GOOD INTENTIONS

BY JESSE ITKONEN

Itäkeskus

The girl wore white. A sleek summer dress that grasped her hips like a lover. She had jet-black hair that hugged her milky-white shoulders. She sat opposite Koskinen on the metro for the long ride from the city center back home and he found himself staring. She caught his eye and they both looked away awkwardly. When the train rumbled into the Itäkeskus stop, they were the last two in the car. A tall man stood at the platform, waiting. She ran into his arms as Koskinen quietly sidestepped them and ascended the escalators.

He crossed the bridge over Turuntie and the girl and her man followed. He heard her crooning and him responding in monosyllables. The cracked boulevard led them toward a hive of cheap apartment buildings. The man and the girl ducked into an underpass and disappeared from view. Koskinen played with the thought of one day escorting a girl like that home, then dismissed it as fast as it occurred to him.

Behind him, he heard a sharp scream cut short. He knew the sound all too well. No matter the source, it always rang the same. The panicked yelp and sudden comprehension of things turning sour. He’d heard it from women at the bar, when their men had too much to drink and even more to prove. He’d heard it from his mother, when she wasn’t quick enough to evade his father of the week. He turned on his heels and looked back at an empty street. He thought of the girl with milky-white shoulders and black hair and found himself walking toward the underpass.

Koskinen wasn’t a big man. He wasn’t short, but in that massive pit of average that infuriated him so. In the seventh grade, he had shaved his head to fit in and the habit stuck. There was no ideology behind it, he told himself, and often believed it as well. When you fought someone, it didn’t matter what the color of his skin was. Everyone bruised the same.

The girl was pressed against the wall of the underpass, her man’s hand around her chin. “Where’d you put it?” the guy was saying over and over. “Where’d you put it, you bitch?!” Again and again she whispered something frantic and each time he repeated himself louder and louder. Koskinen saw as the tall guy’s hand rose from her mouth and, just as she was about to respond, returned back with force. The slap knocked her head backward. Koskinen didn’t waste time with pleasantries. He dove at the guy and both of them toppled to the ground. The guy squirmed and Koskinen sat on his chest. He pressed his knees on the guy’s hands and applied pressure. The girl yelped in panic and skirted out of the way.

“What the fuck?” The tall guy’s eyes focused on Koskinen, who answered the stare. “I’ll fucking kill you, asshole!” he squealed, and Koskinen slammed him in the face. “Fucker!” Another hit.

He kept punching until the responses stopped coming and a soft, helpless whimper took their place.

Koskinen picked himself up and wiped his hand on the guy’s shirt. His knuckles were bleeding and already swollen. He turned to the girl and suddenly felt guilty about something. She pushed him aside and tended to the tall guy who whimpered her name and cried. She shushed him and said they’d be home soon. She took Koskinen aside and told him to leave, her boyfriend meant no harm.

He watched from one end of the underpass as she helped the tall guy up and carried his weight while they stumbled out the other end and out of view. He wasn’t sure who he was more angry at.

* * *

That night Koskinen spent his time drinking and counting the lines on the ceiling. The apartment above his echoed and he listened. Finnish sounded like machine-gun fire when people spoke angrily. A blitzkrieg of rolling r’s and emphasized v’s. At one point, the police had responded to domestic disturbances quite quickly in the area, but now it was easier to get a taxi on a weekend than it was to find a police car.

He thought of the people living up there. The woman was a redhead, he knew that much. The man he’d seen once or twice and didn’t much like him. They’d lived there for about six months and had maybe exchanged three words in the hallway. You could pack us like sardines in a can, he thought to himself, and we’d still do our best to avoid communication. Koskinen didn’t have a girlfriend to call his own—not if he was honest with himself—but he was certain that if he did, he’d never be mean to her.

The next morning he saw the redhead. She was taking the trash out as Koskinen leaned over the thin railing of his French balcony and practiced blowing smoke rings. Her chin touched her neck and every step she took was deliberate and careful, like she was dancing in a minefield. When she turned back toward the apartments, she glanced up, her eyes focusing in the sunlight. Koskinen gave her a wave; she didn’t respond.

