Authors: Tore Renberg
The ambulance travels at speed as it drives up to the front of the school, and Tiril feels a bolt of guilt slide back in her head as the sound of sirens fills the air. It’s as though a closed fist is pounding at her from within. The very thing she denied and dreaded has come to pass.
Sandra.
When someone like her is brought down, things are bad.
And it’s her fault.
Tiril isn’t the only one peering out the window at the ambulance that’s come to a sudden stop outside the entrance and thrown open it’s back doors, at the medics readying a trolley stretcher, at the headmaster and deputy head running out, at Frida Riska gesticulating and taking control; the entire class has got to its feet. Mai has put down the book she was holding, a murmur spreads through the classroom, eyes wander, and hands and feet shift and shuffle: ‘What is it?’ ‘What’s happened?’ ‘Jesus!’ ‘No way?!’ ‘What are they doing?’.
Tiril knocks over a chair on her way out of the classroom. Mai casts a wavering glance in her direction, but refrains from saying anything. Tiril runs out into the corridor, hating the linoleum under her feet, hating the stupid charts along the walls, hating the framed photographs of past pupils, hating the teachers, hating everything that’s happened and is going to happen, hating The International Cunty Wankskop and hating herself as she emerges into the strong sunlight at the same moment that Frida Riska shouts: ‘Tiril Fagerland! Can you please move!’
The flash in Frida’s eyes: ‘And someone will be speaking to you afterwards. You and Shaun and Malene.’
Tiril moves to the side and is almost mowed down by the
ambulance crew wheeling a stretcher. One of them, a young woman with a ponytail and a hawk nose, holds an oxygen mask over Sandra’s face; a white face, thinks Tiril, a white face with dead eyelids. The woman says something as the stretcher is rolled into the back of the vehicle, but she can’t make it out, and just as quickly as they arrived, they’re off again: the double doors slam shut.
Frida Riska stands in front of the headmaster, nodding, ‘Yes, of course, I’ll call the parents, right away,’ and she takes out a mobile phone.
Malene comes over to Tiril and puts her arm around her, but doesn’t say anything. Shaun shows up – or has he been there all along? She looks dejectedly at the glue-sniffer she’s fallen for, who all of a sudden doesn’t seem so attractive, standing there, nodding, unable to meet her eyes, looking like that squirrel in
Ice Age
, Scrat, with his hands in the pockets of his hoodie and nothing at all to say.
‘Frida?’
Frida Riska presses the buttons on her phone. ‘I can’t get hold of them…’ She turns, visibly irritated, to Tiril: ‘Yes?’
‘Yes?’
‘What happens now, I mean, like—’
‘We don’t know, Tiril.’
‘But… she’ll live?’
‘We don’t know that yet,’ says Frida, and then fixing her eyes upon her: ‘All you should be thinking about is that it’s time you started telling the truth, and stopped playing with somebody’s life.’
Then she hurries off.
Tiril feels her face smarting from Frida’s words. Malene runs her hands up and down her back and says: ‘Guess we’re the ones who need to breathe easy now, aren’t we?’
‘Yeah…’
‘What are we going to do?’
‘I…’
‘Tiril, you have to say something, what will we do? I mean, we said it was Shaun and Sandra, that’s what Frida’s told them, but … Tiril? What are we going to do?’
Then Tiril begins to cry.
All she manages to think is that it must be years since she has, since she’s cried. Then she moves off. Twisting away, determinedly, but without anger, from Malene’s consolatory hand, and walks across the schoolyard.
Shaun runs after her. ‘Hey, baby, do you need, like, help? I mean, we can’t be sure that … you know, it could turn out all right, all this.
He’s sweet again now, sweet and small and stupid as a smurf, and cool in a way, but what does that matter when you’ve killed a person, what does that matter when you’ve chosen lies in order to satisfy your own rage, what the fuck does it matter when you’re the one who’s pressed The Big Red Button, the button that opens a trapdoor in the floor under another person, when you’re the one who’s done it, all because you’re so wrapped up in yourself, so busy thinking about being first, being biggest, being best, what does it matter then that Scrat stands in front of you asking if you want his nut?
Tiril shakes her head, rebuffs him with a wave of her hand and walks towards the gym hall. Scrat stands looking after her.
