When I finally got my watch back, the stopwatch had been reset. It showed the time as 00.05.
At first this made me really sad, because it seemed so important to keep his record.
“Why do you think that is?” Dagny said.
“I don’t know.”
It was a bit hard to explain, because at first I hadn’t even realized that the record was still in my watch. And then, once I found out, it was like realizing that a piece of him was still with me, which I guess seems a bit silly.
Dagny said she could relate to the loss I felt, because she once went to Paris on holiday and she lost her camera and all her pictures. At first she was upset, but then she realized that even though the pictures were gone, she still had her memories. I have never been to Paris, but I knew what she meant. Even though the record is no longer stored in my watch, I still remember it and no one can take that away from me.
I had my confirmation in May. I don’t know how it is where you are from, but in Haasund almost everyone does this even if they are not religious at all. I heard that a lot of the kids in my class got more than 25000 kroner in gifts. I didn’t get nearly as much, but I got something better. A white and silver Casio G-Shock digital watch. It is shock resistant and has five different alarms and an automatic LED light. It also has 200-metre water resistance. That means that I don’t have to take it off when I go swimming. Unless I want to. Getting me a new watch was actually Sigve’s idea. He even helped pick it out. If Magnus was still around he would have been the first person I would have shown it to. I think he would have really liked it.
* * *
Oscar had a check-up at the vet’s. The doctor diagnosed him with feline obesity which is just a fancy word for a really fat cat. He said it was very important that Oscar lost weight, because being overly obese will reduce a cat’s quality of life and it can lead to more serious illnesses like diabetes or dysplasia and cause him to die at an early age. Hearing this made me feel really bad about all the treats I had been sneaking him, because I would never purposely do anything to harm him, and I really didn’t want him to die.
So Oscar is back to eating dry cat food. Once a week he is allowed to have a bit of canned tuna, but no more bacon. Turns out a little fat can be harmful after all. At least if you are a cat.
Ruben and I also had a chance to talk. I finally sent him a letter explaining everything and he came to my house.
“I never asked you to come to the woods,” Ruben said.
“That wasn’t me.”
“I know,” I said. “And I never said you were gross.”
“Okay.”
It turned out that Ruben never even supported Frida’s prom campaign. It was just another trick.
Ruben was very upset when he thought that I said those things about him. I was upset with him too, because he didn’t give me a chance to explain. And I was disappointed that he would believe Frida over me. But Frida can be very persuasive and she is hard to read. I, of all people, know that.
I don’t think that everything between Ruben and I is broken. In fact, I am going over to his house to play video games this Saturday. And I have bought a pack of breath mints, just in case. It doesn’t hurt to be prepared.
It’s been seven months, five days and nine hours since the incident in the woods.
A lot has happened since then.
I am older and more mature. My breasts are larger too. Of course, I am fifteen now.
I am doing my third and final year of lower secondary school at a new place. In Bryne. That means that I have to cycle to the next village, and take the train from Nærbø at 7.30 a.m. every morning, Monday to Friday. Dagny felt that it would be good for me to get a fresh start somewhere else.
Bryne Lower Secondary School has a cafeteria where they have a selection of different sandwiches, plus yogurts, milk and juice. And, on every Monday, Wednesday and Friday, they have a warm meal. My mom let me get a punch card so that I can purchase food at school every day. The kids at this school hang out in groups too. The boys who play basketball are in one group and the girls who wear designer shoes are in another. I don’t have a group. At least not yet. Making friends is not easy. Especially not at a new school.
My new math teacher is named Frank Olsen. He often makes poor jokes and he smells like coffee, but apart from that he is okay. One day he held me back after class, because he wanted to talk to me. I wasn’t in trouble. He said that he had noticed that my skill level was way above what was expected in his class. And after he discussed it with the school and my parents, it was decided that I should take an advanced math class. “You are really smart, Malin,” Frank said. No one had ever said that to me before.
I wasn’t exactly sure where the room for advanced math was, so for my first class I went early to make sure I had time to find it. When I got there, a girl was sitting on the floor outside the room. She was reading a book called Fun Facts.
“Hello,” I said.
The girl looked up from her book. “Oh, hi,” she said.
“Are you in the advanced math class too?” I nodded.
“I’m Oda,” she said.
“Malin.”
“Do you want to hear a fun fact?”
“Okay.”
“Turns out Alexander Graham Bell didn’t invent the phone after all.”
“I know. It was Antonio Meucci.”
“That’s right. How did you know that?”
“I read a lot.” Oda smiled. “So do I.”
I think I will be okay in this place. I only have one more year of lower secondary school anyway. And next year I can go wherever I want.
I have started going to physiotherapy twice a week. Most of the time I pull bands and lift dumb-bells. It is very boring, but sometimes you have to do something you don’t like to improve your future. That is what my mom said anyway. After the sessions I normally go to Ruben’s house, which means that I also have something to look forward to those days. Sometimes we play video games and sometimes we kiss, but mostly we just talk. I think it is important that we get to know each other properly. My mom said that is how you build trust.
