Daniel Åberg - Virus - Stockholm - S1

www.storytel.com

Copyright © Storytel Original 2021

Copyright © Daniel Åberg 2021

Publisher: Storytel Original

Original title: Virus - S1

Translation: Anna Holmwood

Cover design: Cover Kitchen Company Limited

ISBN 978-91-7967-509-7

She wakes. The world is twisting, her head exploding.

Her lips are dry. She tries to moisten them, but her mouth has no saliva. She is having difficultly orientating herself. She lifts her right arm and starts groping away from her body, fumbles and finds something soft, but also scratchy. She pulls back, her pulse leaps. Then she realises what it is – a bearded cheek.

Okay, she’s not alone.

She lifts her other hand, feels along the sheets, and stretches out her arm. No wall. A calm spreads through her aching body.

Thank God she’s not at home.

Amanda opens her eyes. Slowly, no need to hurry. The body next to her is still, but breathing heavily. It’s probably still early morning.

She is lying in a recess shielded by a bookcase. Diagonally left in front, through the space between the wall and the shelves, she can see a projector screen pulled down. The sun is glittering on its white surface and it blinds her. This must be what woke her up.

What happened yesterday? It started with a beer with Filip which quickly turned into two and a guilty conscience because he wasn’t at home with his wife and kid. She stayed, ten minutes of loneliness before a guy – this one? – came and sat next to her.

She slowly twists her head towards him. He is turned away from her, his face in half profile, a bearded cheek and a shaved head. Maybe it was him.

Amanda remembers a couple of drinks, a lame “No, I’ll probably head home now” followed by another drink and… a taxi ride? Yes, definitely a taxi. The question is, in what direction? As long as it wasn’t east, anything but Östermalm. Can’t deal with that. Although it would mean a smooth metro-ride home.

She gently pulls herself up to sitting, looks over at him, and tries not to wake him. The room spins, she has to wait a few seconds before getting up completely. Is he really asleep? Yes, his breathing sounds genuine.

Where did the taxi go? She tiptoes over the parquet towards the window. It can’t have come straight here, she’s too hung-over.

The room is tidy, indie movie posters hang on the wall to the right, a green mid-century sofa with matching coffee table sits below and a light green kitchen is just visible through the door to the left. There’s a reasonable selection of spirits in the corner unit. An iPad on the windowsill. Typical media guy. Not that she needed to explore his apartment to know that. This is her modus operandi.

Amanda looks down at the view below, squints in the bright sunlight. A colourless street without shops, a 1920s block opposite, no intersection in sight. Still in the city at least.

In the kitchen she gently turns the tap and fills one of the two big wine glasses that the guy apparently had time to wash before they went to bed. An empty bottle of red wine by the sink. Beer, cocktails and red wine in one evening – hello headache. She fills the glass a second time and drinks eagerly.

The taxi stopped because of a blue light. “What the hell’s going on,” she remembers the driver saying. He gesticulated, opened the window and peered out. The spire. They were stuck by a blue hoarding. She glanced upwards and remembers seeing a church spire.

She rinses the wine glass silently and puts it back in the dish rack.

Cordoned off. The road was cordoned and there were ambulances, ambulances and a fire engine, honking cars, the guy was angry, chucked a hundred at the driver and jumped out. It’s not far, he said, only four or five blocks, but the flashing lights and the noise on the street had broken the spell. “Where are you going?” he cried, but his protests had no effect. She turned and said, “Bye. It was nice meeting you,” and continued on towards the familiar “T” that marks the entrance to Stockholm’s metro system.

Amanda goes back to the bigger room, peers over at the alcove. The guy hasn’t moved.

Her clothes are beneath the bed. She sneaks, crouches down and ow! Her temples are throbbing, she swallows a scream, shuts her eyes and gropes, gets hold of her bra, vest, jeans, no socks – where are they? Whatever. She crawls backwards, gets dressed still sitting. The guy’s mobile is on the coffee table. She clicks to reveal the time. 07.52. Later than she thought.

Odenplan. She remembers that she ran into the metro at Odenplan, took the stairs two at a time by the building site for the new City Rail, down to the gates, rifled in her handbag and…

Shit!

It hits her the moment she reaches the little hall. She grabs the handbag lying on the floor by the apartment door.

Her mobile. She checked it in the taxi, not sure why, and then came the sudden braking and the blue lights, the guy huffing at the driver and the descent. She has no memory of putting it back into her bag again. Did she leave it on the backseat of the taxi? She rushed up the stairs, past the long wall of adverts, towards the blue lights and the people gathered to watch the ongoing pandemonium, but no: taxi gone. Bye-bye iPhone.

She walks back to the coffee table, trying not to make the parquet creak, and grabs his mobile. Presses the home button, slides to unlock – no pin thank you very much – clicks the phone symbol followed by recent calls. There. Her mobile number, seven attempts to phone her between 23.27 and 00.32. All rejected. No answer.

She feels in her trouser pockets. A receipt, one beer for 59 crowns purchased at 23.21.

Amanda remembers. His back walking east towards Norrtullsgatan, she shouted, humiliated herself, called to him to follow her into the bar, bought beer, borrowed his phone, called her own in the hope that the driver would answer and come back with it.

Well, at least according to the receipt she paid for the beer.

She deletes her number from his call list. Hopefully she hasn’t given him more than a first name.

She starts to feel sick. Time to go.

The guy is stirring. Amanda flinches, drops his mobile on the table and the bang wakes him up.

“Oh, hello,” he says in a raspy, cracked voice. “Are you… uuuh, up?”

“Mm,” she says quickly, gets up and goes out into the hall without looking back at him.

“Shit… I feel awful,” he says. “My stomach kills.”

“Hardly surprising,” she says, picking up her bag and unlocking the apartment door. “Goodbye.” She steps out into the stairwell, closes the door behind her and almost runs down the stairs.

Out on the street, Amanda looks around. Where is she? She can’t place herself and it bothers her. She hates not being in control. She walks towards the nearest intersection, she needs street signs. Soon she sees that she is on Hagagatan, at the crossing with Vanadisvägen. Okay, he wasn’t lying, she’s only four or five blocks from Odenplan. She can just take the subway home. Presumably they came the same way last night, although in the other direction.

The sun blinds Amanda as she walks. She feels sweaty, her mouth is dry, but also furry. As long as she isn’t coming down with something. She has to get some work done this afternoon, once she’s slept off the worst of last night.

Thankfully the streets are quiet, apart from an elderly woman with a dog who gives her a disapproving look, and a middle-aged man wearing a suit running past. Oh God, she just wants to go home. She continues due south to the station. Nearly there.

At Odenplan, everything is quiet. It’s the first Tuesday after Midsummer and everyone must be on holiday. Three people at the crossing. She doesn’t even look in their direction, stares straight ahead as the nausea gathers strength. Green. Amanda takes a deep breath and walks past the now familiar blue hoarding towards the entrance to the metro.