Tore Renberg - See You Tomorrow

Sandra Vikadal.

Imagine if the two of them end up together. Maybe he’ll inherit heaps of money. He’s a lawyer, her dad, rolling in money those lawyers. Her mother works at the church, plenty of money there too, in that church system.

Daniel inhales the smoke. He hears a dog bark in the distance. A car passing on the road behind the woods.

He’ll own a car in any case, a car to drive round with his lawyer-daughter wife, who’s always in good humour and who he sleeps with once a day. That’s what his last foster father said. You’re not a man if you don’t have your own garden to piss in and a car you can drive whenever you like. Daniel wants an American car. A Buick RAM. If he gets rich, he’ll buy Veronika a car too. Wonder what kind of music Veronika would like if she could hear. There’s nothing to stop deaf people from driving, is there? She’s totally kickass when she sits in front of him smiling in her Buddha position while he’s hammering away on the drums. Veronika will get to be around, that’s for sure. He’ll take bloody good care of her, she can sit in the Buddha position for the rest of her life, listen to him play the drums, break out in that deaf laughter of hers and be as weird as she wants. She can live with him and Sandra, no problem. He just needs to make a shitload of money so they can all live well. Veronika can have a whole Buddha floor to herself. It’s just a matter of raking in the money. Good thing he writes songs, that means royalties. Daniel knows he needs to write some new lyrics soon. Dejan is on at him the whole time, come on, songsmith, come on with the poetry shit. Yeah, yeah, he says, I’m working on it. But he isn’t. Everything has been blocked lately.

He lifts his head as he hears a sound.

There she comes. Running across the football pitch.

Is it a sun bullet?

Wow, she’s slightly knock-kneed. He hadn’t noticed. She runs like that and all, knees banging together, one hand under her tits, her head sort of dancing from side to side, her other hand swinging out as though it had a mind of its own, alive, free from the rest of her. Christ she looks gorgeous, looks super sexy running along, God, so fucking foxy, those wobbly legs make her whole body kind of dangle like a doll or something.

Daniel straightens up, he feels a wild electron fire up in his head, he flicks the cigarette out on to the road in front of the kindergarten and runs his hand through his hair, exhales as much as he can and inhales as much fresh air as he’s able, feels his face break into a silly smile, feels a rush through his body. He gulps.

Look at that.

Look at her.

Look at her run.

Oh Christ she is so fucking gorgeous.

And just then as he watches her surge towards him, the sentences discharge in his head, like the report of rifle shots, and he knows that soon he’ll write some lyrics, true lyrics, real lyrics about the strongest light any person’s ever seen: girl light, Sandra light. The eternal light from a muzzle, lyrics nobody needs to bury 1,000 kilometres under the ground.

Yess.

Candyfloss.

A light cleaves its way between the black tree trunks, flashing through the woods. Pål gives a start, he turns his head in the direction of the road and catches a glimpse of a car disappearing down towards the shop.

He tries to regulate his breathing, follow Zitha as nimbly as possible, allow her to traverse the forest floor, not upset her. Zitha isn’t a meek dog, but she’s never liked cars. Yeaaah, Zitha, yeaaah, good girl. Can’t have her barking like she did a while ago, mustn’t draw any attention to ourselves, that’s not on.

Pål draws his coat closer around him. The cold is becoming deep-seated, inching its way into his bones. Must try not to think, just get this done.

Pål hadn’t given Rudi a thought in years. But then one day, just as he was opening the post box, retrieving yet another letter bound for the bus shelter bin, an old memory abruptly emerged from the deep. Rudi. Videoboy. An obscure, dim recollection of a day in 1986. Then it slipped away just as suddenly. He began to sift through the memories in his head. He’d heard rumours from time to time. They’d turned out to be as criminal as people thought they would. Could he call them? Surely they wouldn’t remember what happened in 1986. That poor girl lying in the room. The sick set-up they had in the house. All the horror movies. Neither he nor Hasse understood it at the time, but now it was easy to see: Jan Inge used the girl as payment for the favours he got people to do. He had people carry out minor thefts for him and he paid them by letting them see uncensored horror films, and giving them all the cola and sweets they wanted. And letting them sleep with the girl. The sister. He rented her out like a whore. She was only thirteen, fourteen maybe. And Pål remembered her well.

He had slipped the envelope into his inside pocket. Then brought out his mobile and sent a text to directory enquiries. His hands were trembling slightly as he punched in the number he’d been given.

‘Ye yo, Rudi here, yeah?’

‘Hi, eh, it’s Pål…’

‘ Who? ’

‘Pål. Yeah. Fagerland.’

‘Okay, Fagerland away.’

‘Wha? Eh, listen, you probably don’t remember me—’

‘Nope, can’t say that I do. Who did you say you say you say you say?’

‘Pål. Fagerland.’

‘No, doesn’t ring any bells…’

‘Right, I see, well—’

‘Out with it, man, out with it, Pål Skål, what brings you round to this haunted house?’

‘Well. I … I was just wondering if you … if you and your…’

Pål heard a sigh then the person on the other end disappeared.

He walked into the kitchen. Drank some water straight from the tap and tried to understand what had happened. Were they cut off? Did he hang up? He decided to ring again. Put in the number. It rang for a little while.

‘Yeah, Rudi.’

‘Hi, I think we must’ve been cut off there. It’s Pål again.’

‘Yeah.’

‘Right, well, I was wondering if you … or your…’

He disappeared again. The same way. Pål tried to get his head around what had happened. Rudi took the phone. He wasn’t disinterested in talking to him. But he hung up. They weren’t cut off. Pål nodded to himself. It was obvious he was going about things the wrong way. He punched in the number yet again.

‘Hell-o, you’ve reached Rudi-o, yeah!’

‘Hi, Pål again, we seem to be getting cut off, I—’

Silence on the other end of the line.

‘Or … eh … are we getting cut off?’

Still silence.

‘So, anyway, I heard a couple of years back that the two of you, eh, you and that guy Jani, that—’

It happened again. He hung up.

Pål sat down at the kitchen table. Malene and Tiril would be home soon, he couldn’t keep at this very much longer. But Rudi was answering the phone. And then Pål said something wrong, and then he hung up. Okay. He put the number in again.

‘Yeeeeeep, Rudi here, yeah.’

‘Rudi, hi, man! It’s Pål here, you know, Pål from the old days, the eighties, eye of the tiger, the final countdown, holy diver…’

‘You’ve been out too long in the midnight sea! Hey, all right, still not ringing any bells, whatsupdude?’

There was a different tone to his voice now.

‘Been such a long time. Want to hang? What about meeting up, taking a stroll, say Tuesday night, Gosen Woods, by the big rock, nine o’clock, when I’m out walking the dog?’

‘Great plan, Påli, you holy diver. Heh heh! Did you hear Dio died? Shit, that’s the way it goes. Talk to you!’

Rudi hung up.

Down, that´s what it is, thought Pål and nodded. Down too long in the midnight sea. That clicked. I’ve just made an appointment. That’s how it’s done. These people don’t accept just anything.