Beate really likes her suntanned skin. She has rolled up her shirtsleeves, the white material accentuates her colour. Her arms are thin, which is nice, but she would rather not have hair on them, although it’s fair and not that thick. She does not dare shave, because then it grows longer, darker and thicker, Selma told her so in second year at school, that you must never shave hair, that just makes it worse. Nor does she want to wax them, she has heard it is really sore, and makes your skin red and bumpy. Besides, now in the summertime, the golden hairs look quite nice against the brown of her skin. Actually, Beate considers, she has, in a way, model’s arms, and is struck by a sense of summer nights, Mediterranean heat, a dark ocean, something cinematic, something she has not experienced or even been close to experiencing. It sweeps over her, followed by a craving she wants to escape from, a disgusting feeling. Like after masturbating.
Beate walks about, her body an unattainable fantasy for most. Beate is in fact beautiful. She and her body are of course inseparable, yet all the same she is not certain that her body is her. She does not think this in so many words. Beauty is not such a boon as you might be inclined to believe.
Beate looks in the mirror hanging in the hallway of the functional apartment where she lives. The room is painted white, and the strong light from the energy-saving light bulb in the ceiling makes everything cast sharp shadows. When she moves, the shadows lengthen. The white shirt reaches midway down her thighs, she is wearing her tight faded jeans beneath, nothing is wrong, she is tanned enough, slim enough, pretty enough, the clothes are right, she is pleased and applies deep pink lip gloss.
Outside, light rain is falling, Beate opens her jacket, the wind blows warm against her throat, small droplets land on her shirt and face. She plugs the earphones into her iPhone, puts on some music and walks out onto Skovveien.
The music makes Beate happy, it pounds within her. The pavement is wet but the air is warm, she smiles at passing men and their hungry looks, walking past on nimble feet, gazelle, she thinks, graceful, sexy, her nipples chafe against the shirt material and her sandalled feet are moist.
She is looking forward to the lecture. It is strange: a professor stands there speaking in front of a whiteboard. Sometimes searching for words and clicking a little back and forth on her laptop, perhaps pulling down the projection screen to show them a PowerPoint presentation with keywords, graphs and charts. In a way it is pretty boring, while at the same time Beate gets the feeling of something unfamiliar taking root within her, she begins to picture things. Other countries, other times, strange faces. But it requires strenuous, almost unbearable, effort. She feels that somebody wants something from her, it is an exacting, unchecked demand. A hand that wants to drag her in. Further and further in. Into serious matters. Like when she is at Bea Britt’s. It is a relief to go for coffee in the canteen with the others afterwards.
Sometimes she does not attend the lectures. Today she is going to two: Evil in the history of ideas and What is a childhood? Oh, Beate is so looking forward to it, she cannot get enough of what the lecturer says, everything ignites her interest, clusters images: forests, flames and crucifixions, cries towards the night sky, asylums, hospitals, institutions, muddy farmyards, the beating of child labourers and pauper apprentices, the tiptoe of feet in the drawing rooms of the bourgeoisie, the caning of a hand, china cups, factories and mines. If she had spoken of these things with Bea Britt, she would immediately start talking about the children, with tears in her eyes, the small, defenceless children, alone and vulnerable, how could they feel loved in such circumstances? Beate thinks she herself must be lacking in some essential emotion, because she does not think about the children, she just wants to be there, struggle and decry, speak to the people, move them to protest, go forth together. With a man by her side. A strong man. A handsome one.
She knows several boys, who like her and shift uneasily when she sits down beside them. Ones who are into music, activist sorts, farm boys, different types. Who smile and whisper things to her, tilt their heads to look at what she is writing in her notebook. Or who just stare straight ahead, stiff with shyness. Diligent students with considerable knowledge, who would gladly include her in their earnest ways and their Sunday hikes, their frozen pizzas and some treat in the form of going to see a film and having a beer, but just one, because they do not squander their money. Sometimes she wishes she was like them, but not so often, because their ascetic way of life rubs off on their way of thinking, making everything so boring and she wants something different, she likes intensity, heated discussions, visions, venturing grandiose analyses, your own. But no matter, they are boys, they are receptive and she likes them, Beate has always liked boys. Girls do not like each other in that way. At least they do not like Beate. She is too pretty. Beate knows the kind of things they think about her, and not only think but say. Badmouthing Beate is a subject all of its own. She is stuck-up, they say, smug, thinks she is pretty and perfect. Or at least that was what it was like in secondary school, now she is not completely sure. There are so many girls at the university here in Blindern. A lot of them are pretty. A lot of them are clever and pretty and slim, all in one.
