Карин Фоссум - Hell Fire

When he got back to his apartment on the twelfth floor, he was ambushed by Frank. He knelt down and took one of the dog’s soft paws in his hand. The dog’s eyes, which were barely visible amid all the folds and wrinkles, were black.

“You need a facelift,” he said affectionately. “But it would cost a fortune.”

He went into the kitchen and started to rattle around with the pots and pans. Frank immediately trotted in to beg for scraps. Sejer hesitated before giving him a bit of sausage. I never learn, he thought sheepishly. If only Elise had seen that.

Bonnie wanted to tell anyone who would listen about her inheritance because she was so excited. But something made her hold back. Many of her clients only received a minimum pension and struggled financially just as she had. However, young Alex was let in on the secret. When he heard about Erna’s generosity, he was thrilled.

“So are you going to take me to Bagatelle?” he asked hopefully. “Or an eleven-course dinner?”

“Of course,” Bonnie agreed. “In the autumn. And Elisabeth can come too. But first I have to clear my debts.” They were in the middle of a chess game.

“I wish I had a pawn on wheels with right of way,” Bonnie said with a laugh.

He immediately responded with a very smart move. He leaned back in his wheelchair and looked at her. He wanted to tell this beautiful woman, who was only three years away from forty, and who came to his door to help him, that she was the highlight of his week. But he was far too proud and shy to show his devotion.

“I’ve got an old aunt who lives on a small farm,” he said instead. “And her Border collie is named Bonnie, and she’s an impossible dog.”

Bonnie laughed. “What’s your greatest wish for the future?” she asked him.

“To have my own child,” he replied without hesitation. “I want what you’ve got. A son. He would run riot, but he’d also do things for me. And he would of course be a genius at chess. And I would make it perfectly clear that when it comes to bad driving, he has to stay alive.”

“What’s wrong with a girl?” Bonnie asked.

“Nothing, I just want a boy.”

“And you know that you can have children?”

“Oh yes, we’re planning to. And what’s more, we have you,” he said with a little smile. “I hope that you’ll be around for a long time, and that you won’t desert me, just because you’re rich.”

“Never,” Bonnie assured him and moved a knight.

Alex brushed his bangs away from his face. He was clean-shaven and smelled good.

“You better watch your queen,” he warned her. “Let’s take a break. Put the pizza in the oven.”

Simon Hayden resembled his father, Olav. He had the same slim body and thin ankles. The same blue eyes and the same restlessness. When he was big, he wanted to work at sea, like his father. Every morning when he sat on the bench under the snail at daycare, he looked up at his mother and said: “Do you think the money will come soon?”

“Yes,” Bonnie told him. “It won’t be long now.”

“It will definitely come, won’t it?”

“Yes, we’ll definitely get it. Because Mr. Falck promised. And he knows things like that because he’s a lawyer.”

Simon had already told Märta the big news, and about everything he was going to get and the trip to Africa. That he would have to have lots of vaccinations and that he would come home with photographs of lions. Märta retorted that he might get eaten, but then Simon told her that the person driving the safari car had a gun. Kaja noticed that he had blossomed; he opened up to the other children and the desperate scenes when his mother left had stopped. He would now run around and at times couldn’t be stopped. She had to admit that she was a little envious. There was no likelihood of her ever inheriting anything like that amount of money. But she was pleased for Bonnie.

Britt was also delighted by what had happened. Bonnie’s life was back on track and she hadn’t seen her so happy since she had been with Olav. She could never have dealt with all those difficult old people. She liked the drama of her work with the air ambulance; the first decisive minutes in which she could save a life made her feel important. But what Bonnie did was important too, only in another way. They saw each other more often now than before. Bonnie had more energy, so she got her mother to babysit and they went out on the town.

Bonnie didn’t mind staying out late. When the alarm clock rang in the morning, she jumped out of bed right away to wake Simon, often with a song. He was also quick out of bed. They were both looking forward to the summer that would soon arrive.

The cancer had really started to ravage her body. The pain increased, especially in her bones, and she continued to lose weight. She still hadn’t said anything to Eddie. There was fear in his eyes as he watched his mother getting thinner and thinner, but Mass reassured him that it was just age.

“You know,” she said, “old people are never fat.”

“But you’re not old.”

“Yes, I am. I will be soon enough anyway.”

One day, when Eddie was sitting at the computer, Mass came into the living room with two plastic bags of food and drinks, newspapers, and fruit. And chocolate for Eddie, even though it wasn’t good for him. She had been out for some time because she’d had a few errands to run. She was suddenly reminded of the winter she turned thirteen. She had nagged and nagged her parents until they let her get a perm, because other girls in the class had curly hair. She had straight hair. It was long and thick, to be fair, but not even a wave in a single hair. So after going on and on about it, she was eventually allowed to do it — only to come back from the hairdresser with what could only be compared with black sheep’s wool. When she went to school the next day, the boys in her class flopped over their desks, howling with laughter. They shouted and yelled and pointed, baaing like sheep. They punched her and threw erasers at her. After the last class, she slunk home, burning with embarrassment. She sat down at the fireplace in despair and cut off all the curls as close to her head as she could. She threw them into the fire and could still recall the smell of burnt hair. When she looked in the mirror afterward, she looked like a plucked chicken. And as if that wasn’t enough, she then tore off her clothes and threw them on the fire too. She remembered the episode now, standing in the middle of the room with a green scarf around her head. Eddie looked at her in astonishment because she had never used a scarf before.

“Is that in fashion now?” he asked.

“Yes,” Mass said. “Let’s hope so.”

“But you’ve got such lovely hair, you shouldn’t hide it.” He turned back to the screen, his fingers racing over the keyboard.

Mass collapsed into her chair; she looked at her son’s broad shoulders and his brown hair that curled so beautifully at the neck.

“Where have you been?” he asked, turning around again. “You were gone for ages. If you’re going to be that long, you have to say. Otherwise I just sit here waiting and not knowing.”

“I went to the hairdresser,” Mass said in a feeble voice.

“What?” Eddie couldn’t believe it. “But you’ve got a scarf on. Did she make a mess of it?”

“No.” She turned away. She knew that she couldn’t avoid it any longer. It was as if there was a wolf between them, snarling. Get to the point. Coward.

“I don’t have hair anymore,” she said and looked straight at him.

“What do you mean, you don’t have hair?”

“I’ve shaved it off,” she explained, “because it was starting to fall out.”