‘Yes. I’ll call.’
He shut the door, and Sofia decided to continue listening, and turned the cassette over. She could hear her own breathing when Victoria Bergman stopped for breath. When she began to speak again it was in an authoritative voice.
… he was sweaty and wanted to hug me, even though it was so hot, and he went on sprinkling water on the stove. I could see the bag between his legs when he leaned over to get water from the wooden bucket, and I felt like pushing him over so he fell onto the hot rocks. The rocks that never seemed to cool down. Warmed up every Wednesday with a heat that never managed to penetrate all the way to my bones. I just sat there quietly, quiet as a little mouse, and all the while I could see the way he was looking at me. The way his eyes went strange and he started to breathe heavily, then I would go out to the shower and scrub myself clean after the game. Although I knew I could never be clean. I ought to be grateful to him for showing me so many secrets, so that I’d be prepared for the day when I met boys, who could be really clumsy and pushy, and he certainly wasn’t, because he’d been practising all his life, and had been trained by Grandma and her brother and no harm had come to anyone, it had just made him strong and resilient. He’d done the Vasaloppet ski race a hundred times, even with cracked ribs and bad knees, without a word of complaint, though he did throw up in Evertsberg. The chafe marks I got down there when he’d finished playing on the sauna benches and pulled his fingers out weren’t worth making a fuss of. When he was done with me and closed the door of the sauna, I thought about the female spider who eats the smaller males after they’ve mated …
Sofia jerked. She felt sick.
She must have fallen asleep again, and in her sleep she’d dreamed a load of terrible things, and she realised it was just because the tape player had been running. The monotonous voice had directed her thoughts and dreams.
Victoria Bergman’s monologue had forced its way into her subconscious.
Village of Dala-Floda, 1980
THE FLY’S WINGS are stuck fast in the chewing gum. There’s no point in you trying to flap them, Crow Girl thinks. You’ll never fly again. Tomorrow the sun will be shining as usual, but it won’t be shining on you.
When Martin’s dad touches her she flinches instinctively. They’re standing on the gravel outside Aunt Elsa’s house and he’s just got off his bicycle.
‘Martin’s been asking for you. I think he misses having someone to play with.’
He reaches out a hand and strokes her cheek. ‘I’d like it if you came down to swim with us one day.’
Victoria looks away. She’s used to being touched, and knows exactly what it leads to.
She sees it in his eyes as he nods, says goodbye and continues down towards the road. Just as she suspected, he stops the bike and turns back.
‘By the way, you haven’t got a lawnmower I could borrow, have you?’
He’s just like the others, she thinks.
‘It’s by the outhouse,’ she says, and waves goodbye.
She wonders when he’s going to come and get it.
Her chest feels tight as she thinks about it, because she knows that’s when he’s going to touch her again.
She knows it, but she still can’t stay away from the beach.
In a way she doesn’t quite understand, she finds herself enjoying spending time with the family, and with Martin in particular.
His language is undeveloped, but his terse and occasionally hard to understand declarations of love are among the nicest things anyone has ever said to her. His eyes shine every time he sees her again, and he runs towards her and hugs her tight.
They play and swim and go for walks through the forest together. Martin stumbles uncertainly over the uneven ground, pointing at things, and Victoria patiently explains what they are.
‘Mushroom,’ she says, and ‘pine tree’, and ‘woodlouse’, and Martin tries to imitate the sounds.
She teaches him the forest.
First she takes off her shoes, and feels the sand creep between her toes, trying to tickle her. She takes off her top and feels the sun warm her skin. The waves lap coolly against her legs before she jumps in.
She stays in the water so long her skin goes wrinkly, and she wishes it could split or fall off so she could get new skin, untouched.
She hears the family approaching along the path. Martin lets out a squeal of delight when he sees her. He runs towards the water and she hurries to meet him so he doesn’t continue into the water and get his clothes wet.
‘My Pippi,’ he says, hugging her.
‘Martin, you know we’ve decided to stay until the start of the autumn term,’ his dad says, looking at Victoria. ‘So you don’t have to squeeze her to bits today.’
Victoria returns Martin’s hug and suddenly feels the insight strike her.
So little time.
‘If only it was just you and me,’ she whispers in Martin’s ear.
‘You and me,’ he repeats.
He needs her, and she needs him more and more. She promises herself to nag Dad as hard as she can to let her stay up here as much as possible.
Victoria pulls her top on over her wet swimming costume, and slips her sandals on. She takes Martin by the hand and leads him along the shore. Under the mirror-like surface she sees a crayfish crawling along the bottom.
‘Do you remember what that plant is called?’ she asks, to get Martin to look at a fern while she reaches for the crayfish. She grips it and hides it behind her back.
‘Firm?’ Martin says, giving her a questioning look.
She bursts out laughing, and Martin joins in. ‘Firm,’ he repeats.
While he’s still laughing she pulls out the crayfish and holds it up in front of his face. She sees it contort with horror and he bursts into hysterical crying. As if in apology she throws the crayfish on the ground and stomps on it hard until the claws stop moving. She puts her arms around him, but his sobbing is inconsolable.
She feels she’s lost control of him, it’s no longer enough just to be herself for him.
Losing control of him is like losing control of herself.
It’s the first time his faith in her has been shaken. He thought she wanted to hurt him, that she was one of the others, the ones who want to hurt you.
She doesn’t want her time with Martin to end, but she knows Dad’s coming to get her on Sunday.
She wants to stay in the cottage forever.
She wants to be with Martin.
Always.
He absorbs her totally. She can sit and watch him sleeping, see how his eyes play under his closed eyelids, listen to the little whimpering sounds he makes. Calm sleep. He has shown her what it looks like, shown her that it exists.
But Saturday comes, relentlessly.
As usual, they are down on the beach. Martin is sitting on the edge of the blanket at his dozing parents’ feet, playing idly with the two Dala horses they bought in a shop in Gagnef.