Karin Fossum - I Can See in the Dark

‘Never been a small boy,’ he mimicked. ‘Now I’ve heard everything.’

‘I haven’t a single childhood memory,’ I explained.

He was a little taken aback by my obstinacy.

‘Were you ill or something?’ he wanted to know.

‘As I said,’ I reiterated, ‘I can’t remember very much at all. Apart from a little shit at school who called me a pike. Well, and I do remember my confirmation. And everything in between is missing. It’s simply missing.’

Arnfinn’s eyes opened wide in amazement.

‘But I do have a memory,’ I added. ‘Of my mother. A skirt with two legs. And a pair of big shoes. Everything further up passed me by. Hands. Heart. Head. I mean, they were there all right, but I never managed to get hold of them. D’you know what she used to say? You’re always strongest when you’re on your own. That was the way I was raised.’

‘Yes, it’s just one unending bloody struggle,’ Arnfinn opined, but his tone was jocular now, the vodka had made him happy and turned his cheeks red. ‘My bodywork’s in terrible condition,’ he went on, ‘ugly, dented and rusty. But my heart ticks over like an old Opel engine. I bet that when my chassis has fallen to pieces, that motor will still be humming along. I get my strong heart from my mother. My God, how it beats.’

He placed a hand on his chest and cocked his head.

‘And what do you get from your father?’ I wanted to know.

Arnfinn pondered the question for a long time.

‘This here,’ he said, raising his glass. ‘He drank himself to death. Mind if I refill my hip flask?’

Naturally, I refilled his hip flask.

Naturally, I stroked and humoured him as if he were a lost dog. I listened to all his stories, both those that showed him in a good light, and those that showed him in a less flattering one, as a parasite. The narrative about the curse of alcohol, which I wanted to understand, the cold and the loneliness, the wide road to perdition. I wanted to make a difference, to mean something to this forlorn individual, because I was in a friendly state of mind, and time was running out. Naturally I acquired another bottle of vodka and put it in the cupboard. And I continued to visit the park near Lake Mester. I sat on my bench and waited for the others; gradually they came trooping up, like beasts to a waterhole: Ebba, Lill Anita, Miranda, Eddie and Janne. The huge, unhappy black man from the Reception Centre. The strange thing was, although Arnfinn and I could now be counted as friends, or at least acquaintances, he never seated himself next to me on my bench. And he never started a conversation when we met in the park. This was part of the ritual between us, that everything should be done in moderation. We both understood that. And we followed the unwritten rule that nothing should be too intimate, but remain in modest, decorous proportion. Come to my house and drink yourself to warmth and brightness, I thought, but leave when the bottle’s empty. I can’t carry you the entire time, I’ve got enough of my own black days. So he was an unassuming friend in a mad world, a friend who kept me engaged and enthusiastic, something quite new in my barren and austere life.

I went to work.

I watched Anna and all her doings closely, I pictured her aura: it was large and warm and red. I tried to enter it, but it wasn’t easy, she was out of reach, as I’d always known she was. But I had something she wanted, something she lacked, something very valuable. The truth about her drowned brother Oscar. It was my great secret. But I kept it close, because I wanted it to last.

Waldemar Rommen passed away. No one was with him when he drew his last breath, but Dr Fischer sat by his bed a long time mulling it over. The sad ending that overtakes us all. He was reminiscent of a mournful dog as he sat by the bed rubbing his temple. A few relatives eventually turned up to take their final farewell. One of them, a teenaged boy, seemed terrified by the thought of what lay in store. But there was nothing frightening about Waldemar. He lay like some ancient chieftain on his bed, with prominent cheekbones and a sharp, impressive nose. The undertakers took him away quite quickly, and we had an empty bed. A sixty-year-old woman with MS was admitted to the ward.

I paid a quick visit to the room to see to her. I had to assess her character and how I should behave towards her. She could speak, and she seemed orientated, so I couldn’t do anything to her. I don’t tempt providence.

Her name was Barbro Zanussi and she was in pain, every waking moment was a torture to her. Each time I entered her room, she raised her head with extreme difficulty and looked me right in the eyes. It was a powerful, luminous look. As if she wished to transfer some of her suffering to me, and I must say she succeeded. Her husband, a small, dark Italian, came only once, and then with a set of divorce papers. Anna had to help her hold the pen, so that she could sign her name to their final separation.

The days and the weeks passed, the summer grew warmer, light and airy, and this was all the excuse people needed to make them go barmy with joy. They threw off their clothes and went out, beguiled, their belief in life renewed. I frequently sat in the park by Lake Mester. I received Arnfinn, I listened, I filled up his hip flask. I went to work, I plunged hypodermic syringes into mattresses and wrote nursing notes, I discussed things with Dr Fischer and Sister Anna. Can we do anything for Barbro? asked Dr Fischer with a tormented twist of his lips. No, we couldn’t do a damned thing for Barbro. The disease took its course, it spread throughout her body with devastating effect. I went out to the kitchen to see Sali Singh, gave him a friendly pat on the back. He gave no visible reaction to this touch, he was a simple man who lived in his own world. Maybe his mind was away in Delhi, in the slums he’d frequented as a boy. I could imagine Dr Fischer as a young boy too, in shorts and patent leather shoes, and Anna in a blouse and pleated skirt. I’ve got plenty of imagination. I watch them and think my thoughts. Life is a gift, people say. Life is a challenge, a miracle, something God-given.

I’m not so sure.

I see so much toil and worry.

I hear so much moaning and misery.

Miranda’s thin cheeks had begun to get a bit of colour.

Old Ebba’s bedspread had come on well; her hands worked rapidly, and the work grew in her lap from day to day. Eddie and Janne were still together. They came at regular intervals, sat there fondling in the usual manner, always with the same greediness and intensity. I knew they spent some of their time at the Dixie Café, sucking Coke through a straw and ruining their teeth. We saw little of the black man now. Perhaps he’d been deported, or sent to another Reception Centre. Maybe he’d found a job and some digs, but I thought it unlikely, I’ve never been much of an optimist. I’d got used to Arnfinn fetching up at my door from time to time, begging for a treat like a child, just a wee drink. And I always let him in. There was something solid about him in spite of everything, something straightforward and solid, yes, something unfeigned and honest and genuine. He always sat right in the corner of the sofa, bent slightly forwards with his elbows on his knees. I told myself that he came for my company, too, it wasn’t only the vodka. He was like a great, good-natured dog, sitting there holding his glass in both hands. And like a dog he had that look, the look that says: don’t be cruel, I can’t take all that much.

But the day came when I could no longer show such forbearance. My endurance has its limits too, and we breached them together, Arnfinn and I. It was a Friday in the middle of July, 17 July, and I had the day off. Not because it was my birthday, which it was, but because I was due some time in lieu.