“Hey,” Frida said.
“Hello,” I said.
“Listen, I just wanted to say that I am sorry about telling Ruben that you don’t like him.”
I didn’t answer.
“I really was just trying to help you.” I reset the timer on my watch and looked around to see if anyone in a green sweater was walking by. “What are you doing anyway?” Frida said.
“I am timing how long it takes before someone in a green sweater walks by.” “What? Why?”
“Because I like to know how long things take.”
“Okay?”
“I have to make sure it doesn’t go past four minutes and forty-six seconds though. Or else it will erase my cousin Magnus’s record.”
“Oh, right. I heard about your cousin. I’m sorry.”
“Thanks.”
Frida pointed at my watch. “What’s that thing you said about a record?”
“I used to help Magnus time how long he could hold his breath underwater. His personal best of four minutes and forty-six seconds is stored in my watch. If I time anything longer than that it will disappear.”
She nodded. “Well, I have to go. Have fun with whatever you are doing.”
Then she walked away. Just before she was about to disappear around the corner, she turned back. “Oh, by the way…” She smiled. “I like your watch.”
26
Goodbye
The night before Magnus’s funeral, I stood out on the porch in the rain without my coat on. I figured if I got really sick, I wouldn’t have to go to the funeral. The thought of Magnus lying in a coffin and putting him into the ground made me feel sick.
But the morning of the funeral, I woke up and I felt fine. My mom always said that if I didn’t wear a coat when it rained I would get sick. Apparently, this was another lie.
It was a Wednesday and even though I had the day off from school I woke up at 6.44 a.m. My stomach was in a knot and I felt nervous and I just couldn’t sleep any more. So I got up.
I had talked to my mom on the phone the night before, and she’d suggested that I should put on the dark grey dress that I’d worn last Christmas. I didn’t really want to wear it, because it is itchy. But when I looked through my closet, it was the only one that seemed appropriate. I lay the dress and a pair of black leggings on my bed. Then I went into the bathroom and brushed my teeth.
When I walked into the living room all the lights were off, and the house was completely quiet. I left the lights as they were and turned on the TV. The only shows on were ones that sold strange fitness products that I had never heard about and cartoons for little children. And Dr. Phil.
There was a man on the Dr. Phil show who had been accused of murdering his wife, and he agreed to take a lie detector test to prove his innocence. Dr. Phil said that the results revealed deception. Which meant that the man was lying.
A lie detector test is not 100% accurate. A lot of things can affect the results. Being nervous, high blood pressure and muscular movements are all things that can make it seem like you are lying – even if you are telling the truth. The Integrated Zone Comparison Technique is supposedly one of the best testing formats and has an accuracy of 99.4%. But that is still not 100%.
I turned off the TV and sat in the dark and listened to the silence. I wished that I could tell when people
were lying. That, just by looking at them, I could be 100% certain if they were lying or telling the truth. Or maybe I just wished that I was a better liar myself.
Then the lights suddenly came on, which made me jump. It was my dad and when he noticed me he jumped too and said, “What the hell are you doing sitting here in the dark?”
Sigve didn’t get up until 8.29 a.m. His hair was all over the place, but it still looked okay. I don’t know how he does it. My dad said that we should eat breakfast so we went into the kitchen. But none of us were really hungry. My dad had a cup of coffee and I had a glass of orange juice and Sigve had cereal, but he didn’t eat much. He just circled the spoon around and around in his bowl until the little oatmeal squares were all wet and soggy.
Afterwards, I put on my dress and my dad and Sigve put on their dark suits. Then we were ready to go. We picked up Aunt Lillian on our way and we were the first ones who arrived at the church.
The casket was already in place at the end of the aisle. I knew Magnus was in there. But a part of me couldn’t believe it. It didn’t seem real. On top of the casket and around it were a lot of flowers. All of them had greetings on them. Hvil i fred (rest in peace). En siste hilsen (one last goodbye). One said, Høyt elsket, dypt savnet (dearly loved, deeply missed), and had my and my family’s names on it. Then I didn’t want to read any more.
Aunt Lillian and my dad went up to the altar to talk to the priest, while Sigve played on his phone. I went around the church and tried all the different benches to see which one was the best. I didn’t really need to know if one was better than the others, but it kept my mind occupied.
Twelve minutes and sixteen seconds before the service started, we all sat down in the front row. My dad handed me an “order of service”, which had a picture of Magnus on it. It also had his name and date of birth. And date of death. The church started filling up pretty quickly. I saw some of Magnus’s friends, and his classmates, and some of the teachers from my school, and a lot of other people who I didn’t know. I also saw some of Sigve’s friends coming in. I didn’t even look for Hanna, because I knew she wouldn’t be there. Why would she? I thought about how I probably should apologize to her, but I didn’t know if it would matter.
