A Question Mark is Half a Heart Read online

  ‘But I don’t get it, what happened then? Where’s your mom now?’

  ‘I don’t know. I ran away from the hospital where we were both being treated and since then I haven’t heard from her.’

  Alice frowns, confused.

  ‘But surely she missed you? Where did you run away to?’

  ‘To Lasse, to my papa. He was living in Stockholm then, I knew his address, because we got a letter when he came out of prison and it was written on the envelope. Mama got a letter.’

  ‘But didn’t anyone come looking for you?’

  ‘No. Papa told them I was there. No one wanted to know anything about him after what he’d done. And I guess no one wanted to know anything about me either. I’d killed my mother’s new husband, my brothers, our neighbours …’

  Elin is struggling to breathe now, her breath rasping in her chest. She gasps for air, her nose blocked, her eyes swollen.

  ‘But your mom might still be alive, my grandma. Maybe she’s always wondered, always missed you. It was just an accident, wasn’t it?’

  Tears are streaming down Elin’s cheeks. She shakes and sobs.

  ‘Edvin was so sweet, my littlest brother. He had hazel eyes that glittered when he smiled and curly, golden hair. I rescued him from the flames, but he was left there, they left him behind when they rescued me from the field.’

  ‘Was he alive when you left him?’

  Elin nods.

  ‘But there was so much smoke. It’s the smoke that kills.’

  Elin stops. She breathes deeply, as though she still can’t get enough air.

  ‘So how did you end up here? In New York?’ Alice asks her.

  ‘You know that.’

  ‘So Paris is just a lie?’

  ‘No, Paris isn’t a lie, not at all. Just the part about my mother. I lived there, just like I told you. I was discovered as a model on the streets of Stockholm and got to move there and work. I told you that. My papa was nothing special, so I left again.’

  ‘What do you mean, nothing special? How can you say that about your own dad?’ Alice shakes her head.

  ‘I know, it’s hard to understand – for me, too. He tried, he did. He made sure I had clothes and everything I needed for school. But he drank too much. He loved alcohol more than he loved me.’

  ‘That sounds awful.’

  ‘Yeah, it’s not something I was in a hurry to get back to. Paris saved me. I learned to take photographs while I was there too, and I was much happier behind the camera than in front of it. And after a while I met your dad. The woman in the bookshop really existed too, she was a friend. And she was just as I’ve described her. She just wasn’t my real mom. I often wished she had been. She was so smart, she taught me about life, she believed in me. No one had done that before.’

  ‘How can I trust you now? You’ve been lying so much, all my life.’

  ‘It’s just the first thirteen years, everything else is true.’

  ‘Just the first thirteen years … Mom, do you hear how nuts that sounds?’

  The dawn light finds its way in through the apartment’s windows, painting pale stripes across the white floor. Elin and Alice sit quietly, surrounded by all Elin’s suppressed memories and all the thoughts tormenting them both. The sounds of the street grow louder; trucks stop and unload, cabs toot. Alice takes Elin’s hand, braiding her fingers into her mother’s.

  ‘Oh, Mom, I want to go there. I want to go to Sweden with you. You need to go home again,’ she says.

  THEN

  STOCKHOLM, 1982

  The trucks were already lined up down on the harbour, protected by a tall fence and manned barriers. One or two cars drove up, the drivers showing their tickets and joining the queue for the ferry. Elin crept along the fence. There was barbed wire at the point where it met the sea, but if she climbed out round the edge of the quay she would be able to get under it. If only these jeans weren’t so hard to manoeuvre in. She crossed the asphalt to a cluster of shipping containers and found a flat plastic packaging band on the floor, which she pulled through the belt loops. The smooth surface made it hard to tie so she frayed the ends and knotted the narrower shreds together. The jeans stayed up. She ran back to the fence and looked in all directions – no one had seen her. She eased herself down, clinging tightly to the small stone blocks sticking out from the quayside, and climbed sideways one careful step at a time. Soon she had passed underneath the thick coils of barbed wire, and she heaved herself back up and ran over to one of the trucks. She picked a dark blue one, the same colour as her clothes, and squeezed her way in between the driver’s cab and the trailer. From her hiding place she could see the seamen crossing the harbour in their yellow jackets, directing the vehicles as the queues grew longer and longer.

