The cut he had made in his palm had a crust that had broken up a little, revealing the wound underneath.
⦠the blood⦠he didn’t want to mix it. ⦠am I⦠infected now?
His legs carried him mechanically to the front door with the bag in his hand, listening for sounds outside. He didn’t hear anyone and he ran up the stairs to the garbage chute, opened it. He pushed the bag in through the opening, held it fast for a moment, dangling in the dark.
A cold breeze whooshed through the chute, chilling his hand where he held it outstretched, squeezed around the plastic knot of the bag. The bag shone white against the black, slightly craggy walls of the duct. If he let go, the bag would not be sucked up. It would fall down. Gravity would pull it down. Into the big garbage sack.
In a few days the garbage truck would come and collect the sack. It came early in the morning. The orange, blinking lights would flash onto Oskar’s ceiling at about the same time as he generally woke up and he would lie there in his bed and listen to the rumbling, masticating crunch as the garbage was crushed. Maybe he would get up and watch the men in their overalls who tossed the big bags with habitual ease, pressed the button. The jaws of the garbage truck closing and the men who then hopped into the truck and drove the short distance to the next building.
And it always gave him such a feeling of⦠warmth. That he was safe in his room. That things worked. Maybe there was also a longing. For those men, for the truck. To be allowed to sit in that dimly-lit coach, drive awayâ¦
Let go. I have to let go.
The hand was convulsively clenched around the bag. His arm was aching from having been held outstretched so long. The back of his hand was numb from the cold air. He let go.
There was a hissing sound as the bag slipped along the walls, a half
second of silence as it fell freely, and then a thud when it landed in the sack below.
I’ll help you.
He looked at his hand again. The hand that helped. The hand thatâ¦
I’ll kill someone. I’ll go in and get the knife and then I’ll go out and kill someone. Jonny. I’ll slit his throat and gather up his blood and then I’ll bring it home for Eli because what does it matter now that I’m infected and soon I willâ¦
His legs wanted to crumple up under him and he had to lean on the edge of the garbage chute not to fall over. He had thought it. For real. This wasn’t like the game with the tree. He had⦠for a moment⦠really thought about doing it.
Warm. He was warm, like he had a fever. His body ached and he wanted to go lie down. Now.
I’m infected. I’m going to become a⦠vampire.
He forced his legs to move back down the stairs while he steadied himself with one hand—
the uninfected one
â on the railing. He managed to let himself back into the apartment, went into his room, lay down on his bed, and stared at the wallpaper. The forest. Quickly one of his figures appeared, looked him in the eyes. The little gnome. He stroked his finger over it while a completely ridiculous little thought appeared:
Tomorrow I have to go to school.
And there was a worksheet he hadn’t filled out yet. Africa. He should get up now, sit down at his desk, light the lamp, and start to look up places in the geography book. Find meaningless names and write them down on the blank lines.
That was what he ought to do. He softly stroked the gnome’s little cap. Then he tapped on the wall.
E.L.I.
No answer. Was probably outdoing what we do.
He pulled the covers over his head. A fever-like chill coursed through his body. He tried to imagine it. How it would be. To live forever. Feared, hated. No. Eli wouldn’t hate him. If they were⦠togetherâ¦
He tried to imagine it; he spun out a fantasy about it. After a while the front door was unlocked. His mom was home.
***
Pillows of fat.
Tommy stared blankly at the picture in front of him. The girl was pressing her breasts together with her hands so they stood out like two balloons, had pursed her mouth into a pout. It looked sick. He had thought he was going to jack off, but there must be something wrong with his brain, because he thought the girl looked like a freak.
He folded the magazine up with unnatural slowness, tucked it back in under the sofa cushions. Every little movement directed by conscious thought. Wasted. He was utterly wasted with glue fumes. And that was good. No world. Only the room he was in, and outside that⦠a billowing desert.
Staffan.
He tried to think about Staffan. Couldn’t. Didn’t get ahold of him. Only saw that cardboard cutout of the policeman up at the post office. Lifesize. To scare off any would-be robbers.
Should we rob the post office?
Man, you must be crazy! Can’t you see the cardboard policeman is there?
Tommy giggled when the cardboard policeman’s face took on Staffan’s features. Assigned as punishment. To guard the post office. There was something written on the cutout as well, what was it?
Crime doesn’t pay. No. The police are watching you. No. What the hell was it? Watch out! I’m a champion pistol-shooter!
Tommy laughed. Laughed more. Laughed until he shook and thought the naked bulb in the ceiling was swinging to and fro in time with his laughter. Giggled at it. Watch out! The cardboard policeman! With his cardboard gun! And his cardboard head!
There was a knock inside his head. Someone wanted to come into the post office.
The cardboard policeman pricks up his ears. There are two hundred cardboards at the post office. Undo the safety. Bang-bang.
Knock. Knock. Knock.
Bang.
⦠Staffan⦠Mom, shitâ¦
Tommy stiffened. Tried to think. Couldn’t. Just a ragged cloud in his head. Then he calmed down. Maybe it was Robban or Lasse. It could be Staffan. And he was made of cardboard.
