Karl Knausgaard - My Struggle - Book One

Now, however, it is calm. Two fishing boats, both with tarpaulin covers open, chugged toward the mouth of the fjord. Two rusty hulks were moored to the quay on the other side, and behind them there was a gleaming white yacht.

Yngve stopped at the lights, which immediately changed to green, and we bore left by the small shopping center with the rooftop parking lot. Up the ramplike, traffic light — regulated concrete driveway, and onto the roof, where fortunately, for this was a national holiday Saturday, there was a space free at the back.

We got out, I leaned my head back and allowed the warm rain to wash my face. Yngve opened the trunk, and we grabbed as many bags as we could carry and took the elevator down to the supermarket on the ground floor. We had decided there was no point trying to get a deposit on the spirits bottles, we would drop them off at the dump, so our load consisted mainly of plastic bottles, and they were not heavy, just awkward.

“You start while I go and get more,” Yngve said when we reached the bottle machine.

I nodded. Put bottle after bottle on the conveyor belt, crumpled the bags as they became empty, and placed them in the garbage bin located there for that purpose. I didn’t care if anyone saw me and was taken aback by the large number of beer bottles. I was indifferent to everything. The zone that had come into existence when we first left the undertaker’s, and that seemed to make everything around me dead, or meaningless, had grown in size and strength. I barely noticed the shop, bathed in its own strong light, with all its glittering, colorful products. I might just as well have been in a swamp somewhere. As a rule I was always aware of how I looked, of how others might think of what they saw, sometimes I was elated and proud, at others downcast and full of self-hatred, but never indifferent, it had never happened that the eyes that saw me meant nothing at all, or that the surroundings I was in were as if expunged. But such was my state now, I was numb, and the numbness prevailed over everything else. The world lay like a shadow around me.

Yngve returned with more bags.

“Shall I take over for a bit?” he said.

“No, I’m fine,” I said. “But you could go and do some shopping. Whatever happens we need detergent, rubber gloves, and garbage bags. And at least something to eat.”

“There’s another load in the car. I’ll get that first,” he said.

“Okay,” I said.

When the last bottle had been delivered and I had been given a receipt, I joined Yngve, who was standing in front of the household detergents section. We took Jif for the bathroom, Jif for the kitchen, Ajax all-purpose cleaner, Ajax window cleaner, Klorin disinfectant, Mr. Muscle for extra difficult stains, an oven cleaner, a special chemical product for sofas, steel wool, sponges, kitchen cloths, floor rags, two buckets and a broom from this aisle, some fresh rissoles from the meat counter, potatoes, and a cauliflower from the vegetable section. Apart from that, things to put on bread, milk, coffee, fruit, a tray of yogurts, and a few packets of biscuits. While we were walking around I was already dying to fill the kitchen with all these new, fresh, shiny, untouched goods.

When we emerged onto the roof it had stopped raining. A pool had formed around the rear wheels of the car, by a slight dip in the concrete. Up here, the air was fresh, it smelled of sea and sky, not of town.

“What do you think happened?” I said when we were on our way down through the dark parking lot. “She says she found him in the chair. Did he just fall asleep?”

“Probably,” Yngve said.

“His heart stopped?”

“Yes.”

“Mm, perhaps not so surprising the way he must have been living.”

“No.”

Nothing was said for the rest of the journey to the house. We hauled the shopping bags up to the kitchen, and Grandma, who had been watching us from the window as we arrived, asked where we had been.

“Shopping,” Yngve said. “And now we need a bite to eat!”

He started unpacking the groceries. I took a pair of yellow gloves and a roll of trash bags, and went down to the ground floor. The first thing to go would be the mountain of moldy clothes in the washroom. I blew into the gloves, eased them on, and started stuffing clothes into the bags, while breathing through my mouth. Gradually as the bags filled I dragged them out and piled them in front of the two green drums by the garage door. I had almost cleared the whole lot — only the sheets stuck together at the bottom were left — when Yngve shouted that the food was ready.

He had cleared the mass from the counter, and on the table, also cleared, there was a dish of fried rissoles, a bowl of potatoes, one of cauliflower, and a little jug of gravy. The table had been set with Grandma’s ancient Sunday best service, which must have spent the last few years in the dining room cupboard, unused.

Grandma didn’t want anything. Yngve put half a rissole, a potato, and a small floret of cauliflower on her plate, nevertheless, and managed to persuade her to try some. I was as hungry as a wolf and ate four rissoles.

“Did you put any cream in the gravy?” I said.

“Uh-huh. And some brown goat’s cheese.”

“That’s good,” I said.

“That’s exactly what I needed right now.”

After eating, Yngve and I went onto the veranda and had a smoke and a cup of coffee. He reminded me to call Tonje’s father, which I had completely forgotten. Or perhaps repressed, this was not a call I was looking forward to making. But I had to, so I went up to the bedroom, fetched my address book from my case and dialed his number from the telephone in the dining room while Yngve cleared the kitchen table.

“Hello, this is Karl Ove,” I said when he answered. “I was wondering if you could help me with a medical matter. I don’t know if Tonje mentioned it, but my father died yesterday. .”

“Yes, she did, she called me,” he said. “I was sorry to hear that, Karl Ove.”

“Mm,” I said. “Well, anyway, I’m down in Kristiansand at the moment. In fact, it was my grandmother who found him. She’s over eighty, and she seems to be in shock. She hardly speaks, all she does is sit. And I was wondering if there were any sedatives or anything that could help. In fact, she’s taking some medication already that probably includes some kind of sedative, but I was thinking. . Yes, that’s it. She’s in a bad way.”

“Do you know what the medication is?”

“I’m afraid not,” I said. “But I can try to find out. Just a moment.”

I put the receiver down on the table and went into the kitchen, to the shelf where her medication tray was. Beneath it, I seemed to remember having seen some yellow and some white bits of paper, presumably prescriptions.

Yes, here, but only one.

“Have you seen the packaging?” I asked Yngve. “The boxes? I’m on the phone with Tonje’s father.”

“There are some in the cupboard next to you,” Yngve said.

“What are you looking for?” Grandma asked from her chair.

I didn’t want to patronize her, and I had been aware of her eyes on my back while I was rummaging, but at the same time I couldn’t take any notice of that.

“I’m talking to a doctor on the telephone,” I said to her, as though that was supposed to explain everything. Strangely enough, it seemed to calm her, and I left with the prescription and the packets semiconcealed in my hands.

“Hello?” I said.

“I’m still here,” he said.

“I’ve just found some of the boxes,” I said and read out the names on them.

“Aha,” he said. “She’s already taking a sedative, but I can prescribe one more for you, that won’t be a problem. As soon as we hang up I’ll phone it through. Is there a pharmacy nearby?”