More Bitter Than Death: A Novel Part 25

"You couldn't just get an abortion back then," Sirkka explained. "We heard about people going off and getting abortions in other countries, like Poland. And you could apply to get one here in Sweden, if you had some particular reason, but we didn't really have any particular reason. We did what most of our friends were doing. We got married. Maybe people were liberated in the seventies in some ways, but there were still a lot of people who thought it was shameful to have a child out of wedlock. You were supposed to be married, settled. Otherwise what would people think?"

Sirkka throws up her hands in a gesture of resignation, and it's clear that she has thought about this, the course of her life, how things could have gone differently, countless times before.

"Well, anyway, we were happy when our little girl arrived. She was so cute. We got a bigger apartment too, in Sodertalje. Timo was closer to his job and I stayed home with Helena. And then Mikael was born the year after."

"And then what happened?" Sofie's eyes are wide. She looks almost reverent, a child listening raptly to a fairy tale.

"Ah, well." Sirkka sighs. "It's hard to explain. Timo got dissatisfied, and jealous. He started keeping tabs on me, guarding me. I understand now that that's usually how it begins, but at the time . . . I thought I'd done something wrong. I tried to change, be happier, clean better, make better food, make sure the kids behaved when their dad was home. I wasn't as nice to strangers and withdrew from my friends. But none of that helped, at all. Nothing I did helped. He would get mad. He got crazy mad-mad if the children yelled or made noise, mad if I looked grumpy, mad if I was happy, mad if the food didn't taste good. I remember the first time he hit me. It was Christmastime and I'd made a potato ca.s.serole from his mother's recipe. He said it was too salty. He said I made him feel ashamed of his family, that he was married to an ugly old hag who couldn't cook. And then he hit me in the face."

Sirkka closes her eyes, her wrinkled face wincing slightly. The memory is painful; after all these years that blow still hurts.

"It was like he enjoyed it. I don't remember him ever saying he was sorry or apologizing. It was as if he had just done something he thought he was ent.i.tled to do. He became someone else, another person, and I couldn't understand it. Suddenly I was in h.e.l.l and I didn't know how I'd gotten there. He was a devil, a real devil."

Her face contorts again in pain.

"And you couldn't leave him?" Aina's question is gentle, more of a confirmation.

"No, I didn't have anywhere to go-no job, no money of my own, no friends. My family was in Finland, but my parents were getting old and then my mom got cancer. It took six months and then she was gone. All I had was my husband and the kids. So I lived for my kids."

Again a glimpse of that almost imperceptible smile, as if Sirkka has learned not to broadcast her feelings. She sits still, narrating dispa.s.sionately, as if the story weren't about her. Only the faint twitches of her wrinkled face betray her emotions.

"At first he only hit me occasionally. Mostly he yelled, berated me when something was wrong, maybe a slap to the side of my head with his open hand. Then it changed. The threats began. He would say he was going to kill me if I didn't shape up, if I didn't do what he said. I think he enjoyed degrading me, seeing me scared. He had me trapped, and he knew it. He owned me. I've often wondered why he didn't leave me-I mean, since he thought I was so worthless, so ugly, so . . . repulsive. He owned me, and that made him feel powerful. That's how I explain it to myself anyway."

Sirkka smiles apologetically at Aina and me, as if she thinks she's stepping on our turf, that the explaining and interpreting should be left to us.

"The kids, it's like they held me up. There were times when I wished I were dead. Death was the only way out I could imagine. But the kids, I always found the strength to go on because of them."

Kattis looks horrified, peering at Sirkka with a look of profound sympathy. She says, "But the stuff you're talking about was more than thirty years ago. Do you mean to say you stayed with him this whole time? That it kept going? For all those years? For your entire adult life?"