  She balanced on the heavy tow hitch when the vehicle finally began to move. The asphalt flickered beneath her feet; she held on for dear life, so hard her knuckles whitened, but her body still swayed from side to side.

  The truck shook as it drove up the ramp, making the grooves in the metal clunk and clang. One of Elin’s knees buckled and she lost her balance, hanging by her hands alone for a terrifying second until she was able to pull herself up again with the aid of the cargo lashes, scrabbling for a foothold. The black asphalt under the wheels had been replaced by green-painted metal with broad yellow stripes marking the lanes, and the truck slowed down. Elin held her breath, standing in the narrow gap, pressing her whole body against the trailer. No one noticed her. She heard the driver’s cabin open and close. Everything was vibrating. Then there was silence.

  She didn’t move. It wasn’t until all the vehicles had grown quiet, with no more doors slamming, and the low rumble of the boat’s engines filled every nook and cranny of the car deck, that she let go and climbed carefully down from her hiding place. The burnt skin around her ankles stung and ached.

  Realising there were people still in the next car along, she gasped and instinctively crouched down. But they didn’t see her; their seats were reclined and they were sleeping.

  Brushing off the dust and debris from her trousers and top, she walked along, straight-backed, as though she’d come from a car. Now she was onboard, and the boat had already left the harbour, she didn’t need to hide or be afraid any more.

  The lounge on the upper deck was full of people, sitting in armchairs around circular tables. Families with children who clambered over the chairs and crawled across the carpet, couples with thermoses and homemade sandwiches, young people laughing and toasting each other with their beers. She walked past them all, towards the large windows. She stood there a long time and looked out. She didn’t have a krona in her pocket, her only luggage the clothes she stood in. In her head she rattled off the address in Farsta, the one she’d make her way to once the boat landed in Nynäshamn.

  Calmly, she watched the place the boat was leaving behind. The towers and steeples of Visby gleamed in the sunlight and the cliffs shone white against the dark backdrop of forest. The coast grew longer and longer, the island smaller and smaller. In the end it had vanished completely over the horizon, and there was nothing but sea.

  The passengers left the boat in a steady stream. Elin followed them, limping. Her feet were hurting in the undersized shoes, and she was cold. Outside the terminal, a long queue formed as people waited for the bus to Stockholm. Others carried on down the street. Perhaps they lived in Nynäshamn, or perhaps they were going somewhere else. Elin stood and observed the scene. A few cars had stopped at the pick-up area and people vanished from the pavement one by one, as though they were sticks in a game of pick-up-sticks. She and Fredrik used to play it, with regular twigs they’d gathered in the forest. Now they might never play together again. The thought made her feel even colder, shivers spreading through her body. Would he miss her, would he look for her? She hugged herself, hunching her shoulders.

  Her fellow travellers vanished one by one until it was just her and a solitary car left. No one came up to it; it seemed to be waiting in
vain.

  Plucking up the courage to go over, Elin rapped on the window, two careful knocks. The man in the car reached over the passenger seat and wound it down. The car was full of smoke, which belched out. Elin coughed and took a step back.

  ‘Are you lost?’

  The man raised his eyebrows.

  ‘A little,’ she admitted, folding her arms tightly across her chest.

  The man nodded to the seat beside him.

  ‘Jump in if you want, I can drive you to the commuter train.’

  Elin hesitated.

  ‘Aren’t you waiting for someone?’

  The man laughed.

  ‘Always. I’m waiting for the love of my life, you know.’

  Elin smiled and put her hand on the door handle.

  ‘Perhaps it’s you,’ the man went on, and laughed again, which then turned into coughing. He put his hand over his mouth, his chest rattling.

  Elin immediately let go of the handle and backed away, shaking her head.

  ‘I’ll walk, it’s probably better.’

  ‘Better for you perhaps, not for me,’ the man chuckled.

