Twenty-eight

The container had been picked up and yet more cubic meters of the family’s history had been carried away Laura had asked the driver where he dumped everything.

“It can be burned, and in that case it’ll end up in the furnace in Bolän-derna,” he answered, casting an indifferent eye into the container.

She had an impulse to follow the container truck, and see all the junk tumble into an enormous burning inferno, catch fire, and literally go up in flames.

Now a new container stood in the driveway Laura dragged out several bags from the garage and furniture from the house and the container was already half full. Her activities attracted a certain attention on the street. Many of the neighbors had already found a reason to walk past “the Dream House,” they slowed their pace and stared with curiosity at what the Hin-dersten woman was tossing out.

There was talk. Some speculated that she was on her way to leaving the neighborhood. Others believed she was cleaning up after her father. A rumor had arisen that she was going to do a large-scale renovation of the house. Someone had seen her run half naked from the house to the garage. Another could tell that she had heard mysterious, shrill sounds from the upper story.

From having been relatively quiet for a time, the gossip had now gained new momentum and the house stood in the center of the neighborhood’s attention.

Laura noticed her neighbors’ interest but ignored their curious looks and questions. She worked on purposefully. Where this drive came from she wasn’t sure. She was still going to leave everything—the house, Uppsala, and Sweden. But she didn’t want strangers to touch the objects, books, and furniture. It was up to her and no one else to settle the score with her former life.

The upper floor was the hardest, not because she had to carry everything down the stairs but because that’s where the most painful memories were.

Two rooms were full of Alice Hindersten’s belongings. They were of little value and would only fetch a couple of thousand at an auction, Laura thought. The objects of the greatest value were most likely the old Jugend-patterned flower vases and a shaving mirror with a light wooden frame, probably birch. These things had been stored upstairs for as long as Laura could remember. The last few objects had been carried up shortly after her mother’s death. A great deal had probably been thrown away.

For the first time since she had started to clean, Laura became hesitant. She could hardly stand to touch anything, much less throw them into the container.

She sat down on a stickback chair and looked at that which had been Alice’s life. Laura knew that the gigantic America-trunk that took up almost a square meter contained dolls and other toys. Once she and Alice had looked through the trunk together. What had attracted Laura the most that time were the paper bookmarks from Alice’s childhood. Some worn and frayed at the edges, others well-preserved and carefully packed into different envelopes, depending on their theme. What Laura remembered above all was the envelope with angels.

She opened the lid and breathed in the smells of her childhood. Numb with the pain of longing she picked aimlessly through the objects. The old doll with the lace dress had belonged to her grandmother and was probably one hundred years old. The dress looked moth-eaten and in addition it had a large tear on the front, a “skorsa” as Alice would have said. Laura wrapped the doll in her arms, rocked it, and mumbled some words of comfort.

Laura lingered in the room for over an hour, unable to carry anything down and throw it away.

It was getting dark when she returned to the first floor. Her hunger had somehow strangely abated, but her throat was dry from all the dust and she opened a new bottle of wine.

When she had downed half a glass there was another ring at the door. She put the glass down with care and tiptoed into the hall.

“Hello,” she heard someone call out in a low voice and she ran up, turned the lock, and threw the door open.

“You came,” she whispered.

Stig Franklin brushed past her into the hall.

“We have to talk,” he said and scrutinized her half-naked body. “You’re not wearing very much. Aren’t you cold?”

Laura shook her head, elated and smiling.

“Are you hungry?” she asked and in that moment became ravenously hungry herself. It was as if his visit had awakened her from a kind of sleep mode and now when her bodily functions were switched on the hunger immediately returned.

“No,” he said curtly.

“Surely you can have a glass of wine.”

“I can’t stay long.”

“That’s what you said last time,” Laura said with a smile.

“Have you been drinking?”

“Only half a glass.”

She was familiar with his views on alcohol. Jessica had inculcated Stig with ambivalence and guilt.

“It’s a Valpolicella that you have never tasted, I promise.”

