A Question Mark is Half a Heart Read online

  Elin paused, waiting for him to elaborate.

  ‘Elin, come back up, I can hear you’re down there,’ he called. Now his voice was sharp and firm.

  She inhaled deeply.

  ‘I’ll be back in a minute, I just have to sort something out,’ she replied and put her hand on the door handle.

  Lasse’s clogs clacked hard on the stairs. The sound came closer. She didn’t dare open the door. When he came down she was still standing in the entrance.

  ‘The woman who rang said you were the most beautiful girl they’d ever seen. That they were going to make you a star. What have you been up to now, Number One?’

  He wasn’t angry. Quite the reverse. He smiled broadly and laughed so hard his chest rumbled. Then he put his big warm hands on her shoulders.

  ‘A model. Would you believe it!’

  NOW

  NEW YORK, 2017

  It’s been a long time since she lay sleepless for a whole night, but morning is here and she’s still awake. Alice sleeps deeply beside her. The covers have slipped off and her top has ridden up, baring her midriff. Elin tenderly pulls the covers back over her body.

  It’s dawn, and the small tufts of cloud in the sky are finely streaked with pink. From her bed she can see the pointed spire of the Empire State Building, shimmering beautifully in the morning sun. Elin rises, quiet and cautious, and Alice stirs a little but doesn’t wake. Elin stands still, her gaze resting on her daughter’s peaceful face. The bed is as it should be now, untidy and full of love. Alice often used to sleep in the bed with her and Sam when she was little. For too long, Sam thought, but Elin always told him a little extra closeness could only be a good thing. They used to argue about it a lot, but the lazy Sunday mornings together were always so much fun that they soon made up again. She wishes he was here now, that all three of them were in the bed again and that the room would fill with laughter when Alice woke.

  But he isn’t. She’s standing there alone, in the middle of a nightmare, remembering what once was. Remembering only the good times.

  The pipes in the walls rattle and the neighbours start to wake up, the sounds of the city growing more intense. She wraps a dressing gown around herself and goes out onto the terrace, picking withered leaves from the plants and throwing them over the edge of the building so they pick up speed in the wind and sail off. Just like Fredrik’s present did. She wonders which magazine he saw her in, if he reads the American magazines and if so, which ones. She’s often to be found on the contributors’ page, with a picture and a sentence about her, usually a reply to a silly question. Maybe he saw her in the pictures from some party or premiere. She wants to ask him, to talk to him about that, and about everything else that’s happened since they last saw each other.

  No journalists have written about her separation from Sam yet, no one knows about it. The thought makes her close her eyes and swallow hard. The headlines will come, she knows that. Nothing sells as well as the tragic lives of celebrities. She’s never thought of herself and Sam as celebrities, but the papers don’t care what she thinks. Through the years they’ve both become names that spark interest. She’s the creator of the portraits of the modern era, someone who gives the narcissists validation. He’s a successful businessman.

  When Alice wakes, Elin is sitting on the sofa. Her face is carefully made-up, the swelling around her eyes softened with a cold compress. Her hair is curled, falling with a beautiful shine over her shoulders. Her body is clothed in a severe black trouser suit, a polo shirt underneath. Alice pulls on her baggy jeans and a plain top. Elin inspects her.

  ‘Have you already showered?’

  ‘I had a shower last night, that’ll do.’

  She holds her hands up in the air, like a stop sign.

  ‘No comments on my clothing, thanks,’ she goes on.

  ‘I didn’t say anything.’

  ‘But you thought it.’

  ‘Perhaps. But thought is free. Isn’t that what you usually say?’

  She detects a smile on Alice’s lips.

  ‘Let’s go.’

  ‘Are we really going?’

  ‘Yes, we’re really going. Really.’

  Elin hides her eyes behind a pair of big black sunglasses with rhinestone-studded frames.

  ‘Is that what you’re wearing?’

  ‘No comments on my clothing, thanks.’

  ‘Touché.’ Alice grins and pulls an oversized hoodie over her head.

  ‘You look like a rapper,’ Elin says.

