by Karin Fossum
Do you know what I dreamt the other night? That you had a little girl somewhere, who you knew nothing about. That you once had a girlfriend, but you split up, and she had the baby afterwards, and didn’t tell you. A daughter that lived somewhere in Berlin, without a father or a Norwegian grandmother. What if it were true? Some people’s dreams come true, and it was so real. What do you think she is called, Rikard? Maybe a name that is more usual in Germany. Helga, or Hildegard, or Heidi? If it is true, and you were to find out about it, would you be happy?
Liebe Mutti,
I don’t have a little girl anywhere. Nor a little boy. I don’t want you to dream things like that. I don’t want my blood to run in anyone else’s veins. And if your dream was true, I would not want that little girl to know anything about you or me. For God’s sake, we’re both in jail! Our branch of the family must be chopped off, it has to stop with us. Walther is living his life in Stockholm, a life we know nothing about. I may even have been fatherless for a long time. Not that I would care, I have always been fatherless.
The priest came to see me yesterday and we talked for ages about lots of things. It strikes me that priests have thought about almost everything, they always have an answer, and if they don’t have an answer, they have a quote from the Bible and if they don’t have a quote, they say that our minds are not capable of understanding God’s long-term plan.
Don’t think so much, he kept saying, don’t question everything. Be in the moment, be where you are right now. In your cell, with the light filtering in through the window. The heart that beats in you is a good heart. I know that it is good, he told me.
For a moment I was tempted to mention Peter. To look him in the eye and say straight out that if there was something he had not managed himself, it was to be in the moment. With Peter, who he adores and presumably desires. They will never find each other, not here inside the prison or outside its walls. They will each be locked in their closet for the rest of their lives. But the rest of us who wander around in the corridor watch them with a little smile, and I think they can feel it, they know they’ve been rumbled. They burn like torches, both of them, if you see what I mean. The truth, the light, as you put it in your letter, streams into our corridor like beams from a brilliant sun whenever they walk side by side to Peter’s cell, the old and the young, for an important conversation, apparently. You can see it on their faces and in the priest’s blue eyes and Peter’s dark eyes. But you should know that the truth can also kill, as it has done since time immemorial. In my mind, I see Peter falling to his knees and confessing his love to the priest, who is duty-bound to reject him, given his vocation. He is a Catholic. Later, the officers will find Peter in his cell, he has hanged himself. It has happened before, it happens all the time, you know what I’m talking about. So, Mutti, I do not have a little girl. I would have told you if I did. Would that have made you happy? Would that have given you the purpose in life that you feel is missing? Once again I have to disappoint you. I left you and I will never provide you with a grandchild.
I still don’t know anything. Why are you in prison? Did you harm someone, lose control? I have been living here in Berlin for twelve years and I have always wished the best for you. But lots of things are coming back to me now, memories from when I was little, and when I started to understand as a boy, and finally as a teenager decided to flee. I chose the path of least resistance, a coward’s solution. And I’m not proud of that. Perhaps you remember some of it as well, or you have tried to forget. But ever since the inspector called and told me that you were being held on remand for a very serious crime, it’s as though someone has opened a chamber that had been closed for years.
There are lots of things I want to ask you about.
Do you remember the time you took me to the nursery on Kirkelina, but never came to collect me? It was summer, and I had a half-day place, from one to five, that was paid for by the council. They had to ring you several times. Granny was visiting Grandad in hospital, and we had no contact with the neighbours, for obvious reasons. While I waited, I played in the big boat, the one with the pirate flag and small cabin, do you remember? I would often sit in the cabin and look out at the world through the porthole, because I felt safe in there. I wasn’t that old, you know, but I remember it well, how the grown-ups looked at each other, the murmuring and raised eyebrows. They often talked like that, in hushed voices. The other children were picked up one by one, the cars drove out of the parking place and disappeared, and silence fell on the playground. The adults discussed what to do with me, who they should contact. And I sat quietly in the cabin, and if any of them had asked me, I would have begged in a feeble voice to go home with one of them, possibly the one called Britt who was so kind. Stay the night with her, sleep in her bed, in a house that held no uncomfortable surprises. But they didn’t ask me what I wanted. They were more interested in getting rid of me, they wanted to go home to their own children. But you came in the end. Suddenly there you were in the doorway, and all you had on was your underwear and some old wellies. I crawled out of the boat and walked across the grass, and you looked at me with glassy eyes, as though I were a stranger.
‘Who do I have to pick up?’ you said. ‘Is there someone asking for me?’
