Handling the Undead (25 page)

'Should We sing something?' the young man asked.

Yes, of Course they had to sing. Everyone scoured their minds for something appropriate. Hagar looked around.

'What is it?' she asked.

'We want to sing something,' Elvy said loudly. 'We're trying to think of something.'

Hagar thought for a second, then piped up:
Nearer My God to Thee ...

Everyone joined in as best they could. They sang at the top of their lungs and the candles flickered in their outgoing breath, as they drowned out the storm.

Bondegatan 21.50

Someone's fiftieth birthday party was in full swing in the party room upstairs. The storm had died down and from her room Flora could hear the partygoers' laughter echoing in the stairwell. In the background, they were singing along to 'Girls Just Want to Have Fun' and Flora could not for the life of her understand how they could play it without feeling ashamed.

She lay still, savouring her contempt for the middle-class world she had been born into. You were allowed to be a little bit of an individual as long as you did it tastefully. Anything beyond that was a job for a psychologist. She was never at home: the tolerance wrapped her up like a straitjacket and she just wanted to wave her arms and scream.

Viktor had been sent to bed at half past nine, and Flora had declined a party invitation issued in a tone of brittle gaiety.

She rolled out of bed and walked into the living room, turned on the television to check the news. She had heard nothing from Peter and she did not dare call and break his silence.

The news was focused almost exclusively on the reliving. A professor of molecular biology explained that what they had at first believed to be an aggressive decomposition bacterium had revealed itself to be a co-enzyme called ATP, the cell's primary energy supplier. The perplexing thing was that it could survive at such a low temperature.

'It's as if you put a batch of dough out in the snow and it still rose,' explained the professor, who also made appearances on popular science shows.

ATP's baffling liveliness also explained how the newly deceased could overcome their rigor mortis, since it is precisely the breaking down of ATP that locks the muscles.

'Let us for the moment assume that we're talking about a mutated form of ATP. However .. .' The professor pinched his index finger and thumb together to emphasise the point, 'we do not know if it is this enzyme that has caused them to awaken, or if the behaviour of the enzyme is a consequence of their awakening.'

The professor held his arms out and smiled: cause or effect? What do you think? Flora did not like his smug way of talking, as if the whole thing was a debate about over-fishing cod stocks.

But the next item made her draw several inches closer to the television screen.

That afternoon a television crew had been allowed into Danderyd. There was vision of a large hospital ward where around twenty reliving were sitting on the floor, on beds, in chairs. At first you could see their faces. The remarkable thing was that everyone had the same expression: mute amazement. Eyes wide open, mouths slack. In their blue hospital gowns they evoked a group of uniformed school children watching a magician.

Then the camera tracked out and you saw what they were looking at: a metronome. Perched on a rolling cart, it was ticking back and forth, back and forth before the enraptured audience. A nurse was sitting on a chair next to the metronome, upright, aware of the camera.

Must be the one who starts it again when it stops.

The voiceover outlined how the situation at the hospital had improved now that they'd discovered the thing with the metronome, and that the search was now on for other methods.

The weather would continue to be changeable.

Flora turned off the television and sat looking at her reflection in the screen. Noises from upstairs cut through the silence. They had started to sing a sea shanty, in rounds. When the song was over she heard raised voices, laughter.

Flora leaned back, stretching out onto the floor.

I know, she thought. I know what's missing there. It's death. Death

doesn't exist for them, it's not permitted. And for me it's everywhere.

She smiled to herself.

Come on, Flora. Mustn't exaggerate.

Viktor emerged from his room. He looked so thin and frail in his underpants that Flora was overcome by a sudden tenderness.

'Flora?' he said. 'Do you think they're dangerous? Like in that movie?'

Flora patted the floor next to her. He sat down and pulled his knees to his chin as if he was cold.

'The movie ... it's all made up,' she said. 'Do you think there really is a basilisk? Like in Harry Potter?'

Viktor shook his head.

