Eli’s lips twisted in pain and a drop of blood ran out of the corner of her mouth, joined with the pearls emerging on her chin and, growing larger, trickled down to join the drops on her throat.
Oskar’s arms became limp; he let them fall and the record fell out of its sleeve, bounced once with its edge against the floor, then fell flat onto the hall rug. His gaze went to Eli’s hands.
The backs of her hands were damp with a thin covering of blood and more was coming out.
Again he looked Eli in the eyes, didn’t find her. Her eyes looked like they had sunk into their sockets, were filled with blood flowing out, running along the bridge of her nose over her lips into her mouth, where more blood was coming out, two streams running out of the corners of her mouth down over her throat, disappearing under the collar of her T-shirt where dark spots were starting to appear.
She was bleeding out of all the pores in her body.
Oskar caught his breath, shouted: “You can come in, you can⦠you are welcome, you are⦠allowed to be here!”
Eli relaxed. Her clenched fists loosened. The grimace of pain disappeared. Oskar thought for a moment that even the blood would somehow dissolve, that it would all sort of not have happened once she was invited in.
But no. The blood stopped running, but Eli’s face and hands were still dark red, and while the two of them were standing in front of each other without saying anything, the blood started to coagulate, form darker stripes and lumps in the places it had flowed, and Oskar picked up a faint hospital smell.
He picked the record up off the floor, put it back in its sleeve and said, without looking at Eli: “Sorry, I⦠I didn’t think⦔
“It’s alright. I was the one who wanted to do it. But I think I should probably have a shower. Do you have a plastic bag?”
“Plastic bag?”
“Yes. For the clothes.”
Oskar nodded, went out into the kitchen and dug a plastic bag with the logo ica-eat, drink, and be happy on it from the recess down below the sink. He walked into the living room, put the record on the coffee table, and stopped, the bag crinkling in his hand.
If I hadn’t said anything. If I had let her⦠bleed.
He scrunched the bag into a ball, let go of it, and the bag jumped out of his hand, fell to the floor. He picked it up, threw it into the air, caught it. The shower was turned on in the bathroom.
It’s all true. She is⦠he isâ¦
While he walked toward the bathroom he smoothed out the bag. Eat, drink and be happy. He heard splashing from behind the closed door. The lock showed white. He knocked gently.
“Eli⦔
“Yes. Come in⦔
“No, it’s just⦠the bag.”
“Can’t hear what you’re saying. Come in.”
“No.”
“Oskar, I-”
“I’m leaving the bag here for you!”
He laid the bag outside the door and fled to the living room. Took the record out of its sleeve, put it on the playing table, turned the record player on, and moved the needle to the third track, his favorite.
A pretty long intro, and then the singer’s soft voice began rolling out of the speakers.
The girl puts flowers in her hair as she wanders through the field. She will be nineteen this year and she smiled to herself as she walks.
Eli came into the living room. She had fastened a towel around her waist. In her hand she had the plastic bag with her clothes. Her face was clean now and her wet hair fell in tendrils over her cheeks, ears. Oskar folded his arms across his chest where he stood next to the record player, nodding to her.
Why are you smiling, the boy asks then when they meet by chance at the gate I’m thinking of the one who will be mine says the girl with eyes so blue The one that I love so.
“Oskar?”
“Yes?” He lowered the volume, inclined his head toward the record player. “Silly, isn’t it?”
Eli shook her head. “No, this is great. This I really like.”
“You do?”
“Yes. But Oskar⦔ Eli looked like she was going to say more, but only added an “oh well” and undid the towel knotted around her waist. It fell to the floor at her feet and she stood there naked a few feet away from him. Eli made a sweeping gesture with her hand over her thin body, said: “Just so you know.”
⦠down to the lake, where they draw in the sand they quietly say to each other; You my friend, it is you I want La-lala-lalalaâ¦
A short instrumental section and then the song was over. A mild crackling from the speakers, as the needle moved toward the next song, while Oskar looked at Eli.
