“They’re driving a new Range Rover.”
“Which one?”
“Guess.”
“The Vogue?”
“Better.”
“Not the Autobiography?”
“Bingo.”
“I don’t believe it!”
“Crazy, right?”
“Take a picture.”
“Why? You know what it looks like.”
“Not a picture of the car, Marten, a picture of your girl.”
“Her name’s Taja and she isn’t my girl. She’s one of four.”
“How do four girls get hold of a car like that?”
“I have no idea.”
“Either they’re rich or they’ve stolen it.”
“No one steals a car like that.”
“You have a point there. Where are they now?”
“In the bathroom. At first I thought they were here for the festival, but they’re heading further north. Taja’s half German and half Norwegian. She inherited a beach hotel from her grandmother. With a view of a fjord.”
“If you like, we could drop by on our trip and pay them a visit.”
“That sounds good.”
“And?”
“Did you give her your number?”
“Of course not, what makes you think that?”
You can imagine how pleased your father looks right now. The better you get to know each other, the less he’s like your father, the more he becomes your friend. In your childhood he was a stranger who dropped in on weekends and acted as if he enjoyed playing with you for a few hours. Then you got older, puberty set in, and your father was sympathetic in a manly way, which was just embarrassing because he had no idea about your life. The true change only took place over the last two years. You got closer to one another, and your mother doesn’t like that one bit.
And then he gave you this birthday present.
He suggested driving to Norway. He’s bought a new car and wanted you to test it together. Together. It was supposed to be your first big trip. And now he’s your passenger, he’s making jokes with you about girls and life in general, he treats you like an equal. You expected anything, just not this change.
“Are you sure it’s an Autobiography?”
“Of course, I can see it through the window.”
Your father whistles through his teeth.
“What color?”
“Metallic gray.”
You hear a ringing, your father says he has to get the casserole out of the oven, you’re to think about dessert, and say hi to the girls.
“See you in a minute.”
Your father has rented an apartment outside Kristiansand because he wanted to avoid the hurly-burly of the festival. You’d rather have been right in the middle of it, but you haven’t told him that. It’s your second week in Norway, and the festival begins tomorrow. Your father has only bought tickets for you. The music isn’t to his taste, and he doesn’t want to stand beside you all the time like a guard dog. He thinks you need freedom, so you get freedom. Your mother would go nuts if she knew that. As far as she’s concerned, you won’t be grown up until you’ve finished your studies and you’re pushing a stroller around the place.
Be honest, you feel as if your real life only began when the ferry pulled in at Kristiansand. The people here are friendly, everyone seems to be having fun, and even though it’s raining you can’t see any grumpy faces. Your father made it all possible. It’s a mystery to you why your mother didn’t get on with him.
Perhaps it was the other way round, you think when two women ask if there are seats free at your table. You point to the rockers’ chairs, the women sit down. You look across to the bathrooms, then back outside into the rain. Your reflection grins at you, you’re as transparent as a ghost. Your father’s features, your mother’s dark hair. You wink at yourself, take out your phone, and you’re about to check your mail when you see the girls coming out in single file from behind the Range Rover. All four of them. They have backpacks and bags and they remind you of the time when you used to creep around the area playing cowboys and Indians. What are they doing? you ask as they stop by your father’s car, open the trunk, and throw in their bags and backpacks. Then they go round to the front and get in.
For a dull moment you sit there frozen in the restaurant and can’t believe what’s happening. The car starts, the car leaps forward and then backward a little before the engine stalls. A semi-trailer moves sluggishly past the restaurant, and conceals your dad’s car for a few seconds. You get up, reach into your jacket, and feel the key. Thank God, you think and pull it out. It’s not yours. This key is hanging from a round piece of leather with a monogram—OD. You look outside again. Your dad’s car has turned, and finally your paralysis dissolves. You run from the restaurant and shove the group of smokers aside. You skid over the curb, the rain turns you wet in seconds. You stumble down the street and pause and …
They’re gone.
Full stop.
