Chapter 96
Felicia’s basement smelled like earth and paint and laundry detergent. They could hear the voices upstairs clearly; the walls were thin. Footsteps sounded sharp and decisive; furniture scraped loudly when they sat down at the table.
Killian had curled up in a corner as though trying to protect himself.
Felicia had told them that the slightest noise would carry up to the kitchen. Sander hunched and closed his eyes, felt exhaustion coming over him. It mixed with the mild intoxication that was rising into his head.
When he opened his eyes again, Killian was a silhouette of shadows and the occasional stripe of light. He had tucked his head between his knees and it sounded like he was snuffling. Sander saw his shoulders shaking.
“Killian. Killian,” Sander whispered softly, moving cautiously, silently to sit beside him. “It’s okay. Everything’s going to work out fine.”
Killian didn’t seem to hear him. The snuffling continued. Sander put an arm around his shoulders.
Killian seemed almost feverish. Sander told him again that everything was okay, even though it was starting to dawn on him that it wasn’t; he told Killian things would work out even as he realized they wouldn’t.
He pulled Killian close and found him remarkably pliant, as if there was no will left in his large frame.
Killian’s head fell to Sander’s chest and rested there.
This was just like the way Sander held Albin and Josefin sometimes.
When he thought of them, his heart lurched and he wished them all the good and beautiful things in the world, wanted them to be protected at any price.
Hoped that any bad decisions they might be forced to make at the age of eighteen wouldn’t haunt them for the rest of their lives.
Sander watched as Killian reached out a hand, searching for something to hold on to, and found Sander’s upper arm.
They slowly sank farther onto the floor until they were nearly on their backs.
Then it happened: for a brief moment, Killian’s head weighed nothing against Sander’s chest, as if he were merely vapor, or the chilly gust of wind that comes in when you open a window.
Maybe he really was dead, after all. Then in a split second its weight returned, almost unnaturally great and deep, like everything Killian had gone through and still carried was present, but on a slight delay.
Gradually Killian grew still, and soon he was simply breathing. Above them, the police were still talking to Felicia.
Sander had spent so much time thinking about death over the years, Killian’s death and his own, who he would be when the end came.
Death was the greatest of all mysteries, he thought, and the answer would only come in the same instant it became too late to consider it.
Now he realized he was wrong. Life was more profoundly mysterious than death could ever be.
He could smell Killian’s hair. It smelled like the forest, earthy and fresh. Familiar and foreign all at once.
“I wonder what my real funeral will be like,” Killian whispered after a while.
“How would you like it to be?”
“I don’t know. But if there’s no alcohol, I’m not coming.”
“You’re not going to attend your own funeral?”
“No. I mean, it wouldn’t be the first time.”
An absurd laugh bubbled up in Sander’s chest, but he swallowed it down.
“And,” Killian continued, “I want them to play my playlist.”
“You have a playlist?”
“I have songs I like.”
Sander realized he didn’t know what songs those were. He wished Killian could send them to him, but how? Did Killian have a cell phone, did he have social media profiles, did he subscribe to streaming services?
“And,” Killian went on again, “whoever can’t produce a picture of us together isn’t allowed in.”
“What’ll that be, then, like, three people?”
This time Killian was the one smothering his laughter. “Plenty of alcohol for me, in that case.”
He didn’t add up, Killian. It was like he was split in two, both markedly older and still eighteen.
He spoke about death as they would have back then, in 1999, shallowly, fragmentally, uncoupled from reality.
Death as nothing more than a fantasy, something you could easily keep at arm’s length.
Maybe that’s what happens when you manage to fool death for so long.
“You always brought out the best in me,” Killian said. “Do you know that?”
“I did?”
“Yes. That’s how I felt, anyway. Most of the time, at least. Until…you know, that last night. But,” he added, when Sander opened his mouth, “that doesn’t matter now. I just wanted you to know that. That you saw me, somehow. In a way no one else did.”
“I never believed it was you.”
Seconds of silence from Killian, a few too many. “What do you mean?”
“Mikael.”
When Killian finally spoke, he sounded different, like he had crept down into a tiny fissure inside himself. “That night…”
Both of them fell silent as they registered Vidar Jorgensson’s words on the top side of the floorboards.
There is evidence that he may have been involved in Filip Soderstrom’s death.
Vidar’s voice was deeper and more robust, clearer to make out than the other two. Killian didn’t move. Sander kept listening, suddenly more attentive, but he tried to hide it.
They heard soft steps. Someone had stood up and was walking through the house. The footsteps approached the door to the basement. Killian slowly stood up and looked around in the darkness as if trying to locate something.
The steps stopped at the door. Sander held his breath.
“Killian,” he whispered. “No.”
The handle turned with a creak. Killian thrust his hand into his backpack, and when it came back out his fingers were clutching the handle of a woodcarving knife.
“What the hell are you doing?” Sander hissed.
But this was a different Killian, unfamiliar, a stranger.
The handle jiggled. Someone was trying to open the door. Killian moved to the bottom of the stairs with his knife in the air. Sander followed him, very uneasy, and was just about to grab Killian by the arm when all the air was sucked out of the room.
Above them, the yanking on the handle grew more insistent.
“Don’t say a word.”
Suddenly, Killian’s free arm came out and his hand clamped around Sander’s neck, firm and mechanical.
The stranglehold was so unexpected that the shock didn’t give way to pain until his head started pounding.
His mouth and throat were producing sounds, but no words.
Killian stared at Sander, his eyes blank.
Sander tried to call for help, but Killian’s grip only grew more tenacious. He clawed at Killian’s arm, but it wasn’t enough. His friend was so much bigger, so much stronger. Killian looked toward the basement stairs again.
The yanking stopped. Steps again, steps retreating through the house.
Sander’s vision was starting to go black. When Killian finally let go and lowered his knife hand, Sander felt the urge to cough and had to double over to stifle it, gasping for air. His fingertips were prickly, full of pins and needles. He slowly straightened up, feeling increasingly dizzy.
“I had to,” Killian rasped in a hollow tone, his voice vibrating with something Sander didn’t recognize.
They stared at each other in the darkness.