When he got to work that night, Koskinen wasn’t feeling like himself. Most nights he could navigate the bar like he was wearing blinders; today he felt raw and exposed like a nerve.

“What you need,” said Nalle, as they were bringing up crates from the basement, “is a woman.” He waggled his eyebrows and grinned. He looked to Koskinen like a pug dog that had collided with a wall at top speed. Koskinen assured him that he was fine, which Nalle took to mean that he was looking for a guy and replied that Koskinen should forget it as he was already spoken for.

At home again, he listened to the neighbors shout. Someone threw dishes. They shattered on the floor directly above him and the house fell silent. As the sun came up, he thought he heard sobbing echo in the pipework. After breakfast, he sat smoking on the benches near the trash shelter. After three smokes, the redhead came down with trash bags that jingled with empty bottles.

“Morning,” Koskinen offered. She responded quietly. Her bangs were brushed over her right eye and her face was heavy with makeup. “I live downstairs,” Koskinen said, more bluntly than he had intended.

She threw the trash into the bin. “I’m sorry,” she responded.

“It’s not me you need to apologize to.”

She shrugged. “Force of habit. Can I bum one?”

Koskinen lit a smoke and handed it to her. He offered her a seat; she remained standing.

“You okay?” he asked.

She blew smoke. “You lived here long?”

Koskinen nodded.

“Then do you really need to ask?”

They continued to smoke in silence for a bit. She took long drags and held the smoke in longer. Koskinen sipped at his smoke, not in a hurry to go anywhere. He stole looks at her and thought of something to say. She did it for him.

“How long did it take you to gather up your courage to come and talk?”

Koskinen coughed, the smoke going down the wrong pipe.

She grinned and he felt a rush go through his stomach like he was on a roller coaster. “My guess is a week.”

He had no answer.

She dropped the rest of her smoke, now down to the filter, and stepped on it, then held out her hand. “Kati.”

Koskinen shook her hand. “Jari.”

She smiled and he returned it. “I’ll be fine, Jari, he doesn’t mean it.” She turned and walked back into the apartments, leaving Koskinen to wonder if someone could be both turned on and angry at the same time.

* * *

Weekends were a time to vent. The bar would fill up with people and you had no time for thoughts of your own. Koskinen worked the downstairs—where the people could escape the dance floor located above—alone. As the lights flickered for last call, Nalle wobbled down the stairs and came behind the bar. “You’re off early tonight, get outta here.”

“Something wrong?” Koskinen asked, and handed a beer to a young guy who could barely stand.

Nalle placed his hand on Koskinen’s shoulder. “You, sir, have a date.”

He pushed the hand off. “No, I don’t.”

Nalle shook his head and pointed at the stairs. “Yes, you do.”

Koskinen looked and Nalle grinned. By the stairs lounged a petite blond girl who was wearing something Koskinen didn’t think qualified as a whole piece of clothing.

Nalle pushed him away from the tap. “No need to thank me.”

“No thanks.”

Nalle frowned. “What do you mean?”

“I don’t know her, who the fuck is she? Besides, I’ve got things to do.”

Nalle sighed, annoyed. “Her name is Elise, she works in the city, likes lots of things including—most importantly—you!”

Koskinen gave him a suspicious look. “Why?”

“Why? If you need an answer for that, you’ve got bigger problems than a girl, man.” Nalle wiped at his eyes. “She said you look like Bruce Willis, so maybe that’s why, but who gives a shit?”

Koskinen frowned. “I look nothing like Bruce Willis.”

“You’re bald,” Nalle said, and Koskinen nodded in the affirmative. “Close enough.” Nalle waved at Elise and gestured for her to come over. She sauntered in a deliberate, practiced manner that screamed lustful and filthy carnage with every sway of the hip. “Elise, this is my friend I was telling you about.”

She smiled with a row of blinding pearly whites and held out her hand. Her skin was smooth as silk and Koskinen couldn’t help but smile. “Nalle says you’re having an after-party,” she cooed.

Koskinen glanced at Nalle, who whispered in his ear, “I left a few bottles in your bag, you crazy kids have fun.”

* * *

They took a taxi home and Koskinen tried clumsily to make conversation. She smiled coyly and answered with a word or two, her hands brushing at his shoulders and playing with his ear. By the time they got to his apartment, her tongue had found its way into his mouth.

