ELISABET GRIM IS fifty-three years old. She has grey strands in her hair. Her eyes are happy and when she smiles, one of her two front teeth juts out a bit more than the other.
Elisabet works as a nurse at Birgittagården, a home instituted by a state plan for wayward youth, north of Sundsvall. The home is a privately-owned registered residence for care of special cases and has eight girls between the ages of twelve and seventeen.
Many of the girls are drug addicts when they arrive. Almost all of them have issues with self-injury, including eating disorders, and many of them are fairly violent.
For these girls, there is no alternative to the closed home, with its alarms, barred windows and double locked doors. The next step would be adult jail or forced psychiatric confinement. Birgittagården, on the other hand, is a hopeful place – hope that these girls can be guided back into open care.
“The nice girls are the ones who end up here,” Elisabet usually says.
Right now, she’s eating the last bite of a dark chocolate bar and can taste its sweetness and its bitter aftertaste on her tongue.
Slowly, her shoulders begin to relax. The evening had been difficult, although the day had begun so well. Instruction during the morning. After lunch the girls had leisure time and spent it swimming in the lake.
After the evening meal, the house mother returned home to leave Elisabet in charge on her own.
The girls were supposed to watch television until ten in the evening, while Elisabet sat in the nurse’s office and tried to catch up with her personal reviews. When Elisabet heard angry yelling, she hurried to the television room and saw Miranda beating up tiny Tuula. Miranda was screaming that Tuula was a slut and a whore as she yanked Tuula off the sofa and began to kick her in the back.
Elisabet had gotten used to Miranda’s violent outbursts. She ran into the room and pulled Miranda away from Tuula and was slapped in the face for her trouble. In a loud voice, she lectured Miranda about unacceptable behaviour and without further discussion led the girl through the hallway past the registration room and into the isolation room.
Elisabet said good night but Miranda did not answer. She just sat on the bed looking down at the floor with a secret smile as Elisabet shut and locked the door.
The new girl, Vicky Bennet, was supposed to have had an evening chat, but the conflict between Miranda and Tuula had prevented that. Vicky timidly mentioned that it was her turn for a private chat, and when it was put off, she felt unhappy, broke a teacup and cut herself on the stomach and wrists with a shard.
When Elisabet returned, she saw Vicky with her hands in front of her face and blood running down her arms.
Elisabet washed the superficial wounds and put a bandage on Vicky’s stomach and gauze on her wrists while she comforted her and called her affectionate names until she saw a tiny smile appear. For the third night in a row, she gave the girl ten milligrams of Sonata so that she could sleep.