  ‘No comments, you say? Seriously, how is this going to work?’

  They’re flying business class, so the seats are soft and spacious. Elin sits straight-backed, with her sunglasses still on and her hands folded on her lap. Alice reclines beside her, with two cushions under her head and her feet pulled up on the seat. Dancing has made her as supple as a rubber doll. She pulls her earphones out of her ears and hands them over to Elin.

  ‘Listen, there are Swedish films. They speak so weirdly, hoppety-hoppety-hop. Can you talk like that?’

  Elin takes the earpieces and puts them in. The familiar syntax makes her smile, and she follows the film on Alice’s screen with curiosity. Alice pulls out one of the earpieces.

  ‘Say something in Swedish.’

  ‘What should I say?’

  ‘Say: Hi, Grandma, nice to meet you.’

  Elin says nothing.

  ‘I can’t remember.’

  ‘Can’t you speak it any more?’

  ‘Yes, of course I can. It’s my mother tongue. I still hear some Swedish, there are plenty of Swedes living in Manhattan, I’ve shot many Swedish stars.’

  ‘And what did you do then? Pretend that you didn’t know Swedish, that you couldn’t understand what they were saying?’

  Elin nods and laughs.

  ‘It’s hej mormor, fint att få träffa dig,’ she says.

  Alice can’t keep up.

  ‘Again, slowly.’

  ‘Hej mormor.’

  Alice repeats the greeting, tripping on the rounded r’s. Elin goes on.

  ‘Fint att få träffa dig.’

  ‘Hej mormor, fint att få träffa dig.’

  ‘Excellent, that’s it. You can say it now.’

  ‘Did they say anything stupid, thinking you wouldn’t understand?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The Swedish stars.’

  Elin laughs.

  ‘Yeah, it was actually pretty funny, them not knowing I understood.’

  ‘I want to learn Swedish, can you teach me some more? Please?’

  ‘Later maybe. I need to rest now. I barely slept last night. Finish watching your film.’

  ‘No, please, can’t we talk a bit more? I want to know what I should say to Grandma when we meet her. I want to know what she’s like.’

  ‘But I don’t know what she’s like now. I don’t know her. I just know she’s called Marianne Eriksson and that last I heard she was still living in Heivide, where I grew up.’

  A lump forms in Elin’s throat and she coughs, struggling to swallow. Alice gets up and calls the flight attendant.

  ‘Water, can we get some water over here?’

  The flight attendant comes running over with a glass of water. Elin takes two large gulps and then closes her eyes as Alice strokes her back.

  ‘Can we rest now?’ Elin pleads. Her voice sounds hoarse, weak, as though it’s about to break.

  Alice nods and returns to her film. But there’s no way for Elin to relax. She stares ahead of her. In her head, the memories replay, one after the other. Fredrik is always there, always beside her, her reassurance. Maybe that’s what she’s on her way towards, maybe the whole point is for the two of them to meet again.

  THEN

  STOCKHOLM, 1984

  Her suitcase stood ready to go in the hallway. It contained all the clothes she owned and still it was only half-full. Two pairs of jeans. A few tops. An extra pair of white canvas shoes, the uppers so worn that the fabric over her big toe joint ha
d ripped. Her passport was in her pocket, unstamped and new, collected just a few days ago. Lasse had moaned about the cost of the photos and she’d promised to pay him back.

  ‘When you’re famous,’ he’d said, laughing.

  The two spare pictures were now clamped to the fridge with a blue magnet next to some home store discount coupons. She was looking blankly at the camera, smiling weakly.

  Lasse was still asleep, on the mattress. Beside him was a half-full bottle with the lid unscrewed.

  He was snoring loudly and evenly. Those snores had become almost reassuring, like a metronome marking the seconds that passed in the vacuum of their home. Elin listened for a while, following each breath and rattling snore. She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, then picked up her bag and walked out into the stairwell without looking back. She stopped for a second outside the closed door, patting her pockets. Everything was there. Her passport, the tickets, the two hundred-krona notes she’d been given as pocket money by the modelling agency. Everything else would be paid for, they’d promised her that. Her metro card, which was still valid even though school had finished a few days earlier, would take her to the central station and the airport bus.

