Karin Fossum - Bad Intentions

‘I thought it might be a sign. That all of us who knew Jon, we couldn’t manage to hold on to him while he was alive. He got ill and he slipped through our fingers. And we didn’t manage to keep hold of him in death either. We lost him to the earth, plain and simple. It says something about us.’

‘What does it say?’ Sejer asked.

‘That we’re all to blame.’

She fell silent. She waited for Sejer to move the conversation forward.

‘When Jon was growing up, were you ever worried about him?’ Sejer asked.

She smiled bleakly.

‘Of course I was. He was my child. Is there anything we do but worry about them? There’s so much they have to cope with,’ she said. ‘They have to find a space for themselves among their siblings, and in the classroom, and they have to survive in the playground. They have to find a peer group to belong to and a couple of close friends. They need an education and a job, and they need girlfriends. And children. Do you have children?’ she asked.

‘I have a daughter and a grandchild. They have managed all the things you mention. But I’ve never taken it for granted.’

He looked at her gravely.

‘Ingerid. You need to listen to me. There is something I have to tell you and it’s very confusing.’

She did not reply, but the cushion was now back in her lap.

‘There are some details about Jon’s death which we find unusual. We can’t pinpoint anything in particular, yet we suspect that this case might be different, or that there’s more to it than we first thought.’

‘I don’t follow,’ she said.

‘There are a few things about Jon’s suicide which we don’t understand.’

She let go of the cushion.

‘What are you talking about? A few things? Are you saying someone else was involved? But there was no one up there, only Axel and Reilly. And they’re his friends,’ she said. ‘They were very close. Are you out of your mind?’

Sejer placed his hand on the red diary.

‘How much have you read?’ he asked.

‘Nothing,’ she replied. ‘Not a single line.’

‘Are you scared?’

‘Yes, I am.’

Memories from her own past surfaced and disturbed her. The summer she had travelled around Europe with a friend. One day they had found a wallet in a toilet. It had contained a thick bundle of notes, which after a brief discussion they chose to keep and later spent in an expensive restaurant. She remembered when she had had an abortion at nineteen. She was not even sure who the father was. Twice during her marriage to Tony Moreno she had been unfaithful. Both episodes had occurred when she had been travelling alone and she was drunk. When she recalled these incidents she felt woozy, and it struck her that she had not felt any remorse. Merely faint irritation, a slight jolt to the system. She had never, ever confided in anyone, simply stored it somewhere and later dismissed it as insignificant. But she remembered it now. She looked at the red diary. Did she have any sort of right to read Jon’s confessions? She opened it up at the first page and read a few lines. Then she put it away, quickly, as though she had burned herself.

‘I’ll read it,’ she said, ‘and I’ll let you know.’

Molly Gram crossed the lawn in front of the hospital.

She walked diagonally towards the path, glancing briskly both to the left and right as she always did. Molly was seventeen years old, but her childish face, high forehead, slender body and the way she moved made her seem younger. She did not want to come across as womanly. She did not play on that side of herself because she had had her fingers burned. Instead she had assumed the role of small, grumpy girl. She took in everything as she walked. A limping man to her right, a couple strolling arm in arm across the car park. She assessed them as she moved. As far as she could see, there were no enemies around. Every time she left the ward she exposed herself to the outside world and its inhabitants, to the light and the wind. Something might come from above or something might attack her from the side. She felt safe only inside her room. Under her duvet. In the dark. With Melis.

She was outside now. She had finally reached the path. This was where she used to walk with Jon Moreno. Now the dog was her only companion. From time to time it would jump up and snap at her green skirt and she would tell it off in an affectionate voice. Little rascal, she said. Good doggy. She felt that Jon was somehow still with her, that his frail figure was at her side as usual, and she carried on an internal conversation with him.

Hi Jon, let’s go for a walk. The weather is very nice. I like this time of year when it starts to get dark earlier. I couldn’t find anyone who wanted to come for a walk with me. The others are so boring; they just hang out in the smoking room and can’t be bothered to do anything. And they take no notice of what’s going on outside. They don’t know that monks are being killed in Burma and stuff like that.

Her inner voice grew quiet as if she lacked the strength to keep Jon alive. Her eyes soon began to dart around again, and she increased her speed. Melis had to run to keep up with her.

You and I would have been friends for life, she thought, I’m sure of that. But we didn’t get enough time. Jon, I need you to listen to me now because there’s something I have to tell you, something I’ve never told anyone. I want to kill myself too. But I’m afraid. I’m not that scared of dying, but I’m scared that I might change my mind. What if, say, I jump off a bridge and regret it and panic as I fall. Then I’ll die with a terrible scream. I don’t want to die screaming, it would be so embarrassing. People might think I’m some huge seagull as I flap past them, can you imagine that? And once I have made my decision, then I don’t want to whine and moan about it, but to leave life behind with dignity. Or what if I take an overdose? And I have second thoughts and can’t manage to make myself vomit. Imagine me kneeling in front of the toilet bowl, retching, how humiliating would that be? I can’t see a future, only a road that is getting narrower and disappears round a bend and then into darkness, and I’m walking down that road alone. Damn you, Jon!

She sobbed as she walked on. She was quite deep into the forest now. Melis zigzagged; one moment he would appear on her right side, then ahead of her and then somewhat behind. A light breeze caused Molly’s hair to flutter, and the leaves either side of the path rustled as if the forest were an animal stirring. Then she heard a different noise, the sound of a twig snapping. It can’t be Melis, she thought, he’s too light. She stopped abruptly and glanced over her shoulder. Was anyone there? What did they want? Melis, too, had stopped. His small ears had detected a sound. She increased her speed again. She was quite far from the hospital now. No one would hear her if she screamed. Were those footsteps? A muted shuffle and some dry cracks. Was it one of the men from the secure unit, she wondered, one of the lunatics? The patients in the secure unit had their own outside space, but sometimes they escaped. Molly could taste blood in her mouth. She turned around a second time, but there was nothing to see. Perhaps it was just a cat prowling through the scrub, nothing to get wound up about. Other people were out walking too; she did not own the forest or the path. Now calm down, Molly, she told herself.

Calm down, for God’s sake!

But she could not calm down. And then she spotted a man some distance away. He stood motionless on the path. There was something familiar about him, and she searched her memory frantically.

Axel Frimann raised his hand and waved.

‘Well, who would have thought it?’ he said. ‘It’s Molly and Melis.’