Chapter 35 But Only if You’re the Best
But Only if You’re the Best
There’s going to be a press conference in Beartown. It’s the worst possible timing for some people, when the whole town feels like it’s on its way toward imploding from a hundred different conflicts, but of course it’s the best possible timing for other people. Richard Theo, for instance.
The representatives of the factory’s new owners fly in from London; the local paper photographs them cheerfully shaking hands with the Spanish-home-owning politician in front of the factory.
Peter Andersson stands dutifully alongside; his voice is unsteady and his eyes are fixed on the tarmac, but he promises to “get to grips with hooliganism.”
The Spanish-home-owning politician is so proud that his shirt is practically bursting.
He starts the press conference by mentioning his esteemed and modest colleague, Richard Theo: “He deserves our thanks for his great service to the district. Without Richard’s contacts and hard work over the course of several months, this deal couldn’t have been concluded!
” The Spanish-home-owning politician goes on to describe, rather less modestly, his own involvement in the deal.
Taxpayers will benefit enormously, he explains, and the most important thing: “Jobs in Beartown have been saved!”
When the female politician at his side suddenly opens her mouth, the Spanish-home-owning politician is so taken aback that he doesn’t have time to react at first. She says, “And not just in Beartown, of course. In collaboration with the factory’s new owners we have reached an agreement in which the workforce in Hed will also be prioritized!
That’s one of the conditions: if the council is to support the factory financially, the entire council district needs to benefit! ”
The journalists take notes and photographs, film the press conference.
The Spanish-home-owning politician stares at the woman, and she meets his gaze.
He’s powerless, because what can he say?
That he’s not thinking of giving Hed any jobs?
He’ll be facing elections soon. He’s shaking with rage, and his smile for the cameras is strained, but when he’s asked about the jobs, he is forced to say, “Any responsible policy obviously has to involve . . . the whole district.” He is standing slightly hunched as he says this, whereas the female politician feels herself grow several inches taller.
Early one morning in a few months’ time, an envelope will be lying on the step outside her front door, and the documents inside will show how the Spanish-home-owning politician has been involved in undeclared property speculation in Spain.
It will, admittedly, turn out that the Spanish-home-owning politician is entirely innocent, but Richard Theo doesn’t need evidence, just doubt.
The headlines about “dodgy deals” will be big; the notification of his innocence will be confined to a few modest lines on the back pages of the local paper.
The Spanish-home-owning politician’s political career will already be over by then, after his party colleagues agree unanimously that “the party can’t afford any scandals.
” He will be replaced by a female colleague who appears to have plenty of enemies in Beartown but even more friends in Hed.
Benji doesn’t turn up for practices with the team.
He doesn’t call, he doesn’t answer when anyone calls him.
But late one evening when most of the lights in the rink are out and the locker rooms are empty, he is standing alone on the ice wearing jeans and skates, with a stick in his hand.
He’s come here to shoot some pucks, the way he’s done a million times before, and to see if it still feels the same.
If it can be the way it used to be. But his gaze has been caught by the image of the bear in the center circle.
Someone glides out onto the ice and stops beside him. Elisabeth Zackell.
“Are you going to play in the game against Hed?” she asks with a complete lack of sentiment.
Benji swallows hesitantly, still staring at the bear. “I don’t want to be a . . . problem. For the team. I don’t want them to feel that—”
“That’s not what I asked. Are you playing or not?” Zackell asks.
Benji closes his eyes quickly, opens them slowly. “I don’t want to be a burden to the club.”
“Are you planning to have sex with anyone in the locker room?”
“What the . . . ? What?”
Zackell shrugs. “That’s what people think, isn’t it? That gays have a problem with discipline? If everyone starts having sex with each other in the locker room?”
Benji frowns. “Where the hell have you heard that?”
“Are you planning to have sex with anyone in the locker room or not?”
“Like hell!”
Zackell shrugs again. “So you’re not a burden. Hockey is hockey. People can say what they like about you outside the rink, but in here it doesn’t matter. If you’re good, you’re good. If you score goals, you score goals.”
Benji doesn’t look convinced. “People hate me. You as well. Maybe it’s just too much for them, that you and I are both . . . you know. Maybe they could live with one, but two in the same team, that’s . . . too much for people.”
