Karl Knausgaard - Some Rain Must Fall

I returned to Rick’s alone, walked up the broad majestic stairs, entered the room, which was now full of young women in their party frocks and young men in dark suits, urbane and worldly and self-assured Vestlanders. The buzz of conversation, peals of laughter, the expectant atmosphere that only precedes a celebration. I stepped back and searched for Yngve.

Yngve, Yngve, where are you when I need you?

There was Hans anyway. But he was also one of them, urbane and worldly and self-assured, always with an ironic riposte on his tongue. I was proud of being in the same band as him, but not of being in the same band as Yngve, because everyone realised it was thanks to him that I had the chance to play and be here.

I slowly mingled in the crowd. Many of the faces were familiar, I had seen them at Høyden and Café Opera, Garage and Hulen, although I could put a name to less than a handful.

I caught sight of Ragnar Hovland and wondered whether to approach him. Being seen in conversation with him would do wonders for my status.

I moved towards him. He was talking to a woman in her mid-thirties and didn’t see me until I was next to them.

‘Hi,’ he said. ‘It’s the man himself!’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘We’re going to play later.’

‘You’re in a band! Well, I’m pleased to hear that.’

His eyes were smiling but also shifty.

‘How’s it going at the Academy?’

‘It’s good. We had to introduce compulsory attendance after you left. But they’re behaving well.’

‘I know Espen,’ I said. ‘He’s a good friend of mine.’

‘Is that right?’ he said.

There was a silence. Both he and I scanned the room.

‘Any books on the go?’ I said at length.

‘There’s one I’m messing about with,’ he said.

The natural response would have been to ask me how my writing was going, if I had any new books on the go, but he didn’t. I could understand why, and I didn’t blame him, but it still rankled with me.

‘Right,’ I said. ‘Perhaps talk later. I’m just going for a walk.’

He smiled and turned back to the woman. I noticed Yngve arrive, moved towards the entrance area, where he was standing and looking around. I raised my hand and went over to him.

‘Butterflies?’ he said.

‘Yes, terrible,’ I said. ‘And you?’

‘Not so bad. They’ll come soon enough.’

I lit a cigarette, we joined Hans, chatted for a bit until a girl clapped her hands and silence spread like a flock of pigeons startled into the air. She welcomed everyone. There was a dinner, there were speeches, there was entertainment and last of all a gig with Kafkatrakterne.

My stomach knotted so hard it hurt.

We went to the table, there were name cards, I found mine and sat down, a long way from Yngve and Hans unfortunately.

Each card bore a sentence about the bearer, a personal characteristic. Mine said Twenty years on the outside, a thousand on the inside.

Was that how they saw me? Was that how I was seen?

In the last year I had spoken less and less, become more and more reticent, that was probably what the card was alluding to.

The girl beside me, who was wearing a short black skirt with some net trimming at the bottom, dark stockings and red high-heeled shoes, unfolded her serviette and laid it on her lap. I followed suit.

She looked at me.

‘Who do you know here? I mean, of those who organised the party.’

‘No one,’ I said with a blush. ‘I’m playing in the band.’

‘Oh,’ she said. ‘What do you play?’

‘The drums,’ I said.

‘Oh,’ she said.

I looked the other way for a while and that was the end of her questions.

I ate without saying a word to anyone, occasionally casting a glance at Yngve or Hans, who were both chatting away with their neighbours.

The dinner lasted an eternity.

There was a storm outside. The wind was so strong that dustbins were sent rolling through the streets, I could hear the clatter below, and now and then windowpanes tinkled.

The moment the dinner was over I joined Yngve and Hans and stayed at the front until we were due to play.

We were introduced, I could barely stand up straight, people clapped, we went over to our instruments, I sat down on the little drum stool, put on the NFK cap which I had brought along as a little gesture to the audience — NFK was an agricultural co-op, they might be on their way to glittering academic success, but they had grown up with tractors, combine harvesters and cans of formic acid, the whole bunch of them — wiped my hands on a towel, grabbed the sticks. People stood watching us. It was my job to count, but I didn’t dare in case Pål or Yngve weren’t ready.

‘Are you ready?’ I said.

Yngve nodded.

‘You ready, Pål?’

‘Count, Karl Ove,’ he said.

I hummed the first riff of ‘Over My Head’ sotto voce.

OK.

I counted and we started to play. To my horror, I discovered that the bass drum was sliding away from me with every beat. Not much, but enough for me to be sitting with my leg fully outstretched by the end of the song, and as I had to hit the hi-hat and the snare drum at the same time I must have looked like some kind of elongated monster spider.

They clapped, I pulled the bass drum back, counted for the next song and slipped back into my spider pose. People started dancing, it was going well, Hans especially made sure of that, he was the showman, undaunted and, luckily, uncritical.

When I got home, after crossing the wind-blown deserted town in the early hours, I cried. For no reason, everything was great, the concert had been a success, at least as far as we could judge, but it didn’t help, the moment my head touched the bed the tears came.

In the new year I was offered a regular weekend temporary post at the hospital, which I accepted. In addition, I put my name on the temping list and, so gradually that I hardly noticed, I found myself working there full time. I put my studies on hold and said yes to everything, I had an appetite for it, almost an urge, I wanted to work as much as possible and did so all the following year. Some days I did double shifts, started in one ward in the morning, transferred to another in the evening and in this way worked sixteen hours in succession. Some weeks I took shifts in the hardest ward, those who worked there were to a large degree bouncers, and I was ill at ease, in fact I was scared the whole time, a couple of the residents I considered extremely dangerous although the bouncers just laughed at them and sometimes even put them on their laps and patted them while they watched TV, as if they were cats.

One in particular was terrifying. His name was Knut, he was in his late thirties but had the physique of a teenager. Slim muscular body, an attractive shaven head. He had his head shaved because otherwise he would pull out his hair and eat it. He also ate dust balls if he found any, and one afternoon I saw him open the fridge and take out an onion. He sank his teeth in, tears began to roll, but he took another bite and another and soon he had eaten the whole onion, the outer layer and everything, still crying. He could be aggressive. More often than not he hurt himself, once he rammed his head against the wall so hard that he cracked his skull. What he liked best was walking. If no one had been there to stop him he would have walked to Siberia, he was like a machine, he just walked and walked and walked. When he came towards me in the ward with those dark eyes of his, which expressed exactly that, darkness, I was always afraid. Once I was supposed to shave him while he was in the bathtub, he must have sensed my fear because he grabbed my hand, I couldn’t move it, and then he bit. I had to have a tetanus jab afterwards. They told me I could go home, but I went back to work, I was afraid of course but I didn’t want anyone to know that.