John Lindqvist - Little Star

‘No,’ said Beata, ‘unfortunately. It used to have potatoes in it. Ages ago. Before that, I don’t know.’

Teresa wrinkled her nose. A minor disappointment. Not that she had any definite plans, but the very thought of having explosives at her disposal was appealing. Miranda seemed to share her feelings because she said, ‘Shit, that’s a shame. Just imagine if we’d had some dynamite.’

There was silence for a while, and they stood together in the darkness surrounded by the smell of mould, each thinking privately of the use they could make of something that could blow everything to kingdom come. Then they heard Ronja’s voice from up above.

‘Hey, where is everybody?’

A minute or so later, Ronja, Malin and Cecilia were down in the cellar as well. They had all arrived. Teresa closed her eyes, feeling the presence of the others’ bodies around her, the breathing and the small noises, the beat of their pulses and the shared scent that drove the musty smell away. She took a deep breath through her nose and straightened her back. Theres said, ‘Close the door.’

Teresa expected protests. Cold, horrible, scared of the dark and so on, but none came. She didn’t know whether it was because they had all been seized by that same feeling of immediacy and togetherness, or because Theres had said it. But nobody raised any objections as Anna S and Malin pooled their strength to pull the heavy door shut, and suddenly it was pitch dark. Teresa opened and closed her eyes, but there was no difference.

Yes. There was one difference. When they had been sitting in total darkness for a minute or so, it was as if the others’ bodies moved even closer, so close that they began to dissolve and flow through her. She could hear them, she could feel them, she could taste them, and in the enclosed darkness they became like one body, several hundred kilos of flesh waiting, breathing.

‘We are the dead,’ said Theres, and an almost inaudible gasp went through the mass as every heart stopped and listened. She had said it. Now it was true.

‘We are in the darkness. We are beneath the earth. No one can see us. We do not exist. Little One is here. Little One came from the earth. Little One was given eyes. And a mouth. Little One could sing. Little One became dead. And lived again. Little One is here. Death is not here.’

When Theres had uttered the final words everyone let out a long breath together. Teresa got up and made her way through the bodies. When she reached the door she had to brace her back against it to push it open. Sunlight poured in.

One by one the girls emerged, blinking in the gentle evening light. They looked at each other, saying nothing, drifting off in different directions or gathering in small groups. Five minutes or so passed.

Then it was as if a slow, rolling wave moved through the air, reaching them one by one. Happiness. Linn found some early wild strawberries and started threading them on a blade of grass. Soon several of the others began to do the same thing. Ronja found a football that was virtually deflated, and she, Anna L and Sofie started to play, passing it to one another. And so on.

Teresa sat on a chopping block watching them. She had almost forgotten Theres until she saw her come up from the cellar and peer across at the others. Teresa went over.

‘Hi.’

Theres didn’t respond. Her eyes were dark, and she was not squinting because of the light; her eyes were narrowed in disapproval.

‘What’s the matter?’ asked Teresa.

‘They don’t understand.’

‘What is it they don’t understand?’

‘You know.’

Teresa nodded slowly. She was standing beside Theres. She was the one who had the knowledge. That was the way it should be. Unfortunately it wasn’t true.

‘No,’ she said. ‘I don’t know, actually. I thought it was terrific when we were down in the cellar together. You did something. Something happened.’

‘Yes,’ said Theres, looking at the other girls as they raced around. ‘Together. Not now. Not Cecilia. Not Ronja. Not Linn. Not Malin…’ She kept going until she had listed every single name, and finished off with, ‘Not you.’

‘So what do you think we should do now, then?’

‘Come with me.’

Theres turned and went back down into the cellar. Teresa followed her.

When they went into the house a while later, the others had unpacked the baby food and sorted the jars into groups according to content. Vegetable puree was the most popular, but nobody was very keen on meat with dill, and they pretended to quarrel over the jars as spoons criss-crossed so that everyone could try the different flavours.

They were sitting in a circle on the floor and Teresa joined them, while Theres went and sat alone at the kitchen table, opened a jar of beef stew and stuck her spoon in it without a word. The cheerful atmosphere ebbed away and everybody kept glancing at Theres, who shovelled down the khaki coloured slop until she had emptied two jars, her face completely expressionless.

Even Teresa, who had sat with Theres in the cellar and talked until they shared the same conviction, couldn’t understand her behaviour. She had never seen Theres like this in the group, and was just about to pass on what she had said when Theres exploded.

She got to her feet, picked up a baby-food jar in each hand, and hurled them at the wall. When Beata said, ‘Hey-’ Theres screamed, letting out one single, piercingly clear note. It was like having a dentist’s drill thrust into your ears, and everyone curled up, their arms over their heads. Theres’ voice jumped up an octave until the frequency sliced through flesh and made the bones vibrate. The girls just sat there, curled up, rigid with tension as they waited for it to stop.

The scream broke off abruptly, and the silence that followed was almost as unpleasant. The girls lowered their arms and saw Theres sitting at the kitchen table once more, staring at them as silent tears rolled down her cheeks. None of them dared go over to comfort her.

Slowly Theres got up from the table, pulled open a drawer containing tools, and selected an awl. She stood in front of them and drove it into her right arm with such force that it stuck fast. She pulled it out and blood welled up. When she put the awl in her right hand and squeezed it, her palm was already sticky and red. She drove the awl into her left arm, showed it to them and pulled it out again. At no point did her expression change. Only the tears continued to flow.

Perhaps her vocal cords had been damaged by that high-pitched scream. When she spoke her voice seemed impossibly deep for her slender body.

‘You don’t understand,’ she said. ‘I can’t feel it.’

She put down the awl and went outside.

The girls stayed where they were on the floor. Someone picked up a jar that had fallen over, someone dropped a spoon, and those who had started crying because Theres was crying gently dried their tears. Teresa picked up their scent, and the scent was shame. They were all ashamed and did not know why, did not understand what they had done wrong.

Teresa put her jar of apricot puree down on the floor and got up. ‘I’ll go and help her.’

Someone in the group whispered, ‘But how?’

‘There’s something we’re going to do.’

When she got outside Theres was already on her way back from the garden shed with a spade. They passed one another without speaking, and in the shed Teresa found another spade, which she took round to the front of the house, to the grassy slope leading down to the water.

The sun had set but was resting just below the horizon, and the sky was pale violet as they drove their spades into the ground and began to dig. Theres’ arms and hands were bright with half-dried blood; there was a sticky sound as she let go of the spade and grabbed hold of it again, and the effort made the blood start welling up once more from the small, deep wounds. If she was in pain, she gave no indication of it.