  Lasse had accompanied Elin to the Strand Hotel a few weeks earlier, where the French ‘mother agent’ was meeting the teenage hopefuls. She sat in an armchair in the foyer, with assistants on either side. She didn’t ask any questions, just examined them all, up and down. Some were asked to leave, a few were asked to fill in forms, others were led directly to another suite of sofas. Elin was one of the chosen ones who were moved to the sofas straight away. Lasse, grinning proudly, sat straight-backed beside her. He’d dressed up for the occasion, in a shirt and tie and pointy-toed leather shoes with a stacked heel, a well-worn leftover from the 1970s. He had his arm along the back of the sofa behind her and the sickly-sweet scent of his cologne tickled her nose.

  ‘If only your mother knew. Our little girl,’ he laughed, a little too loud, making Elin squirm. ‘You should probably call and tell her.’

  Elin nodded distractedly. The sofas around them had filled with more young girls, and all the others had their mothers with them. Lasse was still chattering away, but she wasn’t listening. She kept her eyes on the waterfront outside the window, watching the boats coming and going, leaving passengers on the quay, and the seagulls floating on the wind.

  The water was the only thing separating them.

  In Farsta there was no water. She struggled with her suitcase along Tobaksvägen, towards the bus stop. Over her shoulder hung a tattered denim handbag, and inside it were the pink sunglasses. She wondered if the sun would be shining in Paris, and if the stars would twinkle as beautifully at night. Would she understand what anyone said?

  An aeroplane cut through the air above the bus stop, its vapour trail like a string of bubbles across the dark blue sky. She’d seen many like it before, from the beach in Gotland, and Fredrik had taught her everything he knew about planes. But neither of them had ever flown in one, and she barely knew what an airport was.

  She unfolded the piece of paper she’d been given. The instructions were in English, neatly divided into bullet-points, with precise timings. She would take the airport bus to Arlanda airport, then fly to Paris, and at Charles de Gaulle someone would be waiting for her with her name on a sign.

  When the bus arrived Elin was reading through the bullet-points over and over again, her heart hammering in her chest. She cast her eyes over the field, towards number 38 and Lasse’s apartment. The sun was too bright for her to be able to make out anything, but maybe he was standing there watching her board the bus. Or maybe he was still snoring.

  The bus doors opened and the driver nodded to her suitcase and smiled.

  ‘Aha, holiday time,’ he said.

  Elin stretched and smiled hesitantly. It was only going to be a two-week trial period. She’d probably be back soon.

  ‘Yeah, I’m going to Arlanda,’ she replied.

  NOW

  VISBY, 2017

  The familiar scent hits her as she steps out of the plane. The scent of earth, sea, and rain. And the strong wind in her face. She stops dead and inhales deeply. Chaos ensues, Alice bumping into her cabin bag, someone behind colliding with Alice. But Elin is incapable of taking another step, it’s as though she’s taken root in the top step of the metal stairs. Apologising, Alice presses Elin towards the rail to allow other passengers to go past.

  ‘Mom, you have to go down,’ she whispers.

  ‘I feel like I’m going to faint.’

  ‘It’s just a short walk, you can see the terminal over there. We’ll sit down when we get there. We’re not in a rush.’

  Alice takes Elin’s hand in hers and goes ahead of her down the steps. Slowly, Elin follows her.

  The arrivals hall is spartan, just a little room and a baggage carousel. There are no chairs. They stand there, along with many others, waiting patiently for their bags. Everyone is silent.

  ‘Why is no one talking?’ Alice whispers. ‘Is there a national vow of silence?’

  Elin grins at her.

  ‘City slicker,’ she says.

  A couple standing in front of them are kissing each other passionately, the smacking sound of their saliva echoing through the little room. Alice starts to sing and Elin elbows her in the side.

  ‘What?’ she whispers. ‘Someone has to do something. It’s too quiet here. I’m going crazy.’

  Alice stops singing, but her hips are still moving to a beat and Elin can see her lips moving. There’s always music in her, always joy.