When I was a child I had a snow globe that Grandma and Grandpa bought me in Prague. Inside was a miniature model of the Charles Bridge. And when you shook it fake snow came down and covered the bridge. It was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. One time, I was playing with some of Sigve’s Lego models when he was out and accidentally broke one of them. When Sigve found out, he stormed into my room and yelled and smashed the globe on the floor. Later my mom made him apologize to me, but it didn’t really matter. The globe was still broken. And when I apologized to Frida for cutting her hair, it didn’t make her hair grow back. But Frida was still very pretty, even with shorter hair. Maybe that’s why she decided to forgive me. I called Hanna a whore. And even if I apologized, I would still have called her a whore. It couldn’t be undone.
The organist started playing and we sang a couple of songs from the order of service. The others did anyway; I just looked at the lyrics. A lot of people were already crying, but not me. I couldn’t.
The priest started talking and he said a lot of nice things about Magnus. How he always stood up for his friends, and that he was kind and had a lot of love to give, and that he always put other people’s needs above his own. I didn’t know how the priest knew these things, but they were all true.
When it was time to carry Magnus out to his final resting place, as I’d heard my dad call it earlier, everyone got up from their seats. The priest walked down the aisle and we followed him. My dad and Sigve and Aunt Lillian and two men who I hadn’t met before – third cousins apparently – carried the casket. A couple of days before, Aunt Lillian had said to me that if it wasn’t for my sling I could have helped carry it too. I’d just smiled, because I really didn’t want to carry the casket. I’d be worried that I’d slip and fall or do something wrong. Having your arm in a sling is very annoying, but it does come in handy sometimes.
We walked out to the graveyard and they put the casket down next to a hole in the ground that was going to be Magnus’s grave. We waited until everyone had gathered around in a half circle. It took a long time because there were so many people. My dad put his arm around Aunt Lillian and she turned and sobbed into his chest. I looked up at Sigve. His eyes were red and watery and his shoulders were shaking. I couldn’t remember the last time I had seen him cry. It made him look soft and mellow. An
d kind. “What the hell are you looking at?” he hissed at me. Those of us who were Magnus’s closest family each put a rose on the casket. When it was my turn, I stepped up and put the flower on the lid and whispered, “Goodbye.”
After that, the priest put three handfuls of dirt on the casket as he said, “Av jord er du kommet, til jord skal du bli, av jord skal du atter oppstå (earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust).”
Then they lowered the casket into the hole in the ground where Magnus was going to stay for ever. And everyone but me sang another song.
* * *
When I went to bed that night I was glad that I did go to the funeral after all. It wasn’t as bad as I had imagined and it felt good to hear the priest say all the nice things about Magnus. And to say goodbye to him.
The next morning I woke up with a cold.
27
Back in the Water
Twenty-first of February was my mom’s birthday. It was also the day I got my sling off. Which also meant that I had to have PE again. For the rest of the semester, we were having swimming class instead though. Swimming is better than PE. There is no ball. But I hadn’t been to the pool since my near-death experience, so I was a bit nervous.
Our locker room has three benches for us to put our stuff on. I took my time getting undressed. All the other girls were already in their swimming suits and on their way to the showers.
Most of the girls in my class don’t bother with taking a proper shower. They just quickly get in with their swimming suits on. As I put my towel around me, I could hear the water running in the other room and all the girls laughing and talking. I folded all my clothes and put them in a neat stack on the bench. Lastly, I took off my wristwatch and put it on top of my clothes. It showed the time was 12.57.31. I had two minutes and twenty-nine seconds before class started. When I finally entered the shower, all the other girls had already gone upstairs to the pool. I put my towel on the hook on the wall and went in. I pushed the button and quickly soaped myself before rinsing off. Then I put on my swimming suit and my swimming cap and ran up to the pool.
When I got upstairs, my whole class was sitting on the benches next to the pool. Boys on one bench and girls on the other. No one tells us to sit like this, but we always do. In front, our teacher, Haakon Krag, was taking attendance. I sat down in the only free seat, closing the gap between the boys and the girls.
Haakon explained that we would start by doing laps back and forth as a warm-up. Then he blew his whistle and everyone jumped in the pool. Except me, I used the ladder. I stayed in the far left lane so that I could grab hold of the edge if I felt the need to. If something happened this time, Magnus wouldn’t be there to save me. After fifteen minutes, Haakon blew his whistle and announced that it was time to play a game. Water polo.
We got out of the pool and sat on the benches again, while Haakon quickly went over the rules. He said that water polo was kind of a mix between swimming, football, basketball, handball, ice hockey, rugby and wrestling. Then he said a lot of other things that I immediately forgot about, but basically we were going to shoot a ball into the other team’s goal.
Even in swimming class, Haakon mananged to find a way for us to play with a ball.
Haakon split us into two teams and told us to get back into the pool. My plan was to just swim back and forth and try to keep out of the way. But the ball kept bouncing over in my direction.
I was scared I’d injure my shoulder again, so every time the ball came near me I just gently pushed it away with both my hands so someone else could take it.
When Haakon blew his whistle again, my team had lost 11–2. Haakon told us to hit the showers and everyone hurried to the locker rooms.
