Betrayal

Psychotherapist Yvonne Palmgren had insisted that they have what she called ‘the first conversation’ in Anna’s room. Jonas had no objections; in there, at least, the compulsion would leave him in peace. Though he had a hard time understanding what good the conversation would do. But fearing that they might take away the nights he slept over if he didn’t cooperate, he had finally agreed to meet with her.

She was sitting in a chair by one of the windows – maybe fifty or fifty-five. Her white smock unbuttoned over a pair of grey trousers and a red jumper. A childish necklace made of big, colourful plastic beads rested on her full bosom, and four felt-tip pens in garish neon colours stuck up from her breast pocket. Maybe all those cheerful colours were intended to outweigh all the blackness she confronted daily in her patients’ tormented souls.

He sat down on the edge of Anna’s bed and held her right hand that was still normal. He could feel the woman in the chair looking at him. He knew full well what she was thinking.

‘Where do you think we should start?’

He turned his head and looked at her.

‘No idea.’

He had shown up as agreed; the rest wasn’t his problem, she would have to take care of that. He wasn’t the one who needed this conversation, it was the County Council, so that they could terminate Anna’s rehabilitation in good conscience and slowly but surely allow her brain to atrophy so that they were spared any more trouble. But they could forget about winning him over to their side.

‘Do you think it’s annoying to have this conversation?’

He sighed.

‘No, not particularly. I just don’t understand what the point is.’

‘You don’t think it’s because you’re afraid that you might have negative feelings about it?’

He couldn’t even manage to answer that. What the hell did she know about fear? Just asking the question meant that she had never even been close to it. Never felt that wild terror of losing everything. To have no power over one’s own thoughts, no control of one’s own life.

Or Anna’s.

‘How long had you been together? I mean before the accident.’

‘A year.’

‘But you weren’t actually living together?’

‘No. We were just about to get married when . . . when . . .’

He broke off and looked at Anna’s closed eyelids.

The woman in the chair shifted position. Braced herself on the armrests and then folded her hands over the open plastic folder on her lap.

‘Anna is a bit older than you.’

‘Yes.’

Yvonne Palmgren glanced down at her papers.

‘Almost twelve years older.’

He sat in silence. Why should he say anything when she could satisfy her sick curiosity by reading it all from the file?

‘Can you tell me a little about your relationship? What your life was like before all this happened? You can describe a normal day if you like.’

He stood up and walked over to the window. He hated this. Why should he have to divulge his and Anna’s life to a stranger? What right did she have to come trampling into their memories?

‘Did you talk about moving in together?’

‘We live in the same building. Anna has a studio at the top of the stairs. She’s an artist.’

‘I see.’

He remembered their first meeting so well. He had distributed the day’s mail, gone home and slept for a few hours, and was on his way to Konsum to buy groceries. She was standing in the stairwell on the ground floor, busy loading cartons into the lift. They said hello to each other and he held the door when she went out to the car to fetch the last box. The similarity was striking. How was it possible for anyone to be so similar? He stood there, not wanting to leave before he had a chance to talk with her. Afterwards it was so natural that he had stayed. That he overcame his hesitation and asked whether he could help her. He didn’t recall what she replied. He only remembered her smile. A candid, warm smile that made her eyes narrow to slits and made him feel chosen, unique, handsome in someone else’s eyes.

He had helped her with the boxes and then she asked him in to her new studio, and she had shown him round, happy and proud. He had mostly looked at her. There was a kind of radiance about her. A genuine naturalness so attractive that he became quite bewildered. After only five minutes he had known that she was the one he had always been waiting for. That his whole life had been merely leading up to their meeting.

‘What did you use to do together?’

The psychotherapist’s question dragged him back to the present. He turned towards her.

‘Everything.’

‘Can you give me an example?’

They started eating their meals together. He would come home from work just in time for lunch, and she worked at home, so after a while it became a habit. One day at her place, the next at his. She was the first person he had allowed in his flat in several years. He had never been able to overcome the distaste he felt at how messy things were after someone visited. She had laughed at his systematic order and claimed that all the right angles made her nervous, finally convincing him to redecorate. She had even run up to her studio and fetched a big oil painting that they hung up in the room. It was after she left that night that he fully realised how much he loved her. He had wandered about in confusion, and yet the compulsion could not reach him. Completely unaware of her improbable feat, she had used her mere presence to neutralise the danger that threatened him.

That night he stood naked in front of the painting and traced her brush-strokes with his finger. The grooved canvas aroused a desire so strong in him that it was painful, but he would not let it go. He would save it and give it to her when she was ready.

‘Did you have a lot of friends?’

He turned back to the window and stuffed one hand in his pocket. His memory had revived the wild longing. The hunger of his skin that would drive him crazy if she didn’t touch him soon.

‘Not particularly.’

‘Relatives, then?’

‘Her parents died in a car crash when she was fourteen. She was one of those children who’s like a dandelion and succeeds in life in spite of everything. Strong and stubborn.’

‘Does she have any siblings?’

‘A brother, but he lives in Australia.’

‘And you?’

He turned his head and looked at her.

‘What do you mean?’

‘Your parents?’

‘What about them?’

‘I don’t know. Tell me.’

‘We have no contact. I moved down to Stockholm when I was eighteen, thought it was good to get away from there.’

‘Get away from what?’

‘I lived up north of Gävle.’

‘Yes, but most people stay in contact with their family even if they move away.’

‘I see.’

Nine words his mother had said to him after the betrayal was revealed. Nine words. It was on his eighteenth birthday. He was sitting in the kitchen eating breakfast, had just come home from his paper round. For three months he had done what he could to win her forgiveness, but she had not been receptive. And his father had holed up in a one-room apartment in Gävle to get away from the shame that her boundless sorrow and disappointment had created. He took his clothes and one of the twin beds from the bedroom and disappeared.

Suddenly she was standing there in the kitchen doorway. She was wearing the flowered robe that he knew smelled so good, smelled of Mamma. And he had been filled with joy and thought that maybe, maybe she was ready to forgive him now. Now that it was his birthday and she was standing there in the kitchen doorway.

Nine words she had said.

I don’t want you to live here any more.

Yvonne Palmgren shifted position in her chair once again. A couple of papers from her folder started to slip, and she caught them just as they were about to fall to the floor.

He lowered his gaze and went to sit with Anna again.

‘Why don’t you have any contact with your parents?’

‘Because I don’t feel like it.’

‘Doesn’t that ever make you feel empty?’

‘No.’

She cleared her throat and closed the folder in her lap.

‘I think that will be enough for now, but I would like to continue our conversation this afternoon.’

He shrugged his shoulders. It annoyed him that he was forced to do as they said. That he couldn’t just tell them all to go to hell.

‘Shall we say two o’clock?’

She got up and went over to the bed, looked at Anna and then at him, and moved towards the door.

‘I’ll see you then. Goodbye for now.’

He didn’t reply.

He saw the door close behind her and took Anna’s hand, placed it on his crotch, and closed his eyes.