They’re seriously gone.
You don’t even see the rear lights.
Nothing.
You look around. One of the smokers gives you the finger, another says: Fucking German. You stare at the exit and still can’t believe it. The trembling starts in your hands, wanders downwards, and when you have the feeling that you’re one single great shake, you take your phone out of your jacket and call your father.
He’s going to kill me, he’s never going to talk to me again, he’s going to—
“Say that again.”
You repeat what’s going on. You stand in the rain and you’re the idiot whose father’s brand-new car has just been stolen by four girls. No one’s going to write a poem about it, it isn’t worth a short story, and if it was ever shown in the movies, you can bet a good number of people would walk out.
“And what about the Range Rover?”
“It’s still here.”
You walk around the car, take a look at the registration plate. On the driver’s side you try to peer inside the car, while your father issues instructions. He wants you to stay right there. He’s going to call a taxi and he’ll be with you in ten minutes.
“The door’s open,” you interrupt.
“What?”
“The driver’s door is open.”
You lean into the car, then you look at your left hand, still holding the key. OD.
“I think they’ve deliberately left me the key to the Range Rover.”
“That doesn’t make any sense,” your father says.
“Maybe the car’s stolen,” you say and get in, away from the rain, away from the naked reality of being a complete failure. The door closes with a soft click. The inside light dims down as if a movie was about to begin.
What if it isn’t the key?
You start the car, the engine fires right away, and for a moment you imagine yourself driving to your apartment hotel, beeping your horn, and your father coming toward you and you getting out of the Range Rover while your father is speechless because he can clearly see now that it really is an Autobiography.
“Marten, are you still there?”
You give a start. What am I actually doing here? You completely forgot your father on the phone.
“I’m still here,” you say and you’re about to get out when you’re dazzled by the lights. They’re coming straight at you. You suppress a chuckle. It’s so simple. It was all a big joke. The girls have come back. And that’s exactly what you say to your father.
“They’re here again. I’ll call you right back.”
You turn off the phone. The car stops in front of the Range Rover. Everything’s the way it was before. Nose to nose. You screen your eyes against the headlights and wonder what the girls are going to say to you, when there’s a knock on the driver’s-side window. You flinch. It’s really time for you to calm down. You can see only silhouettes through the tinted glass and so you lower the window. The rustle of the rain fills the inside of the car, droplets splash in your face, and a man looks at you unhappily. He’s wearing a suit, with a turtleneck pullover underneath. His mouth is a thin line, the rain flows down his face in gleaming trails and collects on his chin. You can see he’d anticipated all kinds of things, just not you sitting in this car.
“Who are you?”
“Nobody,” you blurt out and you want to explain why you’re sitting here, and all the ridiculous things that have happened, because he might be the true owner of the Autobiography, and obviously you don’t want to rile him, when the door is pulled open and from then on it all goes very quickly. You fly through the rain and land on the tarmac. You hear a curse, then a second man appears in front of you. He’s wearing a white shirt so drenched with rain that you can clearly see his chest hair through the fabric. He pulls you up from the ground and hammers you against the Range Rover. Once, twice. As if that weren’t enough, you get a slap. Your head flies to the left, your ears ring, you taste blood and are like a puppet that’s just had its strings cut. An arm holds you pressed against the car. Pause. The two men talk to each other as if you weren’t there, their voices are a murmur. The man in the suit appears in front of you again. His mouth moves, you can’t hear anything. Your head is filled with water, you cough. The man grabs your throat, you see the gun in his hand, you are pulled up, your shoulders squeak over the back door of the Range Rover. There’s a liberating crack, a hissing wind chases through your head and blows your ears free.
“Where are they?”
“I … I don’t know, they …”
“Where are those fucking bitches?”
“… they … they’ve stolen … my father’s … my father’s car and …”
The man strikes. It feels as if his fist is wandering through your stomach and shattering your spine. You become a mouth that’s going up and down and waiting to be filled with air. Your lungs are shriveled, your consciousness vanishes.