[2013] The Heart Echoes

by Helena vonZweigbergk

  Is there anyone in this world who really knows me? Astrid wonders.

  The thought brings tears to her eyes.

  Henrik. Does he know who I am? Who is the woman he loves?

  If he still loves her, that is.

  LENA

  Lena has chosen to immerse herself in quiet all summer long. Although maybe chosen isn’t the right word. That’s simply what has happened. She feels so incredibly tired. She can’t stand the sound of a TV or radio. Everyone talks too fast, laughs so insistently. And there is so much suffering that seeps into the news reports. Disasters, people weeping, earthquakes, murders, wars.

  She has shut everything out.

  But one morning she wakes up to the sound of a car pulling up outside. Her bedroom window is open, so she can clearly hear Holger huffing and puffing as he maneuvers his big body out of the car. The car radio is on, and he doesn’t turn it off. He also leaves the car door open. He’s probably just dropping something off at the house and won’t even come in to see her. A tune is playing on the radio. It’s “The Final Countdown” by the band Europe.

  How old was she when she listened to that song over and over again? Martha, have you heard that song? You must have, Lena thinks. Everybody did. Did you have big shoulder pads back then? And big hair? I can just picture the way you looked. And I bet you sang along at the top of your lungs. It was a song that demanded action. Maybe you played air guitar? Or punched your fist in the air?

  It’s actually so ridiculous, Lena thinks. But I loved that song, just as I loved so many other ridiculous things.

  We’re so good at that, Martha. We find joy in all the little things that are like triumphant peals of laughter when confronting our awful fate.

  The door to Lena’s room opens, and Holger peeks in. Apparently he’s trying to figure out whether she’s asleep because he stands quietly in the doorway. She reaches out a trembling hand toward him, and he comes in and sits down next to her bed.

  “It’s the final countdown,” Lena whispers.

  “What did you say?”

  “The final countdown.”

  “Being a little dramatic today, I see,” he says with a smile. His teeth always make Lena think of Brio candies, which are square and pale yellow. Fruit flavored.

  But there’s something else she wants to tell Holger. If only she could remember what it is. “You’re such a nice person, Holger. Are you this nice to everyone?”

  “I don’t know. I guess it’s not really possible to be nice all the time.”

  “But are you nice to me only because it’s your job?”

  Holger fiddles with Lena’s morphine drip before he takes her hand again. “Meeting someone like you is what makes my job worthwhile,” he says, and Lena thinks she notices a slight blush on his face.

  “I don’t think you’d like me much out there in the world,” Lena offers. “And I wouldn’t like you. I might not even notice you.”

  “But right now we’re here. We’re both here,” he says quietly.

  “Yes, we are. Right now we’re both here.”

  EPILOGUE

  ASTRID

  On a brilliantly beautiful day, Lena is laid to rest on the island of Fårö. The leaves are still clinging to the trees, but they’ve turned a fiery red and bright yellow. The sky is a deep blue behind the whitewashed façade of the church, with its characteristic black tower and spire. It’s a day of sharp contrasts when it comes to colors, impressions, and everyone’s state of mind.

  The finality of the coming farewell is so evident to all the members of Lena’s family that they avoid looking at each other as they gather outside the church. They know that soon they will go inside and see the white coffin, which has now been covered with all the flowers they’ve chosen—ones that Lena used to love. Used to love. It was as they discussed the flower selections that the family used the past tense for the first time when talking about Lena.

  They know that when they see the white coffin with the colorful roses—creamy white, butter yellow, velvety red, delicate pink, and bright fuchsia—it will be their last glimpse of anything tangible connected to Lena. And her remaining family members are having a hard time accepting that. They slip past each other, or give each other a quick hug before going inside. They pat each other on the back, bite their lips, take deep breaths to pull themselves together.

