JESSICA OPENS HER eyes; her lids feel heavy. She sees a painting of a sailboat, a wood-grain closet, a wide door to a wheelchair-accessible toilet, and a little television hanging from the ceiling. She knows she’s still in the hospital and that Yusuf and Nina are alive, recuperating in neighboring rooms. Erne told her so this morning as soon as she woke up.
“Jessica?”
Jessica turns and sees a familiar face, a tightly pulled bun, and lone strands of hair against the bright sunlight.
“Tina?”
A wrinkled hand squeezes hers. A tear trickles down the lean cheek.
“It’s so wonderful seeing you after so many years. . . .”
Jessica studies the other woman. She has dyed her hair a reddish tint and, despite numerous face-lifts, looks much older than Jessica remembered. Pride and an imposing presence have been replaced by frailty and an air of melancholy.
“You have no idea how much I’ve thought about you, Jessica.”
“What do you want?” Jessica turns to the window, and silence falls over the room. Tina clearly doesn’t have an answer prepared. Maybe she tried to come up with one and couldn’t.
“What I want is for you not to think of me as the enemy,” she finally says, wiping her teary eyes on a lace handkerchief she pulls from her purse.
Jessica shakes her head. She has a hard time understanding why her aunt has come to see her now, after all these years. It’s been so long since they last saw each other that Jessica wouldn’t have recognized Tina’s voice if she hadn’t seen her face.
“I don’t. But I don’t think of you as a friend either, Tina.” Jessica’s throat feels tight; it’s surprisingly hard to say what’s on her mind.
“But—,” Tina whispers, and Jessica swats the air dismissively.
“Mom didn’t trust you.” Jessica hears her voice dropping to a whisper too.
They both fall silent.
“Your mother was sick,” Tina eventually says, her voice trembling. “Your mother was the most beautiful and gifted person in the world, but she was also very, very sick.”
Jessica turns away and shuts her eyes. She has heard this before, but can’t remember where. “What do you mean?”
For a moment, Tina looks as if she is going to back down and refrain from saying what’s on her mind. Lock her chest of confessions for the next thirty years. But a deep sigh leads to stammered words.
“Your mother was mentally ill. She was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia at a very young age,” Tina says, and her delicate smile speaks of relief. Starting is always the hardest part. “But thanks to medication, she was able to live a rather normal life, and her work as an actor . . . well, you could say she was extraordinary at it, not in spite of her illness but perhaps because of it. On the other hand, in an upper-class, aristocratic Swede–Finn family like the von Hellens, there was no way their daughter’s mental illness would be spoken of publicly in the nineteen seventies. In order to keep it a secret, Theresa was taken to a private psychotherapy center for children and adolescents directed by Camilla Adlerkreutz.”
“But . . . ,” Jessica mumbles, feeling a heaviness spread from her gut toward her chest.
“If you don’t count the mild paranoia and sudden fits of rage, Theresa managed daily life quite well. To our parents’ horror, at the age of twenty she applied to and was accepted at the Theatre Academy, and before long she launched an acting career that, as you’re well aware, remains unparalleled by Finnish standards. Theresa met your father, who was working as a set designer for the Helsinki City Theatre. You were born soon after and, two years later, Toffe. Then you moved to the States.” Tina takes a sip of water from her plastic mug. The wrinkles at her scrawny throat remind Jessica of a turkey wattle.
“Why are you telling me this now?”
“Your father didn’t want to go to the States. He felt staying in Helsinki would be the wisest course of action, hands down. If for no other reason than for your and Toffe’s sake. By then your parents had inherited so much money that financial success on the other side of the pond wouldn’t have made a difference one way or the other.”
“Mom went to chase her dreams—”
“That wasn’t the primary reason. Your mother left because she was afraid to stay.”
“What was she afraid of?”
“Camilla Adlerkreutz.” Tina pauses briefly. The clink of a dining cart carries in from the corridor. “Adlerkreutz dismissed Theresa’s claims by saying she was delusional. You can guess who everyone believed: a schizophrenic or a well-respected psychiatrist.”
“But . . . what did Mom say?”
Tina looks at Jessica for a long time, then grunts as if it is all too incredible to be true.
“That Adlerkreutz practiced occult arts aimed at brainwashing children and adolescents. Theresa said Adlerkreutz forced her patients to participate in rituals where they were submerged in water. . . . They were abused physically but even more so mentally. And that what Adlerkreutz did to her patients truly worked. Everyone seemed to be in her power.”
“Except Mom?”
“At least based on how stubbornly she resisted and tried to tell our parents what was really happening during her therapy.”
Tina bursts into silent tears. She turns her gaze toward the sunlit window, wipes her nose, and gathers her thoughts.
“When she came of age, your mother refused to attend any more sessions. But Adlerkreutz’s circle wouldn’t leave her alone. Theresa said people were following her at night, that she was getting strange phone calls. That they threatened to do something terrible if she didn’t return.”
“Things a paranoid person would say.”
“Exactly. I don’t know if you can blame my parents for never taking Theresa’s accusations seriously. And that’s why she wanted to get away. As far as possible.”
“Did Mom ever say why she was so important to the cult?”
“According to Theresa, Adlerkreutz had handpicked her to be the future leader of the cult and carry on her work. Adlerkreutz saw something unique in Theresa, perhaps something to do with Theresa’s sensitivity, the charismatic energy she radiated, her ability to sway people’s emotions. The same traits that later made her an influential movie star. Perhaps your mother possessed too much potential to waste. She could have been a valuable asset, a tool of her propaganda.”
