Sleet: Selected Stories

When the clock strikes we’re all sitting around, waiting. All except Sigrid. She’s standing in the corner of the room separating the milk from the cream. Sigh-sigh-sigh goes the separator — that’s just what it sounds like. Normally Alvar helps her out with that, but not today. He’s sitting here at the table, giving me this creepy look. Maybe he wants to pinch me, too.

“Did anybody hear the weather?” he says. “What are we getting?”

He puts his hands up on the table, like giant sandwiches.

“Sleet,” I say for the second time.

And it sounds so strange, so crazy. It doesn’t sound the least bit normal. But it goes so well with all the other unnormal things that have been going on around here today: Grampa sitting on the chaff-cutter, Mama and Alvar dragging Grampa across the yard, the trespasser I scared off, Sigrid lying in the carrot tops with Alvar on top of her, Sigrid pinching me, the fire I started in the hen house, Grampa sitting speechless and pale on the daybed.

Mama’s sitting next to Alvar. She puts her hands up on the table next to his. She looks at them and sighs. The separator sighs, too — sigh-sigh-sigh. Suddenly Mama looks at me to see if I need washing. She wrinkles her forehead. My beautiful mother. She leans across the table.

“Who gave you that ugly bruise?” she says.

The separator slows down, Alvar glares at me, and all of a sudden I’m scared again. Nothing scares me more than a licking. I look away from Mama. I look behind me and see Grampa sitting on the daybed, still so white, just staring ahead with quiet, unmoving eyes.

“Grampa,” I whisper, as I look Mama in the eyes.

Mama bites her lip. Alvar coughs. The separator speeds up again, sighing and sighing. I look at Grampa, but there’s no reaction. I’m sure he didn’t hear a thing. The time goes. The clock strikes another time. The separator sighs on, and I guess that’s why we don’t hear anything until the knock comes on the outside door.

“Was that a knock?” says Mama.

She looks at Grampa.

“Daddy, it’s her,” she says. “She’s here. Shouldn’t you go out and meet her?”

And everybody looks at Grampa, but he doesn’t move from the daybed. He just keeps on looking straight ahead into the empty air. But the thing is, none of us can bring ourselves to go out and open the door either. I pull up the window shade a little and peek out. There’s a car rolling out through the gate, picking up speed, rushing off toward the village. Next we hear some footsteps in the hallway, moving slowly toward the kitchen door. Another knock.

“Daddy!” says Mama, almost pleading with him.

Then the door opens. And all of a sudden, there stands the aunt from America, right on the threshold. A strange woman with thick lines of makeup on her face. She’s got tired eyes, and her mouth is all sunken-in, like she doesn’t have any teeth left.

“Good evening,” she says in a strange accent and then blinks from all the light.

She steps into the kitchen. The separator stands still from pure surprise. And now all of us are looking at Grampa. We want to see him jump up and throw his arms around this strange lady that none of us knows because we’re too young. We want to hear him call her sister. But he just sits there. And all of a sudden the aunt from America’s eyes fix on him, and she jerks back like she’s suddenly afraid of something. Then she moves forward and stops right in front of him with empty outstretched hands.

“Gustav,” she says. “Is that you?” And none of us can figure out why she’d have to go and ask such a silly question.

But Grampa doesn’t answer. Grampa doesn’t change his expression one single bit. It’s like he hasn’t even noticed anything yet. Then the aunt from America sinks down on her knees in front of him. Imagine, she gets right down on the floor in her pretty clothes and everything. She puts her arms around Grampa’s neck and tries to pull his head towards her. But she doesn’t have the strength.

“Gustav,” she whispers. “It’s me. Me, Maja. You must remember me.”

And then, without looking at her the littlest bit, Grampa says, “Take care of yourself. We’re getting sleet.”

Then the aunt from America lets go of Grampa’s neck and stands up. She pulls a long necklace out from under her coat and fingers it helplessly while her face twitches all over, trying to hold back the tears. She kind of looks like one of those dolls that you move around with strings. Finally, she turns away and rushes out of the kitchen.

“Excuse me a minute,” she says, just before the sobs begin to smother her.

* * *

I grab the stable lantern and run out after her. I figure I better light the way so she doesn’t go and fall in the creek. Outside, she’s standing just beyond the edge of the porch, out in the sleet, crying. When I get there with the lantern, she takes me under the arm and pulls me along with her. She talks pretty weird, and I don’t really understand everything.

“Are you the little boy without a father?” she says, among other things, while she looks me in the face for a good long time.