The Bomber

'Nothing. Why do they call you Christina's enforcer?'

Helena didn't know what to say.

'What the hell do you want from me?'

'Nothing really. It's Christina I'm interested in. Why wouldn't she acknowledge her son? Was she ashamed of him?'

Helena Starke's head was spinning. She sat down and put out the cigarette. How could she know about Christina's son?

'He died,' she said. 'The boy died.'

'Died? When?'

'When he was… five.'

'Really? That's terrible. Five, just like Kalle.'

'Who?'

'My son, he's five. How awful! What did he die of?'

'Malignant melanoma, skin cancer. Christina never got over it. She didn't ever want to talk about him.'

'I'm so sorry I… Sorry, I had no idea…'

'Anything else?' Helena Starke said, trying to sound as cold as possible.

'Yes, quite a lot, actually. Do you have a moment?'

'No, I'm doing my laundry.'

'Laundry?'

'Yeah, what's so strange about that?'

'No, it's just that I… I mean… Well, you knew Christina really well, you were so close to her.' Annika pushed it. 'It must be difficult to think about doing ordinary stuff like laundry so soon after…'

'Yes, I knew her well!' Helena Starke shouted, and the tears started running. 'I knew her best of all!'

'Apart from her family, perhaps.'

'Right, her fucking family! That senile old man and her crazy daughter. You know she's a pyromaniac? Cuckoo bird. Spent most of her teens in a psychiatric ward. Set fire to anything she could lay her hands on. That special home in Botkyrka that burned down six years ago, do you remember? That was her, Lena. Talk about nutcase, you couldn't have her in the house.'

She cried straight into the phone, loud and uncontrolled, hearing how awful she sounded, like some strange trapped animal. She put the receiver down and let her arms drop onto the kitchen table, her forehead landing among the breadcrumbs, and then she cried and cried and cried until everything was black out there and everything inside her had run out.

* * *

Annika could hardly believe what she had just heard. For a long while, she sat with the receiver held out from her ear, listening to the silence after Helena Starke's unbearable scream.

'What's up? Why are you sitting like that?' Anne Snapphane said, placing a coffee mug full of glogg and a stack of ginger biscuits on the desk next to Annika.

'Bizarre…' Annika said, putting the phone down.

Anne Snapphane stopped nibbling at her biscuit.

'You look wretched. What happened?'

'I just spoke to a woman who knew Christina Furhage. It was kind of over the top.'

'How so?'

'She started crying loudly, really howling. I always feel awful when I go too far.'

Anne Snapphane nodded sympathetically and pointed at the mug and the stack of biscuits.

'Come with me to the editing suite and I'll show you the beginning of our New Year's show. Things We Remember- That They'd Rather Forget is the title. It's about celebrity scandals. Delicious!'

Annika left her coat but hung her bag on her shoulder and followed Anne, balancing the glogg and the biscuits. The TV offices were empty of people. The season's productions were finished, and they wouldn't start on the next until after the holidays.

'Do you know what you're doing next season?' Annika asked while they stepped down the spiral staircase to the editing suite.

Anne Snapphane pulled a wry face. 'What do you think? Fat chance. I'm hoping to get away from Women's Sofa. I've done it backwards and forwards a million times now. He cheated on me with my best friend, my best friend cheated on me with my son, my son cheated on me with my dog… Count me out…'

'So what do you want to do instead?'

'Anything. I might go to Malaysia with this new show in the spring. People living on a desert island for as long as possible without being voted out by the audience. Sounds like fun, doesn't it?'

'Sounds damn boring to me,' Annika said.

Anne Snapphane looked at her with mock scorn and continued down another corridor.

'Luckily you're not head of the program. I think it'll be great. People love that shit. Here we are.'

They stepped into a room filled with TV monitors, Digibeta players, keyboards, consoles, and cables. The room was considerably larger than the little cubicles they called editing suites at the state television newsroom. There was even a couch, two armchairs, and a coffee table in the corner. The editor was sitting on a swivel chair in front of the main console- a young guy who handled the technical side of putting together the program- staring at a screen where images were rushing past. Annika greeted him and then went and sat down in one of the armchairs.

'Run the opening sequence,' Anne said and sat down on the couch.

The editor reached out for a large Digibeta tape and fed it into one of the players. The screen on the largest monitor flickered and a countdown clock appeared. Then the show started and the well-known presenter stepped out on the studio floor. The audience cheered. He presented the program that would feature a politician who had thrown up in the head waiter's booth at the famous Cafe Opera, the most talked about divorces of the year, TV gaffes we remember, and other important items.

'Okay, you can turn down the volume,' Anne said. 'What do you think? Isn't it good?'

Annika nodded and took a sip from her mug. The glogg was pretty strong. 'Do you know someone called Helena Starke?'

Anne let her cookie drop and thought about it.

'Starke… it sounds really familiar. What does she do?'

'She works at the Olympic Secretariat with Christina Furhage. Lives in South Island, around forty, short black hair…'

'Helena Starke, now I know! Sure. She's a lesbian activist. Butch dyke type.'

Annika looked at her friend with skepticism in her eyes.

'Come on, what do you mean 'butch dyke'?'

'She's active in the National Swedish Association for Sexual Liberation- writes articles and stuff like that. She's trying to make lesbians look less soft. Complains about 'vanilla sex,' for example.'

'How do you know this?'

It was Anne Snapphane's turn to look skeptical.

'What do you think I do all day? There isn't a single activist in this country I don't have the private phone number of. How do you think we make these programs?'

Annika raised her eyebrows apologetically and finished her glogg.

'Has Starke been on your show?'

'Nope, no way would she come on. Come to think of it, we've asked her a couple of times. She says she stands for her sexuality but won't have it exploited by the media.'

'Sensible woman,' Annika said.

'Luckily for me, not everyone thinks like she does, or there wouldn't be a Women's Sofa program. More glogg?'