Fire (4 page)

‘We did so.’

Ida realises that she is whining and sounds just like Lotta and Rasmus.

‘We’ll have to do it some other day,’ Mum says and takes eggs and milk from the fridge.

‘But we hardly ever go for drives. Julia and Felicia will get their licences before me.’

‘Of course they won’t. Neither of them is as disciplined as
you are. Nor has your will to win.’ Mum turns, looks at Ida and smiles. ‘You’re like me when I was your age.’

Ida can’t be cross any more. Julia and Felicia moan and groan about their mothers all the time, but Carina Holmström is one of Ida’s role models. Her mother is always the best-looking and the most beautifully dressed, without being one of those embarrassing yummy-mummy types who put on far too young clothes and try to be best mates with their kids.

‘Isn’t Erik waiting for you?’ Mum asks.

‘Sure.’

‘So why are you staying in here then?’

She turns on the radio and ‘Hello to the Summer’ booms from the wall-mounted loudspeakers. Mum starts whisking pancake batter at the same frenzied pace as her weed pulling earlier.

Ida goes outside to pick her bike up from the garage. Wheeling it through the garden, she passes her little brother and sister.

‘Trampolining can make you incontinent,’ she tells them.

‘What’s that?’ Lotta asks.

‘You’ll find out soon enough.’

Vanessa is woken when Melvin starts screaming somewhere in the flat.

She sits up and the headache does a somersault inside her cranium. The shuttered Viennese blinds leave the room in semi-darkness.

She stands on shaky legs and catches sight of herself in the full-length mirror that is leaning against the wall.

Her eyes are bloodshot. Her face is smeared with a mixture of sweat and what is left of her make-up, and when she runs her tongue over her teeth they’re coated with something that feels like felt. The dark roots look worse than ever
now that her hair is all greasy and messed up. And on top of it all, her right big toe is inexplicably painful.

Vanessa picks up her dressing gown from the chair in front of the desk and turns the radio on. An intense dance hit fills the space. Fragments of memories from the night before are flickering past. They played Truth or Dare and she kissed Evelina. Michelle stood in Jonte’s kitchen and wept over Mehmet. Vanessa and Wille had sex on the ping-pong table. And then she remembers why her toe hurts. She stumbled over the vacuum cleaner in the hall when she came home last night.

Vanessa pulls her fingers through her hair, ties it up in a ponytail. A deep breath before she opens the door to the kitchen.

Mum and Nicke are sitting at the table with their mugs of coffee. Vanessa’s baby brother Melvin is lying on the floor without a stitch on. As always after his tantrums, his face is bright red. Frasse, the German shepherd, lies next to Melvin. The dog’s tongue is practically touching the floor.

‘Good morning,’ Vanessa says.

Nicke looks up from the
Engelsfors Herald
and drinks a mouthful of coffee. She suspects him of hiding a superior grin behind the mug.

‘If it’s still morning,’ he says.

Vanessa glances at the clock. Not even half past ten yet.

‘You do look tired,’ Nicke tells her.

‘It’s too hot to sleep.’

He puts his mug down. Definitely sneering. Had he heard her stumble on the vacuum cleaner? And then she realises what’s up. Nicke was on night shift last night. He must have come home just a few hours ago.

Ever since Vanessa moved back home, she and Nicke have tried to tolerate each other after a fashion. Unspoken hatred separates them like a minefield, but they step with caution,
each watching out for the other’s move. Vanessa pretends to accept Mum’s rules of engagement and Nicke pretends to believe that she is sticking to the rules. But Vanessa knows that he is just waiting to catch her in the wrong. Like the cop he is.

Melvin cries a little, as he wants to remind everyone that he exists.

‘What’s up with Melvin?’ Vanessa asks.

‘He simply won’t get dressed,’ Mum says with a sigh and fingers the tattoo on her upper arm. A snake swallowing its tail. ‘I gave up in the end. Look, I see his point. When it’s this hot I’d like to run around naked, too.’

‘Suits me,’ Nicke grins.

Mum giggles. Vanessa rolls her eyes heavenwards.

‘What are you up to today?’ Mum asks.

‘Off to Dammsjön Lake. With Michelle and Evelina.’

‘Isn’t Wille coming?’ Nicke asks innocently.

‘Yes, he’s coming along as well,’ Vanessa replies with a pretty smile. And thinks,
Die, die, die, you fucking loser
. ‘Right. I’m going for a shower.’