I haven’t seen much of Frida lately, so I can’t tell you what she is up to.
I sent her a text a few months back and said that I was sorry that things turned out the way that they did, but she didn’t reply. It is okay though, I have forgiven her, and maybe in time she will forgive me too.
After my parents told me everything I needed to know about Magnus, my dad went away for a couple of days.
“Is he going on a business trip?” I said.
“That’s not funny,” my mom said.
She said that he needed some time to himself. She also said he felt guilty and that he was worried that I hated him. And I did. I hated them both. Just a little. But they are my parents and I can’t help but love them at the same time. Then my mom told me that she hadn’t been a good mother to me lately. Actually, she wasn’t sure if she had ever been a good mother to me, but she would like to get another chance. And even though bad things happened it was her own choice to drink.
I think she is doing okay. At least she doesn’t forget things like she used to. And she makes dinner on time every day.
Aunt Lillian came to see me. I was sitting at the kitchen table reading my encyclopedia when she walked in carrying a brown paper bag.
“How are you, Malin?” she said.
“I’m fine.”
“I was wondering if you could help me with something.” She opened the bag and took out a shiny cup. I recognized it from Magnus’s room. It was one of his swimming trophies.
“I was thinking of getting it engraved. Maybe you could help me decide what it should say. You knew him better than anyone.”
I didn’t answer right away so she took out her phone. “I’ve found some suggestions online; Always in our hearts. Gone
, but not forgotten.”
I shook my head. “I know what it needs to say.”
A few days later my dad came home.
“Hello, Malin,” he said.
“Hello,” I said.
Then Sigve and Katrine walked in. For some reason no one said hi or anything. We all just stood and looked at each other. Then Sigve held up a deck of cards. “Anyone up for a game?”
I couldn’t remember the last time my family played cards together. In fact, I wasn’t even sure it had ever happened before.
Katrine taught us this game called Play or Pay. The aim of the game is to be the first one to get rid of all your cards. The first person plays any card they want, and the rest need to continue in the same suit and the numbers need to be in a sequence. So if the first person plays a king of hearts, the next card needs to be an ace of hearts, then the two of hearts and so on. You cannot start a new suit until one is completed. If you can’t play, you need to pay.
We used jelly beans as stakes and for some reason I kept winning. Twice in a row, I was the first one to get rid of all my cards and I had a huge pile of jelly beans in front of me.
“Wow, you are really good at this,” Katrine said.
“She is probably counting cards or something,” Sigve said. “I mean, isn’t that the kind of thing that weirdos like her would do?”
Katrine smacked him in the shoulder and gave him an annoyed look.
“Malin is not a weirdo,” my mom said. My dad said, “Let’s just play the game.”
It is not even possible to count cards in that particular game. And you can’t actually be good or bad at it. It all depends on luck and which cards you are dealt, but I decided not to mention that.
Then I started losing. We played two more rounds and by then I had lost all my jelly beans to Sigve. After our last game, Sigve and Katrine said they had to go because they were going to the cinema.
“Don’t forget your jelly beans,” I said. Sigve shrugged. “Keep them.”
Sigve still works at the shop and my dad feels strongly that he is making the wrong choice by not going back to school. But even though he doesn’t like it, he doesn’t yell as much as he did before. My mom says that Sigve needs to find his own way and if it is a mistake it is his mistake to make. Sigve is very happy with Katrine and we hardly ever see him any more. He is either at work or with her. When I, on a rare occasion, do see him, he seems a lot less angry than before and he doesn’t make a fuss if he notices that I have used his Xbox or touched his stuff.
He brought Katrine over for dinner one day. He said that in a year’s time, when Katrine finishes upper secondary school, they are going to get an apartment together. My dad scoffed and my mom smiled. And we didn’t talk about it any more. So not everything has changed.
After Katrine left, my dad took Sigve aside. “Just make sure she doesn’t get pregnant,” he said.
Sigve said, “I will even make sure that her sister doesn’t get pregnant.”
Hanna had her baby. I met her the other day when she was out walking with the stroller. She didn’t show me the middle finger this time. Instead she stopped and said hi. The baby was very tiny. I didn’t know that humans could be that small.
“Her name is Sofie,” Hanna said.
“Did you and Patrik get an apartment?”
“No…” She paused for a minute. “We broke up actually. I mean, he has a lot on his mind these days, with getting his trade certificate and all. We will get back together when things calm down. Probably.” I nodded. “So where do you live?” “With my mom.”
Hanna explained that when she told her mom she wasn’t going through with the abortion they had a huge argument. But as soon as little Sofie had been born, Hanna’s mom had instantly fallen in love with the little girl and now she enjoyed being a grandma more than anything.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “About what I called you that time. You are not a whore.” “I know,” Hanna said.
After that, we didn’t seem to have much more to say to each other. So we smiled and said goodbye and walked in separate directions.