“No thanks, I’m good.”

Laura immediately went into the bedroom.

Stig remained standing in the hallway, unsure about how to proceed with what he had to say. He looked around in the increasingly bare house.

“What are you doing?” he yelled. “Are you getting rid of everything?” He received no answer. He had an hour, then he had arranged to meet Jessica in town.

Laura returned, now in an old dressing gown.

“I have to shower,” she said and before he had time to react she went into the bathroom.

Stig walked into the living room. He sat down in the only armchair left but got up again just as fast and walked into the kitchen, looked until he found a clean glass, poured out a little wine, and sat down at the kitchen table.

He felt it would be easier to talk to Laura here. He took a sip and had the feeling that Jessica saw him. He took another sip. How would Laura react? He prepared himself for the worst but it had to be ended. Jessica was no dimwit. She would soon find out about his visits and then things would be untenable when Laura returned to work.

He heard splashing from the shower and again felt desire stir in his body but he told himself to be strong and resist the temptation to be seduced. He had made his choice and in all honesty it was not even a difficult one.

He poured himself more wine and had a bite to eat. He could see her, soapy, her head tilted back and the dark hair hanging down. What fascinated him most—which was making him feel more and more uncomfortable on the hard kitchen chair—was Laura’s complete abandonment in bed. She didn’t seem to have any restraint.

He and Jessica had a pretty good sex life but Laura was something extraordinary. Jessica was controlled, it almost seemed as if she could press different buttons to regulate her emotions. Even the timing of her orgasm seemed to be something she had a button for. She always had one, as if she ran a program where the end point was a given. Afterward she washed herself fastidiously. Now he was used to it, but in the beginning it had felt a bit strange that she never lingered in bed. No, up like a spring and into the bathroom for the obligatory and scrupulous body wash, as if she wanted to scrub away every particle that came from him. It was rare that she came back to the bedroom. Instead she often went off to the computer or even to the laundry room to start the dryer or put a load in the washer.

I wonder how she will give birth, he asked himself and couldn’t help smiling a little. She probably has some program for that as well. Into the delivery room, plop, and then out again. Not that that was happening any time soon. Not yet, she said. She probably had a time plan for that as well, he thought, not without bitterness.

Stig drained his glass, stretched out, and opened the refrigerator but it was as bare as the rest of the house. The sound from the shower had stopped. Stig got up, adjusted his pants in the crotch, and sank down on the chair again.

The door to the bathroom opened and suddenly Laura was in the kitchen. She smiled and Stig found himself smiling and felt very much at ease.

“Was it nice?”

She nodded. Her hair gleamed black, scented with an unfamiliar shampoo. Laura leaned against the fridge.

She grabbed the bottle in order to fill her glass and discovered that it was a little less than half full.

“You did want some after all,” she said. “Didn’t it taste good? It should actually be aired for an hour or even more.”

Stig marveled at her calm. She again placed herself with her back to the fridge.

“We have to talk,” he said and decided to look at her. He wanted her to sit down. It would feel safer with a table between them but Laura didn’t move.

She nodded and Stig launched in.

“We have to talk,” he said with unnecessary hardness and immediately regretted it when he saw her expression. “Don’t get me wrong,” he went on. “I like you a lot. You are attractive, very attractive.”

He looked out the window, unable to continue, swallowed and made a new attempt.

“Jessica watches me like a hawk. I think she senses something.”

“She isn’t a problem,” Laura said.

“Yes, she is.”

“Stig, we love each other, it’s that simple. We always have.”

He stared at her.

“It won’t work,” he said flatly.

Laura smiled.

“Don’t worry about Jessica. She’s a bitch and you know it. It’s me you want, isn’t it? Look at me!”

Laura tugged on her belt and the dressing gown fell open.

Stig stared at her half-bared body.

“What have you done to your thighs?”

“I dreamed about you and I scratched myself in my sleep.”

“I have to drive,” he said, sniffling, rising on unsteady legs.

“You’re not driving anywhere.”