Dancing in the Dark: My Struggle Book 4 (39 page)

Dad started undressing.

I turned away. I had never seen him undress, I had never been in the same room as him before when he was doing something so intimate. Sitting on the bench, he folded his trousers, rolled his socks in a ball and undid his shirt.

I felt myself getting hot and flustered, didn’t know where to look or what to do with myself, because now he was taking off his underpants and for a few seconds he was completely naked.

I had never seen him naked before, and a shudder went through me as I cast my eyes over him.

He looked at me and smiled.

Everything else had been removed, there was just the smile he sent me before turning away to put on his trunks.

I put on mine and together we walked into the spacious swimming area.

When we returned home Unni had made dinner, a fondue, dad drank a bottle of red wine on his own, afterwards Yngve and Kristin showed their slides of China. Unni had borrowed a projector from school. They talked and explained, dad sat and looked on with no interest at all, I could see Yngve was getting annoyed, why did it bother him, I thought, he should give up on dad.

Fredrik was ironic with dad, who got angry and rebuked him, which made Unni furious, she went to her room, he struggled to his feet and followed, they shouted at each other while, in the living room, we pretended everything was fine. Something smashed against the wall, a shout became a scream, then there was silence. Dad emerged, said nothing, had a drink, suddenly looked up at us and grinned that inane grin of his, looked at Fredrik and said they could go fishing tomorrow if he wanted, his sons weren’t interested in fishing.

Of all the days dad described in his notebooks this is the only one I have a clear memory of, presumably because I saw him naked for the first and only time in his life.

In the notebook he wrote:

Friday 6 March

With K.O. and Fredrik in the swimming pool.

Nice to swim again. Home for fondue and slides of China.

Thereafter chat. Too much to drink. Scenes. Unni fed up – broke clock.

Shame.

On the last evening in Northern Norway I was alone again in the living room after the others had gone to bed. I smoked, made myself some tea, read a book I found, got up and found their photo album, wanting to see the disconcerting pictures once more, and at the back I came across some papers from which it emerged that the travel company had been informed by the hospital where dad had been admitted that the heart problems had been induced by an excess of medicines and alcohol.

I read this with a chill that ran through my whole body.

Medicines?

What sort of medicines was he taking?

There were several documents, I flicked through them, some were connected with a lawsuit he had clearly been involved in that spring. The trigger was an incident with a Securitas guard at the bus station in Kristiansand, and as I read it I remembered that he had mentioned something about it once, he had been harassed, but I knew nothing about him taking the matter to the law courts. However, he had lost resoundingly and had been ordered to pay the costs.

What was he doing?

I put the photo album back, cleaned my teeth and went into the narrow room where my bed was, undressed, got into bed, switched off the light and rested my head on the pillow.

But I couldn’t sleep. After a while I got up, sat down on the sofa closest to the little telephone table, picked up the receiver and dialled Hanne’s number.

I would do this on occasion, call her in the night. If her father answered I would put down the receiver, but he never did, she had a phone next to her room and was always quick to answer. This time too.

We chatted for an hour. I told her about what was going on here, that I would have a brother or a sister by the end of the summer and I was unsure what that would be like. I told her about my father and about Yngve and Kristin. She listened, laughed when I said something funny and in this way the heaviness in me lifted and we began to talk about other things, the exams that were in the offing, all my skiving, her choir, what we would do after we left school.

Suddenly the door burst open and dad charged in.

‘I have to ring off,’ I said and put down the receiver.

‘What are you doing, lad?!’ he said. ‘Do you know what the time is?’

‘Sorry,’ I said. ‘I was trying to speak as softly as I could.’

‘And who said you could use the phone? How long have you been talking?’

‘An hour.’

‘An hour! Are you aware how much that costs? I paid for your ticket here! And this is my thanks, is it? Into bed with you, now.’

I lowered my head so that he wouldn’t see the tears in my eyes, got up, my body half-turned away from him, and walked to my room. My heart was pounding, terror had spread to every part of me, I was shaking as I lifted a leg to pull off my trousers.

