Punished

4. Jon-Ante

JON-ANTE

1985

He stood beside the car parked in the yard, shading his eyes with his palm and squinting at the sun that licked the mountaintops on the horizon. Lots of people who lived in Kiruna became blind to their surroundings and didn’t appreciate the view, but Jon-Ante wasn’t like them. He directed his gaze that way as often as he could, and it was no accident that he’d looked for a place on the outskirts of the city, near what locals had come to call “the Norway road.” Last fall the Norwegian and Swedish kings had inaugurated this highway, and Jon-Ante had been one of the first to drive on it from Kiruna to Narvik. The 160-kilometer stretch was strikingly beautiful, but it was a tough blow for the campgrounds, shops, and gas stations in the eastern part of the municipality, where he’d grown up, because the tourists began to choose this new road over traveling to Norway via Karesuando. Oskar would curse the second anyone brought it up. His father had invested a lot of money in expanding their campground just a few years ago, and now their prospects were dim.

Jon-Ante closed his eyes. He liked the silence at night, especially in the company of the midnight sun. It was as though the whole world belonged to him, just for a moment. He’d had this feeling since childhood. When time didn’t matter, and he was standing next to his isá among the reindeer. Time was infinite in the summer light, and his body never tired.

He had that wakefulness now as he ran a gentle hand along the contours of the black car. The rays of sun hitting the chrome were blinding, and he lowered his gaze a notch. His 1956 Lincoln Premiere had been in the garage for almost two years. He’d let time pass, realizing that some of the most important parts of the rebuild were in the tiny details as he brought the car closer to perfection. There was no reason to rush it. If he did, he might be disappointed once the car was ready, sad the restoration was over.

All the parts he’d switched out—they were worth considering. Like the finish, which he had watched them apply, not to mention the special-order tires and the refurbished interior, which was identical to the original. It had taken time to find those parts; he’d combed through every motoring magazine and even placed want ads.

But now it was ready to be shown off at the drag race in Pite this July. Last year, he and his friends traveled there from Kiruna in a long caravan, and he’d ridden with Classe, who drove his heather-green 1967 Cadillac Fleetwood. In Pite they got to know a gang of guys from V?rmland who’d come up in a ramshackle party bus, which had lived up to its name; they partied around the clock. The guys spoke in a strong dialect and sounded a little funny to Jon-Ante. But on the other hand, his own heritage sang in his voice, and they decided early on to call him “the Lapp.” They offered him a beer and didn’t mean anything by the derogatory nickname, but of course it stung.

The V?rmlanders had promised to return this summer, and he knew they were expecting him to turn up in something extraordinary. After a few beers he hadn’t been able to help himself and started talking about the Lincoln. Its contours, the sound and capacity of the engine, the exhaust pipes, and all the original parts. They listened attentively, asked detailed questions. He had answers for every one.

Before they took off for Pite, Jon-Ante had combed an extra high swoop over the top of his head, using pomade to keep his dark hair in place. His forehead rose high above his dark, prominent eyebrows. In Kiruna, he normally wore his hair down and plain but for a drag-racing day, Midsummer at T?rendoholmen, or Children’s Day in town he took extra care to get the perfect pompadour.

Only Classe had been allowed to see the car so far. Classe and a few of the guys had rented a garage to work in, and they’d said there was room for Jon-Ante too, but no. He liked his own garage in the railyard-adjacent neighborhood of Lokstallarna, off Norgev?gen. He’d been renting the house for a few years and expected to be able to buy it at some point. Which should have happened already, but he knew Betty and Evert were dubious when he steered his Lincoln into the garage, and since then they’d been delaying the sale.

He would never call himself a raggare—it was people in town who called the car buffs that. The general understanding was that raggare liked to run riot and get drunk, and Betty had seen him get dropped off late at night, often in Classe’s rumbling car. Still, it wasn’t until he showed up with his own car that his landlords really began to pay attention. Jon-Ante’d had a really nice American car that he sold before moving to Lokstallarna, a bright red 1970 Buick Electra convertible. Not like his first car, a crappy 1959 Chevrolet Impala Sport Coupe, but of course back then he’d also been quite a bit younger and something of a partier, and he’d let the car take a beating. In time, he began to feel too old for partying, but the dream of fixing up a great car never went away, and here he was.

Betty had come down from their new house, which was on the other side of Norgev?gen.

“Do you drink?”

“Oh, no.”

It was a strange question to ask a grown man, an insult to his integrity, even, but he stood with cap in hand so as not to risk his home.

Jon-Ante had turned thirty-eight in early May. He hadn’t thrown a party, but everyone turned up anyway, the way they always did when someone in the family had a birthday, whether it was a milestone one or not. Cars streamed in, parking in the yard and the ditch—theirs was a big family. They’d dropped off presents and his enná had served sandwich cakes in the kitchen. She’d worn her gákti but didn’t expect him to. His brothers seemed to have arrived straight from the forest in their flannel shirts and work pants. Grumpy about having to come into town, talking about all the things they had to get done. But everyone knew they blazed through those 125 kilometers in under an hour, so it wasn’t like they had much to complain about. His nieces and nephews had come running up to ask, eyes wide, what kind of car was in the garage. They’d peered through the window; he’d forgotten to pull closed the yellow floral curtain Betty had hung up.

