just stood up, and her body followed. Then she felt the urge to go back and demand to see everything in her file. But did it really matter? The things he’d said could be true of anyone. Were there any women who weren’t carrying the baggage of a failed relationship or two?
A few days later, she made a discovery in the woods. Her schedule was stricter, but there was still time for morning walks. Sure, they were expected to be brisk walks, to stimulate the circulation, but Sofia was only out for a stroll that day.
She had returned to the clearing. Her iPhone was in her pocket, in case the eagle showed up again. Naturally, the tree it had been in was empty, but then she caught a glimpse of something red through the foliage. Just twenty metres from the clearing was a summer cottage, in the middle of the forest. It was small, and the overgrown lot it sat on was only a few hundred metres square.
Out front was a wind-torn hammock and some shabby outdoor furniture. Inside, the blinds were down.
She walked into the yard. Someone must have been there recently, because at one end of the house stood a rusty wheelbarrow half full of last year’s leaves. Behind the cottage she found a watering can, empty pots, and a bag of potting soil. She returned to the front and tried the door handle. The door swung open. I’m really intruding now, she thought, but she stepped inside anyway. The front room was both kitchen and living room, with a gas stove, a table, and a kitchen bench. The curtains were crocheted in white lace that had yellowed with cooking fumes and become dotted with fly droppings. It smelled a little musty, thanks to the raw, damp air, but it didn’t seem mouldy. And there was a fireplace with newspapers in a neat pile next to a stack of wood.
She picked up one paper and looked at the date. It was almost a year old.
There was one more room, a bedroom with a single bed and a dresser. The wallpaper was white and patterned with beach balls and snails. The bedspread was crocheted in the same white lace as the kitchen curtains.
She searched for the bathroom. There was only a toilet and a sink, no shower. She wondered if the water was on and tried the faucet, which sputtered and released a thin stream of water. Incredible, out here in the middle of the forest, she thought. She knew she had to leave now to get back before the program started, but she couldn’t tear herself away.
There was a dusty bureau in the living room. The top drawer was full of newspaper clippings. She picked up a scrap of paper on the rag rug before the bureau; it was a ferry ticket bearing yesterday’s date. She suddenly felt like someone was watching her and whirled around. The front door banged in the breeze, creaking on its hinges, but the cottage was empty. She let the ticket flutter to the floor and went outside. The sun had found a crack between the trees and was shining on the lawn in front of the house.
There was no one there.
*
That evening she ate dinner with a man and woman in their fifties. The man introduced himself as Wilgot Östling, chief of the county police; his wife, Elsa, was an accountant. Ellen Vingås joined them as well. She was a large woman with lively brown eyes and dark skin. Her laugh was burbling and infectious, and she kept the conversation going with stories about life in the opera world. It was impossible not to enjoy her company. The Östlings talked about how wonderful the program was, dropping words like down-to-earth, peacefulness, and vitality.
‘How are things going for you, Sofia?’ Ellen asked.
‘Oh, fine — I just got my program.’
‘Me too. The guy who planned it for me must be a mind-reader. That, or he Googled all my online biographies. Oh well, a little relaxation can’t hurt.’
‘It’s a lot more than that for me,’ said Elsa Östling. ‘It feels like I’ve finally come down from the stress of my job. I feel as cool as a cucumber, in fact.’
Her husband nodded in agreement.
‘I’ve known Franz since he started ViaTerra. If there’s anyone that can put a dent in the level of stress we have in this damn country, it’s Franz. He’s created a real oasis here.’
‘But what happens when you go back to real life?’ Ellen asked. ‘How can you be sure you won’t go right back to eating McDonald’s and sneaking alcohol?’
She laughed so shrilly that the guests at the next table turned around.
Elsa looked at Ellen in alarm. Wilgot looked offended.
‘I think it’s up to each individual to change his own life. To keep making use of everything we learn here,’ he said.
Ellen turned to Sofia.
‘We’ll see how it goes. If it all goes to hell, we can always find some other nutso self-improvement group somewhere. There are plenty of them.’
Sofia laughed. She hoped she would get to talk to Ellen again.
*
After dinner she looked in on what would eventually become the library. The door was open, and the building was even more beautiful now that the sun was setting and casting an orange glow across the spacious room. She imagined what it would look like with books everywhere, large sofas, a modern computer system.
At last she went to the common room next to the dining room to use the shared computer. She wrote an email to her parents and promised to come home for a visit in a few weeks.
Her thoughts wandered to Ellis. He had completely flipped out when she broke up with him, throwing things and screaming like a madman. Then came the blog: posts and comments about her that popped up all over the internet. It had all culminated in a few pornographic images with Sofia’s face pasted in. Anyone could tell that the pictures had been Photoshopped, but it didn’t matter. They made her feel awful.
Her thoughts of Ellis caused her to shudder as she worried about what he might do next.
She peered over her shoulder to make sure no one was looking, then fished out her phone and placed it next to the keyboard. She texted Wilma a summary of the first couple of days and ended by writing, Have you heard from Ellis? Feels like he’s haunting my brain again.
Was it the book, the cape, or the cave that came first?
Right, it was the cave, it must have been. Definitely the cave.
The sun is setting. We’ve climbed all the way down the cliffs to catch the crabs that get stuck in the little cavities between the rocks. I show her how you can crush them with your shoe and throw them out to the crying gulls. She’s wearing a short denim skirt. Her legs are so tan; smooth, long, and delicious. She turns to me and the sun catches in her tangled hair so it glows like a flame. It looks like someone is holding a match to her head.
I think about taking her with me after all, but I don’t know what role she could play in my plan. How I would use her.
She squints up at the cliffs, pointing.
‘Look, Fredrik!’
I look up and see it: an opening in the rock that gapes like a missing tooth.
We climb up. The hole is tall and deep, but the entrance is blocked with driftwood and rocks,
