Tore Renberg - See You Tomorrow

She nods.

‘Yeah?’ he shrugs. ‘And so? Don’t you respect that?’

‘We’re competitors.’ Veronika looks him straight in the eye. ‘Does she have a Kvelertak T-shirt?’ Veronika shakes her head. ‘No, she’s slavers after Jesus. She wears a cross round her neck. I know you think you love her. I know you think that she’s the one you want. But I know that it’s raining blood in your heart, Daniel. I know who you are. Does she know who you are?’

He swallows.

‘Hm? Does she?’

Caught up in something.

That’s what it feels like.

Strange sitting here now. The teacher talking, the pupils sitting with their books open in front of them. But none of them are listening. They’re all thinking about her. The teacher too. She can feel it. Nobody in the room is thinking about anything else.

From one second to the next, Sandra has gone from being the most well-behaved, conscientious girl in 10D to becoming the object of everyone’s open-mouthed attention. She’d cracked a few hours ago, lost herself, snogged Daniel and cried when he rode off, while everyone stood at the windows watching. Then the rumour began racing through the school like a fierce wind, the teachers tried to hush it up but it was just as though she’d unleashed a force of nature. When she went into the yard during the break it was like she was a magnet. Malene had walked alongside her as if they were blood sisters; comments had been shouted in their direction, as though both of them had done something crazy and within a few hours it had got completely out of control.

The rumour was that he’d hit her, it was also going around that she’d hit him, that she was pregnant, that she was on something…

She was just caught up in it.

Then at lunchtime, right out of the blue, Tiril had hit that little guy in second year, Shaun, and she had done it for her. Everything has been turned on its head. Tiril? If there’s one person Sandra feels has never liked her, if there’s one person she’s almost been afraid of, it’s Malene’s sister, her co-worker at Spar.

She just let him have it, Shaun the smurf.

So, what, now it’s like, her and the sisters? Her and Malene and Tiril? And where’s Daniel? His replies were so curt. Okay. Okay, fine. Where is he? She realises she’s done something he’s not able to take, but why is he so angry? He said he’d be there tonight although she’s not sure she quite believes it.

Sandra sits with her maths book open in front of her, hardly daring to breathe.

Not to mention Mum and Dad. If they don’t already know everything by the time she gets home, then it won’t take long before they hear about it and that won’t be good. They’ll tell her off, issue more warnings and deliver another lecture, but the worst of it is they won’t allow her to see him. That bright mouth. Daniel William Moi. And if they do that, she’ll just die. She can’t go home. Sandra knows that. She can’t go home today.

There’s a sound of laughter in the classroom.

‘Mira? Something you wanted to say?’

The teacher.

‘No, Miss. Nothing,’ Mira says.

Sandra can hear her sniggering. She can hear it spreading. Other girls laughing. Other boys. Joachim, he’s laughing too.

She glances up furtively, trying to make eye contact with Malene.

Malene nods to her.

Her chest rises and falls. Sandra gets quickly to her feet. She packs her things together as fast as she’s able. The entire class is looking at her. Mira’s cheeky face. Joachim’s smirk.

‘I don’t feel too well—’

A ripple of laughter.

‘I think I need to—’

‘Ooh, I need it! Daniel, I need it!’ Joachim.

‘That’s all right, Sandra,’ she hears the teacher say.

She walks towards the door. She stops at Malene’s desk on the way, her friend smiles at her and takes hold of her hand a moment. Sandra’s seen that smile before. She’s seen it on a grown man’s face. Malene’s father. She feels like a fraud, she isn’t sure if it’s right, what Daniel said, about not telling her anything about her father, but she has to trust the one she loves.

‘See you,’ Malene whispers. ‘Where are you going?’

‘Dunno.’

‘Text me, okay?’

Sandra nods.

‘Say hello to Tiril,’ she whispers.

Malene smiles. ‘Hey,’ she says. ‘Don’t worry. Okay?’

‘No,’ Sandra whispers, hearing her voice beginning to crack.

She runs. One hand under her breasts, the other waving in the air, slightly knock-kneed, through the corridors, out the front entrance, into the mild September day.

It looks like a wading bird and a duck out for a walk.

The sun is low in the sky, its light casting long shadows along the streets as Jan Inge and Rudi make their way uphill from the house by the rail tracks. It’s not that far to Hansi’s place; he lives on the far side of Hillevågsveien.

Jan Inge is conscious that he’s developed a somewhat rolling gait of late. He tries to avoid doing it, but he just sort of swings, from side to side, no matter how he tries to adjust it.

There’s been something agitated and unfocused about Rudi ever since he got back from town. He hurried into the house, went straight to his room, rummaged around a bit, then came out and stood in the middle of the living room looking at his mobile. When Jan Inge asked if anything was wrong, he’d replied: ‘No, what the hell would be?’

But there is something wrong.

After they’ve passed Sun City tanning salon and started up the hill towards Hansi’s, Jan Inge asks again: ‘Rudi, what is it, you’re not even talking?’

‘Man, people don’t need to talk all the time, do they?’

No, but when people who do talk all the time suddenly stop, that’s when you get nervous. So Jan Inge tries once more: ‘We’re here for one another, you know that, right?’

Rudi halts. His long form swaying to and fro in front of a wheelie bin. His eyes are restive.

‘I don’t know, Jani. I just got it into my head.’

‘What?’ Jan Inge wheezes, taking out his inhaler and sucking in air.

‘Chessi,’ Rudi says.

Jan Inge raises his eyebrows. ‘Chessi? What about Chessi?’

‘What the hell do I know.’ Rudi leans his hands on the bin behind him for support. ‘Probably just some bullshit. The puking. That skincare shit. And … well, some private stuff.’

‘Private stuff?’ Jan Inge cocks his head to the side. ‘Is it your brother?’

‘You don’t bloody well have to mention him! No,’ Rudi says. ‘Very private stuff. Shit, I need a fag.’

‘What kind of very private stuff?’

‘No,’ says Rudi shrugging, ‘we are amigos, my friend, but there’re things even brothers don’t discuss. Woman things, Jani. Anyway. She’s heading over to see Tong and she needs the Volvo. So we really have to get hold of Hansi’s Transporter.’

Rudi is seldom like this. Calm, almost. Normal, almost. Talking in short sentences. Chiselling them out of himself as though he were of stone. Even though Jan Inge does often want Rudi to calm that electric head of his and stop talking holes in peoples’ heads, it is disturbing when he’s not acting like himself.

‘Well,’ Jan Inge says, ‘I’m sure it’ll sort itself out. But we probably shouldn’t drive the Transporter around Gosen two nights on the trot…’

Rudi’s eyes flash.

‘Oh yeah, great, what are we going to do? Take the fucking bus? Is that what you want to do, busfuck?

He’s cross, clearly angry. He’s never usually like that either.

‘Rudi, listen to me. You’ve got something in your system. I know you. Get it out or get shot of it. We’ve a sweet job on tomorrow, a classic in our line of business. So we can’t drive around in the work van in the same area two nights in a row. You know that. It’s not going to kill us to take the bus.’