FABIAN TURNED INTO Kungstorget Square outside Knutpunkten Station in Helsingborg and parked in a bay where a sign warned him the maximum stay was ten minutes. He picked one of the seven anonymous pay-as-you-go SIM cards he’d just purchased and pushed it into his old Nokia, whose functions were restricted to calling, texting and showing the time.
Then he found Gertrud Molander’s number in his iPhone and dialled it on the Nokia. True, she’d asked him to leave her alone, but he wanted to talk to her and hear her voice to make sure she was okay.
‘You’ve reached Gertrud Molander. Unfortunately, I’m not available at the moment, but leave a message after the beep and I’ll get back to you.’
Why wasn’t she picking up? It would have been understandable if she were in the same room as her husband. But she wasn’t. Far from it. Molander was in the police lab, busy cross-matching all prints, hairs and trace DNA samples from the different crime scenes, and it would likely be late before he was done.
Her phone could obviously be out of battery or turned down so low she couldn’t hear it. Or maybe she just had better things to do than to stare at her phone all day long.
He unlocked his iPhone and opened Facebook, where he had a profile, though he’d never posted a status update. He’d created the account mainly so he could have a poke around to see how it worked, and unless he misremembered, Gertrud had sent him a friend request sometime last spring.
He hadn’t accepted it. He almost never did. Instead, her request had sat unanswered in a growing line of requests from people who, for some unfathomable reason, wanted to stay in touch with him. Some were former colleagues and friends from Stockholm, others childhood friends from Helsingborg and yet others complete strangers.
He couldn’t explain why, but even though he never shared anything about his life, it felt like he was selling himself and giving out keys to his home whenever he accepted a friend request.
Gertrud didn’t seem particularly active on social media either, though she did post things from time to time, mostly pictures of food, flowers and cats. But on this particular day, there seemed to have been quite a lot of activity on her wall. Congratulatory messages with pictures of flowers, hearts and champagne bottles had been and were still streaming in from one Facebook friend after another.
Of all the days, this one had to be her birthday.
Was that why she wasn’t picking up? Maybe she was out celebrating, treating herself to a spa session or whatever. As he skimmed the list of congratulations, an idea slowly took shape in his mind. When he spotted Hjalmar Bergfors’ Haaaaaapy Birthdaaaaay from Hörby, he decided to give it a go.
Gertrud was originally from Hörby too, so it didn’t seem too far-fetched to assume Hjalmar Bergfors was a childhood friend. He pulled the Nokia back out and started to compose a text message.
Hi Gertrud, since you’re not very active on Facebook, I thought I’d send you a big Haaaapy Birthdaaaaaay this way, too. Hope you have a great day. I haven’t seen you in a long time, but I happen to be on my way to Helsingborg for a meeting right now. Which leads me to ask: can I buy the birthday girl coffee later today? Love, Hjalmar Bergfors. P.S. If you don’t recognize the number, it’s because I lost my phone a few days ago.
With only ten keys and a maximum limit of 160 characters, it took four texts and a considerable amount of time and focus to type up and send the whole message. Consequently, he was completely caught off guard by a hard tap on his window and only just had time to look up before his door was thrown open.
‘Hello!’ Sonja smiled and waved. ‘We’re here.’
‘Hi there.’ He made sure the last text had sent, climbed out of the car and turned to Theodor, who’d had his hair cut and was dressed in a freshly ironed white shirt, a blue blazer and a pair of khaki chinos. ‘Don’t you look fancy!’ He moved to hug him, but Theodor evaded him and started walking around the car to the other side.
‘Maybe you should get going, you don’t want to be late.’
Fabian nodded and gave Sonja a hug. ‘See you soon.’
‘Good luck.’ She kissed him on the mouth and walked over to the other side of the car, where Theodor was buckling his seat belt. ‘Hey, you. Don’t I get a hug?’
Theodor said nothing, just stared straight ahead.
‘All right, fine. I’ll try again when you get back tonight. Just so you know, I’m making lasagne. That’ll be nice, won’t it?’ She waited for a reaction but got none. ‘Oh, right, and if you want something special for dessert, just say the word.’
‘Sonja.’ Fabian caught her eye across the roof of the car. ‘I think we should just get this over with.’
Sonja nodded and stepped aside so Theodor could close his door.
‘Hey, it’s going to be fine, you’ll see.’ Fabian buckled his seat belt and turned the key in the ignition. ‘And don’t worry, I’m going to be with you the whole time.’
Theodor responded with silence while Fabian put the car in gear, indicated and watched Sonja dry her tears in the rear-view mirror as he left Kungstorget behind and continued down Järnvägsgatan.