18
Roskapankki-The Garbage Bank-is one of Helsinki’s most notorious dives. It opened during the financial crisis of the early nineties. Banks went under left and right, and the government instituted a state-guaranteed bank to absorb their toxic assets, hence the bar’s name. It offered some of the cheapest beer in the city to help medicate personal depression caused by the economic depression. The place has become synonymous with a low-priced buzz, and enjoys tremendous popularity with a certain clientele. It must have sold close to a couple million beers by now.
I check my watch. It’s nine p.m. John sits at a wooden table, his hands cuffed behind him. A rent-a-cop sits across from him. He drums his fingers and stares at the wall, bored.
I walk over and ignore John. “Are you Arska?” I ask.
He nods.
“What did you cuff him for?”
“I would have duct-taped his mouth shut, too, if I had any. He’s an annoying fuck. You gonna take care of this? I have things to do.”
“I’ll pay his tab and make things right.”
Arska uncuffs John, shoots him a dirty look and leaves.
John starts in. “Those fucking dickheads-”
I cut him off. “Just explain yourself.”
I watch him concoct a lie. It takes a while. He’s sloppy, drunk as hell, but propped up by speed or coke. I wonder how it’s possible to run up a three-hundred-euro tab when a pint of beer only costs two and a half euros. “Never mind,” I say, and go to the bar.
The bartender tells the story. John came in early, started drinking hard, got drunk and loud. He bought people drinks to make friends. He dropped a credit card. In the late afternoon, he asked if he could take a hundred euros in cash on his card. The bartender didn’t run the card, just made a note to add it to the final tab. John annoyed the shit out of everyone, but they put up with him since he kept the beer flowing. The bill got high, the bartender got suspicious. He ran the card. The card was dead. He asked John if he had another card. John gave him two more. Both dead. John got haughty. John started name-calling. John feigned indignation and tried to leave. A bouncer stopped him. Securitas was called in.
“I’ll pay the bill,” I say, and hand over my MasterCard. John has been in Helsinki for two days. Between champagne last night and his drinking binge today-and the hundred he took from the bartender, which I’m sure he used to buy drugs-he’s become an expensive annoyance. I’m not happy.
I go back to the table and sit across from him. My headache isn’t monster-from- Alien bad, but it’s getting worse again. “What the fuck is the matter with you?” I ask.
“Kari, it wasn’t my fault. Listen, Kari, there’s something wrong with their credit card machine, and they made out like it’s my mistake. Kari, you’re a cop. Do something. Kari, I swear to God I’m going to sue these bastards.”
I hate the American habit of using a person’s name over and over to create a fake sense of intimacy. “John,” I say, “here’s what I’m going to do, and here’s what you’re going to do. John, you’re a lying whore. John, you’re drunk and stoned. John, you’re going to sober up. John, you dumb motherfucker, you and I are going to cover this up because if Kate finds out, it’s going to upset her. John, when someone upsets my wife, I get upset. John, do you want me to be upset?”
He shakes his head no.
“Good. I should be finishing a death investigation right now and going home to Kate, where I want to be. Instead, I’m going to call Kate and tell her we’re having a little boys’ night out, to do some bonding.” I hate that term, but think he’ll relate to it. “My plan is this. I’m going to take you to a sauna, then to get something to eat. When we get back to my house, you’re going to act like a choirboy.”
He starts to speak. I press a finger to my lips. “I don’t want to hear your voice for a while. We clear?”
He nods yes. I call Kate. He stands, puts on his coat, weaves. I help him toward the door.
Kotiharjun sauna is within walking distance of both our apartment and Roskapankki. John never intended to go sightseeing today. He just wandered out and got smashed in the first place that looked inviting to him. He stumbles through the snow. The cold air and exercise will do him good. The sauna will be good for both of us, and also serve as a small punishment for his bad behavior. I’m going to use the opportunity to fuck with him, just a little.
Kotiharjun sauna opened its doors in 1928. It’s a Helsinki institution and one of my favorite places. The only public sauna left that’s both wood-fired and keeps to the old traditions. We approach it. A line of men are outside in the snow, sitting on a low wall, wrapped in towels, smoking cigarettes and drinking beer.
“What the fuck are naked guys doing in the snow?” John asks.
“The same thing you’re going to do, s ans beer.”
We go inside to the front desk. They know me here. I’m a regular, like to come here after lifting weights in the gym. Our little electric sauna at home does its job, but their big wood-fired sauna is a special experience. It generates a wonderful soft heat.
I pay our admission, get us towels and a vihta -a bundle of leafcovered birch branches tied together at one end. “My brother-in-law, John, needs the full treatment, a wash and a kuppaus ,” I say. “Is there somebody still here to give it to him?”
The cashier is a friendly young guy. “Ellu was about to go home,” he says. “John looks like he should go home, too.”
“That’s the point, I don’t want him there yet. Tell her I’ll tip her an extra fifty if she stays.”
He checks it out, Ellu agrees. We go to a room that looks like a little operating theater. I tell John to take his clothes off. He protests. I stare at him. He peels down to his underwear and stops. I keep staring. He takes off his briefs and stands there embarrassed and naked. Ellu waits, impatient. I tell him to lie down on the table. He does it. Ellu proceeds to give him a good scrubbing while I watch. Usually, kuppaus is done after spending some time in sauna, because the raised body temperature enhances bleeding. But I figure what the hell, John can bleed slow.
After a few minutes, John relaxes. “Thanks Kari,” he says, “this is nice.”
Ellu finishes washing him and starts taking out the plastic bubbles used for sucking blood in kuppaus. “You sure about this?” she asks me.
I answer, “I’ve never been more certain of anything in my life.”
She brings over to the table the clear suction bottles with short hypodermic needles extending from them.
John gets suspicious. “What are those? They look like they hurt.”
“It’s an old Finnish folk remedy,” I say. “It gets the poisons out of your system.”
“I don’t want it.” He starts to sit up.
I shove him back down. “Sure you do. Don’t be a pussy.”
He understands I won’t take no for an answer. Ellu attaches the first bottle to his back. He grunts, but doesn’t complain. Ellu attaches six bubbles. John looks over his shoulder and watches them fill with blood. “It doesn’t hurt much,” he says, “but what the hell is the point.”
“They’re like plastic leeches,” I say. “Now you can tell your buddies that you’re a true-blue Finn and got your blood sucked.”
He manages a laugh. “Most of their stories are about getting their dicks sucked. I think this story is better.”
I thought John would piss and moan. He’s impressed me, if only slightly. I get undressed in the locker room. We rinse off in the shower room and I take him into the sauna. It’s a Tuesday, so the crowd is small, maybe fifteen men. On weekends, the place gets packed and rowdy. Friends come here to drink and sweat together.
The iron stove is massive. Logs heat it. The sauna is hotter or cooler, depending on where you sit in relation to the stove. John and I take a spot almost behind it, on the third and top seating tier. John has sobered up somewhat, his humiliation from Roskapankki faded, his courage bolstered by a successful engagement with kuppaus.