I waited until I was sure he had gone to sleep, then tiptoed out again, found a pen, some paper and an envelope, wrote an ironic note about how sorry I was for having used his precious phone, anyway here was the money for the call. Then I put a hundred-krone note in the envelope, sealed it, wrote his name on it and slipped it onto the bookshelf, where he would probably find it after I had gone.

At home I seldom gave dad a thought, apart from when he rang or his name came up. But there were still problems. I had gradually begun to live a double life. I liked being at home in the evening with mum, we either drank tea and chatted, listened to music, watched TV or did our own work, but I also liked being out at night and drinking. I didn’t have a driving licence and buses were few and far between, but mum always said she would pick me up, it wasn’t an issue, all I had to do was call, even if it was in the middle of the night. I called, she answered, an hour later I opened the car door and hopped in. She had no objection to me having a glass, but she wasn’t happy if I was drunk, to put it mildly, so I had to hide that from her. I solved this by sleeping at people’s houses or I said she didn’t need to pick me up, there were people around with a car, and sometimes there were, then I got a lift, sometimes I took a taxi, sometimes the night bus. She didn’t wait up, she trusted me, from my behaviour at home she had every reason to. And it was the real me when I was with her. It was also the real me when I was with Hilde. It was also the real me when I got drunk with Espen or any of the others at school. I was the real me, but the real
me
s were irreconcilable.

There were other matters I hid from mum. For example, all the skiving from school. I did it more and more, I was absent almost more often than I was present. She caught me one day, I hadn’t gone to school, I was at home relaxing, she turned up earlier than usual and we had a row. She said I had to go to school, it was important, I had to get a grip on what was important. She said I’d had a strict upbringing, much too strict, and now she was trying to give me some freedom, but I was abusing it. This was all about norms and they had to come from me. I said school wasn’t the most important thing in my life, she said that was all well and good, but now you’re at school, this is what you do and you have to fulfil your obligations. Can you promise me that? Yes, I could. I didn’t keep the promise, but I camouflaged what I did better. I had a more-than-understanding form teacher, he had realised I was having a difficult time, on a school trip he had been sitting on the seat next to me and said, I know you’re having a difficult time at the moment, Karl Ove, say if there is anything I can do to help or if there is anything you want to talk to me about. I smiled and said I would, and for a few seconds tears were imminent, the concern for me had come out of the blue, but the next moment they were gone. Naturally enough it wasn’t because I was going through a difficult time that I had been skiving, on the contrary it was because I liked doing it so much, drifting around, meeting people in cafés, popping into the radio station, buying records or just lying around at home and reading. I had decided ages ago that I would not continue my education after school, what we learned was just rubbish, basically what life was about was living, and living in the way you want, in other words, enjoying your life. Some enjoyed their lives best by working, others by not working. OK, I was aware that I would need money, which meant that I would also have to work, but not all the time and not on something that would deplete all my energy and eat into my soul, leaving me like one of the middle-aged halfwits who guarded their hedges and peered across at their neighbours to see if their status symbols were as wonderful as their own.

I didn’t want that.

But money was a problem.

Mum had started working overtime to make ends meet. As well as her job as a teacher at the nursing college she had agreed to do extra shifts at Eg Hospital at the weekends and in the holidays. The house must have been making deep inroads into her money. She had bought dad out and taken on big loans. I barely noticed, I had the money I earned from the newspaper and dad’s child maintenance, and when that was gone it was still possible to get something out of mum, so that was fine. She did occasionally criticise my priorities, how could I buy three new LPs one Friday afternoon when I was walking around in shoes with the sole flapping off? They’re just material goods, I responded, objects, while music was completely different. This was the mind, for Christ’s sake. This is what we need, really, and I do mean
really
, and it’s important to prioritise it. Everyone prioritises. Everyone wants new jackets and new shoes and new cars and new houses and new caravans and new mountain cabins and new boats. But I don’t. I buy books and records because they say something about what life is about, what it is to be a human here on earth. Do you understand?