After a long, cool shower, she brushes her teeth and then slaps ice-cold water on her face. Swallows a couple of paracetamols. Back in her room, she has already started sweating again but after putting on make-up she at least looks a little more like a human being.

She checks her mobile. Text from Wille to say they’re on their way. She puts on her turquoise bikini, then a loose top and cut-off jeans. Then packs her beach bag with a bath towel, a pillow and a book.

She fills her water bottle in the kitchen.

‘I’m off now,’ she says.

‘What, aren’t you going to have breakfast?’ Mum asks.

‘No time. But Michelle will bring picnic stuff.’

‘Sure you don’t want me to come along? Wouldn’t it be great to bring your mother?’

This totally naff joke has been repeated all summer but Mum never seems to tire of it. Vanessa has had enough and more. But she has no time to reply. Her beach bag falls over and the book ends up on the kitchen floor.

‘Oops,’ Melvin says and laughs.

‘What are you reading?’

Vanessa quickly holds the book up before stuffing it back into her bag.

‘
The Stand
? Oh, my God, Nessa. Why read Stephen King? Isn’t there death and misery enough in this world?’

‘I took it from your bookshelf!’

‘It’s actually your book, Jannike,’ Nicke says, sounding amused.

Mum shakes her head.

‘Reading that kind of book you fill your head with a lot of rubbish. It ruins your mind. I really ought to weed them out of the bookshelf. I don’t even want to have them in the house.’

Vanessa sighs. Mum has been like this ever since she took that latest course and found the meaning of life. Again. This time, her instructor is Helena Malmgren. Elias’s mother stopped being a vicar and has turned herself into a self-help guru instead.

‘Every one of us is responsible for the energies that are let into our lives,’ Mum goes on. ‘It is really true that you can choose to affirm either the positive or the negative energies in the universe. Keep thinking positively and most problems will solve themselves. But if you only have negative thoughts, well, no surprise that nothing works out for you.’

Vanessa loses her temper. She is so fed up with this crap.

‘Oh, come off it. If people are ill or have a hard time, is that supposed to be their fault? Is that what you’re saying?

Are African children starving because they have negative energies? Or maybe the universe operates to different rules depending on which part of the world you live in?’

Mum looks annoyed.

‘That’s not at all what I meant.’ Her usual way out of trouble.

Vanessa bends down and tickles Melvin’s soft baby-belly until he gurgles with laughter.

‘Bye,’ she says and leaves.

‘All my best to Wille!’ Nicke shouts after her.

At the number 5 bus stop, Wille’s car is waiting with the engine turning over. Vanessa jumps in at the passenger side and slams the door.

‘Hi, hun,’ Wille says and kisses her cheek before starting.

‘Such a weird night, last night,’ Michelle comments from the back.

‘I remember … like, nothing,’ Evelina says and giggles.

‘You do, it’s just that you won’t admit it.’ Vanessa catches Evelina’s eye in the mirror and licks her lips suggestively.

They laugh and Vanessa leans against the backrest. She puts her hand out of the car window and feels the rushing air push against the palm of her hand.

‘Please drive past the Sun Grill. I haven’t eaten a thing. No time,’ she says to Wille.

‘Sure. But we’ll have to pick up Jonte and Lucky first.’

‘How are you going to pack them in? Lucky alone is at least three ordinary people.’

‘The girls will have to sit on the guys’ laps.’

Michelle and Evelina protest loudly.

‘Hey, look in the glove compartment,’ Wille tells her.

Vanessa spots a hint of a smile at the corner of his mouth. She opens the glove compartment and finds a small white
teddy bear inside. The bear is clinging to a large silk-covered heart with the text ‘
To the Best Girlfriend in the World
’.

‘Thank you,’ Vanessa says.

She is really touched. The teddy is so silly and so sweet at the same time.

‘Oh, my God! It’s soooo cute,’ Evelina shrieks.

‘I
never
get any sort of present from Mehmet,’ Michelle says.

Out on the main road, Wille ups the speed.

‘I love you,’ he says and looks at Vanessa.

‘And I love you,’ she replies.

She twists her engagement ring and feels that what she’s said is really the truth.

This is such non-stop exercise, Ida thinks as she opens the tube of sunscreen and squeezes out a large dollop into her hand.