“Are you a raggare?” the youngest gasped in excitement. He’d never seen his uncle, his eahki, like this. That way.

At this, Enná looked up and stopped cutting the cake, her voice like Betty’s. “Jon-Ante, do you drink?” There was a streak of disappointment in her voice. She’d been aware he had bought a new car. He didn’t think she really had anything against the car itself, it was more the connotations it carried for her, and what it carried away from her. She closed herself off, as she had done so many times before, and he was annoyed at her question. She knew that he hardly drank.

Even so, the following weekend, he drank. Classe wouldn’t give in and dragged him along to a spontaneous garage party. The guys sang to him when they realized he’d just had a birthday. They bellowed the traditional four hurrahs. And Classe happened to call him “the Lapp.”

At that point, he took off, decided to trot all the way home on foot even though it was hellishly windy. It didn’t matter. After all, he’d been thoroughly celebrated. Classe called after him: “Jonne! We’re going out from here! Come on, we’ll give you a lift.”

The next day, it was forgotten. Classe didn’t apologize, thank goodness. Jon-Ante didn’t want to explain himself, didn’t want to talk about what it might mean at work. Some of the guys worked in the mine, too, and he’d heard their talk enough to know what they thought about people like him.

H E GOT BEHIND THE wheel and closed the door gently. A mosquito whined in his ear; they were aggressive right before a downpour. They’d shown up prior to Midsummer, and in the birch forest they could be unbearable. He clapped the mosquito between his palms. How could he let someone ride in this car if they didn’t get that you couldn’t slap mosquitoes against the upholstery? In fact, could he bear to let anyone ride in this car? He didn’t want anyone to treat it like Mj?rden, the rusty Ford that Classe owned along with some other guys. That party wagon was always full to bursting, people sitting on top of the back seat with half their asses in the trunk. Drunk and carousing. Feet stomping snus into the floor mats, fingerprints on the finish, spilled beer. Classe had two cars, and the guys had bought Mj?rden from a drunk in G?llivare who’d sold it for way too cheap. The old man had regretted it the next day; once he sobered up he’d called Classe and begged to cancel the deal, but it was too late.

Jon-Ante turned the key, and the purr of the engine stroked the back of his neck until the hairs stood up. His hands rested on the wheel, but his right little finger twisted outward, away. He placed that hand in his lap and, just as he’d done a thousand times before, tried and failed to get the finger to straighten out and obey.

Yes, he had a crooked pinky he didn’t like to look at, or let other people see, but fingers tended to be visible. As a child he’d thought he might as well cut it off. But of course, folks have a talent for spotting missing fingers, too.

He’d been afraid that he wouldn’t be able to manage a lasso anymore. It had been months before he got the chance to try, and he’d almost convinced himself that he might as well give up hope of being with the reindeer.

Once he came home after that first school term, he’d taken the lasso behind the house to try it out on a set of antlers he’d propped up in the snow, and it was fine. But in real life, reindeer didn’t stand still—they pulled, ducked their heads, and hurled themselves sideways. Your fingers couldn’t let you down.

In the winter, hidden in a mitten, his hand wouldn’t attract attention, but he knew it would be worse in the summertime. The finger wasn’t just crooked—it stuck out, too. Then again, when they were with the reindeer, most people wouldn’t have time to stare at a little finger that pointed to the stars. But who wanted to look like a snooty old lady picking up a dainty teacup? Jon-Ante would have liked to resemble his isá, strong and with all his fingers clasping tightly around a lasso that snared a calf. It didn’t quite turn out that way.

“Good thing it wasn’t your thumb,” Enná had said when he came home that first Christmas, after they hadn’t seen each other for months. The tears she’d tried to blink away hadn’t escaped his notice.

No one had examined his finger after it broke, and although he was only seven at the time he knew it was too late to brace and straighten the crooked bone. He’d almost been able to feel the new cartilage begin patching up what no doctor had taken care of.

Surely his enná was right—if it had been his thumb, there was no way he could have fixed up the car he was sitting in right now, and he wouldn’t have been able to work as a machinist in the mine. There were lots of things he would have missed out on, if it had been his thumb. But what if it hadn’t been any finger at all?

He slapped the back of his neck, and a bloody mosquito smeared his palm. He retrieved a wet-wipe from the glove box.

The lasso hadn’t been his only worry. He would never be a handball player, either. This insight had come to him in a flash just as his finger cracked. Oh well, it would have been a hopeless dream anyway, given who he was and where he lived. Most boys in the village wanted to be soccer stars, but he hadn’t been as quick on his feet and preferred to watch. He still did—he would head home and stand with his back against the clubhouse at Vuolle Sohppar, watching as teams from Hakkas, Leipoj?rvi, and Skaulo came to the village. The boys from Sohppar, both the upper and lower villages, were really good. They were often shorter than the competition, but they could stand up to tackling and strike back even harder. They were in good physical shape thanks to spending so much time among the reindeer. Not least Jon-Ante’s brother Mikkel—he had real talent.

Jon-Ante turned off the engine. He looked forward to driving the car to the village, cruising slowly past the houses, stopping by the store, and driving back home. Goahtu.

In the city, he didn’t have a place. Nor did he have the footsteps of those who had gone before him. That was all in the village. And yet he had left it behind.