The small nipples looked almost black against her pale white skin. Her upper body was slender, straight, and without much in the way of contours. Only the ribs stood out clearly in the sharp overhead light. Her thin arms and legs appeared unnaturally long the way they grew out of her body: a young sapling covered with human skin. Between the legs she had⦠nothing. No slit, no penis. Just a smooth surface.
Oskar pulled his hand through his hair, let it rest cupped against his neck. He didn’t want to say that ridiculous mommy-word, but it slipped out anyway.
“But you don’t have a⦠willie.”
Eli bent her head, looked down at her groin as if this was a completely new discovery. The next song started and Oskar didn’t hear what Eli answered. He pushed back the lever that raised the needle so it lifted from the record.
“What did you say?”
“I said I’ve had one.”
“What happened to it?”
Eli chuckled and Oskar heard himself what the question sounded like, blushing a little. Eli waved her arms to the side and pulled her lower lip over the upper one.
“I left it on the subway.”
“Don’t be stupid.”
Without looking at Eli, Oskar went past her to the bathroom to check that there were no traces.
Warm steam hung in the air; the mirror was misted over. The bathtub was as white as before, just a faint yellow streak of old dirt near the edge that never went away. The sink, clean.
It hasn’t happened.
Eli had simply gone into the bathroom for appearance’s sake, dropped the illusion. But, no: the soap. He lifted it up. The soap was faintly
streaked with pink and in the little porcelain indentation under it, in the water that collected there, there was a lump of something that looked like a tadpole, yes: alive, and he flinched when it started to—
to swim
â to move, wag its tail and wriggle its way to the outlet of the indentation, ran down into the sink, getting stuck on the edge. But it didn’t move there, was not alive. He ran water out of the tap and splashed some on it so it was flushed down the drain. He also rinsed off the soap and washed out the indentation. Then he took his bathrobe from the hook, went back into the living room, and held it out to Eli, who was still standing naked on the floor, looking around.
“Thanks. When will your mother be back?”
“In a couple of hours.” Oskar held up the bag with her clothes. “Should I throw these away?”
Eli pulled on the bathrobe, tied the belt around the middle.
“No. I’ll get it later.” She nudged Oskar’s shoulder. “Oskar? You understand now that I’m not a girl. That I’m not⦔
Oskar stepped away from her.
“You’re like a goddamn broken record. I got it. You told me already.”
“But I haven’t.”
“Of course you have.”
“When?”
Oskar thought it over.
“I can’t remember, but I knew about it at least. Have known it for a while.”
“Are you⦠disappointed?”
“Why would I be?”
“Because⦠I don’t know. Because you think it’s⦠complicated. Your friends-”
“Cut it out! Cut it out! You’re sick. Just lay off.”
“OK.”
Eli fiddled with the belt of the bathrobe, then walked over to the record player and looked at the turning record. Turned around, looked around the room.
“You know, it’s been a long time since I was⦠just hanging out in someone’s home like this. I don’t really know⦠What should I do?”
“I don’t know.”
Eli let her shoulders fall, pushed her hands into the pockets of the bathrobe, and watched the record’s dark hole in the middle as if she were hypnotized. Opened her mouth as if to say something, closed it again. Took her right hand out of the pocket, stretched it out toward the record, and pushed her finger on it so it came to a stop.
“Watch it. It can get⦠damaged.” Sorry.
Eli quickly pulled his hand back and the record sped up, kept turning. Oskar saw that his finger had left a damp imprint behind that could be seen every time the record spun through the strip of light from the overhead lamp. Eli put his hand back in the pocket, watching the record as if he were trying to listen to the music by studying the tracks.
“This sounds a bit⦠but⦔ the corners of Eli’s mouth twitched, “⦠I haven’t had a⦠normal friendship with anyone in two hundred years.”