I don’t think I will be seeing much of Hanna in the future. We didn’t say anything, but I think we both knew it. Sigve created a Tinder account for Aunt Lillian. He said that it was time for her to meet a real man. Aunt Lillian laughed and said that that was not for her.
“At least that is what I thought at first,” she said later.
“But before I knew it I found myself swiping left and right.” Whatever that means. Then she asked Sigve if he could help her increase the radius on the app, because, with the current settings, it only allowed her to meet local guys. “If there were any good men in Haasund, I would know about it,” she said. She still doesn’t know if Tinder is the way to go, but at least it is a start. “A start of something new.”
My mom found out about the broken giraffe. She was dusting the shelf and noticed the cracked figurine I had tried to hide.
She picked it up and said, “What happened?”
I looked at the floor. “It was an accident,” I whispered. “I see.”
“Maybe I can save up and buy a new one?”
My mom shrugged. “I think it is fine the way it is.” She quickly dusted the giraffe off and put it back on the shelf next to the others.
She said that not everything in life can be fixed. Sometimes you just have to find a way to live with what is broken and move on.
I looked at the giraffe. The lump of glue around its neck really made it stand out from the rest of the collection. I decided I liked it better this way. It wasn’t perfect, but it was different. And that made it special.
I kept trying to avoid talking about Magnus in therapy, but Dagny kept returning to the subject. Apparently, it was very important that we talked about it. Dagny can be very persuasive. And before I knew it, I willingly told her all about him. And it felt good.
Throughout my life, Magnus had been the only person who was always there for me, no matter what. And he accepted me as I was, no matter what I said or how I acted.
Then I started crying. I never told Magnus how much I loved him, and now I never could.
Dagny said, “Do you wish you knew that he was your brother earlier?”
I shook my head. “No.”
“Why not?”
“Magnus was a great cousin. If he knew he was my brother, he would probably have hated me.” “You think so?”
I nodded. “Cousins are better.”
The sun was peeking through the clouds as we crossed the graveyard. My mom and Aunt Lillian were both carrying flowers and as they were walking they talked about the weather and the news. And other ordinary things. Sigve walked a few metres behind everyone else, checking his phone. My dad took huge steps as we walked through the wet grass and I clutched the trophy to my chest as I struggled to keep up with him.
We turned left at a lamp post and Aunt Lillian led the way past the graves. Some of them were nearly overgrown with tall grass, while others had fresh flowers and some even had toys and teddy bears.
Magnus’s grave was really well kept and had nice flowers and a lantern. That made sense because Aunt Lillian tends to it at least once a week. For the rest of us, it was the first time we had been to visit and that made me feel bad. But at least we were there now. And you can’t do anything to change the past. All you can do is change the future.
The headstone was in dark granite and shaped like a heart. It said,
In loving memory of
Magnus Helvik
You left us way too soon
“It’s a beautiful stone,” my mom said.
Then they put down the flowers and Aunt Lillian lit the candle in the lantern.
I looked up at my dad and for a moment I thought I saw a tear in the corner of his eye. But then he blinked and it was gone and I might have just imagined it.
I pictured Magnus looking down at us and thinking about what a complete mess his family was. But he had forgiven everyone because in heaven everything is perfect and there is no pain. At least that’s how I imagine it.
Before Magnus died I wasn’t sure if I believed in heaven, but the thought of him just lying in the ground and being nowhere was too hard.
I caught Sigve’s eye and I was waiting to see if he would tell me that I was being silly and that this whole thing was stupid, but instead he nodded and gave me a half smile.
So I took a step forward and whispered, “I love you, Magnus.” Then I put the trophy down and turned it around so the inscription became visible.
It said, 00:04:46 – Personal Best.
If I got to be God for one day, I would make sure that everyone gets a second chance. Because everyone screws up sometimes. One way or another.
My dad definitely took some wrong turns in his life, Like the time he cheated on my mom with Aunt Lillian. When my mom found out about the pregnancy she felt lost and hurt and didn’t know where to turn or where to go. So she stayed with my dad and agreed it was best to keep it a secret. But watching Magnus grow up with Aunt Lillian’s eyes and my dad’s hair, along with his cheeky smile, made her resent him and love him all at the same time. So she turned to alcohol to ease the pain a little. Wine made things better in the short run but it made everything a lot worse in the long run. I don’t really know what that means, but that is what she said. She also said that this was just a trigger, and that it was nobody’s fault but her own that she started drinking. “You know,” she said. “One way or another, I would have become an alcoholic. It was just on the cards for me.”
I remember that time I asked Magnus about his dad.
When I mentioned that my dad wasn’t great either he said,
“At least you got one.” And he was right.
My dad has not always been the best dad to me and Sigve, but he sure was a lousy dad to Magnus. The fact that he never gets to repair this or make things right with Magnus is his punishment. He doesn’t need me or anyone else to punish him further.
The Unpredictability of Being Human Page 16
