Sleet: Selected Stories

All the same, it was the offender in me who stepped into the large room behind the white door. There were no hiding places in that room. I felt small, overwhelmed by the pure number of books, by the plushness of the carpets, by the crystal chandelier hanging from the middle of the ceiling. I stopped in my tracks to take it all in, feeling as if I’d been ripped asunder. In a distant corner of the room was an ensemble sofa, smoking table, armchair, and floor lamp. I wasn’t entirely aware just how it was I got there, but suddenly I found myself sitting on the sofa next to Ekman. The reading lamp was just above me, cocked in my direction, shining right in my eyes. I would have liked to move it, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. The light pierced right through my eyes into my head. It was painful, and out of that pain flowed regret. I suddenly regretted everything: that I had come here, that I had made friends with Ekman, that I had learned to play chess. I also regretted that I was alive. The light was blinding me and the sofa was cramped, forcing us to sit right up against each other. Then I began to sweat. A glass was thrust into my hand, and as it seemed to be dissolving before my eyes I had to hurry up and drink it down. When I put it down on the table, with its shiny surface, I noticed that Lind was sitting opposite, looking right at us. He had been looking at us for quite some time.

Now I tried to reposition myself, tried to disconnect from the body that seemed attached to mine, but the sofa was like a vice, so we were stuck together for good. The tones of a piano fell down upon us from a room somewhere above. They sounded so naked somehow. At some point I heard myself say:

“We were playing chess.”

It was like reciting a lesson. Four words that meant nothing. But that also meant everything. However, I wasn’t going to get out of it so easily, and in some strange way that seemed only fair. Getting off the hook shouldn’t be too easy, I thought. So I was actually glad to hear Ekman whisper:

“We weren’t doing anything.”

My face could feel Lind looking at it. But before long it didn’t much matter. One more second and the jaws of the vice would come together inside of me. Again that idiotic phrase from my kitchen table invaded my head. Be fearless. Be fearless! I raised my hands to my eyes to shield them from the light and half-screamed:

“Show him the chess set, Ekman!”

And then, like a skipping record, came Ekman’s response:

“We weren’t doing anything.”

After that we must have sat there a little while longer. I think we may have drunk another glass or two of the sparkling water. Outside the snow continued to fall, swirling in gusts, white as the breath of God. Clear tones resonated from the piano upstairs, as a church bell tolled somewhere in town. It was just the way it should be. Everything was just the way it should be. I was spent, finished. The only piece missing was for me to be carried out and thrown to the vultures.

At some point we were all in the outer hall again, where it was cold. I felt an incredible sense of relief to be free of that sofa in one piece, to be liberated from that foreign body. The cold was restoring some of my vitality. And while I was putting on my coat a thought struck me: the whole time we were in there with him Lind hadn’t said a word to us.

It can’t end this way, I thought. I could sense him standing in the doorframe behind me, but I didn’t dare look that way. I could only manage to squeeze out a thought: that I couldn’t afford to lose him, that none of us could afford that. And then I imagined a way out. The answer was to get him out of his hole. It was my turn to liberate him. But to say something to him was out of the question. Words were just a web that I continually got tangled up in.

I had to move quickly, because Ekman had already opened the door and was waiting for me to follow him out. That’s probably what Lind was expecting too. To the great surprise of all of us I went on the offensive, stepping suddenly forward and taking Lind’s hand in mine, as if snapping it in a hungry beak. He’d have to be blind not to see how desperate I was for his forgiveness, for a chance to shake free of the guilt he’d burdened me with.

But he was blind, and that’s what was so excruciating. His eyes didn’t see me and his hand just sat there in my own, unresponsive, like a heavy stone. I could sense his blindness, and so much more, like how he reviled me for the guilt I bore. The hopelessness of the whole situation made me numb, and so I escaped through the open door, which slammed closed behind me.