Josefsen closed his laptop and put the issues he needed to read in the morning on his chair. Bloody weather, he thought, as he looked with disgust at the pouring rain outside. He lifted his jacket from the hook and hurried out of the office towards the elevator.
As he drove up the spiral exit ramp from the underground parking, he cursed himself for buying a Toyota Landcruiser. It was simply too big. He still had not learned to gauge its dimensions and dead angles, something that had already got him several scratches in the parking lot. The drive up the small, winding ramp was particularly challenging. And he was already late, so his careful drive up the ramp felt provocatively slow. When he finally exited the parking lot, the rain hit the windscreen so suddenly that he jammed on the brakes in sheer surprise.
‘Shit weather,’ he swore as he fumbled the mobile phone from his pocket and dialled Jan Bundgaard’s number.
‘Hi, it’s me. I got a bit delayed, but I’m leaving the office now. Just collect those pizzas. Pepperoni for me. I’ll get there as fast as possible, but traffic is crazy.’
He chucked the mobile phone onto the passenger seat and concentrated on steering the large 4x4 through the heavy traffic. When 450it rained, the traffic crawled as most of the motorists seemed to be learners experiencing the slippery road for the first time. Only the many cyclists were as reckless as always. On Nørrevold, cars had collided, and the motorists stood in the middle of the road in the deluge. Their argument completely blocked one lane, not helping the growing traffic chaos. The Landcruiser failed to make the lights at Nørregade for a second time, and Josefsen’s impatience was getting the better of him. His finger’s rhythmic tapping on the steering wheel in time to the car radio gradually became replaced by a more aggressive slapping with the palm of his hand when other motorists moved too slowly. When he finally reached Aaboulevarden, the traffic eased a little, but a quick glance at the green digits of the dashboard clock revealed that he was now even more delayed. He swore and impatiently jerked the giant vehicle into the second traffic lane, dangerously overtaking a smaller Audi.
‘Bloody Sunday drivers,’ he mumbled loudly, braking sharply to adjust to the traffic’s lethargic pace.
The windscreen wipers were fighting to keep the water off the windscreen and give him a clear view. But it was a futile battle. The rain was falling so hard that he could only identify the car in front of him with its red rear lights. After another twenty minutes, he finally reached Frederiksberg and strained his eyes for the crossroads where he needed to turn. He grabbed the mobile phone and called Jan Bundgaard again. It went straight to answerphone, and he left a further message stating that he was almost there. The lights changed to amber as he pulled into the junction, and he floored the accelerator to cross. At eighty kilometres an hour, the heavy Landcruiser sliced through a left-hand turn when his mobile beeped to signal that he had a new text message. Maybe it was 451because he was stressed, or perhaps the rain made him impatient. Afterwards, he could not explain why he had reached for the phone instead of concentrating on the turn he had commenced. The next moment, he registered the loud BANG and the pain in his leg as he kicked the brake pedal to the floor. But by then, it was too late. Way too late. Feverishly, he fought to free himself from the seatbelt as he pushed the door open. He barely noticed the hard rain as he jumped onto the road. He could only focus on the pedestrian, lying slumped half across the kerb. Time stood still. Not until he noticed the pizza boxes beside the lifeless body, did he recognise the man on the tarmac. Still shocked, he looked down at the phone in his right hand. With his thumb, he reilluminated the screen so he could read the message: On my way back with pizza. See you shortly. His legs buckled under him, and he sat down on his knees. Tears ran down his face in competition with the rain, as he looked lethargically at Jan Bundgaard’s ragdoll form. He did not notice that a crowd was gathering around him nor that a police car had arrived at the scene. Only those standing next to him could hear that he mumbled something to the police constable when he was let into the police car. A young man engrossed in documenting the scene of the accident on his mobile phone thought it almost sounded something like ‘that’s not what I meant by “at all costs”’.