He looked at Oskar with a sorry-I’m-saying-such-silly-things smile. Oskar widened his eyes.
“Are you really that old?”
“Yes. No. I was born about two hundred and twenty years ago, but half the time I’ve slept.”
“That’s normal, I do that too. Or at least⦠eight hours⦠what does that make⦠one third of the time.”
“Yes. But⦠when I say sleep I mean that there are months at a time when I don’t⦠get up at all. And then a few months when I⦠live. But then I rest during the daytime.”
“Is that how it works?”
“I don’t know. That’s how it is with me at any rate. And then when I wake up I’m⦠little again. And weak. That’s when I need help. That’s maybe why I’ve been able to survive. Because I’m small. And people want to help me. But⦠for very different reasons.”
A shadow crossed Eli’s cheek as he clenched his teeth, pushed his hands down into the pockets of the robe, found something, drew it up. A shiny, thin strip of paper. Something Oskar’s mom had left there; she sometimes used Oskar’s bathrobe. Eli gently laid the strip of paper back in the pocket as if it was something valuable.
“Do you sleep in a coffin?”
Eli laughed, shook his head.
“No, no, I⦔
Oskar couldn’t keep it in any longer. He didn’t mean to, but it came out like an accusation when he said: “But you kill people!”
Eli looked back at him with an expression that looked like surprise, as if Oskar had forcefully pointed out that he had five fingers on each hand or some such equally self-evident fact.
“Yes. I kill people. Unfortunately.”
“So why do you?”
A flash of anger from Eli’s eyes.
“If you have a better idea I’d like to hear it.”
“Yes, what⦠blood⦠there must be some way of⦠some way to⦠that you⦔
“There isn’t.”
“Why not?”
Eli snorted, his eyes narrowed.
“Because I am like you.”
“What do you mean like me? I⦔
Eli thrust his hand through the air as if he was holding a knife, said:
“What are you looking at, idiot? Want to die, or something?”
Stabbed the air with his empty hand. “That’s what happens if you look at me.”
Oskar rubbed his lips together, dampening them.
“What are you saying?”
“It’s not me that’s saying it. It’s you. That was the first thing I heard you say. Down on the playground.”
Oskar remembered. The tree. The knife. How he had held up the blade of the knife like a mirror, seen Eli for the first time.
Do you have a reflection? The first time I saw you was in a mirror.
“I⦠don’t kill people.”
“No, but you would like to. If you could. And you would really do it if you had to.”
“Because I hate someone. That’s a very big⦔
“Difference. Is it?”
“Yes?⦔
“If you got away with it. If it just happened. If you could wish someone dead and they died. Wouldn’t you do it then?” ⦠sure.
“Sure you would. And that would be simply for your own enjoyment. Your revenge. I do it because I have to. There is no other way.”
“But it’s only because⦠they hurt me, because they tease me, because I⦔
“Because you want to live. lust like me.”
Eli held out his arms, laid them against Oskar’s cheeks, brought his face closer.
“Be me a little.”
And kissed him.
***
The man’s fingers are curled around some dice and Oskar sees that the nails are painted black.
Silence blankets the room like thick fog. The thin hand tips⦠slowly⦠and the dice fall out, onto the table⦠pa-bang. Hit against each other, spin around, stop.
A two. And a four.
Oskar feels a sense of relief⦠he doesn’t know where it comes from⦠when the man walks around the table, stopping in front of the row of boys like a general in front of his army. The man’s voice is tonelessly flat, neither low nor high, as he stretches out his long index finger and starts to count down the row.
“One⦠two⦠three⦠four⦔
Oskar looks to the left, in the direction the man has started to count. The boys stand, relaxed, freed. A sob. The boy next to Oskar bends over, his lower lip trembling. Oh. He’s the one who is⦠number six. Oskar now understands his own relief.
“Five⦠six⦠and⦠seven.”
