Peter Stjernström - The Best Book in the World

‘He has been inside my home. He has stopped my love. He has stolen it!’

Eddie X slams his hand down on the desk so that the computer jumps up. He can’t concentrate on work. He can’t write, not a single word. Something is churning away inside him, an unpleasant sensation which is increasing all the time. Sometimes it feels as if he had swapped something valuable. Sometimes it feels as if he had lost it forever. And he can’t get hold of Astra either.

He is tired and feels apathetic. The blood is draining out of his veins. Words disappear from his mouth. Ideas evaporate from his brain. What is left is a vacuum, an empty space. He will soon implode.

It doesn’t help to go into vintage shops and buy colourful clothes. It doesn’t make it better to smile at people he meets in town and who expect a friendly reception.

He wants to be able to kick an empty beer can without people wrinkling their nose at him.

He wants to be able to disappear like a chameleon against a wall.

He wants to sleep.

But he can’t.

He has been reading. And, sure, it is an obvious theft. They are going to discover that. Now he must work, regain the initiative. That is the right path.

He knows what must be done, and he is concocting his plans.

Acall from an ex-directory number. I hate people who don’t dare show where they are ringing from, Astra thinks irritably when she answers:

‘Yes, hello?’

‘Yes, hi. I wonder if you are the person responsible for your company’s security issues?’

‘No, I’m not.’

‘Well, my name is Fabian Nadersson and I’m phoning on behalf of Maximal Security. Can you spare a minute?’

‘But I said that I am not responsible for security issues. Are you deaf?’

‘No, not at all. On the contrary. The thing is that at the moment we have a good campaign for automatic back-up copying via the net. All of your company’s computers can upload a complete back-up file every day without the users having to do anything. You don’t need any extra bandwidth, and everything is stored on double servers in Maximal Security’s vaults.’

‘But I don’t care. I AM NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR SECURITY ISSUES.’

‘I see. But you might be interested in signing up for a trial period? The first week is free…’

‘No! You must phone the person responsible for security issues!’

‘Okay, who is that?

‘I haven’t the faintest idea…’

‘But it is just a trial period. You don’t commit yourself to anything. The first week is completely free and after a week you can contact us if you don’t want to…’

‘Stop, stop, stop! I don’t want to talk to you anymore. Thank you and goodbye!’

‘Okay, we’re agreed then?’

‘Wait. WAIT. What do you mean “we’re agreed”?’

‘That you’re signing up for a trial period. Aren’t you?’

‘No! We are not signing up for any damned trial period! Is that understood?’

‘Absolutely. Thank you for your time. Goodbye.’

‘Goodbye.’

Astra throws the phone down onto her desk and leans backwards. She is angry. Just now, everyone is an idiot, especially people trying to sell you things over the phone. Only sadists become telemarketers. They sit there and delight in retaining their icy cold attitude while the person they are talking to gets all the more irritated. In eight out of ten cases it ends with the person who has answered shouting down the phone and cutting off the call. And the pleasure-loving telephone sellers, what do they do? They record the whole thing and listen to the worst conversations time and time again. They praise their own calmness and laugh scornfully at the victim on the other end.

Automatic back-ups. Yawn. Who gives a damn?

She continues the dreary task of answering the day’s emails and shakes her head at that telephone seller Fabian Nadersson and his hopeless attempt to get her to buy something. And anyway, Nadersson? What sort of name is that?

She thinks about Titus and his computer. There, the security is already tip-top. Her company already has an excellent security department and she hasn’t the slightest inclination to let any horrid telephone seller plague their lives. It was quite right to cut off that Nadersson fellow and his ex-directory number.

Then it struck her. The back-up copy…

Hadn’t Titus left a memory card at her flat when they had that working meeting with Evita? Where did that get to? Bloody hell, it’s time she gave Titus some feedback. She really ought to read the manuscript and phone him. It really isn’t his fault that Eddie is a blockhead. Did she take the card with her to work? No, she can’t remember that she ever picked it up. Yet she is absolutely certain that Titus put it on the coffee table. Is it still there?

When Astra gets home she can’t find the memory card anywhere. She looks behind all the cushions and under the rug. Nowhere.

She recapitulates the meeting she had with Titus and Evita. They talked about the book launch and that they would translate some chapters for the book fair so that they had something to show the international agents. And when they had almost finished, Eddie rang the doorbell. Did Titus put the card on the table before or after Eddie had come? He must have put it on the table long before Eddie turned up. And since she didn’t pick it up, that means the card lay there when Eddie came in…

Surely, it isn’t possible…

Could Eddie have…?

No, why should he…?

She dismisses the ridiculous idea. Now she is starting to become as paranoid as Titus. Let’s look at this sensibly. No, the card must have been mislaid when she cleaned, or something like that. She must have had her mind on other things. And by now the card has either ended up in the rubbish, or she has put it somewhere and forgotten where.

She must phone Titus and ask him for a new memory card. That’s probably just as well. Then she’ll have an opportunity to check progress and she’ll get a more up-to-date manuscript. But she can’t tell Titus that she has gone and lost the first one. Then he would just fall to bits.

She phones him, but he doesn’t answer. Where can he be? She looks at her watch to check the date. The sixth. Wasn’t it today that Titus was going to read at that Spoken Word Festival at Södra Teatern? Yes, of course it was.

She decides to grab a bite before she goes. She finds some Parma ham and marinated zucchini in the fridge and she grates a little pepper and parmesan over it. I’ll have to eat quickly, she thinks, I must get some make-up on too. And find something really attractive to wear.

Eddie X will be there of course, and she is not going to treat him to the sight of her looking tired or miserable. That idiot.

Really she doesn’t want to go to that spectacle at all. However, she is Titus’ publisher. Her conscience gnaws and tells her she ought to give him all the support she can, despite his having behaved in such an annoying manner.

These readings are usually out-and-out freak shows. Clownery and sick humour of the worst type, albeit nicely hidden in a cultural cloak.

But now that Titus is sober, perhaps he at least can retain a fragment of his honour?

In Stockholm in the beginning of September you can’t be sure of anything. Is it summer or autumn? Are people happy after their holidays and life-sustaining activities? Or are they already beginning to become depressed, faced as they are with eight months of darkness? If they have let themselves go over the top with summer delights, they can lose their minds in the winter when the dreary contrast casts its shadow on their senses. And if they have completely shut out the summer, their bodies might have been exposed to too little sunlight and the consequent vitamin D shortage will knock them straight into an autumn and winter depression instead.