“Do you want a drink?” he asked as he came up for air.

She shook her head and her hair danced on her shoulders. “I’m good,” she purred as she advanced, her fingers gliding over the buttons of his shirt. She opened the top one and the rest parted like Moses had met the Red Sea. Koskinen sighed sharply and took another step back. She looked him in the eye. “Is this your first time?”

“No,” Koskinen replied. “It’s just . . . how did you say you knew Nalle?”

She studied his face. “You know,” she said, half-smiling, and kissed his chest.

Koskinen considered this. “Know what?”

Her shoulders slumped and for the first time she looked annoyed. She peered up at him from under her brow. He stared back at her, confused. Her features softened and for a second the huntress took a break. She raised her head and gave him the look that people give when everyone else is in on the joke except for you. “You know,” she repeated, pressing the words.

Her cab arrived in ten minutes, which felt like an eternity. Koskinen escorted her to the door. He apologized for wasting her time and she shook her head and touched his cheek and assured him that she had already been paid.

The building was silent. He lay down on his bed and didn’t sleep until the sun crept up the following morning.

Nalle demanded details at work, none of which Koskinen provided. They worked on separate floors again and Koskinen left without talking to anyone.

Smoking in the yard soon became a habit. After a while, Kati started taking the trash out at the same time he was out, even if there wasn’t much to bring. Sometimes she smoked, other times she didn’t. She wore more makeup on the days that she did. Sometimes they talked a lot, other days they barely exchanged words. Every so often he asked her if she was happy and every time she responded by smiling and changing the topic.

“You need to find yourself a girl, you know,” she said one day. “Nice guy like you.”

He shifted uncomfortably in his seat and looked away. “I dunno.”

She grinned. “A guy then?” He flipped her the bird and she cackled. “Would be better for you, women are crazy.”

* * *

In his dream they shared a house outside of Itäkeskus. Somewhere where you couldn’t hear the road. He saw a forest and fields. Anything but roads. No beggars by the metro. No metro at all. In the dream she wore no makeup and smiled from ear to ear.

A sound of crashing dishes broke into his dream and he woke with a start. He leaned up and checked the time on his phone. Three in the morning. He pulled on pants, opened the door to the balcony, and went out for a smoke. There was a faint echo of sobbing running through the pipes.

Weekend came and he disappeared into his work. He took the road through the underpass home. Nobody walked on the road and most of the lights in the houses were off. He counted his steps and walked by muscle memory and didn’t see the parked van until he almost ran into it. An ambulance with its back doors open. The door had been propped open into the stairwell of his building. Koskinen could feel his stomach cramp up and something heavy sink to the pit of it. Two paramedics came down the stairs, carrying someone on a stretcher. Koskinen gave them room and craned his neck to see who. He didn’t need to; he already knew the moment he saw the ambulance.

Kati was lying on the stretcher with her eyes closed and a part of her head wrapped with gauze. The white towel under her head was soaked on one side with blood. Koskinen pushed his way closer. “What happened?”

A flustered voice spoke over the paramedics: “She slipped.”

Koskinen turned toward the door. A man with messy hair, drunken eyes, and insecurities pouring out of his ears—whom Koskinen recognized as Kati’s boyfriend Jarno—stood by the door. He was covered in hipster clothing, some of which Koskinen was sure was meant for women. His eyes kept darting between the paramedics and Koskinen, trying to see who bought the story. He came up with nil. Koskinen glanced at the paramedics, a younger and an older man.

The older man shrugged as if to say, Look, we just do the driving. “She’ll be okay in a day or two. We’re going to take her to the hospital for the night.” They gave Jarno the name of the hospital and drove off.

Koskinen pushed past Jarno, who jumped back like a frightened dog. “She’s just so clumsy, you know?” he simpered. Koskinen stopped and turned. Jarno shrugged. “Just doesn’t look where she’s going.”

Koskinen stepped closer. “She do this often?”

“Oh yeah, man, well, you’ve seen her.” Jarno gestured at him like it meant something.

“Have I?”

“You know, talking to her and stuff; she’s a klutz.”