"Yup, that's it," Sirkka says. "Just like you said, for my entire adult life. First it was the kids, they were little, and then . . . Well, you get used to it. I can't explain it any other way than that. You get used to it. Even the worst of it becomes mundane. And you kind of know what's coming. Eventually I started to kind of doubt myself. Maybe Timo was right, maybe I was a dumb old b.i.t.c.h who couldn't live without him. Now I know what I had-a bad husband, you know? But I also had a roof over my head and money for food. The kids got bigger, moved away from home. Sometimes they told me I should leave him. They knew how things were. Even if they only saw bits and pieces of what happened. Even Timo had the sense to s.h.i.+eld the kids from the worst of it. And I would defend him, make excuses, smooth things over. I know it sounds crazy, but that's how it was. And we had each other. I can't really explain it, but . . . it was the two of us for all those years. Things between us were almost nice sometimes, however strange that might sound. It was like we had a truce, and time pa.s.sed. The years go by so fast. Suddenly you're old, the kids have left the nest, and everything you dreamt about long ago is gone. It's already too late to do anything. Your whole life has pa.s.sed you by. That was almost the most distressing part, when I realized he'd stolen almost my whole life from me. Even if he killed me, he couldn't take anything else from me. And that was when . . ."

Sirkka looks meditative, as if she were debating something with herself. The sudden silence in the room feels heavy, charged, every sound noticeably amplified-the soft hum of the ventilation system, the steady ticking of the clock, the rain beating against the window. No one says anything. We're all hanging on Sirkka's next sentence.

"It was a Tuesday," Sirkka says. "I had the night s.h.i.+ft at the hospital and was making us dinner the way I always did. We were going to eat together and then it would be time for me to go to work. Timo was sitting on the couch watching something on the doc.u.mentary channel as usual. He liked to flaunt all the new things he learned. He hadn't been feeling well for a couple of days, had been staying home from work. And then suddenly he was yelling for me, sitting there on the couch. At first I thought he wanted something, that he wanted me to bring him something, but then . . . I realized something was wrong. His voice sounded so weird. When I got to the living room he was sort of hugging himself. It looked so odd. His face was totally gray, ashen and sweaty. His arms and his chest were hurting. He wanted me to call an ambulance. I've worked in health care for so many years. I knew just by looking at him that it was his heart. And I knew he had high blood pressure and was a little overweight. He smoked too. I stood there watching Timo and I knew this could be bad, really bad. And suddenly it was as if . . . All the years . . . all the years we'd shared flashed through my mind, all the blows, all the insults, the scorn. Now suddenly he was the weak one and I was the strong one. And I knew the right thing to do was go get the phone and call. My G.o.d, I mean, I could tell he was sick, but I couldn't make myself do it. My whole life wasted on him! And now he wanted me to help him. So I looked at him and nodded, whispered that I would call. Then I went back to the kitchen, turned off the burner under the potatoes, put the frying pan away, put the pork chops back in the fridge, put the plates and gla.s.ses back in the cupboard. I was like a movie playing backwards, clearing away the traces of a dinner that we'd never eaten. And then I went out into the hall, put on my coat, got my purse. I picked up the phone: we had one of those cordless ones. I stuffed it into my purse and left. I went to work. When I came home again the next day, he was still sitting on the couch in the same spot, in almost the same position, but he was dead. And when I saw that he was gone, I sat down on the floor and cried with relief."

At night I dream about Stefan again.

Always Stefan.

We're making love in the dark and his cold, wet body is moving energetically on top of mine. I know he belongs to the sea now, that he's resting in Davy Jones' locker, but I don't want to let him go. I want to hold on to him for a little while longer, feel him inside me one last time.

It feels more potent-stronger, better, and more vivid-than making love with Markus.

Even though Stefan's dead.

So, I'm making love to my dead husband and I'm enjoying it, holding him hard around those bony hips, tasting the salt.w.a.ter that trickles off his back, over his shoulders, and into my mouth.

He lies down next to me in bed afterward, with his hand on my stomach. I watch his rib cage rise and fall in the dim light, as if he were actually breathing; I see his black eyes twinkling in the darkness.

"There," he says quietly, gently stroking my stomach with his soft, cold hand. "Now the baby is mine too."

Just as I'm about to respond to him, I feel hands shaking me, bringing me back to reality. The contours of Stefan's body suddenly blur, fade away, until there's just a damp breeze left.

