Little Star (30 page)

Strange, really, because it felt as if someone was standing there pouring warm water over his back. He looked up at Tora and saw that she was holding something in her right hand, although he couldn’t work out what it was. In her left hand she was holding her champagne flute, which seemed to be missing its base.

That was what she was holding in her right hand. The base, with a piece of broken stem three centimetres long and dripping red with his blood. Tora raised the weapon again and Max Hansen cried out and curled up into a ball. A second later he felt a deeper blow between his shoulder blades. The glass spike penetrated his flesh and stayed there.

He screamed. The uneven surface of the broken stem must have damaged some nerve when it went in, because he started jerking as if he were having a fit. It was throbbing and pounding. He managed to raise his head to beg for mercy, but Tora was no longer there. He managed to haul himself to his feet with the help of the bed head. Throbbing, pounding. Then he heard the door opening.

There was something not right
about that Max Hansen. Teresa had felt it as soon as he opened the door of the hotel room. Something wasn’t quite right about the look on his face or the tone of his voice. Perhaps everyone in the music industry was like that, but she wouldn’t have left Theres alone with him if it hadn’t been necessary, and if Theres hadn’t said that was what she wanted. She was going to make her CD.

However, there was absolutely no chance of Teresa going down to reception. As soon as Max Hansen had closed and locked the door, Teresa crept over and placed her ear to the door. She could hear the sound of voices inside, but not what they were saying. After a while she heard Theres singing ‘A Thousand and One Nights’ and felt a stab of jealousy. That was
their
song, somehow. Although of course Theres didn’t know that.

And what if she had known? Would it have made any difference?

Teresa had a sentimental streak. She liked what was known as elegiac mood in poetry. A persistent, imprecise longing for what had been, even if it hadn’t been particularly good. She was sometimes struck by a blissful melancholy when she saw
Bananas in Pyjamas
on TV, despite the fact that she hadn’t really liked it when it was on the first time round.

Theres was the least sentimental person she had ever met. Only the present existed, and when Theres spoke about things that had happened in the past, it was as if she was reading aloud from a history
book. Dry facts that had no relevance to what was happening now.

Teresa heard a scream from inside the room. She leapt to her feet and rattled the handle, banged on the door. When no one opened it, she banged again. A moment later the door opened and Theres was standing there, naked. There were streaks of blood on her stomach. One hand was red, and in the other she was holding a champagne glass without a base.

‘What have you…what…’

Before Teresa managed to formulate a sensible question she caught sight of Max Hansen, disappearing into the bathroom. He too was naked, and before he locked the door she caught a glimpse of his back. A T-shaped object was sticking out in the middle of all the red, a tap that had been opened and let out the blood.

‘Help me,’ said Theres. ‘I don’t understand.’

If it hadn’t been for the word ‘help’ Teresa would have taken to her heels. This was too much. But Theres had asked for help. Theres needed help. Therefore she had to help. Teresa walked into the room and closed the door behind her.

‘Here,’ said Theres, holding out the glass with the broken stem. ‘Do you like this stuff? I don’t. It tastes bad.’

Teresa shook her head. ‘What…have you done?’

‘I sang,’ said Theres. ‘Then I took off my clothes. Then he tried to eat me up. I wasn’t scared. I knew I could make him dead.’

‘Listen. Get dressed. We have to get out of here.’

When Teresa followed Theres into the room, she caught sight of the camera, the red light showing that it was recording. They had a similar one at school, and while Theres was getting dressed, Teresa rewound, and quickly looked through what had happened before she came into the room. Theres’ refusal, Max Hansen’s insistence, the result. She pressed eject, took out the DVD and slipped it into her pocket.

Theres was dressed now. The contents of the glass without a base had spilled out all over the bedside table. ‘Come on,’ said Teresa. ‘We need to leave.’

Theres didn’t move. There was the sound of running water from the bathroom. Teresa was beginning to get an odd taste in her mouth. The particular taste that comes when you are facing something completely unpredictable, a mixture of bile and honey. She didn’t want to do this anymore. ‘Come on,’ she wheedled. ‘We can’t stay here.’

‘Yes we can,’ said Theres. ‘I’m going to make a CD.’

‘Not with him.’

‘Yes. He wants to make a CD with me.’

‘Before, maybe. Not anymore.’

‘Yes, he does.’

