“What should I say?” I focus on a point in the distance.
“That you’re pissed off at me?” he says.
“Pissed off?”
“Yes.”
“Why would I be?”
“For this?” He points toward the entrance to the hospital.
“I’m not.”
“No?”
“I can’t blame you.”
“Do you understand why I’m doing this?”
I don’t answer. He apparently believes I’m completely out of it.
“If it were you?” he says. “If I’d been acting like this. What would you have done? If I’d been reported to the police, not by one, but two of my clients. If people contacted you about me, asked how I was. If I freaked out at home, stood screaming at Milo’s school. Acted completely irrationally? What do you think you would have done? Please tell me. I really want to know.”
He’s controlled, but desperate, fury and impotence still leaking out.
I look at him. “I told you I don’t blame you.”
Henrik drops his arm, walks around to the other side of the car, and opens his door. He climbs in and closes the door. I sit in the seat next to his. He waits until I close the door and put on my seatbelt, and then he starts driving.
He puts on his sunglasses and drives in silence. He stops outside the pharmacy. Asks me to give him my driver’s license. I give it to him. I’m just a child who doesn’t know what’s good for her. I refuse to look at him.
He comes back. Puts a bag on my lap. Medicines I don’t want. I hate them. Hate their blunt effect.
“Mom and Dad picked up Milo from school,” he says. “He’s going to the country with them this weekend. Please, Stella, think about what you’re up to. This isn’t working. Not for Milo and not for me.”
We drive on through afternoon traffic. Henrik in his sunglasses. Me in my cloud of misery.
“You don’t trust me,” I say quietly.
“What did you say?” Henrik sounds formal. His tone is excessively polite. Which he knows I hate.
“I’m afraid of losing Milo,” I say, blinking and swallowing.
I don’t want to cry. Don’t want to have an outburst. Can’t have another one.
“I have already lost one child. Does that make me mentally ill? It’s easy for you to judge.”
“You’re exaggerating,” Henrik says. “I don’t want to hear any more of that.”
I throw the folder that was lying between us onto the floor. All the papers spill out.
“Is it really so fucking weird that I’m afraid?” I scream.
Henrik jerks the steering wheel to the side. Turns into a parking lot and slams on the brakes. He throws off his sunglasses.
“I’ve always been here for you,” he shouts. “I’ve always trusted you. I’ve let you be protective of Milo for all these years. I understood why.”
“And that means I’m sick?” I scream back.
“Milo. Is. Not. Alice.”
“I know, I know, I know. Stop making me feel like an idiot.”
“Take a look at yourself. At how you’ve acted lately. How you sound. I don’t even fucking recognize you anymore.”
The sunglasses go on again. He starts the car and turns back onto the road. I stare out the passenger-side window. We sit in silence all the way home.
Henrik enters our driveway and parks next to my car. His phone rings. He picks it up and looks at the display. He listens, laughs. I hear in his voice that he’s talking to a woman. They’re talking about a party.
“I’ll see you later,” he says. He laughs again, pretending I’m not there. “Are you still in the office? No, no, everything is fine with Milo, thank you for asking. Good, see you soon.”
Again, he looks at the screen, does something, writes something he doesn’t want me to see.
I’m crushed.
“I have to go,” he says. “I’ll ask your mother to come here and keep you company.”
“I don’t need any fucking company,” I manage to get out. Henrik takes off his sunglasses and looks at me. My own husband doesn’t recognize me anymore.
I don’t recognize him.
We are total strangers now.
“Whatever you want,” he says. “You decide, Stella. But take this opportunity. If this doesn’t help”—he makes a gesture to the bag in my lap—“I won’t hesitate for a second to have you committed.”
He looks at his phone again, waiting for me to climb out. I leave the car and slam the door as hard as I can. Henrik speeds off. I stand there looking after him as he drives away.
Everyone has decided that I’m nuts. And they’re right. I’m totally fucking crazy.