There are tears in my eyes as I write this to you. And I wonder what telling you all this now might lead to, when you are obviously in a very difficult situation. And need something quite different. But I’m going to continue all the same. That was a random example. I have lots of stories like that, a sea of strange events that frightened me and confused me. Just as you were always frightened and confused, and Grandad too. The kids at school used to ask me about life in the loony bin on Kirkelina. Or they shouted after me that they’d seen my mum naked. Or they pointed and laughed and screamed because they’d spotted Grandad in the middle of the traffic, where he stood shouting and waving his arms until the police came to get him. Everyone’s going to die, he’d shout, everyone’s going to die. I have problems sleeping, Mutti. I’m constantly afraid. But I guess you know all about that.
Granny was always so tired. Exhausted by the fear that you and Grandad would be sectioned, that social services would come and get me and that I would be handed over to strangers, and that she would be left on her own. In her own heroic way, she managed to keep the family together, she managed to show us in the best possible light whenever they turned up unannounced, and she assured them that she was in full control and knew what was going on at all the various levels. When I think about Granny, it warms my heart, but it also makes me sad. She had no life of her own, she had more than enough to do looking after us. I used to get up at the same time as her, you know, always very early, she had to be ready, always prepared. I sat in the doorway to the bathroom and watched while she put up her long hair, and fastened it, one hairpin at a time, practised to perfection, until her silver locks were all gathered in a big bun. How she took her time getting dressed, always in a dress or skirt and jacket, always good shoes, even when she was indoors, because then she was in control, and goodness knows, she needed to be. I loved our time together in the bathroom, it was sacred, just me and her, and the house was quiet and normal. Grandad had not got up yet, or you. The madness had not begun, it was just Granny and me. Our eyes met in the mirror. We smiled and winked at each other in our special way, we had our own signals, our own language. We were the only ones in the world who understood anything at all. We never spoke about our mornings in the bathroom. We did not have much peace in our house, I could only listen to my own thoughts at five in the morning. Granny was a queen, Mutti. She was a queen.
And you are being held on remand, Mutti. Which means that you didn’t just stop the traffic on Kirkelina or predict everyone’s death and destruction, or stand on the square ranting. You didn’t wander the streets in only your underwear. You have destroyed something or someone. My imagination is running wild here in my cell. I have always been so afraid that this would happen.
Your son,
Rikard Josef
My darling Rikard Josef,
What can I tell you, other than that I am well! I have been very well for a long time now, but you have not kept in touch, you left. Year after year I have managed alone, I have a full-time job with good colleagues, and get on with all the neighbours and the man in the shop over the road (although he has moved now). But this autumn I have been at war, I have been the victim of a cruel campaign and have for a long time been receiving anonymous threats. I asked the police to help me on several occasions, but my request fell on deaf ears. No one bothered to come and see me, no one heard what I said. And now you write to me about things that happened a long time ago. That is all in the past, there is no point in opening up old wounds, and that is what you are doing. You must remember that I had a lot to deal with when I was young. Your grandfather and his illness, financial problems, the authorities, who were constantly on our back. Social services who would turn up unannounced, come in and ask personal questions, while they checked that everything was clean and there was food in the cupboards and clothes in the drawers. And there always was, to say anything else would be a lie. I carried you in my arms, do you not remember? And you know that I’ve always been susceptible to infections. That day you mentioned, when I was late in coming to pick you up from nursery, I had a temperature and was feverish. It turned out to be a lung infection and I was on antibiotics for two weeks. But you know that our family is prone to infections, that our immune systems are not strong, all families have their weaknesses. So when they called me from the nursery, I ran out of the house to come and get you, and was confused. You know how hot and bothered a fever can make you. The only thing I could think was that I had to get there before social services, I knew they were watching us with beady eyes, and that they would take note of the slightest thing. Do you know what I have often thought? That you went to Berlin because you were ashamed of us. You were ashamed of me and your grandfather, you were ashamed because we did not have much money, and you wanted so much more. We were the family you did not want to introduce to others. If that is what you thought, I would like you to tell me. The truth will not kill me, just so you know. The worst thing is not knowing. But now we’re talking again, you and I. So let’s just continue and see where it gets us.
Your mother.
