He goes over to the window and stares out of it. His shoulders sag.
'I can see all the way into town.'
'Yes, it's beautiful.'
'All the lights,' he adds, 'street lights, lights from the houses, they glow.'
'Everything looks beautiful at a distance, doesn't it? Even when seen through shimmering, polluted air.'
'When will the battle commence?' he asks, abruptly turning round.
I shift slightly in my chair, 'Are you asking me for an actual date?'
'Why not? There's no escape for me anyway.'
'November,' I propose. 'The eighteenth.'
'Why November exactly?'
'I need rainstorms and fairly cool air. I need rotting leaves and muddy roads. The kind of shivering quality that characterises November. The grey, naked landscape stripped of everything that grows and comforts us, but not yet blessed with white, icing-sugar snow. A bleak time in many ways, a brutal time. It is as if everything surrenders in November and we huddle in corners and light candles. I love November.'
'But why?' he repeats.
'I was born in that month, on the sixth. It was a wild night, Godawful weather, when I saw the world for the first time. November is in my blood, a darkness, a melancholy. A permanent feeling of sadness. My hands are like bare branches, I have fog in my head and storm in my heart. You were born in September,' I tell him, 'and you are marked by that, the summer was drawing to a close when you were born. The holidays had ended, but the harvest had yet to come and Christmas was far away. No expectation,' I say, 'just an orderly, eventless time between bright sunshine and crisp frost. But I love all the months, each has its own tone, its own hue. Imagine this wheel. January, for example, bright blue and white and a trumpet with clear, sharp notes. February, almost identical, with the sun a little more yellow and I hear a cornet. March, grey and white, I hear a viola, there lies a faint hope in its deep note. April, yellow and white. Violins,' I say, 'with a hint of trapped despair. May, yellow and green. People dancing around a maypole. June, airy and sky blue, accordion. A big flaming bonfire, sparks flying off out into the night. July is a deep yellow, the colour of sand, the sound of a radio. August, the summer is fading, I hear a faint guitar. Then comes your month, September. It is the colour of earth and now I hear a cello. October,' I continue, 'rusty red and with a strong beat. Someone is playing an oboe. November, as I mentioned just now, bare. In November I hear kettledrums and a moaning trombone. Then we finally reach December, with candles and tinsel. And so the years pass, in an ever-recurring circle. If you live to be eighty, Alvar, you will have existed nearly thirty thousand days. Or, approximately seven hundred thousand hours, if you like.'
He pales. 'And how many minutes is that?'
'Forty-two million. It's almost three hundred million heartbeats.'
Alvar comes over and steadies himself against my chair.
'You mustn't say such things. Now I too can feel every single heartbeat.' He places his hand on his chest.
'It's fine,' I say, 'it's fine that you can feel your heart. I think we need to feel alive, I think we need to expose ourselves to pain. But in our society this is not acceptable. People have always used their shrewdness and imagination to relieve pain. Today everything must be easy and it mustn't take time. I hate disposable cutlery,' I confess, 'and ready meals. Parboiled rice. Powdered hot chocolate and instant coffee. Part-baked bread. Things like that. Living takes time. We need to give each other time.'
He finds his place on the sofa. 'November,' he says lamely. 'It's eight months away and from now on I'll be aware of every second. Lindys has knocked through my shell and left a gaping hole. I feel the cold differently now and nearly all sounds have become noises. I'm not used to such sensitivity.'
'It's about time your body found out what it means to be alive,' I say. 'And yes, it hurts. But that's also how you'll learn to let in a little joy.'
'I don't need very much of that,' he claims, 'I prefer security. And you have taken it away from me.'
'In order to give you something else,' I say. 'Experience.'
CHAPTER 22
The days passed, and the weeks.
Alvar carried out his job with the same diligence and pride as he always had done. He was friendly, correct and polite, and when he framed pictures in the workshop it was with great care and attention to detail. But in the late afternoon, when it was nearing closing time, he was consumed by a nagging anxiety. What if she was lying on his sofa, or even worse, in his bed? Perhaps she was having a shower in his bathroom now? Perhaps she had robbed him blind? Though he had no valuables to speak of. He had acquired another idiotic habit. He always stopped by the cashpoint outside the Cash and Carry on his way home. As long as he had money, she would take it and go, it was the only way he was able to get her out of the flat quickly. His savings dwindled slowly and steadily. One day there would be no more, he thought, one day I'll be as poor as a church mouse. What's she going to do then?
He left the gallery at five in the afternoon. The knot in his stomach grew as he walked through the streets to the Cash and Carry. He got to the cashpoint, he took out his wallet and found his card, which he stuck in the machine. The card was checked, please enter your PIN. He entered the code and all the time a voice inside was telling him that this was insane, but he was unable to stop himself. The money was his only weapon and with it he bought back his own freedom. He took out six hundred kroner, put the notes in his wallet and headed home. The cat was sitting on his doorstep and he experienced a brief moment of bliss. His front door was locked, but then she usually locked it from the inside, presumably so she could hear when he came back. He unlocked the door and went in. He spotted her immediately; she was lying on the sofa under the blanket without moving. He took a few more steps towards her. Then, to his horror, he saw something on the coffee table. A syringe, he realised, and a thin light grey rubber tube. He clasped his mouth in fear. He stared at her for a long, long time, but all he could see was a bit of her cheek and locks of her blonde hair falling over her forehead. Out of sheer desperation he coughed violently to see if she would react. She did. She turned her head and opened her eyes, her gaze was unfocused.
'You can't bring this back here,' he yelped, pointing at the table, at the syringe and the tube, which frightened the living daylights out of him. She grunted something incomprehensible and closed her eyes. He remained where he was while his brain was working overtime. He had put up with so much from her, but now he was overcome by an irresistible urge to put his foot down. To tell her that there were limits to what he was willing to tolerate.
'Lindys,' he said louder this time, 'you can't bring drugs in here!'
Again she opened her eyes and she gazed at him dully. 'Why are you calling me Lindys?' she slurred. 'My name's Rikke.'
He let out a soft groan. 'I'm not having it!' he said, still in a tone of voice bordering on falsetto. She sat halfway up, turned and lay down with her back to him. Alvar waved his hands in the air. It felt as if he was fighting a shadow, which kept slipping away so that he would never be able to punch it. He looked at the syringe on the coffee table and shuddered. Here, in his living room. A girl on heroin. Had his neighbours seen her arrive, and what might they be thinking? He spun on his heel abruptly and went out into the kitchen. Stood for a while leaning against the worktop while he thought furiously. I need to eat, he thought, I need to eat to get through this, I mustn't panic. I need to talk to her when she wakes up, properly. I need to be firm and decisive and resolute. Yes, he thought, I need to stop giving her money. I will make this a condition. She will not get another krone if she brings drugs into my living room. It's that simple.
Cheered by this resolution he opened the door to the fridge and found a box of eggs. An omelette was what he needed, he could grate some cheese and sprinkle it on top, have some bread with it. The cat appeared for a drink of water. There were no sounds coming from the living room. He tried to ignore the fact that she was in there. Then he cracked two eggs against the edge of a bowl. She'll be gone soon, he told himself, and perhaps I'll get several days without a visit. Again he had another flash of inspiration and an idea began to take shape in his head. She had taken his spare key, perhaps it was in the pocket of her grey jacket? He took a few steps and looked into the living room. Yes, it was in a pile on the floor. And Lindys was still sleeping. Or Rikke, or whatever her name was. What if he stole it back? What if he gave her a taste of her own medicine for once, used her own