For a moment, Jessica stares ahead blankly. She experiences shock, anger, and sadness, but none of these emotions manages to take root inside her. Finally she whispers: “Did . . . did Dad know?”
“Theresa didn’t want your father to know the truth. Your father no doubt came to know your mother’s unstable side over time, but I don’t believe he had the slightest idea what caused the sudden mood swings and the intermittent loss of perspective. So he hung in there.”
“For my and Toffe’s sakes?”
“Of course! I’m certain he loved Theresa too,” Tina says, then drains her water mug. “All that success . . . life in the spotlights and on the red carpet . . . I’m not sure if it made your parents’ lives harder or easier in the end, but within a few years, things had gotten so impossible that your father decided to move away.”
Jessica’s heart skips a beat and suddenly her throat feels incredibly dry. “That morning . . .”
“The night before the accident, I got a phone call from your father in Los Angeles. I hadn’t heard a word from either of them for years, so it took me completely by surprise. Your mother had done her best to paint me and the whole von Hellens family as villains, but as homelife grew more difficult, your father gradually came to realize that the problem lay elsewhere. He briefly told me that the marriage had run its course some time ago, that he had fallen in love with someone else, and that he was moving to Palo Alto to be with this other woman. Your mother was just preparing to shoot a new film, and your father had hoped he could take you children with him, but Theresa was adamantly opposed. In any case, your father called and begged me to fly out and support Theresa and lend a hand with the children.”
“You flew to Los Angeles?”
“Of course. Theresa was my sister. But unfortunately I arrived too late. . . .”
“The accident had already happened,” Jessica says, and looks out the window. The freeze has created a beautiful symmetrical star on the windowpane.
“When it happened, I was still in the air—flying over Nevada, to be precise.” Tina wipes away a tear with the pad of her thumb. “I didn’t find any of this out until I’d been waiting two hours in the backseat of a taxi at the entrance gates to Bel Air. Eventually the police came, explained the situation, and brought me to the hospital. You weren’t expected to pull through, Jessica. . . . I’ll never forget how little you looked, surrounded by all those machines. . . .”
“So you were there—”
“Every day for four weeks while they patched you back together. Your grandparents also came over. It was incredibly hard for them . . . especially since they had to say goodbye to their elder daughter and her family after such a long period of estrangement. Without a chance to make up, to repair the damaged relationship. But they still didn’t know to blame themselves for not having believed what Theresa told them about Camilla Adlerkreutz’s therapies.”
“So you believed her?” Jessica says, and turns her gaze out the window again. The sun is shining more brightly than it has in weeks.
“Listen, Jessica,” Tina says. “I wanted to take you in, but it simply wasn’t possible.”
“Because you didn’t like children?”
“I was too young to adopt, and due to breast cancer, your grandmother wasn’t in stable condition. Your father’s sister was the only logical choice. And although she wasn’t exactly fond of us von Hellenses, I knew she was the best alternative for your sake. The Niemis were good people.”
“They were. Do you think I haven’t spent every other day of my life thinking I’m cursed? That I’ve lost both sets of parents? Who the hell under the age of twenty has lost a brother and both their biological and adoptive parents? I’m the one here who must really be a witch.” Jessica can no longer hold back the tears. “Do you think money makes it any easier?”
“If anyone knows that it doesn’t, it’s me, Jessie.” Tina strokes Jessica’s hair, and to her surprise, Jessica doesn’t recoil from the gesture. “I’m sure you don’t remember anymore, but we tried to maintain contact with you even after the Niemis adopted you. We truly thought that one day you’d forget all your bitterness toward us, and we could go for an ice cream, to the amusement park . . . do something fun.”
“And when your husband died, you didn’t have anything better to do than track me down in Venice—”
“Everyone was worried, Jessica. I had to send someone after you.”
“Why are you here now?”
“Because you’ve lived nearly thirty years of your life without knowing the truth. Brooding over all sorts of theories about your parents’ accident. You knew your mother hated us. I’m sure you heard dozens of reasons for it, the majority of which were no doubt the product of her imagination. And now you know the truth, that she hated us because we didn’t believe her. We thought she was a paranoid schizophrenic—which she was, absolutely—and we didn’t believe her when she told us what Camilla Adlerkreutz had done to her. “
Tina picks up her gray purse from the floor and pulls out a folded piece of paper. Jessica looks at it for a second, then takes it suspiciously and unfolds it.
State of California motor vehicle collision report
Place: Los Angeles, 4280 Lincoln Blvd 33°58’41.1”N 118°26’08.9”W
Time: 7:45 am 05/04/1993
For a moment all is silent: there’s a pause in the machines’ hum; no footfalls echo from the corridor. Jessica realizes that she has always known but hasn’t wanted to believe it. That if you push something deep enough, it’s out of sight but never truly goes away. Jessica feels her brother squeezing her hand harder and harder. She sees Mom look at her in the rearview mirror. And Mom’s eyes aren’t sad anymore; they’re hopeful. Mom’s dark eyebrows rise; her mouth draws up in a smile. The sorrow is gone, and it even seems as if her eyes are laughing. Soon everything will be fine, sweetheart. Her father, who is staring out the window, comes out of his reverie when the car crosses the median. Her father turns, roars, and tries to grab the steering wheel.
Soon we’ll be happy again.
A silence that goes on and on. An endless silence, white in color and smelling of hot asphalt and exhaust, an emptiness that follows her into this hospital room, where it all takes on meaning again.