  His voice gave her a queer feeling. He stretched across the seat and pushed open the door, then patted the seat encouragingly. Dust sprung up from its plush surface.

  ‘Come on, sweetheart. I’ll drive you to the train. Young girls like you shouldn’t be out on their own this late.’

  Elin walked away without a word. She chose the same direction she’d previously seen the stream of people going. She wasn’t sure what a ‘commuter train’ involved, as there were no trains on Gotland. But maybe it could get her to Stockholm? It was easy to dodge fares on trains, she’d seen it in films.

  It wasn’t long before the man in the car turned up again, crawling slowly alongside her. If she sped up, he did too. The light from the streetlamps created faint yellow circles, and between them the street lay empty and threateningly dark. She started to run, as fast as her legs could carry her, and the man drove alongside her the whole way. Suddenly he sounded his horn and called something through the window. She couldn’t hear what he said, but he repeated himself.

  ‘It’s up there, turn right, I’ll stay here until I see you’ve reached the platform. Do you need money for a ticket?’

  Elin stared at him.

  ‘How do you know that?’ she asked.

  ‘I know a runaway when I see one. I’m sure you’ve got your reasons, I won’t ask. Here!’ He handed her a ten-krona note.

  Elin walked hesitantly over to the car and took it out of his hand.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said quietly.

  ‘Hurry now, the train leaves soon and it’s the last one.’ He grabbed hold of her wrist, hard. ‘And make sure you get in touch with the folks at home. Don’t do anything silly.’

  Elin nodded and pulled her arm away. Her wrist ached, like a reminder of what he’d just said.

  ‘I’m going to see my papa now, that’s not silly,’ she whispered.

  She turned on her heel without saying goodbye, and ran towards the platform. The train was there and she just made it through the doors before it set off. Through the window she saw the man in the car slowly driving off, the exhaust fumes trailing behind it.

  The carriage was full of people with luggage; she recognised a few of them from the boat. Everyone looked hollow-eyed and tired. Elin chose an empty seat, leaned against the cold wall and watched the buildings rushing by. When the conductor came, she held out the ten-krona note and looked him in the eye.

  ‘Farsta please,’ she ventured.

  ‘You’ll be wanting Södertörns Villastad, then,’ he replied and gave her back a pile of coins as change, counting them out into her palm.

  Elin closed her fingers on the coins and held them tensely the rest of the long journey. The train stopped now and then, and she read each sign carefully.

  At last it came. The sign she’d been waiting for the entire journey: Södertörns Villastad. She got off and soon found herself alone on a deserted platform.

  Blocks of flats in long rectangular rows, like gigantic brown shoeboxes. Neat lines of windows, in perfect symmetry. Doors with numbers above them, lit by weak lamps. Elin had finally got there after wandering the empty streets for hours, after taking directions from a slumbering alcoholic on a bench on the square at Hökarängen. And now here she was, walking towards Tobaksvägen. She stopped and looked up at all the windows, astonished that so many people could live in one building. Somewhere, behind one of these panes of glass, her father was sleeping. And soon he’d wake up.

  Thirty-eight. The number she’d stored in her memory since she’d seen it written on the back of the letter he’d sent Marianne. The door squeaked slightly when she opened it, echoing faintly in the stairwell, and a dog barked noisily behind a door. She stood still a while until it stopped. She was so tired she was swaying from side to side. She was carrying the canvas shoes in her hand; her toes had been hurting so much that she’d gone barefoot for the last few hours. Her feet were cold, just like the rest of her, and the blackened soles of her feet stung. She tiptoed up the steps, reading the names on the doors carefully until she was standing before her own surname. She rang the doorbell without hesitation, rubbing the tiredness from her eyes as she waited for someone to open the door. It took a long time. She rang again, and again. At last she heard someone moving on the other side. She held her breath as the door was opened a crack.

  ‘Number One, is that you?’ The eyes that met her own were surprised, and the door swung open. Elin smiled as her papa stroked her cheek with his big warm hand.