  Kerstin wants to be the first to enter the church. She goes in, leaning on Sandra’s arm. She’s looking stylish, with red lipstick and a high-necked black dress. She’s wearing a brooch shaped like a red rose. Astrid knows that this is her way of saying one last good-bye to Lena, who always loved seeing Kerstin look so chic. Kerstin, who has seemed more and more stooped over the past few months, now straightens her back. Astrid has an awful thought as she surreptitiously stares at Kerstin. My mother wishes she was made of stone, she thinks.

  Astrid feels Henrik’s hand touch her hip. Just a slight caress. They haven’t had any physical contact since earlier in the summer. But now, as her shoulders shake in a desperate attempt to fend off her tears, his hand is there, and she reaches for it and holds on tight.

  All of Astrid’s children have come to the funeral. Josefin, Viktor, and Sara have now joined Emilia, to form a group. Per walks beside Sandra and Kerstin. He’s carrying a hymnal, and he keeps looking down at it, as if trying not to acknowledge either the church or the people gathered there. Astrid sits down, with Henrik on one side and Viktor on the other. Sara and Josefin move close to their brother, and Emilia takes a seat next to Per. Sandra sits with Kerstin, both of them with stony expressions.

  Astrid takes a deep breath. How are we ever going to make it through this? she wonders. What happens to a family weighed down by such grief? She turns to look up at the model of a sailing ship hanging from the church ceiling. Three tall masts, but no sail. How will Mamma, Sandra, and I go on?

  And Henrik.

  They traveled together from Stockholm to Fårö yesterday. All summer long, they have tried to avoid each other. Astrid has spent most of her time at the summer house, while Henrik has either been away on business trips or at home in their apartment with the children.

  Astrid has found it very strange to go through the last devastating phase of Lena’s illness without hearing Henrik’s comforting words or being able to sink into his embrace. And yet she has not felt alone. She and her sisters and their mother have spent a lot of time talking. They have also hugged each other, taken walks together, and cried. Emilia soon returned to Stockholm to be with her father. Lena told her family she didn’t want anyone else to visit. She just couldn’t handle it. So Astrid and Sandra did not invite their husbands to the island.

  Astrid, Henrik, and the children arrived in Visby so late that they went directly to the Visby Stadshotell. Henrik and Viktor shared one room, while Astrid, Sara, and Josefin shared another. This morning they ate breakfast in tense silence, and then set off for Fårö, all of them feeling solemn and glum. As they were getting into the car, Sara, who had been looking pensive for a while, asked her parents if it was over now.

  “What do you mean?” Astrid asked. “What’s over?”

  “I mean will everything go back to the way it was before? After the funeral?”

  “No, of course not,” Astrid replied brusquely. “Nothing will be the same. How could it be?”

  She stared at her younger daughter, who was tugging at her sock and looking uncomfortable in the black outfit that Astrid had bought for her. Astrid had a sudden impulse to give Sara a shake, to draw her out of that self-absorbed focus of hers. How could she say such a thing? What an egotistical and spoiled child.

  “I just meant . . .” Sara didn’t know how to explain. She swallowed hard, looking uncertain.

  Astrid realized then that Sara was scared. Of course she was. The child was worried that nothing in the life she had known so far would ever return to normal.

  Henrik placed his hand on Sara’s shoulder and told her everything would be okay. At that moment, he and Astri
d exchanged glances. And with that, it felt as if they had come to some sort of decision together, right there and then. No matter what they ended up doing, it would be okay. For the sake of the children, everything had to be okay. “I’m sorry, Sara,” Astrid then told her daughter. “Of course everything will be fine. You’ll see. I’m just feeling stressed and nervous because of the funeral.”

  The pastor is a woman in her thirties. When the church bell has stopped tolling and everyone has sat down, when the only sound is some muted sniffling and a few people clearing their throats, the pastor begins to speak.

  “We are gathered here today to say good-bye to Lena.”

  At that point Astrid’s mind shuts down for a while. She escapes from her body—from her own life and everything fixed in place. She can’t stay grounded. She rises up to float freely overhead.