It feels like you have acres and acres of skin when you rub it in. If you go in for a swim you’ve got to repeat the whole process from the beginning. Besides, this repulsive heat will make you sweat it all off in five minutes even if you don’t go near the water.

Ida is longing for rain, a cloudy sky, the slightest little breath of wind. Sounds hang suspended in the still air. The children’s shouting and splashing at the water’s edge. Julia and Felicia’s chatter. Robin and Erik’s rubbish hip hop from a cracked loudspeaker.

Ida finds a sunblock lip salve and smears it across her lips. The whitish, elastic substance reminds her of ectoplasm, the stuff she apparently dribbles when she gets possessed. The thought is irritating, so she rejects it and lies down on the beach towel. She tries to relax but her body is slippery and messy from all the cream. And now Erik is moving in, pushing his sweaty thigh against hers.

‘Christ, can’t you stop sticking to me like some kind of wart?’ she says.

Julia and Felicia stop talking and Ida doesn’t need to see them to know that they are exchanging nervous glances.

‘Is it your period, or what?’ Erik mutters but at least he moves away a little.

Julia and Felicia start talking to each other again. Saying things like how today is the last day of the summer holidays and how inhuman it is to have to go to school when it’s this hot. Julia starts on a story about meeting the principal, Adriana Lopez, in that hocus-pocus shop in the City Mall.

Ida tries not to hear. She doesn’t want to think about the principal and that horrid scar on her chest. Sitting up, she reaches for her water bottle and unscrews the top with sticky hands. The water is tepid and tastes of plastic. It’s disgusting, disgusting, everything is so totally disgusting.

She peers at the others. Julia is holding forth, now and then tugging at the T-shirt to cover her bikini. Felicia pretends to listen, but she is completely focused on Robin who doesn’t notice a thing. Must be the only one who hasn’t figured out that Felicia is crazy about him.

‘I wonder who of the mental cases are going to off themselves this year,’ Robin says suddenly. The others cackle at this, Felicia louder than anyone else.

Ida avoids having to laugh along with them by swallowing another mouthful of the dregs in the water bottle. She certainly doesn’t want to think about the so-called suicides by Elias and Rebecka. Why does everything and everyone have to remind her about the Chosen Ones and all the shit that happened last year?

‘There can’t be that many left by now,’ Felicia says to Robin.

But his attention is directed elsewhere. He thumps Erik’s chest.

Erik snorts and sits up.

‘What now?’

Then he sees what Robin sees and goes quiet.

Ida doesn’t even have to look to know that it’s Vanessa Dahl. If only Ida had been more alert she would have registered from hundreds of metres away the hyped-up mini-tornado that is Vanessa’s energy. Ida knows it only too well from their training sessions in magic.

She turns around. Vanessa has brought her entire following of pathetic no-hopers.

‘I bet she slept with every one of them,’ Felicia says. ‘That fatso, too.’

Ida and Julia giggle. But the guys stay silent. Fixed on Vanessa, who bends over, in her minuscule bikini bottoms, to spread the beach towel. Her tan is perfect in the way Ida’s pigmentation will never allow.

‘Check out those roots,’ Ida comments.

Vanessa’s pale blonde mass of hair ends in several centimetres of dark brown hair close to her head. Ida touches a naturally pale blonde strand of hair that has worked free from her own ponytail. It reassures her. Vanessa turns and for one brief moment, Ida feels sure that she will say something, like ‘Hi’.

But instead Vanessa silently lies down on the towel. That’s a relief. Of course, there is no longer any reason for the five Chosen Ones to try to hide that they know each other. The demons already know who they are. But should it get around in Engelsfors that Ida and Vanessa had something in common … well, regrettably, Ida would have to kill herself.

Vanessa’s boyfriend, the drug-pusher one, lies down next to Vanessa. It takes about, say, half a second before they start snogging.

Ida glances at Erik. She would dearly like to scream at him
to stop ogling Vanessa, but doesn’t want to seem to care one way or the other.

Instead she puts her head to the side and stares at his thick dark hair until he senses her eyes on him.

‘What is it?’ he asks crossly.

Clearly, he isn’t the slightest bit ashamed of being fixated on Vanessa. Ida keeps her voice as calm as she can.

‘How weird that I haven’t noticed it before,’ she says.

‘What?’

‘Oh, nothing,’ Ida mumbles and looks away.