Jens Lapidus - Never Fuck Up

“Come with me, buddy.”

At first, the brat barely seemed to realize what was happening. Babak came in. “What the hell are you doing?” the brat asked. They couldn’t care less about his whining. Mahmud held the hand with the brass knuckles down along the length of his leg. Didn’t want it to be visible from the outside.

“Ey, come with us now. We won’t do nothing bad.”

The brat—not a fighter. They dragged him into the inner room behind the cars. Closed the door. An office: stylin’ oak desk, a flashy-looking computer and pens. Bottles with ink, or something. This was probably where they signed the contracts for these million-kronor cars. Mahmud told the shop kid to sit down. The guy looked more scared than a seven-year-old shoplifter caught barehanded.

“It’s simple. We’re not going to fuck with you anymore. Let’s try this one more time. We just wanna know if you’ve sold a Continental GT to an Arab named Jibril. It’s also possible that he was with someone else who bought it, like, on paper. But you know. You’re the only place in town that sells these cars and you can’t sell too fucking many a month. Am I right?”

“What is it you want, really? You can’t do this.”

“Shut up. Just answer the question.”

Mahmud took a step closer. Stared the kid down. Clear as day how this prejudiced brat saw him: a huge, lethal blatte from some war zone somewhere where they killed one another for breakfast. A bloodthirsty demon.

“We sold a car like that two months ago,” he finally peeped. “But it wasn’t to an Arab.”

“Do better.”

“No, it wasn’t an Arab. It was a company.”

Mahmud reacted right away. There was something the kid wasn’t saying.

“Stop playing now, bratty, you know more. What, Arabs can’t have companies?”

Mahmud opened the door. Peered out. No one in the showroom. He bitch-slapped the shop boy. Gave him his craziest look.

“Racist.”

The dude was still sitting on the desk chair. His cheek red like a stoplight. Looking straight up at Mahmud. Babak with the baseball bat in his hand.

Mahmud hit him again. This was awesome—pure American interrogation technique.

The brat’s eyes watered. Drops of blood fell from his nose. But at least he held the tears back.

“I don’t know. Honestly.”

Mahmud exploded. Kicked the guy in the chest. Inspired by Vitali Akhramenko’s crazy kicks in the Solna sports center. The desk chair went flying into the wall. The guy fell on the floor. Screamed. His eyes twitched. Maybe a tear.

“Fuck, man, you’re crazy.”

Mahmud didn’t answer. Punched the guy straight in the face. Bull’s- eye. Felt like something broke.

The guy shielded his face. Curled up. Mahmud leaned down.

“Tell me, now. ’Cause it’ll just get worse for you.”

The brat bitch whimpered, “Okay, okay.”

Mahmud waited.

The guy whispered, “This is how it was. We sold a Continental two months ago. There were two guys in the store, I think. On paper, the official buyer was a company, but one of the guys was getting the car. Definitely.”

In a calm voice Mahmud said, “Can we see that paper?”

The front door slammed shut. It sounded like someone had knocked something onto the floor out in the hall—maybe it was Mom’s umbrella, maybe it was the bicycle pump that was always propped up against the dresser.

It must be him.

No one else came over to their house in the middle of the week without ringing the doorbell, and no one else shut doors with such a definitive sound.

It must be Claes.

Niklas raised the volume on the TV. He was watching the same movie for the third time this week: Lethal Weapon . Mom didn’t like it when he watched what she called “scary and violent” movies, but she didn’t have the energy to stand up to his protests. He’d learned that a long time ago—Mom always gave in if you asked enough times.

But Claes, he didn’t give in. Niklas knew it was pointless to even ask Mom anything when Claes was there. Not because Mom was less easy to convince, but because Claes got involved and ruined everything. He forbid Niklas to do what he wanted—to watch movies, to go out at night, to get candy from the grocery store. Claes messed everything up. And the old man wasn’t even his real old man.

But sometimes he was nice. Niklas knew when—it was when Claes’d gotten money from his job. He didn’t keep track of exactly when that happened, but it happened too seldom. On those days, Claes came over with a bag of chips and some Coke, a couple of movies, and raspberry licorice. Always raspberry licorice for some reason, even though there was lots of much better candy. He brought bags for him and Mom that looked heavy. Niklas recognized the white bags with the text RECYCLING AT SYSTEMET , meaning the state-run liquor store. He knew what the sound of clinking bottles meant. Sometimes they uncorked that very same night. Sometimes they waited until the weekend. The result varied with Claes’s mood.

Claes came into the living room and positioned himself in front of the TV, right when Mel Gibson was about to dislocate his own shoulder. He looked at Niklas where he lay, slouched down in the couch. One of the sofa cushions was about to tip over the edge and fall down on the floor.

“Niklas, turn the movie off,” he said.

Niklas sat up on the couch and reached for the remote control. The numbers on the hard buttons’d been worn off. The TV was old and looked like it was sitting in a wooden box. But at least there was a remote control.

He turned the TV off. The video continued to run in silence.

“Turn the video off, too. It’s unnecessary to keep it turned on. Don’t you care that your mom doesn’t like it when you watch shit like that?”

Niklas opened his mouth to say something, but no sound came out.

Mom came in and stood in the doorway.

“Hi Classe. How was your day? Can’t he watch the movie a little? You and me can make dinner.”

Claes turned to her.

“I’m damn tired, just so you know.”

Then he sat down on the couch next to Niklas and turned the TV on again. The news was on.

Niklas got up and went into the kitchen. To Mom.

She was peeling potatoes, but stopped when he came in. She took a beer from the fridge.

“Niklas, can you go bring this to Classe? It’ll make him happy.”

Niklas looked at the cold beer. There were small drops on the outside of the can, like it was sweating. He thought it looked funny and wondered to himself, The fridge was cold—so why was it sweating? Then he said, “I don’t want to. Claes doesn’t need a beer, Mom.”

“Why can’t you call him Classe? I do.”

“But his name is Claes.”

“Yes, that’s true, but Classe is nicer.”

Niklas thought Classe was an uglier word than corduroy.

Mom took the beer herself and brought it out to Claes.

Niklas lay down on the bed in his room. It was too short; his toes stuck out. Sometimes it felt a little embarrassing: he was about to turn nine years old and he still slept in a kid’s bed. The same bed that he’d had his whole life, Mom said. They couldn’t afford a bigger one. But on the other hand, he almost never had any friends over anyway.

He picked up an old issue of Spider-Man from the floor and started reading. His stomach was growling. He’d learned at school—that meant you were hungry.

Yes, he was super hungry.