Erik is different from the other boys. Good-looking, of course, and neither shy nor serious, on the contrary, he is pushy, jokes and flirts, dares to stick his neck out, asks questions during the lectures and has strong opinions. Fortunately there are always lots of people about when she has talked to him, around a table in the canteen, outside the door to the lecture hall, she does not know how it would go if it were only the two of them. Cringe, so embarrassing.
She wonders how things would be if she stopped being perfect and pretty. Suppose she goes through a change and is suddenly completely different, ordinary, or ugly, gets loads of spots, puts on weight, what would she do then? Die? She is not quite sure where things are going from here either in, like, the future. That seems so blank, yet filled at the same time, confused and disorderly, and when she ponders it, she always ends up thinking about love and sex, no matter what.
She has only had sex once and that was during all the end-of-school partying, she regrets that, it was horrible. All the same, she wants so much to experience it again, only in a different way, the next time will be completely different, and she just does not know how she is going to manage to wait, you cannot want something so badly without it happening, it must be right around the corner, maybe already under way.
She can picture it. Being naked with a man. Him saying: I didn’t know you were so beautiful. Sometimes these images are all she sees, she fantasises about being plunged into a mad love affair, and cannot manage to concentrate on anything else, it can last for hours. She knows, therefore, what it is to love, to be loved, that is how it is. But afterwards, when she is walking on the street, looking around her, it is gone, empty. She sees only trees, houses, lawns, roadways, cars, people, nothing.
She buys a chocolate bar, but regrets it as soon as she has eaten it, it is only empty calories, her blood sugar will soon fall and she will be starving by teatime, because now she cannot eat lunch. It is either-or, chocolate or an open sandwich, otherwise she will put on weight. Now the whole day is out of balance, she is on the verge of tears.
She had planned to walk the whole way to the campus at Blindern, across Majorstua, past the students’ union and between the university science labs, but there is not enough time, so she takes the tram and gets off in Majorstua to take the underground. Skipping the lecture had not occurred to her, but she begins to consider it while waiting on the platform. If the train to Holmenkollen comes first, she thinks, I will go up to Bea Britt. The Holmenkollen train does not come first, but she waits for it all the same. She wants to go to Bea Britt’s place. The missing girl, Emilie, has something to do with it. She feels a kind of tension in her body the entire time, the girl is the first thing she thinks of when she wakes up, and she checks the online newspapers on her iPhone before getting out of bed. It is a serious matter, something gruesome has happened, something out of the ordinary, everyone is following it, Beate is not the only one checking the Net more often than usual and turning on the TV to watch the evening news, anxious to hear the latest.
She can study at Bea Britt’s. She has done it before. Sitting at her kitchen table. Bea Britt does things around the house then. More often than not in the living room, the door ajar, and Beate can see her sitting on the sofa with her eyes closed, or sometimes listening to music or watching TV. She can go out to the garden, be gone for a while and return with something in her hands. Flowers, maybe, or tomatoes, plums and apples if it is autumn. Now and again she will work at the kitchen bench even though Beate is reading in the same room. Cut vegetables, cook, bake. Sigh, stop what she is doing and look out the window. Make a comment if someone passes by on the quiet road. There’s the man in the baseball cap, she will say, he’s at the gate gawking again. Beate will go over and stand beside her. It is not the first time she has seen him, Bea Britt has pointed him out before. A loner, Beate says, or, actually he seems a little backward, I think, retarded. Always wearing that cap, and just standing there, even though he must know we can see him.
No, Bea Britt will then say, he’s not retarded, it’s something else.
A nutter then, Beate says, returning to her books. There is a limit for how strange a person can be, she thinks, feeling suddenly irritated. Bea Britt always has to make a problem out of things, nothing is allowed to just be normal.
Sometimes she will see Bea Britt write something in a notebook, but only on rare occasions. Seldom, considering she is a writer. What does she think about? She looks as though she is pondering something so intently, her features darkened.
Whatever she is reading has a different effect on her when she reads it at Bea Britt’s. It takes on a darker cast she does not understand. It might be due to Bea Britt taking everything she says so seriously. She listens and responds as though they are talking about profound, inescapable truths, things you have to take in, yes, almost take on and suffer for. If Beate brings up something about the plight of some children in the seventeenth century, the events seem to grow and somehow meld with the kitchen, they are face to face with them, with all the terrible things which befell them, and life outside, here and now in Slemdal, hardly exists. It is as though Bea Britt has everything within her the entire time. The whole world in her body and the more that comes the more she is filled. It cannot be good. But all the same, it is as if Beate needs to be in proximity with it. Even though what is written in her books assumes unfathomable depths at Bea Britt’s kitchen table, threatening to drag her down into the darkness. She needs it. For everything written to have physical meaning. The thought of having sex fades when she is here.
