t supposed to ask about death!’ Alice gets to her feet.
‘What’s the point if you can’t ask about death?’ Rosa says. She starts laughing.
Before they part, she looks Alice straight in the eye.
‘There’s no reason for you to be afraid,’ she says. ‘You’re not the one dying first.’
38
The fence around what had once been a garden had given up and toppled over. Charlie looked at the moss-covered gateposts and it was as though she could see herself as a child. How she would si
t on top of one of them, shouting out rules to the grown-ups at the party, all the things she knew you weren’t supposed to do: not make fires when there was a draught, not let go of the handlebars, not give kids beer. She just wanted everyone to obey the rules. Betty liked to remind her who the adult was in their relationship. She, Betty, made the rules. And if there’s something I hate, honey, it’s rules. It’s like they’re begging to be broken.
And it didn’t matter that Charlie told her that some things really weren’t allowed. Betty just laughed and said she had the world’s most precocious daughter. She didn’t know any other little girls who were as old as her.
The curtains in the living room were still there and for a moment Charlie thought she could see Betty standing there behind the sheer white fabric, looking down on her.
An overzealous therapist had once asked Charlie to return to the house in her mind. Let me come with you to Lyckebo, Charline. Close your eyes, take my hand and let’s go inside. And Charlie had brought her into the hallway and on towards the kitchen and parlour. She had even gone upstairs, but there, on the upstairs landing, her courage had failed her.
Describe what you see. Tell me what you see. But then Charlie had opened her eyes and said it was a sight she had no desire to relive. She didn’t think putting words to her feelings would make them more manageable.
So how was she going to solve it, the therapist had wanted to know; how was she planning to confine it to the past and move on?
You have to accept, Charline, accept and forgive.
And Charlie had thought to herself that she would never be able. She would never forgive Betty.
Challe and Anders were probably right. She was a person who didn’t know her own worth, who made bad decisions. It’s just going to drive me insane if I go inside, she thought, yet even so, she picked up her suitcase and walked towards the door.
The pallets were stacked like steps in front of the side door. The notch from Betty’s clog gaped at her like an open mouth in the wooden door. Hand on the handle. Locked, of course. What had she expected? Was there a key? She couldn’t remember if she’d been given one. But it’s my house, she thought as she walked around the corner and picked up a rock. It’s my house so if I want to enter through a window, I will.
And then she was inside. In her dreams, her visits to the house were invariably like scenes from a horror film, but now, with the sunlight streaming in through the dirty windows and the familiar smell of wood greeting her, it didn’t feel as ominous. Yet even so, she felt dizzy again, her head crackled. Charlie braced herself against both walls in the corridor leading in from the hallway.
Flies were buzzing around the kitchen. The table was set with cups and saucers, as though someone were expecting company. It made her think of the story of Goldilocks that Betty had used to tell her. It had always seemed unfair to Charlie that it was only the little bear’s things that were eaten and broken. And Betty told her that’s exactly what the world is like. Unfair.
She walked into the living room: the parlour as Betty had jokingly called it. Come now, friends, let’s enjoy a drink in the parlour. She ran a finger through the dust on the black piano. Betty had played at every party.
Make a request, anything.
Climbing roses covered the window by the piano. They turned the light in the room a beautiful shade of green. Charlie thought that it was true what Betty used to say, that trees and plants didn’t need pruning and trimming, that people should let things grow in peace. She looked over at the steep stairs leading up to the first floor. No, she wasn’t ready to go up there yet.
The only family photograph in the house was sitting on top of the piano. Betty as a little girl and next to her, a beautiful young woman who was her mother. Charlie thought about all the fruitless attempts she had made to make Betty talk about her family, relatives, everything that had been before they ended up in Lyckebo. The only thing Charlie knew was that her grandmother’s name had been Cecilia and that she, according to Betty, had been a wonderful person. Cecilia had been brave enough to go her own way, Betty would say, and if there was one thing she loved, it was people who went their own way. It was a family trait, something they should be proud of.
Charlie figured it might not be much to be proud of since going their own way seemed to have led them all to an early grave, seeing how everyone was dead. But death had nothing to do with making wrong decisions, Betty would tell her. They had simply been unlucky. That’s just how life was. Unfair.
But we have each other, Charline. You and I don’t need anyone else. We’re strong together.
What about her dad then, was she never going to tell her who he was?
Betty had sighed and told her there had never been one. As she was well aware.
