The adventure park could be seen from afar. It was a brightly coloured, red-yellow-and-orange box, in size somewhere between Stockmann’s department store and an average airport terminal. It was almost two hundred metres in length, stood fifteen metres tall, and on its roof in giant lettering was the park’s name: YouMeFun. Right now, the wistful, beautiful November sunlight struck the sign, bathing the car park the size of three football pitches in gold and lending a soft sheen to the great mass of tin and steel standing proudly behind it.
I stopped at the traffic lights, looked up at the adventure park across the road and thought once again that something really was different.
Something had changed and changed for good.
This was my park, I thought to myself. The thought gave me strength. I had almost died trying to save this park. I had steered it out from under a mountain of debt, and though it might not be profitable yet, at least, in all probability, it would be a survivor.
Only six months ago I’d been forced to resign from my job as an actuary at a leading insurance company. I was faced with choosing between a change in my job description that would have seen me moving into a broom cupboard to conduct an endless stream of meaningless pseudo-calculations or taking part in an emotion-oriented, time-dynamic training programme, not to mention group yoga sessions. But only a moment after handing in my resignation, I learnt that my brother had passed away and that I had inherited his adventure park. Upon arrival at said adventure park, I learnt that I had inherited my brother’s considerable debts too, debts that he had taken out with an assortment of hard-boiled criminals. One thing led to another, and to save my own life, the jobs of the staff, and the park itself, I had to resort to some radical acts of self-defence, and as a result of this one of the gangsters died after finding himself on the receiving end of the kinetic intersection between me and a giant plastic rabbit’s ear, I ended up opening a payday-loan operation, then quickly running it down again, I met an artist who aroused feelings I had hitherto never experienced, I had to avoid both the crooks and the police and witness an event that still makes me nervously fumble with my neck.
After all this, the park’s financial situation was still tough. There was no other word for it.
I’d already resorted to numerous money-saving measures, and I suspected there would be more of them down the line. I’d tried to lead by example in every respect. My salary was already lower than anybody else’s, and I paid for my lunch and snacks myself at the park’s main eatery, the Curly Cake Café. I didn’t want to cut the other employees’ salaries, but obviously I’d been forced to take a closer look at budget allocations for each department. This initially met with some resistance, but I defended my solutions with a series of carefully compiled spreadsheets and stressed to the staff at every turn that we had to look at things over a five- to ten-year timeframe. This was greeted with silence. Which, in turn, gave me the chance to outline my money-saving proposals in more detail, ranging from the largescale (energy saving: the ambient temperature in the main hall was now on average one and a half degrees cooler than a month ago. Naturally, the children haven’t noticed the change, and I’ve provided the staff with warm sweatshirts sporting the park’s logo) to the smaller scale (I repainted the Loopy Ladder in Caper Castle by myself, which is evident in the splashes of paint on the wall behind it, but the saving was not insignificant).
I crossed the road and walked into the car park. My mood improved with every step because all the pieces were finally falling into place, both in general and individually, in the long term and on a day-by-day basis. The equation was beginning to take shape. All was well.
This was my life now. And most importantly of all, my life was orderly again.
A series of brisk steps brought me to the main entrance, the sliding doors slid open and I stepped into the foyer, which was well lit and decorated in bright colours. This was always the point at which I felt like I was stepping into another world, and something akin to that happened now too. Alongside this, another feeling appeared too, one that I recognised right away. I realised that I felt at home. Was that what all this was about – that this adventure park had become a home from home?
Kristian was standing behind the ticket counter, handing a set of tickets to a tired-looking man trying to shepherd three shorter customers, all actively pulling in different directions. The man took his tickets, turned reluctantly, herded his flock, and together they all disappeared inside the main hall.
I bade Kristian good morning. I expected to see that broad, eager smile of his and to hear him give some variation on the theme of how fabulous or magnificent this particular morning was.
‘Morning,’ he said politely and continued staring at his computer screen.
Kristian was highly effective in his role as sales manager, and on the whole he was extraordinarily enthusiastic. He was in the habit of calling me and sending me messages, even outside of work hours. Hi Boss, there’s a SUPER-AMAZING surprise here waiting for you!!! he might text, though upon arrival at the park I would learn that this super-amazing surprise was nothing more than the release of a new flavour of ice cream at the self-service counter at the Curly Cake Café. For Kristian, every day was a great day, and he never tired of telling me so. Now, however, he stood sullenly clicking his mouse. The clicks sounded like nervous little fillips. I glanced over my shoulder. There was no queue at the counter. By the volume of cars parked outside, I concluded that we had a moderate number of customers right now, just as one would expect on an unremarkable Wednesday morning in November.
