She refused to listen to him then, and she was still convinced that he was only trying to cover up what was so obvious to Erica: her mother had never loved her, and that was something she would have to carry with her for the rest of her life.
Erica decided on impulse to visit Alexandra’s parents. Losing a parent was hard, but it was still part of the natural order of things. Losing a child must be horrible. Besides, she and Alexandra had once been as close as only best friends can be. Of course, that was almost twenty-five years ago, but so many of her happiest childhood memories were intimately associated with Alex and her family.
The house looked deserted. Alexandra’s maternal aunt and uncle lived in Tallgatan, a street halfway between the centre of Fjällbacka and the Sälvik campground. All the houses were perched high up on a slope, and their lawns slanted steeply down towards the road on the side facing the water. The main door was in the back of the house, and Erica did not hesitate before ringing the doorbell. The sound reverberated and then died out. Not a peep was heard from inside, and she was just about to turn and leave when the door slowly opened.
‘Yes?’
‘Hi, I’m Erica Falck. I’m the one who …’
She left the rest of her sentence hanging in mid-air. She felt foolish for introducing herself so formally. Alex’s aunt, Ulla Persson, knew very well who she was. Erica’s mother and Ulla had been active in the church group together for many years, and sometimes Ulla would come over on Sundays for coffee.
She stepped aside and let Erica into the entryway. Not a single light was lit in the entire house. Of course, it wouldn’t be evening for several hours yet, but the afternoon dusk was beginning to descend and the shadows were growing longer. Muted sobs could be heard from the room straight down the hall. Erica took off her shoes and coat. She caught herself moving extremely quietly and cautiously because the mood in the house permitted nothing else. Ulla went into the kitchen and let Erica find her own way. When she entered the living room, the weeping stopped. On a sectional sofa in front of an enormous picture window, Birgit and Karl-Erik Carlgren sat desperately holding on to each other. Both had wet streaks running down their faces, and Erica felt that she was trespassing in an extremely private space. Perhaps she shouldn’t intrude. But it was too late to worry about that now.
She sat down cautiously on the sofa facing them and clasped her hands in her lap. No one had yet uttered a word since she entered the room.
‘How did she look?’
At first Erica didn’t understand what Birgit had said. Her voice was tiny, like a child’s. Erica didn’t know what to answer.
‘Lonely,’ was what finally came out, and she regretted it at once. ‘I didn’t mean …’ The sentence faded away and was absorbed by the silence.
‘She didn’t kill herself!’
Birgit’s voice all at once sounded strong and determined. Karl-Erik squeezed his wife’s hand and nodded in agreement. They probably noticed Erica’s sceptical expression, because Birgit repeated: ‘She didn’t kill herself! I know her better than anyone, and I know that she would never be capable of taking her own life. She would never have had the courage to do it! You must realize that. You knew her too!’
She straightened up a bit more with each syllable, and Erica saw a spark light up in her eyes. Birgit was opening and closing her hands convulsively, over and over, and she looked Erica straight in the eye until one of them was forced to look away. It was Erica who yielded first. She shifted her gaze to look around the room. Anything to avoid fixing her eyes on the grief of Alexandra’s mother.
The room was cosy but a bit over-decorated for Erica’s taste. The curtains had been skilfully hung with enormous flounces matching the sofa pillows that had been sewn from the same floral fabric. Knick-knacks covered every available surface. Hand-carved wooden bowls decorated with ribbons with cross-stitch embroidery shared the room with porcelain dogs with eternally moist eyes. What saved the room was the panoramic window. The view was wonderful. Erica wished that she could freeze the moment and keep looking out the window instead of being drawn into the grief of these people. Instead she turned her gaze back to the Carlgrens.
‘Birgit, I’m really not sure. It was twenty-five years ago that Alexandra and I were friends. I really don’t know a thing about her. Sometimes you just don’t know someone as well as you think you do …’
Even Erica could hear how lame this sounded. Her words seemed to ricochet off the walls. This time Karl-Erik spoke up. He extricated himself from Birgit’s convulsive grip and leaned forward as if wanting to make sure that Erica wouldn’t miss one word of what he intended to say.
‘I know it sounds as if we’re denying what happened, and perhaps we’re not presenting a very coherent impression right now. But even if Alex did take her own life for some reason, she would never, and I repeat never, have done it this way! You probably remember that Alex was always hysterically afraid of blood. If she got the slightest cut she was absolutely uncontrollable until someone put a bandage on it. Sometimes she even fainted when she saw blood. That’s why I’m quite sure that she would have chosen some other method, like sleeping pills, for instance. There is no way in hell that Alex could have managed to take a razor blade and cut herself, first on one arm and then on the other. And then, it’s like my wife says: Alex was fragile. She was not a courageous person. An inner strength is required for someone to decide to take her own life. She didn’t have that kind of strength.’
His voice was compelling. Even though Erica was still convinced that she was listening to the hope of two people in despair, she couldn’t help feeling a flicker of doubt. When she thought about it, there was something that hadn’t felt right when she stepped into that bathroom yesterday morning. Not because it would ever feel right to discover a dead body, but there was something about the atmosphere in the room that didn’t really fit. A presence, a shadow. That was as close to a description as she could come. She still believed that something had driven Alexandra Wijkner to suicide, but she couldn’t deny that something about the Carlgrens’ stubborn insistence had struck a chord.
It suddenly occurred to her how much the adult Alex looked like her mother. Birgit Carlgren was petite and slender, with the same light-blonde hair as her daughter, except that instead of Alex’s long mane she wore hers cut in a chic page-boy. Birgit was dressed all in black, and despite her sorrow she seemed aware of what a startling appearance she made, thanks to the contrast between light and dark. Tiny gestures betrayed her vanity. A hand carefully patting her coiffure, a collar straightened to perfection. Erica recalled that Birgit’s wardrobe had seemed a veritable Mecca to eight-year-olds who loved to dress up, and her jewellery case had been the closest thing to heaven they could imagine in those days.
Next to Birgit, her husband looked ordinary. Far from un-attractive, but simply unremarkable. Karl-Erik Carlgren had a long, narrow face engraved with fine lines. His hairline had receded far up his scalp. He too was dressed all in black, but unlike his wife the colour made him look even greyer. Erica could sense that it was time for her to leave. She wondered what she actually had wanted to accomplish by visiting them.
She stood up and the Carlgrens did too. Birgit gave her husband an urgent look, as if exhorting him to say something. Apparently it was something they had discussed before Erica arrived.
‘We’d like you to write an article about Alex. For publication in Bohusläningen. About her life, her dreams – and her death. A commemoration of her life. It would mean a great deal to Birgit and me.’
‘But wouldn’t you rather have something in Göteborgs-Posten? I mean, she did live in Göteborg, after all. And you do too, for that matter.’
‘Fjällbacka