Koskinen smiled. “Funny.” He chuckled and Jarno tried joining in. “She never seemed like that around me.” They stopped laughing. Koskinen turned away. “Must be the company she keeps.” He ascended the stairs and left Jarno at the door.

* * *

He told Nalle about Kati the following night. Nalle, in turn, told some of the regulars. It was quiet and they’d decided to keep the upstairs closed. It was soon decided that men who hit women are not men at all. The regulars—former factory workers, others permanently unemployed—talked, each relaying stories of what they’d seen or heard. The women told of old flames who had hurt them and the men swore up and down that they would never do such a thing. The women cooed and cackled. “Now that’s a man!”

Had anyone asked him a few days earlier, Koskinen might have joined in as well. He would have waxed lyrical about what to do with men like that, how beating them in return seemed too kind, and someone would have laughed and he would have felt sated, his dreams filling the hole in his heart because he knew that talking wasn’t enough. Not tonight though. Tonight all Koskinen thought of was slick plastic polymer and the chiseled pistol grip that he could still feel pressed into his hand. He cleared glasses from tables and joked with the regulars, but he might as well have been doing it over a phone.

The clock struck two and the last stragglers wandered out. Koskinen closed shop and picked up his bag from the back room. He felt its bottom and something hard brushed against his fingertips. That very morning he had bought a gun from people who asked no questions and barely spoke the same language, and it had taken him most of the day to realize just how much it actually weighed.

Before the gun and that night, Koskinen would probably never have considered ever handling a weapon again. He’d done his mandatory military service, and knew which way to point a gun. Everything else was stuff he didn’t care about. And if he didn’t care about something, it may as well have never existed. The redhead, Kati, she existed, and someone had to do something.

When he got home he pulled his chair next to the front door and waited. He listened to the footsteps in the corridor and counted the floors as the elevator hummed up and down. The door downstairs clanged shut and someone entered the lift. It droned past Koskinen’s floor and stopped at the one above. He slipped the door ajar and listened. Keys jingled as they scraped at the lock on a door. Quietly, Koskinen slid out of the apartment, walked up to the landing between floors, and waited. Jarno pulled the door open and Koskinen was upon him.

He pressed the gun into the back of Jarno’s head and shoved him inside. The door slammed shut behind them and the room fell dark. Koskinen fumbled at the light switch and Jarno bolted into the other room screaming, “What the fuck, what the fuck, what the fuck?!”

Koskinen flicked the switch on in the living room. Jarno turned and all color drained from his cheeks. He stared at Koskinen, at the gun in his hand and the void in his eyes. A stain ran down his trouser leg and his body turned to Jell-O. The acidic smell of piss mixed with the reek of stale alcohol.

The French balcony behind him opened to a view of the front yard, high enough so that people couldn’t see in. “Open the door,” Koskinen ordered, his voice menacing. Jarno did as he was told. He avoided eye contact and mumbled something that got stuck in his throat.

“You know what it’s like with some people?” Koskinen asked. Jarno whimpered. Koskinen exhaled sharply. “They’re really clumsy.”

Jarno weighed very little. Koskinen could feel his ribs as he shoved him over the railing. The guy didn’t struggle. He sobbed, but didn’t struggle. His upper body flopped over the thin metal railing. His legs flipped over and into the emptiness. There was a short scream and a sudden stop. Koskinen didn’t look over. He backed up and left the room as it was, the balcony door an empty frame where Jarno had just been.

As he closed the door to his own apartment, Koskinen stood and listened. The building was silent. He didn’t hear screaming or ambulances until morning.

* * *

Kati returned from the hospital three days later. Her eyes were as red as her hair and she didn’t look up as she got out of the taxi. She slumped and dragged her feet. She rode the elevator in silence and disappeared into her apartment where, moments later, she broke into hysterical and inconsolable sobbing. Koskinen listened and practiced what to say. It pained him to hear her.

He knocked on her door and the wailing stopped. He heard her tiny footsteps approach and stop. The door didn’t open. He peered through the peephole and saw her standing motionless by the door. She wiped her eyes and reached for the lock. The door opened with the security chain still attached.

Koskinen felt a stab of pain in his chest. He stammered, “I c-came to see if you were okay.”

She sniffed. “No.”