‘Yes, you’re probably right, in a way. But isn’t it terribly impractical to walk around with your soles coming off? And it doesn’t look very nice, either, does it.’

‘What do you want me to do? I haven’t got any money. I prioritised music on this occasion.’

‘I’ll have a little surplus this month. You can have it to buy some shoes. But you’ll have to promise me you’ll spend it on shoes and nothing else.’

‘I promise. Thanks very much.’

And so from her office in the nursing college I went to town and bought some trainers and a Nice Price LP.

At Easter the football team was going to a training camp in Switzerland, of course I wanted to go with them, but it was quite expensive and mum said no, she was sorry, she wished it didn’t have to be like this, but that was how it was, we didn’t have the money.

A week before the departure date she slapped the money on the table in front of me.

‘Hope it’s not too late,’ she said.

I rang the coach, not too late, no, he said, you can come along.

‘Wonderful!’ mum said.

During the days before we were due to leave I finished an article on Prince that I had been mulling over for ages. His new record,
Sign o’ the Times
, was absolutely brilliant and I wanted everyone to know.

Then we left. Bus through Denmark and Germany, spirits were high, we were drinking duty-free beer on the way, and when we got to the hotel, Bjørn, Jøgge, Ekse and I jumped off while the bus continued over the border to Italy, where a Serie A match was on the programme. We preferred to be in a bar drinking. When they came back at ten we were in a fantastic mood while they were exhausted after the journey and everyone wanted to go to bed early. I shared a room with Bjørn, it was on the fourth floor and more luxurious than any room I had ever slept in, with attractive furniture, mirrors and a carpet on the floor. We reclined on the beds, bottles of beer in hand. It was eleven at the latest, what about a trip into town to have a look? The rule was no noise after ten, by eleven everyone was supposed to be in bed, but they hadn’t exactly posted guards on the doors. We waited for a while, not wishing to risk meeting anyone in the corridors, then we went out, hailed a taxi, mumbled, ‘Downtown,’ leaned back and were driven along unfamiliar streets with the soft light from the street lamps shining down over us. The driver stopped in a square, we paid, got out and strolled towards the centre. Soon we came across a large building, we could hear music inside, there were bouncers on the door, we went in. There were discotheques, bars, an enormous casino and a stage where beautiful women stripped and other scantily clad women, equally beautiful, wandered around the audience.

Bjørn and I exchanged glances. What was this fantastic place?

We drifted round, looking and drinking, hung around the stage and watched the striptease, discovered to our horror that the scantily clad girls who were walking between the tables were the same ones as those dancing on the stage, hardly had we watched one go up than she was down and walking past us on the floor. We went into a disco, propped up various bars there, mooched around the room with the roulette tables, where the men were dressed in dark suits and all the women wore evening gowns, ended up in front of double doors at the other end and saw a hall beyond, with groups of people standing around and chatting while waiters dressed in black and white carried trays of wine glasses and canapés. We didn’t talk to anyone else, drank non-stop, left at about half past three in the morning and six hours later were running round a field in a semi-conscious state. Slept for a couple of hours before the next round of training, had dinner, drank some beers in the bar and then it was off to find a taxi to go to this palace, where we floated around like in a dream until the following morning. Then we had to get up and go skiing in the Alps, there was something dreamlike about that too, for the sky was completely blue, the sun was shining, everywhere we looked white mountains towered in the air, and after a few minutes on the lift, with our skis dangling beneath us, everything was perfectly still. As though we had passed into another state. All that could be heard was the low hum of the lift close to us, otherwise it was completely and utterly still. A sense of jubilation filled me, for the silence was as vast as an ocean, while there was also something painful about it, as there is in all joy. The silence high up in the mountains, surrounded on all sides by beauty, allowed me to see myself or become aware of myself, not in relation to my psyche or my morality, this had nothing to do with my personal qualities, this was all about being here, this body which was ascending, I was here now, I was experiencing this and then I would die.