Theres sat down on the bed and indicated that Teresa should come and sit beside her. Teresa wavered for a few seconds, but there wasn’t really any alternative. She picked up the champagne bottle, tipped the contents into the ice bucket, tested its weight in her hand as a weapon, then sat down next to Theres. She handed her the bottle. ‘Here.’

Theres didn’t take it. ‘What for?’

‘In case he…tries to eat you again.’

‘He won’t.’

‘But just in case.’

‘If he does you can make him dead.’

They sat side by side. The intensity of the whimpering from the bathroom was lessening somewhat. Theres was probably right. That Max Hansen was an unpleasant character, but not particularly dangerous. A coward.

Teresa weighed the bottle in her hand. It was thick and heavy. The shape of the neck and the bulge at the top made it ideal for use as a club. She imagined what it would be like to bring it down on Max Hansen’s coiffured skull, examined her feelings carefully. No. It wasn’t unthinkable. Something within her actually longed to do it.

They were two defenceless girls. There was proof of Max Hansen’s attempted attack on film. They would walk free on every count. She thought. But as Teresa sat there on the bed next to Theres, she felt anything but defenceless. On the contrary. She tried out a couple of
mock blows with the bottle in her hand, looked at Theres, so calm and erect, her hands resting on her knees. Not defenceless.

We are invulnerable,
thought Teresa.
We are the wolves.

When Max Hansen emerged from the bathroom five minutes later, he was literally as pale as a corpse. Every scrap of colour had left his skin, and he had knotted a couple of bath towels around his chest and stomach as temporary bandages. He gave a start when he saw Theres and Teresa sitting on the bed.

‘What the fuck…what the fuck are you doing here?’ he said faintly, glancing at the bottle in Teresa’s hand. He fumbled in his jacket pocket and took out his wallet, threw it on Theres’ knee. ‘Here. Take it. It’s all I’ve got.’

Theres gave the wallet to Teresa, who didn’t know what to do with it. She opened it and considered removing the money, but decided it was best not to, so she threw it back to Max Hansen.

‘I’m going to make a CD,’ said Theres.

Max Hansen swallowed. ‘What?’

‘I’m going to make a CD,’ Theres repeated. ‘I’m going to sing. You’re going to help me.’

For a moment it looked as if Max Hansen was going to burst into tears. He swayed on his feet. Then he opened his mouth to say something, but no sound emerged. He was about to take a step towards Theres, but something in her posture stopped him.

‘Is that…is that what you want?’ he said eventually.

‘Yes,’ said Theres.

‘So we can…we can just draw a line under this, and kind of…?’

Since Theres didn’t reply, possibly because she wasn’t familiar with the expression, Teresa answered instead. ‘Nobody’s drawing a line under anything. But you heard what she said, didn’t you?’ She patted her pocket and nodded at the camera. ‘By the way, I’ve got the movie.’

‘OK,’ said Max Hansen. ‘OK, OK.’

In the mirror Teresa could see blood seeping through the towels.
Presumably Max Hansen ought to go to hospital, if he was going to be in a position to help anybody with anything.

When Teresa got up, she realised her legs weren’t quite as steady as her discussion with Max Hansen might have suggested. But she managed to get Theres to her feet, and placed the empty bottle on the table next to Max Hansen. She had to keep up the show for a little while longer.

And she succeeded. She would remember that moment for a long time, and how for once she actually managed to say the right thing in a difficult situation instead of thinking of it afterwards. As she and Theres headed for the door, Teresa turned back to the ashen, sweating figure.

‘Don’t call us,’ she said. ‘We’ll call you.’

Teresa thought she was in
a fairytale. The subway train rumbling along through the bowels of the earth was a magic train, and Theres by her side was a creature from another world.

Perhaps it was a way of dealing with the incomprehensible blood-splattered episode she had just witnessed, but from her final comment onwards her brain had decided that the whole thing was a fairytale in which she had been given a role.

Once upon a time there were two girls sitting on the subway. They were as different from one another as two girls can be.

‘Theres,’ she asked when they had gone a couple of stops. ‘How come you killed those people you were living with?’

‘First a hammer. Then different tools.’

‘No, I mean why. Why did you do it?’

‘What was inside. I wanted it.’

‘And did you get it?’

‘Yes.’

One of the girls looked like a fairy princess, but she was a dangerous killer. The other girl looked like a troll, but was as cowardly as a hamster.

‘How does it feel?’ asked Teresa. ‘To kill someone?’

‘Your hands get tired.’

‘But I mean, how does it feel. Does it feel good or bad or horrible or…what does it feel like?’