Zackell sounds taken aback. “What do you mean?”
Benji’s eyebrows twitch. “That you’re . . . gay.”
“I’m not gay,” Zackell replies.
Benji stares at her. “Everyone thinks you are.”
“People think a lot of things. They’re far too obsessed with their emotions.”
Benji just gawps at her for a long time. Then he starts to laugh. He can’t help it. “Seriously, Zackell, you must see that everything would have been a hell of a lot easier for you in this town if you’d just told everyone that you’re not—”
“Like you?”
“Yes.”
Zackell snorts. “I don’t think you have any obligation to tell everyone who you want to have sex with, Benjamin. I don’t think I have, either.”
Benji scrapes the side of his skate against the ice. He thinks for a while before he asks, “Do you ever wish you were a man?”
“Why would I?” Zackell wonders.
Benji looks at the bear on the ice. Tries to find the right words. “So you didn’t have to be a female hockey coach.”
Zackell shakes her head slowly, but for once she doesn’t look entirely unmoved. “My dad probably wished I was a boy sometimes.”
“Why?”
“Because he knew I’d always have to be twice as good as the men to be accepted.
The same thing applies to you now. You’ll be judged differently.
The people who hate me might let me coach a team, but only if we win.
And they’ll let you play, but only if you’re the best. Just being good isn’t enough for you anymore. ”
“It’s fucking unfair,” Benji whispers.
“Unfairness is a far more natural state in the world than fairness,” Zackell says.
“Did your dad tell you that?”
“My mom.”
Benji swallows hard. “I don’t know if I can be captain.”
“Okay,” Zackell replies.
Then she turns and leaves him without any more words. As if any more were needed.
Benji is left standing alone at the center circle.
Eventually he fetches a stack of pucks from the boards, drops them onto the ice one after the other, for possibly the last time.
This sport is never happy being just part of you, you have to sacrifice too much, there are too many things you know only if you’ve spent your whole life in here.
How much your feet hurt when you skate for the first time after the summer.
How unbelievably bad your gloves smell at the end of the season.
The sound when you slam into the boards or fire a puck into the glass.
How every rink has its own unique echo. How every stride sings when the stands are empty.
How it feels to just play. How your heart beats.
Bang bang bang bang bang.
The first morning Ana sits next to Vidar, neither of them says anything.
Ana is too weighed down by guilt and loss to speak.
For the entirety of her childhood she has always gone to school with Maya, and the loneliness is a shock.
She’s sleeping a lot, because she’s hoping she might wake up and realize that the mistake of her life was a dream. It never happens.
But the second morning she sits next to Vidar again, and just as the bus is approaching the school she glances at him. He pretends to be busy with his phone, but she sees him looking. He’s the sort who can’t help it.
“What are you playing?” she asks.
“What?” he mumbles, as if he’s only just noticed her.
She’s not that easily fooled. “You heard.”
He starts to laugh; he does that when he’s nervous.
He will soon discover that when Ana gets nervous, she makes sarcastic jokes instead.
If they spend their whole lives together, they might become the least suitable couple to encounter at a funeral: one who can’t stop making jokes and one who can’t stop giggling.
“Minecraft. I’m playing Minecraft,” he says.
“Are you seven or something?” Ana wonders.
He laughs. “It helps me to not . . . I have trouble with my impulse control. My psychologist says Minecraft is good. I can concentrate better when I just play.”
The bus stops. The students spill out. Ana doesn’t look away from him. “You’re Teemu Rinnius’s little brother, aren’t you? You were the one who was in prison?”
Vidar shrugs. “It was more like a holiday camp.”
“What do you mean, about not being able to concentrate? Have you got some sort of syndrome or something?”
“I don’t know.”
Ana smiles. “You’re just an ordinary nutter, then?”
Vidar laughs. “Some people say I’m a psychopath! You shouldn’t be talking to me!”
Ana looks him carefully up and down. His black hair is draped around his eyes. “You look too kind to be a psychopath,” she says.
He frowns. “Watch out! I might have a knife!”
She giggles. “If you had a knife I wouldn’t be scared of you, even if I was a loaf of bread.”
Vidar falls head over heels for her, because he’s the type who doesn’t know how to stop himself.