‘What a fantastic morning,’ I heard myself saying and realised that the words came out of my mouth precisely because I hadn’t heard them from anyone else.
‘What?’ asked Kristian. It was only now that he looked at me properly. He made eye contact with me, but his gaze was somehow unfocussed, as though while looking at me he had forbidden himself from actually seeing me. I was about to ask if there was anything troubling him, something pulling him closer and closer to the screen in front of him – he was stretching his neck in a most unnatural fashion – when I noticed the large clock in the park’s foyer.
I was at the start of the Komodo Locomotive, and it was already eleven o’clock. The Komodo Locomotive was one of our oldest rides, a perennial favourite among our younger clientele. It was also one of the safest rides we had, suitable for those who weren’t even old enough to ask to get in it. To increase security further, we had decided to install additional airbags in each of the seats. I thought this a bit over the top, but Esa was the park’s head of security, and he believed we should prepare for any eventuality. I’d realised some time ago that when Esa says ‘any eventuality’, he really means it.
I found Esa behind one of the carriages. He was lying on his stomach, tapping it from underneath with a hammer. As always, the air around him was stale and thick. And even though he was lying flat on the floor, he looked as though he would be ready to leap into action at any moment. The sweatshirts of the US Marine Corps, which he had worn religiously until only a few weeks ago and which listed the bearer’s years of service, might have had something to do with it. Though he had recently switched these sweatshirts with cosy-looking woollen jumpers, complete with colourful animal figures, I saw the same military demeanour and physical readiness that one might expect from a former US Marine.
‘Aren’t the airbags supposed to be on the inside?’ I asked.
The hammer stopped in mid-air. Esa didn’t turn or take his eyes from the underside of the carriage.
‘All in good time,’ he said.
‘Meaning?’
‘Once we’ve secured our position.’
I couldn’t imagine what Esa was referring to, but this style of communication was typical.
‘How long do you think it will take to … secure our position?’
‘Hard to say with our current intel. We’re vastly outnumbered and constantly having to make do with inadequate coordinates. And seeing as there’s no let-up in hostilities—’
‘Quite,’ I interrupt him. ‘I have to take an important call at eleven-thirty…’
‘It’ll take longer than that,’ said Esa, this time speaking more quickly than ever before, the words spilling from his lips in a single jumble of sounds.
I looked around. Getting the Komodo Locomotive up and running wasn’t a matter of life and death. There were still only relatively few customers, and most of them were larger than the median passenger on the Komodo Locomotive, and in all respects it looked as though today would be a fairly quiet day. Just then, Esa audibly passed a cloud of noxious gases from deep within. I felt a warm puff of air on my face, stopped breathing through my nose so as not to trigger my gag reflex, opened my mouth and instantly felt a burning sensation at the top of my larynx.
‘I’ll come back later,’ I suggested.
The hammer resumed its tapping. Esa said nothing.
I walked off towards the Big Dipper, and once I was sufficiently far away – in Esa’s case, I considered a safe distance around fifteen metres – I filled my lungs with fresh air once again.
The Curly Cake Café smelt of salmon soup and pastries fresh from the oven. Our shorter clients were often at the louder end of the scale, and that was the case now too. Though the air conditioning had recently been enhanced and optimised, the café was still very warm. Taken together, the cumulative effect of these factors – the thick, greasy smells, the shrill squeals, the higher than usual temperature – made the place feel quite exhausting. I often felt conflicted when visiting the café, my mood a vexing combination of drowsiness and dread.
I walked up to the counter and saw Johanna in the kitchen. I took a butter-and-sugar bun from the glass cabinet and raised my plate so that Johanna could see it. She noticed me, lowered a batch of French fries into the vat of bubbling oil and walked to the other side of the counter. I was about to say I would pay for the bun and take it back to my office when Johanna cut me short.
‘This one’s on me,’ she said. ‘Do you want another one too?’
I looked at the plate in my hand, the bun sitting on the plate. Then I looked up at Johanna again. The very first time I had met her, several months ago, I’d been struck by the way her face made me think of a former convict training for an iron-man competition. I wasn’t wrong. And the café meant everything to her. Here, nothing happened without her say-so, and nobody circumvented the rules, both the written and the unwritten varieties. But more to the point, she never, under any circumstances whatsoever, gave anything away for free. And now she was offering me a second bun.
