Walpurgis Night 1986
‘Love is hard, Elita.’ That’s what my grandmother used to say. The hardest thing in life.
I only met her a few times. Lola didn’t like going there. Grandma was always nice to me, but I understood that she hadn’t been that way with Lola. The few times they were together, there was something strange about Lola’s expression, as if she both adored and hated her mother.
Sometimes Lola gets the same look on her face when Lasse is around, but only when he has his back to her. The other day I saw her tuck a knife into her pocket.
Love and hatred are very close to each other, Grandma said.
I understand exactly what she meant.
Arne drove fast through the forest, ploughing through muddy puddles, ignoring the branches and undergrowth scraping against the wing mirrors and paintwork.
Elita had used him, just as her father had done. Treated him as a lackey, pretended to be his friend, toyed with his emotions. She’d borrowed his camera so that she could take a picture for her fucking boyfriend. She hadn’t even had the wit to hand it over secretly; instead she’d done it right in the middle of the yard where everyone could see them. Elita and that fucking mother-in-law’s dream Per Nyberg. The very thought made him feel sick.
Arne slammed on the brakes, leaped out of the car and grabbed the camera in its case. He didn’t want it anymore, didn’t want to be reminded of what it had been used for. He swung it back and forth by the strap a couple of times, intending to throw it as far as possible into the bog, deep into the mud where no one would ever find it, but the catch came undone and the camera fell to the ground.
‘Shitshitshit!’ He kicked at the camera, then saw that something else had fallen out. Another white rectangle, another photograph.
He picked it up, brushed off the dirt.
Elita, in a white dress with her hair loose. She was standing on a stone with her eyes closed, hands folded across her chest, holding two antlers. Long silk ribbons were attached to her wrists, and two small figures in animal masks stood on either side of the stone – four in total, clutching the ends of the ribbons. Arne was sure he’d seen a similar picture somewhere else, but where?
He stared at the photograph, held it close to his eyes so that he could pick out every tiny detail. Something about the image made him feel weird. Dizzy, feverish, sick, all at the same time.
Elita had written beneath the picture:
To Arne. Walpurgis Night 1986. Come to the stone circle at midnight.
Then three more words.
His heartbeat pulsated through his whole body. Reached his throat, his temples, his stomach, his crotch, repeating the words she’d written.
The spring sacrifice
The spring sacrifice
The spring sacrifice