Shadow

31

With what right?

Kristoffer pulled another length of books off the bookshelf.

With what right was everything taken from him?

Another gulp burned his throat, but like a rejected lover it refused to come to his rescue. The image of Jesper was scorched onto his retina, refusing to be dissolved by the solvent he was pouring into himself.

He had rung Jesper’s parents and received confirmation of his death. Two days before they had found him in his flat. A police report had been filed and a search had been launched to find the masked man. What crime he might be charged with, the police couldn’t yet say.

Another length of books crashed to the floor, and when he was finished with them he knocked over the bookshelf too. Gasping, he looked around for something else he could pull over. Nothing could be allowed to stand, pretending to be whole. All these books at his feet that he was ploughing his way through. Written by smug scholars who had fooled him into thinking there was a logic to existence.

He raised the bottle to his mouth. The liquid he’d been longing for ran down his throat, but all he sensed was a shrill ringing in his ears.

He turned to the desk and swept the computer to the floor. The screen went blank and he gave it a kick to make sure that it would never light up again.

Jesper was gone.

Jesper had left him.

Jesper was dead and had taken with him all that he had meant to Kristoffer. The closest thing to love he had ever dared feel.

Outside the window, Katarina Church still stood there. The branches of the trees were still attached to the trunks. No windows were blown out in the surrounding buildings. And down in the cemetery someone was walking as if the air were still fit to breathe. Only in his flat was the catastrophe apparent. The rest of the world seemingly intended to go on as if nothing had happened.

He was gone. Would never exist again. All that he’d had ahead of him would never happen now. His brilliant power of observation had in the end been beaten by cynicism. Evil had been permitted to triumph.

Exhausted, Kristoffer sank down in a chair. He sat there, listening to the sound of his own breathing. The involuntary repetition. The prerequisite for his survival. The instinct to keep himself alive.

Gratefully he felt it take over. The feeling of liberation when his brain went numb. When he was no longer capable of comprehending the depth of his pain. Why weren’t human beings born this way? With their blood spiked from the start with a small percentage of alcohol. With the defence mechanism disconnected and the soul in a state of peace.

Was survival really so important that it outweighed all suffering?

He took another gulp from the bottle. On the desk before him lay a letter. He had picked it up from the hall when Jesper was still alive. Having a reason to reach out his hand felt like an achievement. Sender: Marianne Folkesson. He tore open the envelope. Inside was a note and another letter.

I found this in Gerda’s flat. See you at the funeral.

Yours truly,

Marianne

A white envelope with his name on it. Written in a flowing script.

To be delivered after my death.

He opened the envelope lethargically and began to read.