22

William stood up as soon as Palmgren entered the room. He was standing by the computer, stress in his eyes, perhaps even guilt, as they stared at Palmgren, like a child in a larder with both hands behind his back. And maybe Palmgren should have seen it. But he didn’t.

‘William,’ was all he said.

‘What’s going on?’ asked William. ‘Is it an attack?’

‘William,’ he said again.

‘Is it in Sweden? Somewhere else? What is it?’

Palmgren opened his mouth and wished that the answer had been yes.

Sara had done what she always did: she’d stood on the platform the train was arriving at, patiently and idly at first, as though waiting for someone to arrive. Then she’d wandered slowly through the crowd as the passengers got off, just as though she was one of them and had just got off too.

As the crowd started to disperse she slipped into the first carriage she could see was empty. Once on board, she locked herself in the toilet, a pristine toilet in a first-class compartment. It was warm and quiet, and if they weren’t going to clean it before departure then she’d be left in peace for some time.

She had promised herself, but the rules had changed. She’d wanted to stop so that she could go home, but that was no longer an option. They’d given up, so why shouldn’t she do the same?

She did it the way she’d learnt. She unfolded the foil and warmed it and sucked in, she took her top off and stopped the blood flow, and then, on the inside of her elbow, where the skin was still struggling to heal the old holes, she made another, same as always. Almost.

She sat there in her internal cockpit as she felt herself starting to shrink. She felt the space between her and her body expand, the distance growing and growing to everything that was Sara and that had once been herself.

Soon she could only see herself from afar, like a thin, thin shell round a universe of nothingness, a warm, quiet universe where she was floating in peace and could see herself disappear. There was no cockpit any more, no body to resist and try to control. She was alone now, alone and nowhere, surrounded by darkness, and for the first time in a long while she felt completely at ease. And as soon as she realised that, she knew.

Now, when she’d decided to forgive them. Now, when she so desperately wanted to see them again and hold them tight. This time, she knew, it was irrevocable.

She relaxed, felt herself shrinking, getting smaller and smaller. And far away, somewhere on the other side of the darkness, Sara Sandberg had stopped living.

The black Volvo XC90 moved in silence through a city without features. William’s upper body jerked left and then right between the two solid agents from the Security Police, but he didn’t feel the jolts or hear the sirens; just watched as the fronts of the buildings outside seemed to float past the window.

The city ahead was flashing blue, rushing towards them at a dizzying speed. Traffic lights and road signs glowed in their reflective coatings and became threatening geometric shapes in the darkness.

Nothing was right here, in the present, and everything was far too late.

When they finally let him out, his feet ran of their own accord down the grooved steps of the escalator, out on to the patched-up tarmac that formed the platform, through the smell of damp and electrics and rubber from brakes and couplings.

All he wanted was to hold her, say how sorry he was, ask her forgiveness. He wanted to make up for that solitary lie, the one he’d thought was for her sake, but it wasn’t going to happen.

His feet kept running, sped over puddles and trodden-in chewing gum, ran alongside the train although there was really no need to hurry.

He felt the paramedics’ hands coming towards him, consoling hands, maybe, but above all restraining–calm down, take it slowly, take a deep breath–hands trying to prepare him for what he was about to see.

As though anything in the world could do that.

It smelled of plastic and moquette and complimentary coffee. The carpet was grey-blue with damp patches left by slush-covered shoes. And the door to the toilet was open.

There she was. Lying on the floor.

And along with Sara Sandberg, part of her father died too.