‘I only need one,’ I said.
‘Just a thought, in case a second one might come in handy.’
‘By my initial calculation, one should be enough to sufficiently raise my blood-sugar levels,’ I replied, and in a curious way I felt like a turtle that had been turned upside down: I couldn’t move, and even if I could, it would have taken far too long.
‘What about lunch?’ she then asked.
‘Lunch?’
‘We have Sailor’s Salmon Soup, Cock-a-Noodle-do, and today’s vegan option is Tearaway’s Tofu Tart. For dessert there’s Spotted Quick and all the grown-ups’ favourite, Caramel Cannons. My treat.’
‘I think I’ll be fine with this for now…’
‘I meant later on,’ she explained.
I was about to say something – I didn’t quite know what – when I noticed a queue had formed behind us. Johanna seemed to notice this too. She looked at me and gave a curt nod. I assumed this meant I was excused, for now. I took the opportunity and, once my legs started obeying me again, left.
I walked towards my office, passing the Strawberry Maze and the usual cries and stampede of footsteps coming from inside it, then I turned right at the noisy, rattling Caper Castle, made my way around the Turtle Trucks, whose loud and over-excited drivers were currently changing seats, and headed towards the corridor, at the end of which was my office. I had only taken a few steps along the corridor and I was about to pass the office belonging to Minttu K, our head of sales and marketing, when she stopped me in my tracks.
‘Hi,’ she whispered. At least, I thought it was a whisper. The voice was gravelly and demanding, like a serrated saw against a plank of hard wood, only much, much lower. It was morning, but Minttu K’s room already exuded the unmistakable scent of tobacco and gin. She raised her right hand and waved me over, beckoned me inside. ‘Let’s talk money.’
‘The marketing meeting isn’t until Thursday,’ I said. ‘It’s probably best if we return to the—’
Minttu K shook her head and raised a well-tanned hand to silence me. Her silver rings sparkled.
‘Honey, this Tesla waits for no man. Imagine – a real-life karate sensei. Thirty-five thousand followers on Instagram.’
Minttu K took a sip from her black mug. From her expression, it was hard to tell whether there was coffee in it or something else. The mug was as black as her blazer, which was at least one size too small for her.
‘And why do we need a … karate sensei?’ I asked.
‘Karate Kids,’ she replied. ‘There’s plenty of them round here. All we need is a good slogan.’
Minttu K ruffled her short blonde hair. She seemed utterly convinced of whatever it was she was trying to tell me, which didn’t particularly surprise me.
‘First, this sounds like it could be a little dangerous, and the park isn’t really a martial-arts college…’ I began but started to feel a slight wooziness. I had to get to my office. ‘We don’t have the funds to cover any extra activities. As I’ve said several times.’
Minttu K twiddled a cigarette in her fingers. It had appeared there without my noticing.
‘So you’re just going to let this fish get away?’ she asked huskily, and before I could say anything at all, she answered the question herself: ‘Fine then. We’ll forever be second best.’
I was genuinely taken aback. Usually Minttu K was ready to fight to the bitter end, figuratively speaking. Now, barely seconds after the apparent end of our conversation, she was calmly sipping from her mug again, sucking intensely on the end of her cigarette and tapping her computer keyboard as before, as though she was reprimanding it for doing something naughty.
There was one final corner in the corridor.
The morning’s encounters started replaying in my mind. And I realised that the brief wooziness of a moment ago had very concrete origins: it had grown exponentially with each encounter. Now everything was playing through my mind on fast-forward, getting stronger and sharper, taking on depth and life, and I started seeing and hearing things in these brief encounters that I hadn’t registered at the time. Kristian wasn’t bursting with enthusiasm, he hadn’t suggested any changes or offered to make improvements first thing in the morning, the way he usually did; Esa was in no hurry to shore up the park’s security, and instead he was carrying out repairs at a leisurely pace and without any sense of impending disaster; Minttu K caved in quickly and easily; Johanna offered me a second bun in case I needed it. As that last thought came into focus and began echoing more vividly through my mind, I felt the hand holding the plate with my bun begin to tremble.
I turned the final corner, stepped into my office and stopped in my tracks.
The butter-and-sugar bun leapt into the air.
The plate flew from my hand and smashed to smithereens.
The dead had come to life.