  At last they’re sitting in a hired car, all their luggage stowed in the boot. Alice leans against the window, studying the passing landscape: the fences behind which a few grey sheep are grazing the barren ground, the trees, the crooked little pines Elin told her about. The houses, which are few and far between, surrounded by large plots of forest. Elin knows exactly where she’s going, the roads haven’t changed at all. When they get to the roundabout at Norrgatt she turns down towards Norderport, and Alice shouts and points as she sees the beautiful city wall. The buildings inside look like toy houses, taken from another time.

  ‘Do people live here?’ she asks, astonished, making Elin laugh.

  ‘It’s probably a good thing we came here, so you can see something other than skyscrapers. Yes, people live in these houses.’

  It’s barely three in the afternoon, but darkness is already falling. Light snowflakes float in the air beneath the glow from the street lights. Elin winds her way through the narrow streets between the harbour and the hotel. Inside her body, her organs are twisting and heaving, and when she feels a wave of nausea she suddenly stops the car, leaning her head against the steering wheel. Alice unbuckles her seatbelt and opens the door.

  ‘No, we’re not there yet,’ says Elin.

  ‘Why did you stop then?’

  ‘Why are we here?’

  ‘Because you have to do this.’

  ‘I don’t want to. I really don’t want to.’

  The wind catches the car door, which blows open. Alice grabs it and pulls it shut, and though not before the interior fills with cold, sea-scented air.

  ‘Drive. Let’s just get to the hotel and we can rest awhile.’

  ‘He lives here, I think. Just a few streets away.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Fredrik.’

  ‘Tell me about him. Was he your boyfriend?’

  ‘Just a friend. Almost like a brother.’

  ‘We can stop and knock on his door if you want.’

  Elin starts the engine again and drives off, the tyres spinning against the slippery cobblestones.

  ‘Are you mad? Of course I don’t want to.’

  They sit in silence the rest of the way. They only see a handful of people, hunched against the icy wind, with thick coats and scarves and hats pulled down over pale faces. This is where they live their lives, this is where they go about their daily business. She wonders what Fredrik do
es day-to-day, what work he does. He still lives on the island, so he can’t have become an astronaut like he wanted to as a child. Maybe he has a wife, children. She wonders if he thinks about her often, if he missed her when she disappeared or if he was angry at her for taking his papa away from him.

  The thought makes her shudder.

  ‘Elin. Är det du?’

  They’re standing in the hotel lobby, surrounded by bags, when a member of staff suddenly stops in front of them. Elin looks at her quizzically.

  ‘It is you, isn’t it? Elin Eriksson? I never thought I’d see you again.’

  The woman looks like she’s seen a ghost. Elin puts her sunglasses back on, but Alice reaches over and pulls them straight off again.

  ‘Yes, I’m Elin,’ she says in English, and nods at the woman. ‘Who are you?’

  She starts hesitantly in English, but then switches to Swedish.

  ‘It’s Malin, don’t you remember me? We were in the same class. Well, until you moved, after the fire. How lovely to see you here on the island after all these years. I’ve always wondered where you went. No one ever told us.’ Malin tilts her head and studies Elin. ‘You’re just the same, and yet different.’

  Elin’s face tightens, small wrinkles forming around her mouth. She avoids meeting the woman’s eyes and reaches for her bag.

  ‘I’m sorry, I don’t remember you, you must be mistaken,’ she mutters in Swedish.

  Alice prods her.

  ‘What are you saying, who is that? Can’t you speak English so I understand?’

  ‘I don’t know, I don’t know her. Let it go.’

  Elin pulls her bag towards the reception, but Malin and Alice stay put. Elin can hear them talking but she can’t make out what they’re saying. She checks in, eager to get to her bed.

  ‘Mama, you have to stop running away now. Talk to her, you were in the same class at school, you must remember her. Don’t be so rude,’ hisses Alice, who has now caught up with her.

  Elin holds out a key card and turns her back on Alice.

  ‘Here, you’ve got your own room. Do what you want, order room service if you’re hungry. I need to rest a while, be alone.’