Tore Renberg - See You Tomorrow

A darkness brims in Jan Inge. It flows from his little blueberry eyes and washes down over him.

Malene walks out the front door and out into the street, heading in the direction of Folkeviseveien.

She went home when Thea and Tiril left for the rehearsal, the same time as Sandra disappeared into the darkness to meet Daniel. The wild sensations the day had thrown up vanished quite abruptly, the tingling of her skin, the heat of her body, which had made her feel strong and new. She couldn’t manage to take control of the situation. All of a sudden, Sandra didn’t need her any more; suddenly it was Tiril who had taken over everything, as though she were the big sister. Malene no longer felt at ease wearing the bright red lipstick.

‘Will I go with you?’ she’d asked. Sandra had shook her head. ‘No, no, course, you have to do this yourself.’ Malene had hastened to add, ‘Don’t let him ride roughshod over you, Sandra, okay?’

Dad wasn’t at home when she got in. The house looked like it was abandoned right in the middle of something. The living room door was wide open. One slipper at an angle to the other in the centre of the kitchen. A single saucer with a slice of bread on the kitchen table. A half-empty glass of juice. Zitha’s rubber bone on Dad’s pouf.

Malene cleaned up, but the sight of her hands annoyed her. She thought they looked like the hands of a forty-year-old as she loaded the dishwasher, as she hung up damp towels in the bathroom and as she placed Dad’s shoes beside one another.

Soon it was nine o’clock. She looked over her homework. She flicked through the channels on the TV. Clicked around on Facebook.

Now she’s outside. It’s daft. It’s idiotic. Out spying on Sandra and Daniel. But she can’t help herself. Sandra is having a torrid time and Veronika has it rough … is she jealous, is that it?

She walks quicker.

‘You’re such an idiot, Malene,’ she whispers.

She hurries along past the tower blocks in Jernalderveien and comes out on the plateau above the primary school, from where she’s afforded a view. There they are. Daniel and Sandra. In the middle of the football pitch, underneath the lights. She slackens her pace, lets her feet move slower across the tarmac. She knows she should turn around, but she’s can’t manage to.

Malene straightens up. Walks as naturally as she can out on to the gravel pitch. What will she say when they spot her? She doesn’t know Daniel. He hardly knows who she is. He’s a dangerous boy — who can tell what he’s capable of.

She draws closer. He’s so handsome. Everything about him is beautiful and strong. It’s hard to act naturally when people are so good-looking. How are you supposed to act, when the presence of another person is so overwhelming? She would never have dared go out with a boy like that. He gives a lot but he takes more. What he touches would always be left dazzled but also diminished. It’s not possible to come away from Daniel William Moi intact.

Malene scuffs her feet on the gravel so they’ll notice her. She’s only a few metres from them. What’s she going to say when they ask her why she’s here?

Sandra turns. So does Daniel. What eyes he has, what a mouth. If he opens it up the whole world will disappear down his throat

‘Malene?’

She raises her hand in a clumsy greeting and refrains from looking at Daniel.

‘Hello, fancy meeting you two,’ Malene says, trying to make her voice sound as unaffected as she can.

‘Hi…’ Sandra looks nervous. ‘This is Daniel…’

He gives her a quick look, a look that says she should get out of here as quick as she can.

‘Well,’ she hastens to say, ‘I’m heading to the school to listen to Tiril. Not too many people paying her much attention at the moment, so I figured I’d better be there for my little sister.’ Malene knows she’s speaking too fast, and she knows she’s a bad liar. ‘Yeah,’ she giggles nervously. ‘Y’know, Evanescence, heh heh, have to support little sis.’

You need to go, Malene.

It’s in their faces, it’s in their body language.

She sees two men come into view down by the substation. They’re coming out of the woods, they resemble characters in a computer game. One of them is ungainly and as tall as a tree, the other quite small and fat. They’re momentarily lit up by a streetlamp outside the kindergarten, before they disappear from under it, heading in the direction of the main road.

‘I see,’ Daniel says, ‘you’re one of the sisters. The gymnast? Heard about your tumble. Bummer. Ankle was it?’

One of the sisters? Has Sandra been talking about her?

‘Yeah…’ Malene nods.

She looks at Sandra with uncertainty, whom for her part, avoids Malene’s eyes.

‘Okay, but anyway, Malene,’ Sandra says, with an affected smile, ‘we’re just going to have a chat…’

Another figure appears beneath the light outside the kindergarten. And a dog. They look like they’re part of the same computer game. First the towering figure, then the little, fat round guy, and now a normal man with his head down, and finally a dog sniffing along. Malene juts her chin out and squints.

It’s Dad.

She feels something shoot through her stomach, a needle-thin pain.

She points at the substation, ‘I’m…’ she says to Daniel and Sandra, ‘I’m just … that’s my dad.’ The others turn to look. ‘He’s out walking Zitha, our dog, that is…’

Dad bends over. Picks something up. It’s a stick. He holds it up high in front of Zitha, who’s wagging her tail expectantly. Then he stops dead, his head turns in their direction, his hand suspended in the air.

He looks like he doesn’t want to be seen, Malene thinks. It’s completely obvious. Dad doesn’t want to be seen.

He relaxes his body, his face breaking into that nice smile of his, shouts ‘Come on, Zitha!’ and throws the stick toward the goalposts.

Zitha sets off in pursuit. Dad strolls towards them.

This is embarrassing.

‘Hi!’

Dad’s big, warm smile.

‘Malene, didn’t expect to see you.’

Dad’s big, false smile.

He puts his hand out as he reaches them. He whistles for Zitha. Daniel shakes his hand and introduces himself. ‘I’m going out with Sandra.’

Dad smiles. ‘I know Sandra all right. Nice evening, eh?’

Zitha comes running over with the stick in her mouth, drops it at Dad’s feet and he commends her.

‘Out walking the dog?’ Daniel asks, bending over and running two hands along Zitha’s snout.

‘Oh yes,’ Dad says, ‘every day. What are you lot up to?’

Daniel’s grins and he says: ‘Darkness imprisoning me, all that I see, absolute horror, I cannot live, I cannot die, trapped in myself.’

Dad gives a start, as though someone had hit him in the face.

‘Heh heh,’ laughs Daniel, ‘Metallica. Your T-shirt.’

Dad laughs and looks down at his chest, the old T-shirt barely visible under his jacket.

‘Best band in the world,’ says Daniel.

Dad smiles. ‘Well, I better be getting home,’ he says. ‘Enter Sandman, y’know. Heh heh. Are you heading home, Malene?’

She nods, knows she’s been given away, but it makes no difference.

She smiles at Sandra, gives her a hug.

‘See you around,’ says Daniel.

The windows of the tower blocks are lit up in the darkness. All those people crammed together. It looks cheery and sad at the same time. Malene is aware of her father’s heavy form beside her. He walks along, making small talk about something, but she’s not following what he’s saying. She’s just aware of him plodding along, aware of something being terribly wrong. She stops as they get to the last tower block. She stares at him for such a long time that he’s forced to make eye contact with her.