Claire S. Duffy - The Stranger - Season 1

‘Sorry,” Fergus said, with an apologetic smile, ‘ inte … understand,’ he finished lamely.

Bugger. He knew the phrase for I don’t speak Swedish. He’d downloaded the Learn to Speak Swedish course onto his phone, and now that he finally had a chance to use it on another human being, he couldn’t for the life of him think of it.

The woman, diminutive and wiry with light grey hair pulled back into a severe bun, continued to berate him. She jabbed a finger angrily at a spiral notebook hanging on a string next to the door, which did nothing to illuminate Fergus’s transgression. Fergus shrugged helplessly. ‘You don’t speak English, I take it?’

She ignored him, clearly not comprehending, which answered his question. Fergus sighed. Tess had gone on enough times about how annoying she found it that she never got a chance to practice the little Swedish she had learned on the beginners course the company sent her on as part of her relocation package. The current Swedish generation had grown up immersed in English to the point that it was barely a foreign language anymore, but if this woman could effortlessly quote Friends and The Simpsons in a flawless American accent as Tess insisted they all could, she was making a pretty decent job of hiding it. Fergus had no choice but to hope that a mea culpa smile would suffice as apology for whatever he had done.

‘ Men hej, lilla gubben! ’

At the sight of Alfie, the woman abandoned her fury. Her eyes lit up and she grinned, crouching down in front of Alfie who looked up curiously.

‘Vad gör du med tåget?’

Alfie didn’t respond, but continued to stare.

‘He doesn’t speak Swedish either, sorry,’ Fergus said, conscious of the intrinsic pointlessness of his words. The woman ignored him anyway.

‘ Vad heter du?’ she asked, and Fergus returned to the washing machine, figuring that if chatting to Alfie stopped the woman from shouting at him then it was all good. He had just picked up the maddening washing machine instructions again, when he heard something that made his veins run cold.

‘ Heter Alfie, jag bor här, ’ Alfie said distinctly.

‘ Alfie! Vilket vackert namn! Jag heter Magdalena. Hej hej.’ She waved.

‘Hej hej, ’ replied Alfie with a brief smile, returning the wave.

Fergus’s breath caught in his throat. He couldn’t believe what he was hearing. He turned slowly to stare at his son.

The woman had asked Alfie his name and Alfie had responded.

Vad heter du?

What’s your name?

Fergus had never taught Alfie any of the basic Swedish phrases he knew. Tess would probably know the phrase, but she had barely seen Alfie since they arrived and Fergus was confident she wouldn’t have spent the few snatched hours with him speaking Swedish.

Trying to ignore the disquiet growing within him, Fergus wracked his brains. TV? But the odd time Fergus had resorted to TV — feeling furtive and guilty — to keep Alfie amused while he threw together some dinner, it had been British shows he’d found online.

‘Alfie, c’mon let's go and get lunch,’ Fergus said, deciding abruptly that the laundry would have to wait another day.

‘ Trevligt att träffas Alfie. ’ The woman solemnly shook Alfie’s hand. ‘ Vi ses. ’

‘ Hej då !’ Alfie called to the woman’s retreating back as, with a final dirty look at Fergus, she took her leave.

***

Alex woke with a start. She was cold. She opened her eyes, but it made no difference, the dark was so deep it was clearly a long way from morning. She rolled over, snuggled back down and waited for sleep to creep over her again.

It had been a sunny day, one of those rare, precious winter days when the sky was startlingly blue and the snow sparkled, so Alex had taken the opportunity to let some fresh air into her flat as she cooked an elaborate Indian dish. She could have sworn she had closed the window again before going to bed, but maybe the lock hadn’t caught.

Alex’s mother was a great believer in the healing powers of fresh air. One of Alex’s earliest memories was of waking in the pram, bundled up cosily with only her eyes and the tip of her nose exposed to the elements, and coming face to face with a curious cow. They’d stared at one another, the cow’s huge, docile, brown eye filling her vision almost entirely. Alex’s mother, Gull-Britt, in the denim dungarees that featured in every one of Alex’s childhood memories, her white-blond hair tied up in a brightly coloured scarf, had come running from the kitchen with a broom to shoo the cow back into the field. She had then kissed Alex’s forehead before going back inside. Nap time wouldn’t be over until Gull-Britt had finished the chores she had planned for the morning, whether the child was awake or not.

Alex remembered feeling a protective glow from the warmth of her mother’s lips as she dozed off again. The garden had been only covered in frost then, but, like most Swedish children, she had napped in snow and blizzards throughout childhood. Smiling at the memory, she decided not to bother closing the window. If sleeping with an icy nose didn’t do her any harm as an infant, she couldn’t see that it was a problem now.

Just as she felt herself sinking back into a contented sleep, something jolted her back to full consciousness. She froze, as she remembered, with a blinding flash of clarity, that she had closed the window. That it had been locked. The cold wasn’t coming from the December night.

It was happening.

Alex knew that searching the darkness would do no good. It was nothing but a sense. An awareness of something that drove a hard knot of terror into her core. She didn’t hear voices or see visions, there were no ghostly howls or hovering apparitions. No clinking chains or bony hands glowing menacingly. It was just that she knew she wasn’t alone. Sometimes, the awareness came with a strong emotion. She would feel suddenly frightened or thrilled or desperately sad. Other times, it was simply a presence. There was nothing she could do about it. She lived with it. She tried not to think about it.

A curious noise in the darkness made Alex’s stomach twist. She listened keenly, the echo of her thudding heartbeat filling her ears. It had never made a noise before. Something had knocked against the wooden floor of her bedroom. Something hard, something small. Not an organic sound, it wasn’t an insect or a mouse. It moved closer. It trundled. Alex’s hand darted out from under the covers and switched on the lamp. She scrabbled to sit up, then stared at the thing on the floor, curiosity overcoming fear.

It was a small, red, wooden train carriage.

***

‘Have you got any idea how tired I am?’

‘Keep your voice down — he’s sleeping.’ Fergus closed the living room door as Tess paced by the window.

‘This is the first night this week I’ve made it home before midnight, and I’m supposed to deal with — with I don’t even know what —’

‘You don’t have to deal with anything Tess, I was just telling you what happened. The neighbour —’

‘What neighbour?’

‘What does that matter? A woman. A Swedish woman in the laundry room, spoke to Alfie, in Swedish, and Alfie spoke back. I’m just telling you what happened, I’m not saying —’

‘He’s a baby Fergus, he barely speaks English.’

‘He’s been talking loads actually, that’s, that’s the thing — I thought he was regressing, talking baby talk all the time, but it’s not baby talk. I just didn’t understand because I don’t bloody speak Swedish —’

‘So what? So he picked a bit of Swedish up from hearing kids at the park, or cartoons, or —’