'OK. Do you think that there's ... do you think there really are elves and hobbits? Like in
Lord of the Rings
?'

Viktor hesitated for an instant, then shook his head and said, 'No, but there are dwarves.'

'Yes,' Flora said. 'But they're not walking around with axes, are they? No. The zombies in that movie are just like the basilisk, just like Gollum. They're just made up. It isn't like that at all in real life.'

'What's it like in real life?'

'In real life .. .' Flora stared at the black monitor. 'In real life they're nice. At least, they don't want to hurt anyone.'

'Are you sure?'

'I'm sure. Now go to bed.'

Svarvargatan 22.15

The clock on the bedside table said quarter past ten when the phone rang. Magnus had been breathing evenly for a long time and David eased out his tingling arm, walked out into the kitchen and picked up.

'This is David.'

'Hi. My name is Gustav Mahler. I hope I'm not calling too late. You wanted to speak to me.'

'No, it's ... nothing,' David caught sight of the bottle and the glass, poured himself some. 'Honestly ... ' he took a big gulp, 'I don't know why I tried to contact you.'

'I see,' Mahler said. 'That happens sometimes. Cheers.'

There was a click on the other end and David raised his glass, said, 'Cheers,' and took another gulp.

There was silence for several seconds.

'How's it going?' Mahler asked.

And David told him. Whether it was the wine, the bottled-up anguish or something in Mahler's voice-the barriers came down. Not caring whether the stranger on the other end was interested, he told him about the accident, the awakening, Magnus, the visit to the State Pathologist, the feeling of having fallen off the edge of life, about his love for Eva. He talked for at least ten minutes, only pausing because his mouth was dry and he needed more wine. While he poured, Mahler said, 'Death has the capacity to isolate us from each other.'

'Yes,' David said. 'You'll have to excuse me but I don't know why 1. . .I haven't talked to anyone about .. .' David stopped with the glass half-way to his mouth. A chill shot through his stomach and he put the glass down so violently that wine splashed out. 'You aren't going to write about this, are you?'

'You can .. .'

'You can't! You can't write about this, there are a lot of people who ... '

They lined up in front of his eyes: his mother, Eva's father, his colleagues, Magnus' classmates, their parents ... all the people who would find out more than he wanted them to know.

'David,' Mahler said. 'I can promise you that I won't write a single word without your approval.'

'Do you mean it?'

'Yes, I mean it. We're just talking right now. Or more precisely: you're talking and I'm listening.'

David laughed, a short laugh that came out in the form of a snort and pushed mucus into his nose, stale tears. He drew a finger through the spilled wine, forming a question mark. 'What about you?' he asked. 'What's your interest in this? Is it purely ... professional?'

The other end grew quiet. David had time to think that the connection had been broken before Mahler answered.

'No. It's more ... personal.'

David waited, drank more wine. He was starting to get drunk. He noted with relief that his state of being was starting to lose definition, his thoughts were slowing down. In contrast to earlier in the day this was a state in which he could rest. There was a person on the other end of the telephone line. He was drifting, but he was not alone. He was afraid the conversation would end.

'Personal?' he asked.

'Yes. You trusted me. I'll have to trust you. Or. .. if you want to put it another way we'll both have something on each other. My grandchild is with me, and he's ... ' David heard Mahler take a gulp of whatever he was drinking, 'he is ... he was dead until last night. Buried.'

'You're hiding him?'

'Yes. Only you and two other people know about it. He's in bad shape. The fact that I called you was mostly because I thought perhaps you      knew something.'

'About about what?'

Mahler sighed.

'Oh, I don't know. It's just that you were there when she woke up and .. .I don't know. Maybe something happened that could be useful.'

David replayed what had happened at the hospital in his head. He wanted to help Mahler. 'She spoke,' he said.

'She did? What did she say?'

'Well, she didn't say anything that ... it was as if the words were new for her, as if she was testing them. It was ... ' David heard it again: Eva's metallic, raspy voice, 'it was pretty awful.'