She walks towards the large building and the others let her go. She rounds the corner, sniffles and spits, takes a cigarette from her packet and wonders what in the hell she’s going to do. Just say balls to everything? Screw the singing. Don’t be bothered about Dad, about Malene, about the songbirds, about Mum in Bergen, about love, to hell with everything; and she means
everything
. This old school, this Stavanger suburb, the telecom tower on top of Ullandhaug, the hill at Limahaugen, these streets, everything.
If you take another person’s life, you have to offer your own.
She hears the sound of footsteps while standing there. She sees a little guy scurrying towards her. He has an awful running style, not even bothering to take his hands out of his pockets. He has a fresh shiner, a daft-looking body and his head wobbles as though not properly attached to his neck. He draws closer and he’s only thirteen years old, but pants and puffs like he has lung disease and he clearly won’t give up.
Shaun comes to a halt in front of her. He’s sweating and needs
to swallow, put his palms on the wall and gather himself before he manages to say anything: ‘Just wanted … fuck … okay, give me a sec here … just wanted … awh … shit … people don’t always die because their consciousness faints … or … yeah … I just wanted to say that you have to sing tonight and … well … you’ll figure out what we should say, y’know … you’ll figure out what’s right, because that’s your style … and everyone says you should all go ahead and sing … that no matter what happens, we’ll sing, because it’s … shit … like solidarity and international and the environment and that … nobody’s going to give up, we’re not going to let fear … get the upper hand, or something like that …. Anyway, the headmaster says the international, like, workshop is going ahead and everyone’s talking about unity, and fellowship and solidarity … and you’re going to sing … because it doesn’t help not to sing … or … I can’t exactly sing myself … but that’s probably just me … anyway … yeah … I just wanted to … hear if you needed help with anything … I’m like really into you … Tiril?
Men? Cecilie walks a few paces behind them. They’re not real men, not that lot. A fat guy who’s always eating crisps, watching horror movies and thinks he’s a business executive. A beanpole with ADHD who walks around with a constant hard-on and lies in bed crying at night. A twisted Korean brute without any feelings at all. They’re just little boys. They haven’t grown up at all, they’re just like they were twenty-five years ago, the only difference is that any charm they had then is long gone.
That’s how boys are.
They never grow up. They grow down.
I’d do anything for you.
Cecilie has her eyes fixed on Tong’s back as they walk along Store Stokkavann. The white sun shimmers on the surface of the water, one or two people out walking pass in the opposite direction. She wants to explode. The fact she had sex with him the whole summer. The guy is just plain evil.
She lets her gaze drift from the back of Tong’s taut neck, via her brother’s bloated neck over to Rudi’s unsteady bird neck. A feeling of guilt spreads in her stomach; the way she’s treated him over the years. He’s been there right in front of her with that glittering intensity of his, waiting upon her every single second, and what has she done?
Cecilie dries away a tear from under one eye as they enter the wooded area along the east bank of the lake, about a kilometre and a half along the trail, and the boys slow down and exchange glances.
‘Yeah,’ says Rudi, his voice a little despondent, ‘feel a little ashamed now, fetching that stuff. I mean, with that woman and
her piano and everything. Those grandkids of hers. Jørgen and whatever the hell his name was.’
Jan Inge pokes at the gravel with the tip of his shoe. ‘Svein Anders.’
Tong looks out at the lake.
‘We need to pick it up anyway,’ says Jan Inge. ‘Did you hear, Tong, what we found out?’
Tong looks at Jan Inge with disinterest.
‘Yep,’ Jan Inge says. ‘Stegas is a homo. Eh? You wouldn’t have guessed that. Sits at home baking muffins, lighting candles and climbing on top of Bunny.’
‘Each to their own,’ Rudi mutters, ‘but it’s not natural.’
‘Amen,’ Jan Inge nods, ‘amen to that.’
Tong spits on the ground. ‘And you’re still working with him all the same?’