  She sees Henrik—those familiar shoulders of his—and she thinks of all the times she has rested against his cheek. She sees his hands lying in his lap, and she thinks of his caresses, which can evoke such calm. She sees his newly shaven face, his lips pressed tightly together. She thinks about his mouth, which has expressed everything she has ever needed to hear to keep going, and his embrace, in which all her concerns have faded, sometimes to be forgotten entirely.

  Her Henrik. Astrid and Henrik.

  Near the coffin is a flower arrangement, and Astrid knows what it says on the ribbon, because Sandra told her about it yesterday. “Rest in Peace. Michael, Linda, and Leonard.” And Astrid thinks to herself, Rest in peace, Michael. You, too. Finally, you and I can both rest in peace.

  The pastor is saying, “And Lena asked me to read a poem to you by Edith Södergran.”

  Astrid sinks back inside her body. She is again sitting on the church pew.

  What do I fear? I am a part of infinity.

  I am a portion of a cosmic force,

  a separate world within a million worlds,

  a star of the first magnitude, the last to die.

  The triumph of living, the triumph of breathing,

  the triumph of existing!

  The triumph of feeling time flow, glacial, through

  my veins.

  I can’t take this, Astrid thinks. Feeling panicked, she glances over her shoulder and then looks up at the ship overhead. Spasms ripple through her body, threatening to suffocate her. Feeling like the thundering roar of a glacier breaking up, she tries to breathe normally, calmly, but she can’t.

  And hear the silent stream of night

  and stand atop the mountain in the sun.

  I walk on sun, I stand on sun,

  I know of nothing but the sun.

  Lena, forgive me, Astrid thinks. Please forgive me, but I have to get out of here.

  She pushes past Viktor, past Sara and Josefin. She pretends to be coughing, though she’s not quite sure what that sound is issuing from her throat. She hurries along the aisle to the door.

  Outside on the church steps, Astrid takes in big gulps of fresh air as her panic grows. She covers her mouth and nose with her hand, as if breathing into a paper bag. She needs to calm down. She sees a bench next to the church wall, so she goes over and sits down.

  Forgive me, Lena. Please forgive me.

  She is clutching a rose like the ones given to everyone gathered for the funeral. When she looks down, she sees that the stem of the rose has broken in half.

  Forgive me, Lena.

  She leans back against the cold whitewashed wall and tilts her face up toward the sun, which feels so warm in the chilly air. She places the tattered rose on the bench next to her while she wipes away her tears.

  Forgive me, Lena, Astrid thinks again. Forgive me for all the ways I failed you. I forgive you, too.

  But does she?

  Well, maybe not.

  “But I love you,” she murmurs. “Wherever you are, I love you.”

  Someone is pushing open the church door. Out of the corner of her eye, Astrid sees Sara. She comes outside and then sits down next to her mother.

  “I couldn’t stay in there anymore, either,” she says, wiping her nose with the back of her hand.

  Astrid holds out the tattered rose to Sara.

  “Look what happened,” she says.

  The flower looks so pitiful with the broken stalk, the velvety red petals drooping.

  “You can have mine instead,” Sara tells her, holding out her rose. “I think you need it more than I do.”

  SANDRA

  There have been times when Sandra has scoffed at the promise she made to Lena. She tells herself there’s something so lofty or pretentious about saying she should make something of her life. She also thinks it was presumptuous of Lena to demand such a thing of her, as if Sandra couldn’t figure out her own life and needed Lena’s help.

  But there’s one thing Sandra has learned during these summer days she has spent with Lena, Kerstin, and Astrid. She now knows that she can’t live her life alone. Why did she think it was her life’s mission to brag about how independent she was, when that was far from the truth? She has been stumbling her way through life, with part of her closed off and arrogant, the other part submissive and miserable. And it’s only now—having realized that she needs other people, that she needs love and tenderness—that Sandra finally feels able to move freely.

