Caroline Eriksson - The Missing

“I’m on your side,” I blurt out. “Don’t you realize that? You and I, we have a lot—”

“Who the hell do you think you are? We are not on the same side!”

She shouts so loud that I fall silent and take a step back. For a moment, I think I see her face contort in a grimace of pain and shame, but then it’s gone. Replaced by a hard and impenetrable mask. She looks away. Her arm shoots out, straight and tense. She seems agitated as she points at something right behind me.

“Jorma knows now! He knows you were the one who did it!”

I turn to look where she’s pointing, toward the boats. My eyes are drawn to the smeared lump and the blood in the bottom of the newer boat. An icy cold spreads through my body.

“Did what?” I ask, my voice hoarse.

“We know you’ve been on the island. We’re the only ones who go out there. So it must have been you.”

Everything is shimmering before my eyes. I don’t reply. Because what is there to say? I stand there, feeling how it’s seeping out of me. All my self-confidence and strength. The girl puts her hands on her hips.

“Did you go there alone? Out to the island, I mean. Were you alone, or were there others?”

Her voice now has a commanding ring to it. As if this were an interrogation. And in a way, it is. I realize it makes no difference what I say. My throat tightens, and I take a step back.

“No… or, yes. It was me and my husband and my… my…”

I struggle to finish the sentence, but I can’t. Dizziness is making the ground spin under my feet. The lies are swarming over each other, slithering around my body and threatening to pull me down. I’ve lied ever since we came here to Marhem. To the girl and her gang, to the man in the brown house, to the police. Even I have no idea why. But it doesn’t matter; the reason is of no consequence. The only important thing is that it can’t go on. I can’t lie anymore. Alex is not my husband. And Smilla is not my daughter.

“There were three of us who went out to the island. But the other two…”

Not another lie. Not to her. The girl is waiting. But when I don’t go on, she gets impatient.

“What? What about the other two?”

How do I explain? They didn’t come back. They disappeared. Slowly, very slowly, I keep backing away from the water and the girl, moving toward the forest road and my bicycle. But my young namesake follows. Again she shoves me hard in the chest.

“Confess! I already know what you did. We all know.”

Then I turn around. And run. As fast as I can, cutting between the trees and clambering over the ditch. Back up on the forest road, I grimace with pain and nausea, but I don’t allow myself to pause or rest. I grab the bike and jump on. The girl makes no attempt to hold me back. As I ride away from there, I hear her yelling after me.

“Jorma will make sure you’re punished.”

At that moment, when I hear those words, something clicks inside me. Something important is making its way through the haze that envelops my consciousness. A realization. Revenge. That’s the thought pounding in my head. He’s out for revenge. He’s going to make sure I’m punished. But Jorma isn’t the he I’m thinking about.

It was never a secret that Alex was married. From early on in our relationship, he was open about the fact that he had a wife and daughter in his life. It wasn’t something that bothered me. On the contrary. Even though I’d been reluctant to allow anyone to get close, it seemed just as unthinkable to let go when Alex came into my life.

Before I knew it, I’d told both my mother and Katinka about him. Mama had asked me so many times, with a hopeful look in her eyes, whether there was anyone special in my life. But she wasn’t pleased when she heard about Alex. Did I let slip the fact that he was already taken? Or did Mama ask questions that led her to that conclusion? I’m not really sure. All I remember is her reaction.

How could you, Greta? How on earth could you?

I knew what she was thinking—that I was my father’s daughter, that I was following in his reprehensible footsteps. But I wasn’t responsible for Alex’s infidelity. I owed nothing to that faceless woman who sat somewhere, waiting for him to come home. Truth be told, I respectfully didn’t give a shit about her. Just like I didn’t give a shit about Mama’s disapproval.

Katinka was also skeptical, but she promised to share my joy if I was happy. Happy, I thought one evening, a month after the start of my relationship with Alex. Am I happy? I turned my head to look at him lying next to me on the mattress.

“Shouldn’t we talk more? Get to know each other? Isn’t that what people do?”

He grinned at me.

“If you want to,” he said. “So tell me something about yourself. Something really shameful.”

My throat closed up. Something shameful? Papa. The subject never to be discussed. No one had ever been able to get the truth out of me about what happened. It was the reason I’d spent my whole life keeping people at arm’s length. But here I was now, with a man who claimed to see me, really see me. And suddenly I heard myself telling Alex about that night. About the open window, about Papa falling into eternity. When I came to the end, something made me stop, keep the most crucial details to myself. But I’d told him enough.

“I think you’re a little crazy, sweetheart. Not exactly right in the head.”

Alex laughed, but I could see in his eyes that he was serious. And he was probably right. After that, I gradually gave up any hope for emotional closeness. I had someone at my side. That was enough. We didn’t need to know everything about each other.

Then came the night when Alex pressed my naked body against the windowpane.

Don’t ever leave me. That’s what it said on the card that came with the flowers the next day. It might have been a plea. Or a command. No matter what, I didn’t leave. I couldn’t stand the thought of being alone again. Instead, I placed myself in Alex’s hands, allowed him to lead me further into the dark. Pain slowly crept into our relationship.

But still I didn’t leave. I continued to cling to him. Alex led and I followed. Until the path led down into the abyss.

I hear a beeping in my pocket. I take a deep breath, look around in a daze. Where am I? I take in my surroundings, realize that I’m sitting in my car in a half-empty parking lot outside a small grocery store. How did I get here? I must have driven, of course, but I don’t remember doing that. Then I recall my encounter with the girl, the bike ride through the woods back to the cabin, the lactic acid in my legs, the taste of blood in my mouth. The fateful shouts about revenge and punishment resounding through the forest and inside my head. I remember the fear, can still feel it tingling in my fingertips and churning in my stomach. But it’s not only fear. It’s more than that. It’s a sense of rebellion, the desire to stand up and confront the enemy. Finally that feeling has awakened inside me. That’s why I’m here. To take action.

The beeping sound in my pocket again. I take out my cell. A text message from Katinka. Hope you guys are fine. Thinking of you. Only two sentences, but heavily charged with meaning.

As time passed, and my relationship with Alex changed, as I accepted more, asked for more, Katinka was always there with her silent, searching eyes. When I started calling in sick more often, she would ask me how I was really feeling. She was the only one who noticed there was something strange about the way I was walking that day. Or at least the only one who asked me outright.