In the end, Charlie had contented herself with that. She had contented herself until Betty had let Mattias move in. Because if they were so fine on their own, just the two of them, then what did they need Mattias for?
Charlie went into the room behind the kitchen. The white wallpaper with roses had come loose in several places and thick layer of dust covered her old desk and bookcase. Outside, the rope from the first floor was still there, the one she and her brother were supposed to use to send letters to each other. Betty had said that’s what she had always wished for, a sibling to share her secrets with.
Betty had thought she was a stick-in-the-mud when she tried to explain that people didn’t become siblings just because their parents were together. Charlie realised she really needed a drink. What was the point of staying sober when you weren’t allowed to work anyway? She opened the basement door and sent up a prayer that Betty’s treasure trove would still be there.
A smell of soil and damp hit her when she walked down the stairs. The grimy little windows barely let any light in, so she had to feel her way until her eyes adjusted to the dark. It didn’t take her long to find the door to the wine storage. Was it still drinkable? She was about to find out. Quickly, she snatched up two bottles and turned back up towards the light.
It took her a while to find a corkscrew. Everything was jumbled in the kitchen drawers. Betty had never seen the point of having a system for things. That was one of the issues the stubborn woman from social services would bring up with her, the importance of tidiness and order, regular hours and a clear structure. If you want to keep the girl, Betty, you have to prove you’re a grown-up and that you can be responsible. That would induce Betty to shoot her an exaggerated smile and say that greatest of all is love, and then the social worker would sigh and say that the one did not preclude the other, that it all went hand in hand.
Is she going to take me? Charlie would always ask after she came by. Is the mean lady taking me away?
Over my dead body, Betty would say. You’re safe with me, Charline.
But it was hard to feel safe with Betty. It wasn’t because every drawer and shelf was untidy, that there was no structure and that Charlie was allowed to roam about freely. It was because of Betty’s capricious mood, because of the unpredictability of what kind of day it was. Granted, there were days with singing and dancing in the cherry tree forest, days when they swam all the way out to the platform and played piano four-hands in the parlour. But there were also days when Betty couldn’t get out of bed. When life revolved around shutting out all sounds and light. Days she just lay on the sofa, staring. And then, once she got back up again, the parties started. All the drunk people with guitars and confused German shepherds. Betty standing there on the front steps welcoming everybody. Why did every last weirdo in the world have to come to their house?
Because Betty wanted an open home, a home filled with song, laughter and music. Yes, life was too short to be bored. Surely Charline didn’t begrudge her mother a bit of a fun now that she was finally happy again?
And it made no difference that Charlie said she didn’t like it, that the drunk people scared her. Betty didn’t understand what she was on about. She would never invite bad people to her home. And if
anyone so much as lays a finger on you … if anyone even looks at you, then … I’ll protect you, my darling.
But those nights when the parties went off the rails, when Betty fell asleep in the bathroom and couldn’t protect her from anything at all, Charlie had wished the mean social services lady would come and take her away, take her away to a better place.
That evening
‘There you are!’ Rebecka exclaimed when Annabelle entered the living room. The TV was on and the sound was turned up so high she had to shout. ‘What the fuck’s wrong with you?’
Rebecka reached for the remote and turned the sound off.
‘What?’ Annabelle said.
‘You look like you’ve seen a ghost.’
Maybe I have, Annabelle thought to herself. She looked into Rebecka’s bleary eyes and realised there was no point talking to her about anything serious right now. That it would have to wait until the next day.
‘I started early.’ Rebecka raised her glass to her.
‘I can see,’ Annabelle replied. She looked at the coffee table, the overflowing ashtray, the alcohol, the Fanta. ‘Where did you get the booze?’
‘The drinks cabinet,’ Rebecka said. ‘You’re going to owe me a life when my mum notices. I just don’t get how you could mess it up with Svante. You do know I already paid, right? Three hundred kronor.’
‘He’s just going to give you the stuff later. Besides, I sorted it out anyway.’ She held up her clinking bag so Rebecka could see it.
‘Who did you buy it from?’
‘Since when do I reveal my sources?’
Rebecka heaved a sigh and said all the secrecy was really getting on her nerves, really fucking getting on her nerves. They’d gone from telling each other everything to suddenly keeping everything secret. She didn’t see the point of having a best friend if she was always fucking clamming up.
Annabelle started pulling the bottles out of the bag. Rebecka whistled when she saw the bottle of liquorice shots.
For the Missing Page 20