Mutti,
I have read your words very carefully. I have read them again and again, and I hope, of course, that you are in good hands. That they understand what you need and that they have the support network that you will need when the case is over, and you have been sentenced. And I hope that you accept their help. I was not ashamed, Mutti, I was tired and confused. I tried to find a role for myself in the circus that was our family, but couldn’t. I was always superfluous, I just rattled around, hid away in the corners. Grandad was unpredictable, you lived in your own world, I never knew what to expect. I tiptoed around, with my eyes peeled and my ears open, in case something was about to happen, a terrible storm, a landslide or an earthquake. The doorbell scared the living daylights out of me, I imagined that big strong men had come to tear me away from the house and throw me into a car and whisk me off to some strangers in an unknown house and that I would never see Granny again. I also remember good days, when Grandad ran around in the garden trying to catch sunbeams, and Granny sat in the shade knitting, while you cooled down in the paddling pool that we always had out. You were always too warm. But the atmosphere could change just like that. Grandad might spot a bank of clouds approaching at speed that would take away the sun and lower the temperature. Preparations had to be made. Everyone had to go inside and hide in the bathroom. I have no idea how many times I sat there on the hard floor, close to Granny, waiting for it all to pass. Those few hours at nursery were a relief, my time off. The small cabin with the round porthole was my space, my own little world where I was king. There were kind, predictable adults there to help us. But the things that happened in Kirkelina had nothing to do with immune systems and fevers – I didn’t understand that when I was little, but as I got older, I did. I’m going to write something important now, and I want you to believe me. I always think of you with great affection, and I think of Grandad with great affection too. And of course, Granny. But I’m not the first person to have left the people they love. The unpredictability was just too much, living with the derision of others, and the feeling that anything could happen at any moment. Loneliness and predictability became the better option. Even though I made some bad choices. The officers here never get excited about anything, they behave in a certain way and it’s the same, day after day. And there’s something about the cell, you know, the walls keep me in place. My cell reminds me of the small cabin in the fishing boat, where I felt safe and could look out on the world. The way you look out on the world from your cell window.
You, too, should read these words again and again.
Your son in Berlin
Chapter 30
‘It was you who found him, wasn’t it? Your father.’
‘Yes, it was me who found him. All he had on was a pair of old underpants. And they weren’t clean either, that was how far things had gone. He was in bed most of the time. We often heard his voice, like a radio in the next room, as he lay there and read the news. Messages and warnings that he received from foreign stations that were inaccessible to us. Messages from the enemy.’
She smiled sadly.
‘He couldn’t be bothered to get dressed in the morning, and he couldn’t bear the thought of food. He had more important things to think about, he said, we mustn’t bother him with trivialities.’
‘But he was allowed to stay at home?’ Sejer asked.
‘My mother insisted. She could see that he didn’t have long left.’
‘Tell me what it was like,’ Sejer said. ‘How he died.’
‘He had tied a lamp cable round the handle on the cupboard door, and hanged himself sitting down. It would have taken a while for him to die.’
‘Were you frightened?’
‘Just sad. We knew it was going to happen one day, Mummy and I, we were well prepared. But to hang yourself is not a very dignified way to go, if you know what I mean, it’s not a pretty sight. I’m sure that you know what I’m talking about, that you’ve seen it yourself. No one should hang like that, we should die lying down.’
‘Yes, I have seen it,’ he said. ‘Did he leave a letter?’
‘Not a letter, as such, just a short message. “Feel free to laugh.”’
‘“Feel free to laugh”?’ Sejer realised that deep down he actually liked Hans Riegel, this father he had never met.
‘Were you ever worried that you might inherit your father’s illness?’
Ragna frowned.
‘Oh, I have some of the same problems. I often overheat, especially at night. It’s possibly my internal thermostat,’ she said with a smile. ‘But that’s more to do with my age.’
Sejer tried again.
‘Schizophrenia is often inherited. Your father was a paranoid schizophrenic.’
‘Inherited?’
She looked away.
‘I don’t know very much about things like that,’ she muttered.
‘You don’t? Were you ever frightened that you might develop the same illness?’
Sejer’s office had never been so still. Another line on his phone started to flash, a door slammed further down the corridor, a car on the road outside hooted its horn. Sounds that they had been unaware of until now suddenly filled the room.
‘I’m not ill,’ Ragna whispered, without looking at him.
She shook her head.
‘I’m not ill,’ she repeated.
‘It was just a gentle question,’ Sejer said.
‘Who have you been talking to?’ she asked immediately.
‘Your GP, Dr Naper. You have a long history, Ragna. Some people would say that you are seriously ill. And that you have been for a long time. Your medical file is extensive, and it goes way back. To your teenage ye
ars, in fact.’
‘I don’t want to talk to you any more today,’ she said and fidgeted on the chair. She lifted her right hand to stop him.
‘Do you feel threatened?’
‘I’m just saying that you’re wrong. My head,’ she said and laid a hand across her brow, ‘my head is perfectly clear. It’s tidy and ordered and always has been.’
‘Apart from when your brain melted.’
‘That was a nightmare. Don’t you use my dreams against me.’
‘Don’t forget I’ve read your letters from Berlin. There is a reason why your son left, isn’t there?’
Another silence. They were no longer allies, they no longer had eye contact.
‘Schizophrenics often have a sensory system that goes beyond what other people experience,’ Sejer said. ‘The constant stream of impressions, of sounds and smells and images, can sometimes get too much. Because there is no filter in relation to the world, and it becomes difficult to sort out what is important. Is that what happened this autumn, Ragna, did things get out of hand?’
