‘I noticed that you’ve hardly touched your medicines,’ her mother continued, pushing away her yoghurt bowl. ‘Not the Stilnoct or the one that helps against depression.’ Gunilla sounded reproachful.
Vera sighed. ‘It was nice of you to… get all that stuff for me, but I listen to music to help me sleep.’ They ought to prescribe Fleetwood Mac and Debussy, she thought and continued, ‘I’ve almost stopped having nightmares.’
‘You and your father and your music!’ Gunilla looked at her uncomprehendingly.
I don’t know what I would have done without it.
They were quiet for a minute, then Gunilla asked: ‘What about that course you’re taking? What is it about?’
‘I guess you could say it’s about the development of the modern economy and how to understand it,’ Vera said as she put a piece of bread in the toaster.
‘Economics? Not medicine?’
Vera sighed and refrained from trying to explain, something she had become quite practised at.
Gunilla looked at her daughter. ‘How are you? Are you at least eating enough?’
Vera nodded.
‘This studying, you aren’t borrowing money to finance it, are you?’
Vera shook her head.
‘Well, then you’re going to have to work in the fall, aren’t you?’
‘I’m going to take Economics I in the fall.’
A deep frown formed between Gunilla’s eyebrows, and Vera quickly added, ‘But I’m happy to work extra in the evenings and on weekends.’ She had been planning to do that anyway. Even if she usually didn’t need much money, you couldn’t live on nothing, and she hated being financially dependent on other people.
‘Uh-huh. Since you’re going to be in town anyway, do you want me to check if they need help at Solbacka?’ Gunilla wondered.
‘Yeah, sure, do that. But don’t promise anything, because what if I’m not better in the fall?’ She gently felt her left knee.
‘Of course you’ll be fine in the fall! If your knee were really that bad then they would have operated on it right away; you know that! You just have to stick it out, and then you can start working, and well… everything will go back to normal. You’ll see.’
Vera was almost finished eating when Gunilla finally forced out the question that she badly wanted answered. ‘What really happened between you and Adam when you came home in May?’
The food in her mouth seemed to expand; Vera caught her breath and couldn’t look up.
Gunilla gripped her hand comfortingly. ‘You know, Eva and Krister were down visiting him, and he is really sad. Eva called just to say that he really misses you. He wants everything to be back to normal again.’ Gunilla tried to catch Vera’s eye. ‘Just remember, however bleak things seem, he loves you.’
Vera took a deep breath. Yes, that felt like the truth. Despite everything that had happened, she knew that Adam loved her.
But what she said each time he contacted her was the only thing that she was sure she felt: I just don’t have the energy to see you at the moment.
5
Peter forgot the promise he made to Cecilia Åström. He didn’t do it on purpose; it was just that living up to other women’s expectations of him took all his time. But in August, when Kalle unexpectedly showed up in the otherwise empty dormitory to move out of his room, which was next to Peter’s, Peter suddenly remembered the crazy story.
‘You know your room is hard currency, don’t you?’ he said happily as they clapped one another on the back. ‘I heard the most exaggerated sob story, cooked up by somebody desperate to get their hands on these cleverly designed square meters.’ Peter made an elegant gesture, as if he were a well-paid real estate agent showing a luxury condo.
‘Oh, knock it off!’ Kalle looked up from his removal boxes. He was on his way to Kalmar to take a substitute teaching job, and he was thinking hard about where to put what.
Peter continued, inspired. ‘Imagine a nurse who could have been living a life of leisure as a rich man’s wife. But she travels the world instead, working for Doctors without Borders. She’s somewhere in South America for a few months, saving lives. Then some armed guerrillas invade the camp and kidnap everybody they can find, including a colleague, an older Swede!’
‘Shit!’ Kalle said. He straightened up, pulled up his shorts and dried the sweat off his forehead with the arm of his faded Greenpeace t-shirt.
Peter smiled at his friend, who, at that moment, looked more than ever like Fred Flintstone – thick hair sticking up in all directions, grey five o’clock shadow around his chin and hairy, stocky legs.
‘I know! Creative, right?’ Peter was always fascinated by elaborate fantasies. ‘But wait! There’s more! This girl got away, barely, but she hurt herself, broke her arm or something, and got sent home. There’s something wrong, though; the arm won’t heal. She goes home and lives with her mother and then walks straight into the Economics Department and says, like, “How does money work?” Can you believe it?!’
‘Yeah, good question,’ Kalle mumbled from inside a removal box.
‘And now she apparently needs to live here, if you’re not opposed to renting out your room to a one-armed mythomaniac?’ Peter grinned and helped Kalle with the last pile of books about animal behavior and micro-organisms in water.
Kalle wrinkled his brow and actually looked almost sad.
Peter’s smile faded. ‘What the hell, Kalle; don’t you have a sense of humor? Can’t you appreciate a good backstory when you hear one? And think of me who has to live here; what if the girl is half as good-looking as she is creative? Maybe she’s both a damn good storyteller and an SHB 10?
Kalle took a step forward and pushed his index finger into Peter’s chest. ‘I gave you that book to… Do you understand the risks of acting like you do? Of all of this…’
‘What risks?’ Peter asked, interrupting him.
‘You know, different girls all the time.’
‘Oh, you take it much too seriously!’
‘It wasn’t to teach you new sexist expressions,’ concluded Kalle stubbornly.
Kalle was somewhat unusual as a biologist who, in addition to his courses in high-school pedagogy, had taken 15 credits in Women’s Studies. It was actually a little suspicious, but Peter was willing to overlook it. Kalle had been a good dormitory neighbor, and Peter hoped he would come back when his substitute teaching position ended.
‘What?’ grinned Peter. ‘SHB 10? Abbreviations are so practical! “Super-hot babe 10 points” takes so long to say.’
‘And you sound like an idiot,’ muttered Kalle.
‘What…?’ Peter thought he knew what the problem was. ‘If you need a few tips about how to pick up girls, then you can read The Game yourself.’
‘I have read it,’ said Kalle and blushed under his stubble. ‘It gets good at the end, but I guess you haven’t read that part?’
‘Song lyrics. You can listen to them from beginning to end. Somebody cared enough to summarize the most important stuff. But books…’ How in the hell would I have managed to read Lord of the Rings if I hadn’t skipped over all the language Tolkien tried to construct? he thought. ‘You only read as much of a book as