I realize Markus is waking me up, and suddenly I'm afraid I was talking in my sleep. Maybe I called out Stefan's name, or maybe something else, something worse.

"Siri, wake up!"

I look at him, my current partner, the one I should love properly, the one who deserves and needs my love.

The bedroom is dark, but the faint yellow sheen from the fireplace in the living room lights up his face. His hair is sticking straight up and I notice that his forehead is beaded with sweat.

"Siri, she's gone. Someone took her," Markus says.

"Who? What are you talking about? Who's gone?"

"Tilda, you know, that little girl who witnessed Susanne's murder. Someone kidnapped her last night from her dad's place."

Suddenly I'm wide awake. Despite the heat in the cottage, I'm freezing. Something in my abdomen twists into a knot and I feel sick.

Tilda, that little girl who sat there drawing in the pool of her own mother's blood, traumatized little Tilda, who had only been able to say that the murderer was a man.

Kidnapped.

Excerpt from a letter to social services from the treatment director at Saby Treatment Home

The client is an 18-year-old boy who has been living here at Saby since he was 14. He has also spent some periods during that time living at home with his family, but that has not gone so well. During the years the client has lived with us, we have done a lot of environmental therapy work with him. For example, the client has been put in charge of tending the kitchen garden, which he has done well. He has also enjoyed various types of creative activities such as drama and art. We have had a little trouble motivating the client academically and have therefore had a hard time a.s.sessing his intellectual capacities, but a lot of the staff consider him to be a little slow and think he has a hard time understanding complex instructions. He does best in structured situations working with practical, hands-on tasks. He has also turned out to be very artistically gifted and enjoys drawing and painting.

During the periods when he was living with his family, there was frequent conflict and occasional fights. We think the client has significant difficulties adjusting to new situations and it is also obvious that he fares best in a calm environment. The client has been very cautious and a little reserved in his relations with his peers here at Saby. He really wants to spend time with his peers and is very happy when they pay attention to him and invite him to partic.i.p.ate in their social lives. At the same time it's clear that he doesn't really know how to conduct himself with kids his own age. He easily becomes nervous and insecure and can also become aggressive, especially if he misinterprets the intentions of the other teens.

The time has come to discharge the client from Saby so that he can move back to his hometown. It seems most likely that he will live in his parents' old home, which he inherited following their deaths. We here at Saby think it is important that the client continue to receive support from social services following his discharge, as we do not consider it likely that he will be able to manage fully on his own. We recommend ongoing contact with the social services office. We also believe that he would benefit from joining the workforce, so we also consider contact with the employment office to be extremely important.

Peter Runfeldt, treatment director, Saby Treatment Home

I'm sitting on a stack of dissertations in Vijay's office, crying, tears streaming down my cheeks.

Vijay is sitting in his chair, looking concerned. I know what he's thinking: that it was a mistake for him to ask me to help run the support group, that I'm not strong enough, that I can't keep my own issues separate from my patients', that the past has caught up with me at last.

I had so desperately wanted to prove the opposite, but instead I'm sitting here crying.

Vijay stuffs some snuff up under his lip, clears his throat, and says, "Well, but it's not like it's your fault that someone kidnapped that little girl, is it? You realize that, right?"

I can't respond, just shake my head and noisily blow my nose in the big facial tissue he handed me, the one that is turning into a little wet ball.

"She's a witness," he continues, "it even said so in the paper. The murderer probably wants to . . . get her out of the way."

I blow my nose again and look at him.

"It could be anyone," I say. "Markus says they don't have any leads. They didn't find any evidence outside the window. It rained too much, so there weren't any footprints or anything. Henrik is on the run, so he could have taken her. But he really doesn't have a motive, since he has an alibi for Susanne's murder. So why would he kidnap Tilda? He can't be Susanne's killer. No matter how you look at it, it just seems that everything has to do with that first murder, Susanne's murder."

Vijay takes another tissue from his desk, scrunches it up into a little ball, and tosses it to me where I'm sitting on the stack on the floor. I catch it and continue.

"The police are checking out everyone Susanne knew with a fine-toothed comb, talking to all her coworkers, all her relatives. I don't think they've found anything."