It is dark and raining outside. Beate lies down on the sofa. Bea Britt has taken some berries from the freezer and is making redcurrant jelly at the worktop, the radio is on but the volume is low. It must be a repeat of BluesAsylet, because she can hear the voice of presenter Knut Borge between songs. Bea Britt’s sofa is soft and deep. Beate places a cushion under her head to avoid feeling as though she is sinking down into all the softness. Through the window, she sees the branches of the huge birch tree swaying in the wind. The street lamps are on, their light reflected in the raindrops on the pane.
Beate dozes, but now and again the music on the radio pulls her back up to the surface, the tones seem so powerful out of context, then she nods off again, but she is not aware of doing so before she wakes to hear Bea Britt crying in the kitchen. Beate sits up and coughs, places her feet heavily on the floor and coughs once more before going out to the kitchen. Perhaps they have found that girl, has there been some news on the radio she did not catch? But Bea Britt is not crying any longer and neither does she say anything about the Emilie case.
Do you know that girl who’s gone missing? Beate asks.
No, Bea Britt replies. She’s just a girl I usually see walking by with her dog. That’s why it feels so close, more real somehow, when I know who she is.
Beate thinks about how she is never going to walk around here on her own again, not at night-time at any rate.
She sits down on the antique day bed with all the cushions. On the table between them stands a basket of freshly baked buns, a bowl of redcurrant jelly, butter and tea. A pair of three-branched candlestick holders with lit candles, reminiscent of a picture of the apostles, Beate thinks, something to do with Jesus and Italy and the Last Supper, a painting she has seen, maybe in one of Mum’s art books.
Why were you crying? Beate asks. Bea Britt shakes her head a few times and does not answer.
The radio is still on but the sound is down. Jazz is playing now. Listen, says Bea Britt. She stands and turns up the volume. Beate thinks Bea Britt was crying because she does not have a man. She looks happier now. It is probably down to the music, maybe helped by the wine, which Bea Britt does not think Beate knows she drinks from her mug. Bea Britt sits back down.
Have you got a boyfriend? she asks.
I don’t know, Beate answers. As though she is already together with Erik.
Bea Britt has blown out the candles and turned on the ceiling light. Beate gathers up her books. She is cold and longs for home.
I’m going to head back to my place and take a shower, she says.
Okay, says Bea Britt. You can always shower here. Or have a bath, she says, smiling. She knows that Beate likes a relaxing soak. But Beate needs to tidy up her flat, and put a load of washing on, she has no clean clothes left.
Bea Britt stands in the hallway and makes to put on her raincoat. I’ll walk you down, she says, you shouldn’t be out alone around here now. Do you want to borrow an umbrella?
But Beate does not want her to come, suddenly she does not want to spend a second longer in the company of Bea Britt and all she exudes, emotions outpouring everywhere, all the time, her breath and body heat, Beate cannot take any more of her presence, she needs to be alone, right now.
How quickly things can tip the other way. Lately she has taken chances she promised herself never to take, she has tempted fate and lost control. Like when she walks alone through Oslo city centre at night even though she knows it can be risky.
I’m a grown-up, she says, it’s no more dangerous for me than for you, I can go by myself. I just won’t take the shortcut, and I’ll keep my mobile handy. She thumbs in Bea Britt’s number and pockets the phone. There, she says, all I need do now is press OK and I’ll call you. She is on the verge of tears, maybe that is the reason Bea Britt gives in.
Beate turns and looks back after she has walked a little distance. Bea Britt is standing in the doorway watching her. Beate thinks about how she is far too visible from the road like that, lit up by the hallway behind, the darkened windows on the floors above, it is a big house.
Rain is still falling. Why does she have to think about Erik? She does not want to. He is too good-looking, he could not possibly be counted on.
The lights of the cars. The gusts in the trees. The wet tarmac. The mobile vibrating. It is Mum calling. Her place is always warm and bright, lamps all around, clean clothes, a spare room and Beate’s very own soft, expensive duvet. She cries.
Oh, sweetheart, what’s wrong, has something happened?
No, Beate sobs, I don’t know.
Come on home for a little while, her mother says, and Beate does as she is told. She will not get to tidy up her own place now. She should not have eaten that chocolate. Everything is a mess.