  He was wearing nothing but baggy white underpants. His stomach hung over the waistband, covered in curly black hairs. His chin was hidden under long stubble, his hair unruly. They stared at one another, neither of them sure what to say. In the end, Lasse stepped aside and asked her to come in. He moved quickly through the hallway into the only room, apologising on the way.

  ‘I haven’t really got it ship-shape yet.’ He gathered up bottles, rubbish, and beer cans until his arms were full. Then he pushed past her into the little kitchen and shoved them into a plastic bag. The noise was cacophonous in the nighttime silence.

  Elin took a few steps into the room and looked around her. There was a narrow bed with tattered sheets and a little table with a TV on it. On the other side of the room was a single brown armchair, angled towards the window, and a large coffee table. The walls were bare, the window had no curtains and there were no plants on the windowsill, only more beer cans.

  Lasse came into the room again. He’d found a shirt from somewhere, but buttoned it up wrongly, so the left side of the collar was pushed up towards his ear.

  ‘Did your mother send you here?’ He ran his hand over his head, smoothing the thick hair.

  Elin nodded.

  ‘Can I stay here a while?’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Lasse sank onto the bed.

  ‘Well, live here.’

  Lasse’s eyes flitted around the room. He stood up stiffly and looked at her.

  ‘You? Here?’

  When Elin awoke the room smelled of cleaning fluid. Lasse had offered her his bed and she’d fallen asleep the second her head hit the pillow, exhausted from her journey. Now, sunlight was flooding into the room. Lasse’s head stuck up over the top of the armchair. His legs were stretched out, with his feet resting on the windowsill. On the coffee table there was juice and bread and cheese, waiting for them.

  Elin crept over to him and sat down with her back against the wall. Now it wasn’t just the burns around her ankles that hurt, the soles of her feet were also wounded from her barefoot pilgrimage.

  Lasse’s eyes were closed, and the rattle of his breath was familiar. His scent reminded her of everything she’d longed for. She looked around her. Everything had been cleaned up: heaps of clothes tidied away, the beer cans on the windowsill cleared, piles of newspapers thrown out. She smiled as she studied her father, who was wearing proper trousers and a s
hirt, neatly buttoned right up to his chin. When he finally opened his eyes, he blinked several times.

  ‘Number One, are you really here?’

  ‘You’ve cleaned up so nicely. Have you been up all night?’

  ‘Yeah, if you’re going to live here it needs to be a bit tidier. I tried to ring your mother but there was no one registered to that number. Hasn’t she paid the bill?’

  Elin shrugged and looked away.

  ‘I sent a letter, in any case, when I went to the shop. Wrote that you’d arrived OK. So now she knows you’re here,’ he went on, twisting the chair round to face the table and the tray.

  Elin picked up a slice of bread and crammed it into her mouth in a few bites, with no topping.

  ‘Are you that hungry?’ Lasse cut a thick piece of cheese with the kitchen knife, passed it over to her and he watched as she stuffed it straight in her mouth.

  ‘I didn’t have any money with me on the boat. I’ve had nothing to eat for ages.’

  ‘What have you done to your legs?’ Lasse gestured to the white dressings, now grubby.

  ‘I burned myself, there was a fire …’ Elin stammered and didn’t know how she was going to explain.

  Lasse interrupted her:

  ‘Yeah, fuck, I heard about it. They called. Did you know that …?’

  ‘Yeah, I don’t want to talk about it. Ever.’ Elin cut him off. She didn’t want to think about what had just happened, just wanted to suppress it forever.

  She reached for the juice and poured it into two glasses. Then she made two sandwiches, one for herself and one for Lasse. Lasse made no attempt to force her to speak, just took a big bite of his sandwich.

  ‘Look at that, I’ve got a maid into the bargain. This will be all right, this will,’ he mumbled, his mouth full.

  ‘So I can stay?’

  Lasse put both his warm hands on her cheeks and tipped her head from side to side.

  ‘Well, yes, my little bug. I’ll treat you like a princess. Tomorrow we’ll find you a school. Today we’ll fix up a mattress. And I’ll sleep on that, you can have the bed, and I’ll buy you the loveliest quilt there is. And teddies.’