"It feels like we're missing something," Vijay says. "Purely statistically speaking, Susanne's killer should be someone who was close to her. Most murders are committed by people close to the victim. The nature of the crime also suggests that. She was kicked to death, in the face no less. That is extremely brutal and very personal. That suggests that whoever committed the crime had strong feelings toward her, or maybe I should say against her."

I blow my nose again and ask, "So what do you think?"

Vijay taps his pen on his desk and says, "I think we should start by considering the possible motives."

"And?" I prompt.

"Well, if Kattis's accusations are true, and Henrik was guilty of domestic violence, there's good reason to suspect that he actually did do it."

"But he was at the bar," I remind Vijay.

"So he and his buddies say, yes."

I consider this comment for a bit. If Henrik's alibi doesn't stand up, if he and his friends are lying . . . That would fit. The brutal, unjustified violence, the hatred. It would fit a culprit like that.

"But wouldn't the police have checked out something like that? Whether his alibi held up or not, I mean."

"Sure, probably. I'm just trying to think of possible explanations for what might have happened. Then there's the robbery homicide theory. I just don't buy that. The modus operandi is totally wrong. Unless drugs were involved. Then we have the dad, Tilda's biological father, I mean. He may have had some reason to hate Susanne, how would I know? I a.s.sume the police have taken a close look at him?"

"I don't know," I say.

"Of course they have. He's an obvious suspect."

"But Tilda's father couldn't have kidnapped her. I mean, she disappeared from his house."

"So he says, yes. It's not unheard-of for a parent who has killed a child to claim that someone kidnapped the child."

"Oh, my G.o.d . . ."

Vijay flings his hands up. "I'm sorry, Siri, but that's how the world is. And the faster we accept it and really understand how these people think and act, the easier it will be to stop them. Anyway, who says she was kidnapped?"

"Well, but she disappeared through the window, in the middle of the night."

Vijay smiles faintly. "Maybe she ran away?"

"Why would she do that? A five-year-old doesn't just hightail it out the window in the middle of the night-"

"Unless-"

"What?"

"Unless she wanted to get away from her dad." Vijay says. "Maybe she was afraid of him for some reason?"

I contemplate Vijay's words for a bit. Could that be it? Did Tilda leave her father's place of her own accord, fleeing out into the cold and dark wearing only her nightgown? I have trouble believing that.

For a second I consider telling Vijay about Malin but decide it isn't relevant. After all, Malin was running a marathon that day and the killer was a man. Death is a man, I think.

Vijay fidgets, pulls his fisherman's cardigan tighter around his body, leans back in his chair, puts his feet up on his desk, absentmindedly props his sneakers on top of a book on African art.

He runs his hand over his stubbly chin and suddenly looks sad.

"Do you think she's alive?" I ask him.

"Who knows? If someone wanted to silence her, the police certainly don't have much time. Time would be critical in that case, extremely critical. Or it could already be too late. If Henrik took her, and if he didn't actually kill Susanne and is just psychotic or confused, and just thinks Tilda should be with him, then the odds are better."

I start crying again: an innocent child abducted, her life in danger. I can't help it, suddenly I'm thinking about the life growing inside me, the equally innocent child in there, in the darkness, and about how terribly cruel and unpredictable the world can be.

"There is one thing . . . ," I begin, "one thing I haven't mentioned, one thing about me."

He just says, "I know," and smiles his secretive smile. "Perhaps I should say congratulations?"

"But how did you . . . ?"

He beams. "Oh, honey. You're not drinking a drop anymore. You're usually a real sponge. And Markus is stuck to you like a Band-Aid." He pauses. "You know, I'm actually really jealous."

"You are?"

"Yes," he says, and suddenly looks embarra.s.sed, staring down at his cluttered desk. He appears to discover the nice art book under his dirty sneakers. Carefully he lifts his feet, brushes the book off, and then looks at me again.

"Olle doesn't want kids. I really do, but he's so incredibly uptight. He loves everything neat and tidy, doesn't want any kids turning our lives upside down. That's what he says, anyway."