Theres leaned closer and whispered, ‘It feels good when it comes
out. You don’t feel scared anymore.’

‘What is it that comes out?’

‘A little bit of smoke. It tastes good. Your heart gets big.’

‘Do you mean you feel braver?’

‘Bigger.’

Teresa took Theres’ hand in hers and examined it as if it were a sculpture and she was trying to understand the technique behind it. The fingers were long and slender; they seemed so fragile they might snap under the slightest pressure. But they were attached to a hand that was attached to an arm that was attached to a body that had killed. The hand was beautiful.

‘Theres,’ said Teresa. ‘I love you.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘It means I don’t want to be without you. I want to be with you all the time.’

‘I love you.’

‘What did you say?’

‘I love you, Teresa. Let go of my hand.’

Without noticing, Teresa had squeezed Theres’ hand tightly when she heard the words that had never been spoken to her before. She let go of the hand, leaned back and closed her eyes.

But in spite of the difference between them, they needed each other as the day needs the night. As the water needs the person who drinks it, and as the wanderer needs the water.

Teresa didn’t know how the story went on, or how it would end. But it was hers, and she wanted to be a part of it.

When Jerry got back to
Svedmyra, he was feeling happier than he had for a long time. Everything had gone according to expectations, even if Paris hadn’t been the voracious lover he had hoped for. She had mostly lain still, gazing into his eyes in a way that paradoxically felt much too
intimate.
When he came she bit him hard on the shoulder, then began to cry.

It brought back so many things, she explained as they lay smoking afterwards. They would have to give it time. It would get better. Jerry stroked her curves and said that was all he wanted. Time with her. All the time in the world.

When he stepped into the lift her skin and her soft flesh were still there within him like a body memory. He had been woken by her hand on his penis, and had made love with her again, half-asleep, gently; with no tears. She was wonderful, he was wonderful, everything was wonderful.

He had been careless, he knew that. He had hardly given Theres a thought since he went home with Paris. But that was the way things were now; it would all work out, or it wouldn’t. He was in love for the first time in his life, and if everything else went to hell, then so be it.

However, he still felt a stab of anxiety when he inserted the key and realised that the door wasn’t locked. He walked in and shouted, ‘Theres? Theres? Are you here? Theres?’

The DVD cases for
Saw
and
Hostel
were lying on the table in the living room. His own mattress was on the floor next to Theres’
bed. Breadcrumbs and an empty baby food jar on the kitchen table. No note anywhere; he went around like a CSI technician trying to reconstruct the girls’ activities before they disappeared.

He sat down at the kitchen table, swept the crumbs into his hand and ate them. There was nothing he could do but wait. He sat there looking out of the window, and the whole thing felt like a dream. Theres had never existed. The events of the last year had never happened. Would he really live with a fourteen-year-old girl who had killed his parents and who didn’t exist in the eyes of society? The very idea was just absurd.

He slipped his shirt off his shoulder and studied the marks left by Paris’ teeth, glowing red against his pale skin.
That
had clearly happened, at least. Which was a good thing. He got up and drank a glass of water, wondering what he ought to do, but came to no conclusion.

When the doorbell rang ten minutes later he was sure it was the police or some authority figure coming to put a stop to everything, one way or another. But it was the girls.

‘Where the fuck have you been?’

Theres slunk into the apartment without answering, and Teresa pointed at her wrist, where she appeared to be wearing an invisible watch. ‘I have to go. My train leaves in half an hour.’

‘Yes, that’s all very well, but where have you been?’

Teresa was on her way down the stairs, and answered over her shoulder, ‘Out.’

When he went back inside, Theres was busy dragging his mattress out of her room. He picked up the other end and helped her to carry it, then sat down on his bed.

‘Right,’ he said. ‘Start talking. What have you done?’

‘We made songs. Teresa did the words. They were good.’

‘OK. Then you watched horror films and then you both slept in your room because you got scared…’

Theres shook her head. ‘Not scared. Happy.’

‘Yeah, right. But what did you do this morning?’

‘We went to see Max Hansen.’

‘The agent, the one who wrote? What the fuck did you do that for?’

‘I’m going to make a CD.’

Theres was standing in front of him, and Jerry grabbed hold of her hand. ‘Theres, for God’s sake. You can’t do things like that. You can’t just go off like that without me. You get that, don’t you?’

Theres pulled her hand away and examined it, as if she wanted to make sure it was unharmed after the contact. Then she said, ‘Teresa was with me. That was better.’