The finger points straight at Oskar. The man looks into his eyes. And smiles.
No!
That wasn’t⦠Oskar tears his gaze away from the man, looks at the
dice. They now show a three and a four. The boy next to Oskar looks around wildly, as if he has just woken up from a nightmare. For a second their eyes meet. Empty. Without comprehension.
Then a scream from next to the wall.
⦠motherâ¦
The woman with the brown shawl runs toward him, but two men intervene, gripping her arms and⦠throwing her back against the stone wall. Oskar’s arms fly out a little as if to catch when she falls and his lips form the word:
“⦠Mama!”
But hands as strong as knots are laid over his shoulders and he is taken out of the line, led to a little door. The man in the wig is still holding out his finger, following him with it while he is pushed, pulled out of the room into a dark chamber that smells
⦠alcoholâ¦
⦠then flickering, fuzzy images; light, dark, stone, bare skinâ¦
until the picture stabilizes and Oskar feels a strong pressure against his chest. He cannot move his arms. His right ear feels as if it is going to burst, lies pressed against a⦠wooden plank.
Something is in his mouth. A piece of rope. He sucks on the rope, opens his eyes.
He is lying face down on a table. Arms bound to the legs of the table. He is naked. In front of his eyes are two figures: the man with the wig and another one. A little fat man who looks⦠funny. No. Who looks like someone who thinks he is funny. Always tells stories that no one laughs at. The funny man who has a knife in one hand, a bowl in the other.
Something is wrong.
The pressure against his chest, his ear. Against his knees. There should be pressure against his⦠willie as well. But it is as if there is a⦠hole in the table right there. Oskar tries to wriggle a little to check it out but his body is bound too hard.
The man in the wig says something to the funny man and the funny man laughs, nods. Then both of them crouch
down. The wig man fastens his gaze on Oskar. His eyes are clear blue, like the sky on a cold autumn day. Looks as if he is taking a friendly interest. The man looks into Oskar’s eyes as if he is searching for something wonderful in there, something he loves.
The funny man crawls in under the table with the knife and the bowl in his hands. And Oskar understands.
He also knows that if he can just⦠get this piece of rope out of his mouth he doesn’t have to be here. Then he disappears.
Oskar tries to pull his head back, leave the kiss. But Eli, who was prepared for this reaction, cups one hand around the back of his head, pushing his lips against his, forcing him to stay in Eli’s memories, continues.
The piece of rope is pressed into his mouth and there is a hissing, wet sound when Oskar farts with fear. The man in the wig scrunches up his nose and smacks his lips, disapprovingly. His eyes don’t change. Still the same expression, as on a child opening a cardboard box he knows contains a puppy.
Cold fingers grasp Oskar’s penis, pulling on it. He opens his mouth to scream “nooo!” but the rope prevents him from forming the word and all that comes out is “aaaaaaah!”
The man under the table asks something and the wig man nods without shifting his gaze from Oskar. Then the pain. A red hot iron forced into his groin, gliding up through his stomach, his chest corroded by a cylinder of fire that passes right through his body and he screams, screams so his eyes are filled with tears and his body burns.
His heart beats against the table like a fist against a door and he shuts his eyes tight, he bites the rope while at a distance he hears splashing, he seesâ¦
⦠his mother on her knees at the stream rinsing the clothes. Mama. Mama. She drops something, a piece of cloth, and Oskar gets up, he has been lying on his stomach and his body is burning, he gets up, he runs toward the stream, toward the rapidly disappearing piece of cloth, he throws himself into the stream to put out his torched body, to save the piece of cloth, and he manages to get it. His sister’s shirt. He holds it up to the light, to his mother, who is silhouetted on the shore, and drops fall from the cloth, glittering in the sun, falling splashing into the stream, in his eyes, and he cannot see clearly because of the water running into his eyes, over his cheeks as heâ¦
Let The Right One In aka Let Me In Page 36
