Burned

Chapter 7

It feels odd to be back inside the grey building at number 44 Gronlandsleiret again. Once upon a time the police station was practically his second home; even the cleaners used to greet him. Now he tries to make himself as inconspicuous as possible, but is hampered by the burn scars on his face. He is aware that the other reporters are looking at him, but he ignores them. His plan is just to attend, listen to what the police have to say and then go back to the office to write — if, indeed, there is anything to write about.

He freezes the moment he enters the foyer. Nothing could have prepared him for the sight of the woman leaning towards a man who shows every sign of being a reporter. Dark corduroy jacket, suitably arrogant presence, the ‘did-everyone-see-the-scoop-I-pulled-off-yesterday’ expression. He sports designer stubble which makes his face look more sallow than it is. His thinning hair is gelled and swept back. But it’s the woman. Henning had never imagined he would see her, here, on his first day back.

Nora Klemetsen. Henning’s ex-wife. Jonas’s mother.

He hasn’t spoken to her since she visited him at Sunnaas Rehabilitation Centre. He forgets when it was. Perhaps he has suppressed it. But he’ll never forget her face. She couldn’t bear to look at him. He didn’t blame her. She had every right. He had been looking after Jonas, and he had failed to save him.

Their son.

Their lovely, lovely son.

They had already separated at that point. She only visited him at the hospital to finalise the divorce, to get his signature. She got it. No ulterior motives, no questions, no conditions. In a way, he was relieved. He couldn’t have coped with her in his life — a constant reminder of his own shortcomings. Every glance, every conversation would have been tarred with that brush.

They hadn’t said much to each other. He was desperate to tell her everything, tell her what he had done or failed to do, what he remembered of that night, but every time he breathed in and got ready to speak, his mouth dried up and he couldn’t utter a single word. Later, when he closed his eyes and daydreamed, he talked like a machine gun; Nora nodded, she understood, and afterwards she came to him and let him cry himself out in her lap while she ran her fingers through his hair.

He has been thinking he should try again, the next time he saw her, but now is clearly not the time. He is working. She is working. She is standing very close to some reporter — and she is laughing.

Bollocks.

Henning met Nora Klemetsen while he worked for Kapital and she was a rookie business journalist on Aftenposten. They ran into each other at a press conference. It was a run of the mill event, no drama, merely the announcement of some company’s annual results with so little headline-grabbing potential that they only warranted a paragraph in Dagens N?ringsliv and a right-hand column on page 17 in Finansavisen the next day. He happened to sit down next to Nora. He was there to profile one of the senior executives who would be retiring shortly. They yawned their way through the presentation, started giggling at their respective and increasingly hopeless attempts at disguising their boredom, and decided to go for a drink afterwards to recover.

They were both in relationships; she was living — semi-seriously — with a stockbroker, while he had an on-off thing going with a stuck-up corporate lawyer. But that first evening was so enjoyable, so free from awkwardness that they went for another drink the next time they found themselves covering the same story. He had had many girlfriends, but he had never known someone who was so easy to be with. Their tastes were compatible in so many ways, it bordered on scary.

They both liked grainy mustard with their sausages, not the usual bottled Idun rubbish. Neither of them liked tomatoes all that much, but they both loved ketchup. They liked the same type of films, and never had protracted arguments in the video store or outside the cinema. Neither of them liked spending the summer in hot foreign places when Norway offered rock faces and fresh prawns. Friday was Taco day. Eating anything else on a Friday was simply unthinkable.

And, gradually, they both realised they couldn’t live without each other.

Three and half years later they were married, exactly nine months afterwards Jonas arrived and they were as happy as two sleep-deprived career people in their late twenties can be, when their life is a plank full of splinters. Not enough sleep, too few breaks, minimum understanding of each other’s needs — both at home and at work — more and more rows, less and less time and energy to be together. In the end, neither of them could take any more.

Parents. The best and the worst human beings can become.

And now her arm is entwined with another man’s. Unprofessional, he thinks, flirting at a press conference. And Nora spots him halfway through a fit of laughter. She stops immediately, as though something is stuck in her throat. They look at each other for what seems like forever.

He blinks first. Vidar Larsen, who works for NTB, touches his shoulder and says ‘hi, so you’re back, Henning?’ He nods and decides to follow Vidar; he says nothing, but he makes sure he get as far away from Nora as he can, looking no one in the eye, following feet and footsteps through doors he could find blindfolded. He takes a seat at the back of the press room where he can watch the back of other people’s heads rather than vice versa. The room fills up quickly. He sees Nora and Corduroy enter together. They sit next to each other, quite a long way forward.

So, Nora, we meet again.

And, once again, we meet at a press conference.