I’m close to the square of the hotel and pause to scan my surroundings, but spot nothing, neither animal nor man. Not a soul in sight.
A figure promptly materialises in front of me and seems to be in a rush. I can’t work out which is bigger, the moon or the man, whether it is rising or he is drawing closer, it rushes into the clouds and he heads straight for me. As soon as he comes up to me, he utters something I can’t understand. Was it a question or a statement? Before I get a chance to answer, I feel a swift blow and, a moment later, I’m lying in the street. And I feel another blow and red rain pouring over me. Something hot and wet trickles down my temples. The man looms above me like a lunar eclipse, or tank, and kicks me. I smell the scent of aftershave and leather. I think, should I defend myself or count myself into the night? Then, just as quickly, he has stopped beating me and I hear footsteps moving away and see the glow of a cigarette like a blip in the middle of the moon. Then I hear a scooter being kick-started. There’s a taste of blood in my mouth but I feel an odd contentment. Something furry and familiar rubs against my shoulder as I lie in the street; it figures, it’s the cat from the restaurant, the one-eyed cat. I stretch out my bleeding hand to stroke him, a burst of black particles swirl around my eyes.
I clamber to my feet. I hear footsteps again, someone running towards me from the hotel.
“Mister Jónas,” I hear an anxious voice call out. It’s Fifi who rushes over and grabs me under the arm. I feel cold, but manage to remain totally lucid in my thoughts:
If the actress asks me to sleep with her when she comes back from her journey, I’ll say yes without hesitation. It’s been more than a week and she hasn’t returned yet.
FOUR
Four stern faces look down at me, inspecting me: May, Fifi, the boy, and an unknown woman.
I’ve already vomited once and I have to vomit again.
“You’ve suffered a blow to your head and a concussion, and we have to stitch that cut on your forehead,” says the woman, pulling out a syringe. Out of a toolbox.
“A few stitches,” she adds.
I catch a whiff of orange peel and when I turn my head I see the boy standing close to the bed, holding a slice of orange, he’s wearing a T-shirt that reads “Stockholm I love you.” Taking another step forward, he presses himself right against the edge of the bed and lifts the blanket that someone has spread over me, to conduct an examination. I try to remember; it was Fifi who dragged me to my room.
“Hi,” I say, trying to smile at the boy.
His mother says something to him and he lets go of the blanket. Then she looks at me, she’s upset and has tears in her eyes.
“What happened?” she asks. “Who attacked you?”
I think I answer her but can’t be sure.
“It’s okay,” I say.
I am like molten rock. I’m like other people, I suffer, I wrote in my diary when I was twenty-one years old. In the sentence above I had written: Full moon. Three degrees.
When I stand, it’s not just my head that pulsates but the whole room, revolving. I spin, I feel as if I’m looking at the earth from the peak of a mountain, outlines vibrate and slowly shimmer, as if under plexiglass.
I stagger to the bathroom to throw up.
When I lie down again, the unknown woman bends over me and shines a light in my eyes. She tells me to unbutton my shirt so she can examine me, while May gathers her brother and son, drawing them back into a corner of the room. They stand in a cluster, observing.
The woman asks disjointed questions: what my name is, how old I am, and asks me to count my fingers. I have five on one hand and five on the other, unlike many others in this town.
“Are you married?”
“Yes,” I say. “Or to be precise, no.”
I sit topless on the edge of the bed.
“Are you married or not?”
“Not anymore. Divorced.”
“Do you have any children?”
“Yes. Or no. I have a daughter, but I don’t.”
She continues unfazed.
“When is your birthday?”
I feel as if I’m looking at them and the bedroom in disjointed freeze-frames, jamming and hopping from one to the next, waiting for the film to start running smoothly again.
“May twenty-fifth.”
The woman looks at May and she looks at her brother. They look at each other.
“That’s today,” says the woman.
I reach for my passport and hand it to them, it’s passed around. I notice how they scrutinise it and turn the pages.
What should I do about this? Invite them to a birthday party?
“You’re bruised but nothing’s broken, so from that point of view you’re lucky,” she says when she’s finished examining me. “You can button up your shirt.”
Then she nods at me as she’s packing her bag.
“Nice flower.”
MOM
“You spoke about your mother,” May says. “Before the doctor came in. You said, Mom. I understood it. You repeated the word.”
When I look at her questioningly, she adds:
“One doesn’t have to understand everything that is said to understand.”
I ask her what day it is.
“Is it Monday?”
“No.”
“Tuesday?”
“No. Wednesday.”
“How long have I been here?”
“Three weeks.”
I stand up and ask her if there is a male choir in the town. She’s bewildered.
“Yes,” she says hesitantly. “I think they’re short of voices. Tenors mainly, I think.”
“I must call my daughter,” I say.
“Are you going back