We have to shower after swimming class too, but all the other girls just hurried into the locker room. I took my swimming suit off, went into the shower and turned on the water. It is the rule.
By the time I got out of the shower, all the other girls had left. I felt straight away that something wasn’t right, but I couldn’t tell what it was. And then, when I went to get my clothes, I saw it. My watch. It was gone. My blue and white OTS watch that I had put on top of my clothes wasn’t there any more. I quickly started searching for it and I ended up throwing all my clothes on the floor. Then I started going through my bag, but I knew that I wouldn’t find it. My watch wasn’t there. It was gone.
Someone had taken it.
I don’t really remember getting dressed. My thoughts were all over the place and I wasn’t feeling well. Someone had my watch. Someone had Magnus’s record. I know that somehow I collected my things and got dressed because I remember running into Hanna as I crossed the schoolyard. I didn’t really run into her, I just saw her. And she saw me too. And she showed me her middle finger before she turned and walked the other way.
Later I talked to my mom on the phone. I don’t really know what she said, because I was distracted and thinking of my watch and found it hard to concentrate. All day I kept checking my wrist to see what time it was, even though my watch wasn’t there any more. Then my mom said she had to go and we hung up. And then I realized that I had forgotten to wish her a happy birthday.
That night I struggled to fall asleep. I had been looking forward to going to bed because it is much more comfortable without the sling on, and I don’t have to worry about which side to sleep on. But even though the sling was off I couldn’t sleep, because I was thinking about my watch. Someone had to have taken it. Was it Hanna? She was definitely still mad at me – her giving me the finger confirmed that – but how would she know that I was having swimming class at that point? Could it have been Frida? She had said that she had forgiven me, so why would she suddenly steal my watch? I supposed that any of the other girls could have taken it, but I hadn’t done anything to them and I didn’t understand why they would do that.
Then I heard Oscar meowing outside my window. I tried to ignore him because I didn’t feel like getting out of bed, but he always seems to know when I’m in my room and he doesn’t give up easily. So I got up and opened the window so he could jump in. Then I went back to bed and Oscar curled up next to me and within seconds he was asleep. No matter what is going on, Oscar is always able to fall asleep straight away.
After a long time, I slowly drifted into sleep too. I dreamed that my mom was home; that I lay in bed and could hear my dad’s voice speaking calmly and my mom laughing – that cheerful laughter that she only lets out when she is really happy and that I hadn’t heard in a long time. Then I woke up and thought about going into the living room to check if she was actually there. But I was really tired and I knew that it was only a dream so I went back to sleep.
28
Watch
The next morning I woke up and checked the time on my phone. What used to be Magnus’s phone. It was 6.21 a.m. Lately, I had been waking up before the alarm went off a lot. I couldn’t see Oscar anywhere so I guess he had left through the window. I went into the bathroom and turned the water on and brushed my teeth. For a brief moment I thought I heard my mom’s laughter again. I turned the tap off and listened, but there was nothing. I went back to my room and got dressed. I put on a pair of jeans and my red zip-up hoodie. Then I put my phone in the pocket of my jeans so I could easily check the time. It wasn’t the same though. I liked checking the time on my wrist. And I didn’t like the thought of someone else having my watch.
I wondered if whoever had it was messing with the stopwatch. And if Magnus’s record was still intact. I had to get it back. But how could I get it back, when I didn’t even know where it was?
When I walked into the living room I could hear my dad talking to someone in the kitchen. I went in there and saw that he was talking to Aunt Lillian. I was a bit surprised, because it was really early for visitors.
“Oh, hey, Malin,” Aunt Lillian said.
“Hello,” I said.
Then my dad said t
hat he was late for work and got his things together and left.
“Let me make you some scrambled eggs,” Aunt Lillian said. There were some dirty pots and pans on the stove, which Aunt Lillian moved out of the way. She couldn’t put them in the sink because that was full of dirty dishes and pans as well. She got a new pan out and started making the eggs. With her back to me, she said, “So, how are you this morning?”
“Not very good.”
“What?”
“Not good.”
Aunt Lillian moved the pan to one side and came and sat down next to me. Then she put her hand on my arm and said, “What’s wrong? Something bothering you?
Or is it Magnus you’re thinking about?”
I didn’t say anything.
“You know, some days will be worse than others,” Aunt Lillian said. “But it helps to talk about it.”
I looked down at my hands. “I don’t,” I said. “Don’t what?”
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Well, if you change your mind you can always talk to me,” she said. “And not just about Magnus. About anything.”
“Okay,” I said.
She tapped my arm gently. “Now, let me finish cooking your eggs.”
The eggs tasted better than anything I had had in a long time. I don’t know what was different, but they had these small green bits in them and maybe that was why they tasted so good.
After I had eaten, Aunt Lillian made a salami and cheese sandwich for me to take for lunch. I packed my backpack and put my coat on. Then I put my hood up and walked to school.
My first class was math. Math is okay, but the tasks we are given are way too simple and therefore it’s also kind of boring.
The Unpredictability of Being Human Page 11
