Chapter 2
The first thing I found when I started looking up the Himlafall Clinic six months ago was that there were no pictures of the premises anywhere on the internet.
There were plenty of interviews with the founder, Martina Hastings—the so-called revolutionary new actor whose romance-centric vision of psychological treatment is changing the world—but they were all performed in the safety of hotel restaurants; cozy little coffee shops; or, on one occasion, which resulted in a clearly very starstruck reporter, an exclusive private club.
The topic of the lack of images came up in a couple of the interviews I found, and Martina always gave a variation on the same answer.
“I want our clients to come to us without any preconceptions, with a completely clean slate. It’s important for the success of our treatment model.
We also put a high value on our clients’ privacy.
Even a faraway picture might give away a client’s identity, from a reflection or a silhouette, and the very possibility of that goes against our basic philosophy.
All our employees sign NDAs when they start working with us, and our guests do as well. ”
The reporter had tried to ask a couple of inferred questions about some of the rumored celebrity clients—a famous musician, a well-known Danish director—but Martina had deflected with a laughter the reporter had described as “strangely seductive,” while also getting in a quick description of her impressively toned shoulders.
“Some deeply vulnerable things are processed at the Himlafall Clinic, and that is built on a level of trust that is incredibly precious to me. I want to do my best to honor that.”
So when my car rolls up to the gates, I, like all the other patients to have ever arrived at the Himlafall Clinic, am seeing it for the first time.
From a distance, it looks like a farm. Low buildings, close to the ground, half-covered in ivy, all painted white, with small windows and tiled roofs, all in a row on the near side of a small, picturesque pond.
The road is blocked off with a pretty, ornate cast-iron fence.
It’s low enough that a woman of average height would be able to climb it, as long as her pants were stretchy and she wasn’t wearing heels, but I can’t drive through the gates.
Instead, I have to stop my rental car and get out of the driver’s seat.
It’s colder than I expected, but the air is pleasantly crisp, as opposed to biting; the pale white sun in the sky holds more warmth than I would have thought.
The aesthetic of the fence is somewhat ruined by the massive, clunky intercom on the left-hand side. There’s only one button; I press it and step back as the voice of a young woman comes through, as clear as if she was standing right in front of me.
“Welcome to Himlafall Clinic. How can I help you today?”
For a moment, I wonder if it’s Martina Hastings herself, but I quickly reject the notion. Martina is the owner, founder, and face of the operation. Surely she’s much too important to man the intercom.
Whoever it is I’m talking to must be one of the employees. Her voice sounds breathy and ethereal. I resist the urge to ask if she has to talk like that, and instead say:
“Hi, yeah, this is Isobel … Anderssen.” I correct myself at the last minute; my real last name almost slips out. Pure muscle memory.
“I’m supposed to check in today? I think I’m a bit early.”
“No problem at all, Isobel,” the voice responds, in a tone that suggests she’s delighted by my early arrival, and by the sound of my voice, and, indeed, by my very existence. “I’ll open the gates. Did you arrive here by car?”
“Yes, I did,” I say.
“The parking lot is on your left-hand side. Belinda will come and greet you.”
A brief pause, and then she adds, with an extra helping of warmth:
“We’re truly so happy you’re here, Isobel. I look forward to getting to know you.”
The intercom beeps, and after a few short seconds, the gates start opening inward.
I get back into the driver’s seat and start up the road.
As I get closer, little details begin to come into view. The wildflowers peeking out through the moss on both sides of the driveway; the blueberry bushes crowded beneath the windowsills of the buildings, little white buds just starting to form on their spiky branches.
I can see three small, neat cabins from over here, and two larger houses on the other side of what looks to be the main building.
If Armin was here with me, he’d make a joke about it. He’d say something like, “That big one at the end is probably where they do their satanic rituals.”
I feel a pang in my chest. For a second, I turn back in my seat, but the gates have already closed behind me.
It feels like my chest is constricting.
Don’t panic, Isobel. It’s going to be fine. You’ve been planning this for months. You can leave whenever you want.
The road branches off to my left, and, just as described, I see a small parking lot under a corrugated steel roof. There are seven cars parked there, and three spaces still open.
I ease the car into one of the free spaces, terrified of scratching the electric BMW parked next to it; the Toyota Camry is bigger than what I’m used to driving, which would be an electric scooter.
I could barely cover the cost of the two weeks for the rental.
If I dent someone’s luxury car, I’ll have to run away in the dark of night and pray they don’t try to find me.
Once I manage to ease the car into the space, I try to exhale, but some of the air still feels like it’s stuck in there. My ribs hurt, and I try to tell myself it’s from the seat belt and the five-hour drive.
I close my eyes, breathe in deep through my nostrils.
Then I force myself to think of every job interview I’ve been to in the last seven years.
Every gray, worn-out-looking elder journalist who’s peered at my résumé through bifocals, lines etched around their eyes, stress pulling the corners of their mouths down before they look up to meet my pathetically hopeful gaze.
The sympathy is always the worst part. That, and the explanations.
Hiring freeze right now … Really looking for someone with more of an established following … Is there any chance you speak German? Or Mandarin? No?
Maybe try to build up your portfolio. Do some more freelance work.
Have you thought about applying for an internship?
I’ve been in so many of those sad little conference rooms over the years.
Borrowed so many ill-fitting nice blazers from friends.
Pored over my résumé for hours, trying to find the right wording, attempting to tweak it to perfection.
Written and rewritten my work samples, hoping that a single sentence might break through the fog, show someone, anyone, that despite the shitty economy, despite my lack of on-the-job experience, and despite the cratering newspaper industry, I’m worth taking a chance on.
When I started studying journalism, everyone told me not to. My mother cried when I insisted that this was the path I wanted to take.
She told me it was a job without any security, that I’d be better off going into something more stable, something with some promise. Like law, or finance, or computer programming.
She told me I had nothing to prove.
She told me that I was just trying to fix history, and that I would be better served to just move on.
But I insisted, and she let me go.
She wanted me to burn the past and look forward, like she had. She couldn’t understand that that was never an option for me.
My fingers go to the pendant resting between my collarbones. I almost left it behind, but just as I’ve almost thrown it out hundreds of times, I couldn’t quite bring myself to do it.
My father gave it to me on my fourteenth birthday. A silver rose, small and exquisite. A little inside joke, since his name was Rosenwald. The name I bore as well.
I could sever myself from the ruined family name. But I couldn’t cut off the half of me that had grown in tainted soil.
I can only try to cleanse it. Prove myself different. Show the world, and everyone who doubted me, that they were wrong to do so.
And now I might have a story. I might have the kind of story that’s good enough, juicy enough, important enough that it’ll get syndicated. That it will spread like wildfire through the world and make it clear, once and for all, that I am someone to be counted on.
This is my shot. Himlafall Clinic is my shot.
All I have to do is not fuck it up.
The knock on the window makes me yelp and open my eyes.
A smiling, beautiful face peers in at me. A quick impression of very white, very even teeth and the kind of freckles influencers spend hours trying to fake with liquid bronzer.
“Hi!” the woman says and waves at me through the window, her voice ever so slightly muted by the glass. “You must be Isobel!”
I nod.
“I’m Belinda,” she says, still smiling. “If you’re all ready to go, I’m here to bring you to Martina.”