I GAVE YOU a clear order, Jessica. Do you think I’m going to turn a blind eye to this sort of insubordination?
Erne clicks the lighter lid shut, stretches out the first drag as long as possible, then exhales the smoke that briefly circulated through his airways in quick puffs from his big, hairy nostrils.
Erne eyes the wall of the smoking area at HQ. It’s darkened by grime and exhaust, and even the snow trapped in the seams of the concrete elements isn’t able to soften the ugliness. The building is so damn hideous that it makes a superb clubhouse for the unimaginative civil servants working inside, one in which they can reinforce one another’s prejudices and paranoia. There’s something East German about the ghastly structure; it calls to mind the Stasi or some other tyrannical organization that doesn’t even try to mask its cynical attitude toward the world around it. The fact of the matter is, for the ordinary citizen, coming to the police station just to drop off a passport application is intimidating. In addition to the building, a role must be played by the rigid, bureaucratic way the agency runs things. Out of this piss yellow monstrosity—not to mention the rest of Länsi-Pasila, which was evidently zoned and built in an unstable state of mind, with the hand holding the pen seeking inspiration from postcards showcasing Plattenbauten.
Beep. 37.9. Goddamn it.
Damn you, Jessica.
The tip of the cigarette is burning his forefinger and middle finger. His ring finger is freezing in the icy wind. His pinkie and thumb are locked in an embrace.
Six months. If you begin treatment immediately.
Erne had been keeping an eye on his phone throughout the day; the private clinic had promised to call between eight a.m. and eight p.m. Generally news like this is delivered to the patient face-to-face, but due to Erne’s situation at work and because the call is only a follow-up to bad news that had already been delivered, a telephone appointment was arranged.
So at eight p.m. on the dot, the oncologist Dr. Pajunen laconically recited that the CT scan of the chest cavity and the biopsies from the gastroscopy confirmed what was already considered probable: the tumor had metastasized, spreading not only to the liver and the bones but also to the esophagus.
Jessica, Jessica.
As he hung up, Erne suddenly felt curiously at peace: when he realized the thing he’d feared more than anything else in the world had finally happened, he stopped being afraid. He felt drained, and disappointed and shocked of course, but at the same time the knowledge of his own mortality set him at ease. No more questions, no more guessing. It would all be over soon.
Erne rolls the cigarette against the edge of the ashtray and lights another.
If Jessica would just have the sense to do exactly as he says.