‘Listen,’ Rudi says, ‘I’ll tell you something. Stegas … I agree. It’s against the word of the Lord. It’s against nature. It’s disfuckingusting.’ He pauses and turns to look at Tong. ‘But when you get older, when life begins to … when life begins to … how can I explain this … okay: when I was five, life was simple. It was like this: Get up! Go out! Play with something! Get fed! Sleep! When I was fifteen, it was like this: Get up! Go out! See if I could get laid! Get fed! Sleep! Y’know, simple, yeah? Nothing to get philosophical about. But then. Okay. Tong. And you need to listen fucking closely here. And there was me thinking you’d had time to do some thinking in the joint. I have to say, I thought you’d become richer, not poorer in there, but fair enough, our time as colleagues will soon be over, so hey, I can say what I think: You understand, after a while, that
simple,
that is the one thing which life is not. It’s … shit, I don’t know what you’d call it…’
‘Ambiguous?’ Jan Inge says. ‘Is that what you’re thinking of?’
‘Ambiguous …’ Rudi sways his head from side to side, ‘yeeeah … but…’
‘Multifaceted?’ Jan Inge inquires. ‘Could that be the word?’
‘Better,’ says Rudi, continuing to move his head from side to side as he sucks on his lip, ‘but…’
‘What you might be thinking of,’ says Jan Inge, sweating in the
sunshine, ‘is the sense of majesty. Of gravity. A feeling of interminable complexity.’
Rudi stops swaying his head, bends down, picks up a stone from the gravel path and throws it out into the lake.
‘You’ve put your finger on it,’ Rudi says solemnly, before turning again to Tong. ‘It’s probably true that you don’t fit in with us. We’re on a different level from you. We’re alive to the feeling of gravity, to the feeling of majesty. What is it Deep Purple sing? “I’m a blind man and my world is pale.” Well, I can see very well, as Elton John sings on “Madman Across the Water”, and yeah, I’m not quoting Elton because I like him, I’m quoting him out of reluctant respect for his fellow bumchum Stegas, and I’m not quoting him because my brother, that jackal, didn’t listen to anything but Elton when I was small, before he became a Cars fan, but that’s another thing entirely. But anyway, my brother – who I have a
serious
problem even talking about, in fact even the
mention
of my brother makes me bristle, so when I bring him, that rat, up, you know that I’ve something important to say, something that surpasses my hatred for him,
burninhellyoubastard
. He used to sit there going on about Elton this and Elton that … shit! Now I’ve forgotten what I was on about. Why am I even talking about that git, get thee behind me, carpenter! I hope you drown in your own puke! I find it so fucking hard … my own brother … and to think we slept in the same room when we were small … in the bunk beds … not to mention my own fam … my own fam—’
Rudi gasps for breath.
‘Listen,’ Cecilie says, ‘you know you don’t need to talk about them, not if you don’t want to, you know how worked up you get.’
‘That my own fam—’
‘I know.’
‘That my own famil—’
Cecilie rubs the back of his hand. ‘I know, Rudi.’
‘Rikki and Ben … and Kate…’
‘I know.’
‘Rewind!’ sniffles Rudi, and slaps his hands together. ‘Where was I? Yeah, Tong: Elton. John. An openly homosexual man. And friend of the British royal family. Yes.’ He clears his throat. ‘And
that’s what he sings, my Korean friend, or rather my
former
Korean friend: “I can see, very well.” And that’s what Deep Purple sing: “I’m a blind man and my world is pale.” And to take it slightly further, what is it The Cars sing: “Oh, heartbeat city, here we come.” Hm? Tong. Have you been there? In heartbeat city? And what is it Marillion – yeah, I know you hate Marillion, and I’d be only too happy to sit down and discuss the strengths and weaknesses of that band – what is it Marillion sing? “You’ve got venom in your stomach, you’ve got poison in your head.” Well, I’ll tell you one thing, brother of evil: I was blind, but now I can see, and my address is in heartbeat city, and my stomach isn’t full of venom, my head isn’t filled with poison, I’m rich. How is your stomach, yellow adder? How is your head, my furious friend? That’s the way it is, Tong, you have to accept that your best friend sucks cock, no matter how fucked up it seems.’
It’s quiet after Rudi’s flood of words lets up. Four pensioners pass by, one of them smiles, raises his hand to his forehead and gives them a three-fingered scout salute and says: ‘Lovely day, isn’t it?’
Cecilie feels warmth spread across her skin. Her eyes are moist.
‘In prison,’ says Tong calmly, ‘I read a good bit of psychology. And psychiatry. There’s a diagnosis for people like you, Rudi. It’s called manic. A lot of unstable people suffer from it.’