'I see,' Mahler said. 'But it didn't seem as if she ... remembered anything?'

Without thinking about it, David had forced that moment at the hospital from his consciousness. Had not wanted to go near it. Now he knew why.

'No,' David said and the tears pricked his eyes. 'It was like she was completely ... empty.' He cleared his throat. 'I think I have to ... '

'I understand,' Mahler said. 'Let me give you my number in case ... well, in case you think of anything.'

They hung up, and David sat at the kitchen table, polishing off the last of the wine and devoting twenty minutes to not thinking of Eva's voice; of her eye, as it had looked at the hospital. When Magnus went to sleep he lay as if crucified in the middle of the bed, his arms thrown wide. David shifted Magnus over to one side, undressed and lay down next to him.

He was so exhausted he fell asleep as soon as he closed his eyes.

Koholma 22.35

'What did he say?'

Anna walked into Mahler's room only a couple of seconds after he hung up. Mahler rubbed his eyes, said, 'Nothing in particular. He told me his story. Horrible, obviously. But nothing that helps us.' 'His wife, was she ..

.'

'No. It was basically the same as with Elias.'

When Anna had gone back to the living room and the television came on, Mahler looked in on Elias. He stood there a long time staring at the little body. Elias had downed yet another bottle of brine, yet another bottle of sugar water over the course of the evenmg.

It was like she was completely ... empty.

But Eva Zetterberg had only been dead for half an hour. Was he wrong?

Was it true, as Anna said, that nothing of Elias remained in the tiny creature lying in the bed?

When he stepped out onto the patio the air was new. During the long drought he had forgotten that the air could feel so rich, so much like nourishment. The darkness was dense and filled with scents from a

landscape that the downpour had restored to life.

Does some ... intention exist?

Elias had been dead and withered. Something that was not rain had brought him back to life. What? And what was keeping him alive if he was empty inside?

A seed can lie dormant for hundreds and thousands of years. Dried or frozen in a glacier. Place it in moist earth and it sprouts. There is a power. The green force of the flower. What is the power of the human being?

Mahler studied the stars. Out here in the country they were more numerous than in the city. An illusion. Of course the stars were always there, and in numbers infinitely greater than the sharpest eye could discern.

Something touched him. An insight, inexpressible. He shivered.

In a rapid succession of images he saw a blade of grass break through the seed casing and struggle toward the surface, saw a sunflower strive toward the sky, turning to the light, saw a small child pull itself to its feet, hold its arms out, jubilant, and everything lives and is drawn to the light, and he saw ...

It is not inevitable.

The green force of the flower. Not inevitable. Everything is effort, work. A gift. It can be taken from us. It can be given back.

Attachment 2

15 August

Initial Examination: Attempt No.3 (cure) [Soc. Dept. Confidential]

The supply of nourishment to patient 260718-0373 Bengt Andersson was interrupted 2002-08-15 at 08.15.

Catheters for saline and glucose solutions were removed in order to observe the patient's reaction. The patient showed no signs of decline by 09.15. ECG blank, EEG as before.

09.25 the patient experienced a series of spastic cramps. The contractions lasted for approximately three minutes, whereupon the patient returned to the earlier state.

No further cramps or other reactions observed by 14.00.

Our conclusion is that the saline and glucose supplements are not a necessity. The low values that the patients show neither improve nor decline.

[From
Studio One
16.00]

Reporter: ., .results that indicate that the reliving do not need nourishment. Professor Lennart Hallberg, how can this have been established?

Lennart Hallberg: Well, of course the actual tests have not been made public at this point, but I assume that they simply suspended the supply of nutrients in order to observe what would happen ..

Reporter: And you can do that? Is it allowed?

Lennart Hallberg: Firstly, the reliving exist in a kind of legal

grey area. It will probably be a while until we develop some medical-ethical guidelines for handling them. Secondly, the flag of pestilence has not been lowered yet, so to speak, and this gives us physicians a certain .. .leeway.

Reporter: How is it possible to exist without nourishment?