  She has spent the whole summer on Fårö, while Per has stayed in their apartment in Stockholm along with Emilia. Sandra receives occasional phone calls and texts from her daughter, updating her on the situation. Sometimes Emilia reports that Per has been drunk. Sometimes that he’s feeling depressed. Once in a while he’s in a better mood and goes out for a run or jokes with Emilia while he cooks them bacon and eggs for breakfast.

  He’s like he always is, thinks Sandra. I’m not there, but his life goes on as usual.

  Sometimes that realization seems to sneer at her, as if her fantasy that Per would feel shaken to his core by her absence was merely a ludicrous notion. Did she really think she was that important?

  It’s both liberating and sad to find out that she has never been Per’s great love in life. His art is what he loves, his passion is his dancing, and his personal story has turned tragic. But he will have to bear that sorrow alone.

  Sandra takes Kerstin’s arm as they walk forward to place their roses on the coffin. But Kerstin pulls away, saying that she doesn’t need any help, her voice sounding almost childishly defiant. She stands next to the coffin for a moment before a big warm smile appears on her face. Then she wipes away her tears with trembling fingers.

  Emilia has fastened an envelope to her rose. Early in the morning, as she listened to music on her iPod, she sat down to write a letter in secret. Then she put the letter in an envelope and sealed it. Sandra has no idea what Emilia wrote. What does she know about anyone closest to her? For instance, what made Astrid suddenly get up and leave the church during the pastor’s eulogy? Does Astrid even know why she did that?

  And who needs to know? Haven’t they been a little overzealous about analyzing each other’s motives and actions?

  Outside the church, Lena’s friends and family have now gathered after the service. Sunglasses hide red-rimmed eyes; people reach out to hug each other, feeling an emptiness when no words can suffice. Most people speak each other’s name when they embrace. Lisa. Erik. Kalle.

  Lena was loved by so many people. And here in the autumn air, they go over to Kerstin, one after another, to tell her so. Sandra turns to look for Per, but she can’t see him anywhere. Then she spots him, standing near the church wall with his back turned to everyone else, looking out across the fields on the other side of the road. Sandra goes over to him, wanting to know what he’s looking at. The windblown thickets struggling to remain erect as best they can? Is that what he sees? The grass, now withered and dormant? The sky tinged an austere blue, portending the coming winter?

  “Why are you standing here?” she asks him.

  “I don’t know what else to do. I’m not good at these kinds of things
.”

  “These kinds of things?”

  “Expressing emotion. Especially in public.”

  Neither of them reaches out to touch the other. They have worked so much with their bodies, paying attention to how they function physically, how they express themselves, but right now neither of them is capable of doing anything but standing erect and motionless, their arms at their sides.

  “Well, I need to go back,” Sandra tells Per. “Astrid and I need to help out.”

  And she leaves him there, standing alone next to the wall.

  ASTRID

  This is my home in the world, Astrid thinks when she gets back to their apartment in Stockholm after the funeral. She and her family have had a good life here. And they can have a good life again. The girls are visibly relieved when they can take off their outfits and put on sweatpants and T-shirts. They curl up at either end of the sofa. Sara switches on the TV while Josefin scrolls through her Facebook page.

  “It’s great to be home,” Astrid says, but the girls are so immersed in what they’re doing that they don’t seem to hear her.

  This is my home in the world, Astrid thinks again. Her legs feel wobbly, as if she’d swum several miles and her muscles were trembling from the effort. She goes over to Viktor’s room and knocks on the door. She hears a murmured, “Come in.”

  Viktor looks like he’s taken a shower. He’s standing in the middle of the room, wearing only his underwear as he pulls a T-shirt over his head.

  “I just wanted to check to see if you’re okay,” Astrid says.

  “I’m fine.”

  Viktor smiles, and Astrid sees that the shadow, so evident on his face after the assault, has now vanished. He looks calm again.

  “Where are you going?” she asks him.

  “Out with Jalle and Sebbe.”

  “Why does everyone have nicknames these days? Sebbe and Davy and Jalle. Do they call you Vik?”

  Viktor picks up a pair of jeans from the clothes piled on the floor and puts them on.