He shifted his weight. “Can I help?”

She shook her head and didn’t meet his eye. “No.”

His face fell and he took a step back. “I’m sorry to bother you,” he said and turned toward the stairs. She looked up and watched as he gently raised his hand to gesture goodbye. Kati closed the door and Koskinen could hear the lock jingle and fall. She reopened the door, fully this time.

They sat on opposite sides of the living room. She didn’t offer anything to drink and he didn’t ask for anything. They did this for what seemed like a long time. Koskinen stared at her and realized that she had shrunk. Her figure was tiny and her shoulders were hunched. Her hair looked unwashed and her cheeks were gaunt.

“Why are you so sad?” he asked. It escaped his mouth the moment he thought it and echoed in the room like a deafening explosion.

She finally whispered, “What?”

He leaned forward. “You’re free now. Why are you sad?”

She screwed up her face, fighting hard not to cry. “Fucking asshole.”

He nodded. “He was a fucking asshole, he—”

“I’M TALKING ABOUT YOU!” she screamed, and it made his ears ring worse than anything ever had in his life. He felt his cheeks grow hot and his posture collapse. He looked confused, which enraged her further.

“He. Loved. Me,” she hissed.

He shook his head, not believing what he was hearing.

She nodded and tears fell more freely. “He loved me. He didn’t mean to do anything. He just had a temper. And I told him—he came to see me in the hospital—I told him he could just go to hell. Die for all I care. I told him that and he jumped off a balcony.” She was sobbing loudly again. Koskinen wondered if he could just hold her; she’d see then that things were all right. She sniffed and sobbed and hiccuped. “Why would he do that?”

“He was drunk,” Koskinen said, finally. “He was drunk and stupid and didn’t deserve you.”

Kati bolted up. “Get out,” she spat. “Get out right the fuck now.”

Koskinen stood up; this was one of the few times he towered over someone. “I was—” he began, then stopped. “I’m just trying to help.”

She pointed at the door. “I never asked for your fucking help. Who do you think you are? Get the fuck out of my house.”

Koskinen moved toward the door. “I don’t get it,” he muttered. She cocked her head. “I just don’t get you women. You get together with these spineless shits and you take the punches day in, day out, and you put on more makeup and pretend like nobody notices. Then when someone does and tries to do something about it, all you do is mope and whine after the shit who did this to you.” He felt himself burning from the inside out. “You like being where you are, is that it? You like this? You like being scared? I can make you scared. It’s easy. The easiest thing in the world. You know what’s hard? Love. Love is fucking hard.” He was breathing fire and his fists were clenched. He stopped speaking and inhaled deeply. His eyes darted to his hand and a shiver of guilt coursed through him.

She had moved away. Her back touched the glass between the apartment and the balcony. She stood where Jarno had stood and looked just as scared as he had. She cried, “What are you?”

Koskinen contemplated this. “I’m just a nice guy.”

He disappeared into the hall and closed the door after him as Kati slumped on the floor and howled as quietly as she could into the palm of her hand.

* * *

He sat in his chair and smoked for what seemed like hours. He stared at the walls and shifted in his seat. His legs were numb, but he didn’t bother to get up. Kati had been scared of him. Of him. And for what? Helping her.

There was shuffling upstairs. More sobbing. Then voices. He listened. One voice, Kati’s. She was on the phone. He stood up and his legs twisted and screamed pain. He balanced himself on the chair and cocked his ear upward. She was sobbing to someone. He couldn’t make out what, but she was frantic. Then he heard the words, clear as anything else: “Help me.” He could hear the balcony door creak open and her heavy breathing carried down with the wind.

Koskinen sat down again and stretched his legs. Whoever she was calling would show up. Sooner or later. Probably would take longer than ordering a cab. Nah, he thought, if she doesn’t see it, others will. They can come here, he said to himself, and they can talk. They can say whatever they like and point any fingers they want—but they’ll know. Deep down, they’ll know and they’ll think, He did right by her. In the end, who knows, maybe she will too. She’ll wake up one day and not be scared. She’ll look around and realize she didn’t have to put on more makeup or tiptoe around her own life anymore. She’ll realize it.

All he wanted to do was help.

 

This story was originally written in English.