Isabelle
It’s evening. I’m sitting in an old garden chair looking up at the stars. Here in Barkargärdet, they are so clear. In Stockholm you rarely see them. It’s cold tonight. The air feels fresher and cleaner. But the best thing about being home is the silence. Listening to the wind whisper through the trees. It feels easier to think here. In Stockholm there’s always some noise coming from somewhere.
I don’t regret going home. And it made Mom so happy. It feels good that we’re getting along so well. Mom has actually changed. She’s not as difficult as before. But I can’t stop thinking about Stella and our meeting this morning. It can’t be normal to seek out your therapy clients in your free time. Mom says therapists aren’t allowed to do that. All those questions about my childhood, about Mom. It feels so wrong.
Still, I can’t help thinking about what she said.
Could I be her missing daughter?
Am I Alice?
No.
Not a chance.
Stella just wishes it was so. She’s ill. It’s terrifying to think how a person could end up like that. I feel sorry for her, I do. And I still like her. I wish it hadn’t turned out like this. But maybe there’s a good explanation.
My phone dings. Another Snapchat from Fredrik. Every time I get that same feeling. It’s a selfie with a filter that gives him silly little dog ears and a pink nose. He looks intentionally depressed and has written this on the picture: Do you have to be gone all weekend?!
I laugh. He makes me feel something I’ve never felt before. As if I’m just like everybody else, not some stiff, odd person with the world’s weirdest life. I hold up the phone and take a picture of myself. I mimic his sadness and choose a filter with a flower wreath around my head. I ponder what to write. Two whole days!
Five seconds later I get a text message.
Too bad. I was hoping you’d come over tomorrow. Sleep over.
Why did I go home? It was impulsive. Being here doesn’t change anything. If I’d stayed in Stockholm, I’d be at Fredrik’s. Sleeping over tonight. Now I’m going to drive myself crazy with longing.
I think about how to answer. Choose to call instead. He answers right away. His voice makes me miss him even more. And I tell him that.
I ask him if he remembers that time I thought somebody was watching me at KTH. Tell him my therapist turned out to be kind of weird. That she tracked me down again, and that’s why I went home for the weekend.
He’s understanding, considerate, wonders how I feel. I’m on the verge of tears. I hope he doesn’t notice. I say I’m fine, it’s nice to be home, but I’m already looking forward to going back. And I miss him.
He misses me, too. He says he longs to kiss me again. To eat more ice cream and hold each other in bed. And he says a few more things that make me warm, words that make my body tingle. I know he’s as frustrated as me. I can hear it in his voice. And I’ll think of him when I lie down. Imagine what we would do if we were together.
If I went home tomorrow.
We end the call after forty-eight minutes.
As soon as we hang up I get another Snapchat. A happy Fredrik with a thumb up.
He has on a black tank top; his hair hangs down over one eye. He’s reclining on a sofa, and he’s so hot. Despite the cold I take off my jacket, unbutton the top buttons on my blouse. I lean back and see my hair spread around me like sunbeams. I send a Snapchat back, where I’m smiling happily with my head to the side.
My chin is pointed; my dimples are deep. My skin is pale, my hair thick and black. My eyes are big and green. I look pretty good, I think. And feel immediately embarrassed by that thought. Pride goes before the fall, as Mom always says. Even though I get a text where I’m told I’m so fucking sexy.
I would have liked to keep texting back and forth like that, but it’s getting icy cold outside. I go in.
The house is a mess. Every room looks wretched—the only exception is my room. It looks the same as the last time I was home.
A pipe in the bathroom upstairs is leaking, and it drips from the kitchen ceiling. Mom has only put a bucket underneath it. She says she can’t keep up with everything since Dad died.
I feel guilty. I’ve felt that way constantly since I got home. I should have come here earlier, like she asked. I can’t go back tomorrow. She would be so disappointed. After everything she did, both for me and for Johanna. I should be more grateful.
Stella
I’m sitting on the floor in the corner of the living room staring straight ahead.
I stink of sweat; my hair is stringy.
I don’t have the energy to do anything about it. Can’t move. Can’t drag myself all the way up to the bathroom.