Penis-dummy, cardboard-mummy.
Tommy cleared his throat, said thickly: “Who is it?” It s me.
He recognized the voice, couldn’t place it. Not Staffan, at any rate. Not paper-Papa.
Barba-papa. Stop it.
“Who are you, then?”
“Can you open?”
“The post office is closed for the day. Come back in five years.”
“I have money.”
“Paper money?”
“Yes.”
“That’s good.”
He got up out of the couch. Slowly, slowly. The contours of things didn’t want to stay put. His head was full of lead.
Concrete cap.
He stood still for a few seconds, swaying. The concrete floor tilted dreamily to the right, to the left, like in the Funny House. He walked forward, one step at a time, lifted the latch, pushed open the door. It was that girl. Oskar’s friend. Tommy stared at her without understanding what he was seeing.
Sun and surf.
The girl was wearing only a thin dress. Yellow, with white dots that absorbed Tommy’s gaze, and he tried to focus on the dots but they started to dance, move around so he became sick to his stomach. She was maybe twenty centimeters shorter than him.
As cute as⦠a summer day.
“Is it summer now all of a sudden?” he asked.
The girl put her head to one side.
“What?”
“Well you’re wearing a⦠what’s it called⦠a sundress.”
“Yes.”
Tommy nodded, pleased that he had been able to think of the word. What had she said? Money. Yes. Oskar had said thatâ¦
“Do you⦠want to buy something?”
“Yes.”
“What?”
“Can I come in?”
“Yes, sure.”
“Say that I can come in.”
Tommy made an exaggerated, sweeping gesture with his arm. Saw his own hand moving in slow-motion, a drugged fish swimming through the air.
“Step inside. Welcome to the⦠local br
anch.”
He didn’t have the energy to stay on his feet any longer. The floor wanted him. He turned around and flopped back on the couch. The girl walked in, closed the door behind her, put the latch back on. He saw her as an enormous chicken, giggling at his vision. The chicken sat down in an armchair.
“What is it?”
“No, it’s just⦠you’re so⦠yellow.” I see.
The girl crossed her hands over a little purse in her lap. He hadn’t noticed that she had one. No. No not a purse. More like a cosmetic bag. Tommy looked at it. You see a bag. You wonder what’s inside.
“What do you have in there?”
“Money.”
“Of course.”
Nope. This is fishy. There’s something strange about this.
“What do you want to buy, then?”
The girl unzipped the case and took out a thousand kronor note. One more. Then another. Three thousand. The bills looked ridiculously large in her small hands when she leaned forward and laid them on the floor.
Tommy chortled: “What’s all this?”
“Three thousand.”
“Yes. But what for?”
“For you.”
“Give me a break.”
“No, really.”
“That must be some kind of damn⦠Monopoly money or something. Isn’t it?”
“No.”
“It isn’t?”
“No.”
“What’s it for, anyway?”
“Because I want to buy something from you.”
“You want to buy something for three thou⦠no.”
Tommy stretched out one arm as far as he could, snapped up a bill. Felt it, crinkled it with his hand, held it up against the light and saw the watermark. Same king or whatever who was printed on the front. The real deal.
“You’re not kidding, are you?”
“No.”
Three thousand. Could⦠go somewhere. Fly somewhere.
Then Staffan and his mom could stand there and⦠Tommy felt his head clear a little. The whole thing was cuckoo but OK: three thousand. That was a fact. Now the only question wasâ¦
“What do you want to buy? For this you can have⦔
“Blood.”
“Blood.”
“Yes.”
Tommy snorted, shook his head.
“No, sorry. We’re all sold out.”
The girl sat still in the armchair, looking at him. Didn’t even smile.
“No, but seriously,” Tommy said. “I mean, what?”
“You’ll get this money⦠if I get some blood.”
“I don’t have any.”
“Yes, you do.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
Tommy suddenly got it.
What the hellâ¦
“Are you⦠serious?”
The girl pointed at the bills.
“It’s not dangerous.”
“But⦠what⦠how?”
The girl stuck her hand into the kit, fished something out. A small, white, square bit of plastic. Shook it. It rattled a little. Now Tommy saw what it was. A packet of razor blades. She put it into her lap, took out something else. A skin-colored rectangle. A large Band-Aid.
This is ridiculous.
“No, cut it out now. Don’t you understand that⦠I could just take that money from you, you know. Put it in my pocket and say, What? Three thousand? Haven’t seen it. It’s a lot of money, don’t you realize that? Where did you get it from?”
The girl shut her eyes, sighed. When she opened them again she didn’t look as friendly.
“Do you want to or not?”
She means it. She really means it. No⦠noâ¦
“What, are you, like, going to⦠swish, and then⦔
The girl nodded, eagerly.
Swish? Wait a minute. Wait a little now⦠what was it⦠pigsâ¦
He frowned. The thought bounced around inside his head like a rubber ball thrown hard inside a room, trying to find a resting place, to stop. And it stopped. He remembered something. Gaped. Looked her in the eyes.