Cecilie continues looking at Rudi. The warm feeling on her skin increases, like a friendly fever. Please, whispers Cecilie to herself, please baby, don’t be Tong’s kid. And please, baby, please never let Rudi find out what I did. He’s my man, she whispers to herself, and now finally, I’m in love with him.
It just took a little time.
Then she approaches Rudi, places her hand in his, and says: ‘Hey, Rudi boy. Manic?’ She turns to Tong. ‘So what? Manic, my ass. I love manic.’
Rudi stares at her, his eyes look like they’re going to fall out of his head.
Cecilie continues to look at Tong.
‘Hey, Tong,’ she says, her voice clear and distinct. ‘Can you see how ugly I am?’ Then she goes up on her toes, reaches towards
Rudi, takes hold of his head, finds his mouth, gives him her tongue and whispers: ‘I’d do fucking anything for you.’
His kiss is stiff. His eyes flit about. ‘Shhh!’
‘Wha?’
‘Pogo!’
She turns and looks in the direction he’s staring. About fifty or sixty metres from them, Tommy Pogo is approaching along the path. He’s wearing white trainers, blue jeans and a black belt with a shiny, silver buckle. A freshly washed, black T-shirt sits tight across his torso. Kia is rolling alongside in a motorised wheelchair. She has wavy, blonde hair and curling eyelashes to match, and she’s almost alarmingly pretty; imagine having a daughter like that.
‘No way,’ Rudi whispers, kissing Cecilie back as naturally as he’s able, ‘there’s no way this is a coincidence.’
Tommy and his daughter draw closer. Kia turns her head to her father and says something. He nods three times in succession. They’ve recognised them.
‘Tampon is sticking
so
close to us,’ Rudi whispers. ‘So bloody close. Come on, baby, let’s show him a bit of tongue here.’
And so Rudi snogs his woman, with such passion and intensity that his whole body is shaking as he hears Tommy Pogo’s resonant voice: ‘Well hello, didn’t expect to see you lot up here. I didn’t get a chance to pop by. Kia was off school due to some rehearsals, so I took the day off too, and
voilà
, here we are, and what do you know, you lot are here too. Tong, you’re back again. Did you have an okay time in Åna? Hi, Jan Inge, seems like either we never meet or we can’t stop bumping into each other, eh? You know, I’ve often thought about it, how you and Cecilie were left there in Hillevåg in the eighties; that’d never happen today, Child Welfare would have intervened, we would have stepped in, but maybe you’re happy we never did?’
Jan Inge smiles, but doesn’t reply, and Rudi merely continues making out with his girlfriend.
Pogo laughs. ‘Will there be wedding bells in the near future, Rudi? See, Kia, love can work out too, can last a long time. Good thing Rudi isn’t inside, the way the two of them carry on, eh?’
His daughter laughs, a mellifluous sound, she’s obviously inherited her father’s vocalisation. Tommy Pogo is a very handsome man. His beard is trimmed, his harelip barely visible beneath, not that it mars his appearance – it’s more of a liberating feature under the straight nose and piercing eyes.
Cecilie smiles mischievously and Rudi frees himself from her lips. Buoyed by self-confidence, he stares fixedly at Tommy: ‘Not that I believe for one second that you’re here by chance, Tommy. But I’ll tell you this, man, here we are, four friends, four bloody good friends, it’s Thursday and we’ve just had a heavy moving job, a grand piano in Våland, and we have one more job this evening, entire contents of a terraced house in Sandal, and now we’re taking a walk, and that, sir, we intend to continue with, and love, which I heard you talking about while I was giving Dolly here a little taste of things, yes, love, that’s the flag blowing in our breeze.’
Tommy Pogo nods.
‘It’s a free country, Rudi. Good to hear. Well, what do you say, Kia, will we be getting on?’
And so they part, Tommy and his daughter in one direction around the lake, the four crooks in the other. They stop and fall silent just five minutes from the car park, they look around, and on Jan Inge’s signal, Rudi runs up into the woods towards a large stone where he sticks his hand into a crevice and locates a bag of speed. Cecilie observes him from a distance, she feels like her face is burning up and she thinks about how strange this life can be, where one day the sight of a certain person makes you want to puke, and the next he’s your god, and she turns abruptly and looks straight into Tong’s face with utter disdain.