Karin Alvtegen - Shadow

He stuffed the letter and the manuscript back in the envelope and unlocked the door to the cupboard. He put it on top of a pile and went back to his typewriter.

It was twenty past two.

By evening he still hadn’t written a single word.

The low pressure that had settled in during the summer was stubbornly hanging on. For four days it had been raining, and the sky was so dark they had to turn on the lights in the morning. Water had leaked in through the letter-box, but Axel could clearly read the writing on the card that Gerda delivered to him when the post arrived. Written in ink and open to public gaze.

Prinsen Restaurant 17.00 today. Your H

Gerda had left, and again he sat bewildered. He couldn’t quite work out why it was so important to him to know whether Gerda understood or not. She would never tell tales to Alice, so that couldn’t be the reason; it must be something else. There was something in him that sought Gerda’s approval. He had heard the happy laughter from the kitchen whenever his parents were visiting, easy-going conversations that faltered when he tried to participate. The community from which he was now excluded. He wanted to have Gerda on his side, to assure himself that what she told them about him was well-intentioned, what she said to the two people he could no longer reach. She was his link to what had been taken from him.

He turned over the card. A picture of a little kitten on a pink cushion. The key to the cupboard lay in his desk drawer, and he opened it up and put the card in a box of fan mail.

Naturally he wouldn’t go to the restaurant, but her boldness had ruined his concentration. Anything other than ignoring her would be meeting her halfway. For a long time he’d been used to having people around him respect his orders, and if anything bothered him, measures were immediately taken. Now he was being subjected to her unwelcome approaches. She kept cropping up in his thoughts; she had acquired a power she had never been granted. The whole situation was untenable, and at the present moment it was intolerable.

The rain continued. It was reported on the news that the record had been broken. Never before had so much rain fallen in eastern Svealand as in these two months.

His publisher called, proposing a meeting. Some of his older titles were going to be reissued, and they wanted him to look at cover designs. Reluctantly he left his office and took a taxi into the city. He needed to ask for more advance money, which was always humiliating. Alice didn’t know, but there was good reason to worry. If he didn’t get something written soon, the situation could well become alarming.

He was received with coffee and rolls, and not until the end of the meeting did his publisher ask how it was going with the new book. He lied and said everything was going well. He might be able to finish by spring. He regretted the remark at once, as he realised the consequences. But an additional advance was approved.

When he stepped outside, it had finally stopped raining. He stood in the entrance for a moment, wondering whether he should take a little walk. Perhaps all the way down to Slussen and then take the commuter train home. He was just setting off when he felt a hand on his shoulder. It may have been the cigarette smoke, maybe just his instinct, or maybe he had been expecting it the whole time, but he knew who it was before he even turned round. He was greeted by her smile. Nothing of what he’d planned to say to her remained, not a word would pass his lips. The strength of his displeasure gave him a feeling of inferiority. Even the note slipped into his pocket on the train had felt like an infringement. All the days of dreading new attempts at contact came as an assault.

She dropped her cigarette and made a move to embrace him. He fended her off and took a step back.

‘Listen to me, Halina, I…’

‘Sshh.’

She put her finger to his lips and he was caught off guard.

‘Just let me look at you for a moment.’

He noticed the smell of tobacco. He removed her hand from his face and dropped it as if wanting to be rid of something unpleasant. Her smile faded as abruptly as she had appeared.

‘What is it? Why are you acting so strangely?’

The door to the publisher’s opened and two men came out. Axel recognised one of them and nodded in greeting, doing his best to seem nonchalant. The whole time he was watched by Halina, who seemed to be reconsidering the situation. She fished around in her handbag for another cigarette, lit it and took a quick puff.

‘Shouldn’t I be the one who’s angry? Do you know how long I sat waiting for you at Prinsen?’

‘I never said I’d come.’

‘Oh, I see. So you didn’t even think you could take the time to ring the restaurant and let me know you weren’t coming? That would have saved me a lot of bother.’

He changed the subject and tried to assume a conciliatory tone.

‘Halina, I don’t know what you were hoping for, but you have to stop contacting me. You know I’m married.’

She snorted. ‘It didn’t seem to matter in Västerås.’

‘No, I know. I was… it was stupid that things turned out the way they did, but I thought it was understood that it didn’t… that it only… that it was just then…’

‘That you wanted to have a sneaky little fuck?’

Axel closed his eyes and put his hand over his face. The situation he was in was so absurd that despite his profession he was at a loss for words. Forty-eight years old and he was standing here in the street trying to break off a relationship he had never started. In the hope of making himself understood he threw out his arms.

‘I’m sorry if I led you to believe there could be anything between us, I really am. I don’t usually behave that way but, well, things just turned out the way they did. I assumed that we both knew it was a one-off. I have a family and children and I, well, I really do beg your forgiveness.’

She smiled, but now it was another sort of smile.

‘So that’s all it was?’

‘Yes, unfortunately, that’s how it has to be.’

She gave a flat little laugh.

‘So, you, Axel Ragnerfeldt, the famous fucking author with a pole up his arse, you think it’s okay just to screw me a little and then throw me away like an old towel?’

‘Halina, please,’ he appealed to her, but she just shook her head.

‘How the fuck could I be so stupid?’

He suddenly got the feeling that he was dealing with a child.

‘Halina, please, I sincerely apologise for what happened. Can’t we just try to part as friends? Can’t we at least do that?’

She took a drag on her cigarette.

‘Do you know what I do when I get angry with myself?’

He sighed.

‘Can’t we just…’

‘This is what I do.’

She stretched out her arm. He couldn’t stop her. With a sizzling sound she pressed the tip of the cigarette onto her bare wrist. He slapped away her hand and looked in horror at the reddish-black hole the burn had left behind.

‘Are you mad?’

She stood quite still, as if the pain had numbed her. He looked around to see if anyone had seen what happened, but there was no one nearby. The sleeve of her jacket fell down over the wound and he gently took hold of her arm. She wrenched it free and stepped back a couple of paces, turned round and walked away. Axel stood there watching her go, utterly at a loss. She crossed the street and he still stood there, incapable of understanding what had just happened. What scared him was not only what she had done, but also what he had seen in her eyes. Something in her look that had escaped him the first time, but this time he had seen it clearly. He wanted to get out of her consciousness. He didn’t want to be a part of what occupied her thoughts.