“⦠no⦔
“Yes.”
“This is some kind of joke, isn’t it? You know what? Go. I want you to leave.”
“I have an illness. I need blood. You can have more money if you want.”
She dug around in the kit and took out two more thousand kronor notes, put them on the floor. Five thousand. “Please.”
The murderer. Vallingby. His throat slit. But what the hell⦠this girlâ¦
“What do you need it for⦠what the hell⦠you’re just a kid, you⦔
“Are you scared?”
“No, I can always⦠are you scared?”
“Yes.”
“Of what?”
“Of you saying no.”
“But I am saying no. This is completely⦠come off it. Go home.”
The girl sat still in the chair, thinking. Then she nodded, got up, and picked the money up off the floor, put it back in the makeup kit. Tommy looked at the spot where it had been. Five. Thousand. A clink as the latch was lifted. Tommy turned over on his back.
“But⦠what⦠are you planning to slit my throat?”
“No, on the inside of your elbow. Only a little.”
“But what will you do with it?”
“Drink it.”
“Now?”
“Yes.”
Tommy’s mind turned inward and he saw that chart of the circulatory system projected over his skin like an overhead transparency. Felt, maybe for the first time in his life, that he had a circulatory system. Not just isolated points, wounds where one or more drops came out, but a large pumping tree of veins filled with⦠how much was it?⦠four or five liters of blood.
“What kind of illness is it?”
The girl didn’t say anything, just stood there at the door with the latch in her hand, studying him, and then the lines of veins and arteries of his body, the chart, suddenly took on the character of a⦠butcher’s chart. He pushed the thought away, and thought instead: Become a blood donor. Twenty-five even and a cheese sandwich. Then he thought:
“So give me the money.”
The girl unzipped the case, took out the bills again.
“How about if I give you⦠three now. And two after?”
“Yeah, sure. But I could just⦠jump you and take the money anyway, don’t you understand that?”
“No. You couldn’t.”
She held the three thousand out to him, between index and middle finger. He held each one of them up to the light, checking to make sure that they were genuine. Rolled them into a cylinder that he clenched his left hand around.
“OK. And now?”
The girl put the other two bills on the chair, crouched down next to the couch, dug out the white packet from the kit, shaking out a razor blade.
She’s done this before.
The girl turned the razor blade to see which side was sharper. Then held it up next to her face. A little message, whose only word was: Swish. She said:
“You can’t tell anyone about this.”
“What happens if I do?”
“You cannot tell anyone about this. Ever.”
“No.” Tommy glanced at his outstretched arm, at the thousand kronor bills on the chair. “How much are you going to take?”
“One liter.”
“Is that⦠a lot?”
“Yes.”
“Is it so much that I⦔
“No. You can handle it.”
“Because it comes back.”
“Yes.”
Tommy nodded. Then watched with fascination as the razor blade, shining like a little mirror, was lowered against his skin. As if it was happening to someone else, somewhere else. Only saw the play of lines. The girl’s jawbone, her dark hair, his white arm, the rectangle of the razor blade that pushed aside a thin hair on his arm and reach
ed its goal, rested for a split second against the swelling of the vein, somewhat darker than the surrounding skin.
Then it pressed down, lightly, lightly. A point that sank down without puncturing it. Then—
Swish.
He had an involuntary reaction to pull away and Tommy gasped, squeezed his other hand tightly around the bills. A creaking inside his head as his teeth bit down, grinding against each other. The blood streamed out, pressed out in spurts.
The razor blade fell to the floor with a tinkle and the girl grabbed hold of his arm with both hands, pressing her lips against the inside of his arm.
Tommy turned his head away, only felt her warm lips, her tongue lapping against his skin, and again he saw that chart inside his head, the channels that the blood ran through, rushing toward that⦠opening.
It’s running out of me.
Yes. The intensity of the pain increased. The arm was starting to feel paralyzed; he no longer felt the lips, he only felt the strong suction, how it was sucked out of him, how it wasâ¦
Flowing away.
He got scared. Wanted to put an end to it. It hurt too much. The tears came to his eyes, he opened his mouth to say something, to⦠couldn’t. There were no words that would⦠He bent his free arm toward his mouth, pressed the clenched fist against his mouth. Felt the cylinder of paper that stuck out of it. Bit down on it.
11:17, Sunday evening, Angbyplan:
A man is observed outside the hair salon. He presses his face and hands against the glass, and appears extremely intoxicated. The police arrive at the scene fifteen minutes later. The man has left by this point. The window does not appear damaged in any way, only the traces of mud or earth. In the lighted window display there are numerous pictures of young people, hair models.
***
Are you sleeping?”
“No.”
A waft of perfume and cold as his mom came into his room, sat down on the bed.
“Have you had a good time?”
“Yes.”
“What did you do?”
“Nothing in particular.”
“I saw some papers. On the kitchen table.”
“Mm.”
Oskar pulled the covers more tightly around him, pretended to yawn.
“Are you sleepy?”
“Mm.”
Let The Right One In aka Let Me In Page 38
