though.
I take her with me to a coin-tossing game, push her into the crowd of spectators with an invisible hand, or I show her a knife-throwing game, one which also requires a crowd of spectators, or else she can make dams with the slush in the street, which as a rule only involves the participants themselves. But none of this is much to Linda’s taste, it seems, even though she is fond of repetition.
She also has the chance to witness another of Freddy 1’s breakdowns, this time over his new bike, which is not new but old and black and bought by his father off scrap dealer Adolf Jahr in Storo for fifteen kroner, and is about as much use as a wooden leg. His performance is so dramatic that Linda takes my hand and tries to drag me away, I almost have to tear myself free, wondering how the others do it, how they get away from clingy younger siblings. But I see no way out, this skill is invisible, I can’t even see anyone clinging, as if everyone, great and small, knows how to deal with siblings and friends. And Mother?
Over dinner she says:
“Well, how was it today, then?”
“Great,” says Linda with a smile, and then Mother doesn’t ask who she played with, or what she played with, instead she looks relieved that nothing bad has happened.
Marlene starts sending Linda on shopping errands, up to Lien’s, which is usually my job, so that we have potatoes and bread for when Mother returns from work. But also that little journey crosses my field of vision. From Hagan I see Linda go into the shop and she does not re-emerge for ages, and then she is empty-handed, so I have to go down and ask what has happened, only to have the note written in Marlene’s handwriting shoved in front of my nose. I take Linda into the shop again and explain to her that the idea is not that she should hide behind the shelves but nail herself to the floor in front of the counter and she shouldn’t budge an inch, neither for women, nor children, until fru Lien catches sight of her, and then she should pass over the note, snappy, like this.
Two days later she comes out empty-handed again.
“What’s up this time?” I ask, irritated and out of breath after having to break off what I was doing yet again. Once more I am shown Marlene’s list, and realise at length that there might have been a problem deciphering her handwriting, was that one or two loaves?
“You’ve got to
speak,”
I say. “Come here.”
We go back, I demonstrate my skills to Linda and catch myself shouting, all too late, however.
“One loaf! Wholegrain!”
“Goodness me, Finn,” fru Lien says, rolling her eyes. I blush in the crowd, take the loaf and drag Linda out.
“Now you just carry this and go home –
alone,”
I say sternly, still crimson to the roots of my hair. But she doesn’t want to, she stands hugging the bread with both arms, as if afraid it will make a getaway.
“Come on now. I’ll watch you until you have passed No. 8.”
After much hithering and thithering she goes, backwards almost, down Traverveien, but not around the corner, not at all, she stops right on the borderline between her world and mine, and starts mooching around and looking up at me, until there is nothing else I can do but go after her yet again and walk home with her, where I say to Marlene, who is listening to the radio and humming and singing while pairing off an ocean of small, almost identical socks:
“Can’t you bloody write properly!”
“What are you talking about?”
“This!”
I show her the note and explain, but Marlene is not the type to be knocked out of her stride by any old scribble, not even her own.
“Why don’t you ask fru Lien to learn to read?” she says. “Smart-arse.”
I close my eyes and visualise a deserted plain with a tiny apple tree. Then I open them again and tell Linda who is still clutching the by now almost flattened wholegrain loaf:
“Tomorrow I’m going to take the note off you, then you’ll have to
say
what you want, got
I take her with me to a coin-tossing game, push her into the crowd of spectators with an invisible hand, or I show her a knife-throwing game, one which also requires a crowd of spectators, or else she can make dams with the slush in the street, which as a rule only involves the participants themselves. But none of this is much to Linda’s taste, it seems, even though she is fond of repetition.
She also has the chance to witness another of Freddy 1’s breakdowns, this time over his new bike, which is not new but old and black and bought by his father off scrap dealer Adolf Jahr in Storo for fifteen kroner, and is about as much use as a wooden leg. His performance is so dramatic that Linda takes my hand and tries to drag me away, I almost have to tear myself free, wondering how the others do it, how they get away from clingy younger siblings. But I see no way out, this skill is invisible, I can’t even see anyone clinging, as if everyone, great and small, knows how to deal with siblings and friends. And Mother?
Over dinner she says:
“Well, how was it today, then?”
“Great,” says Linda with a smile, and then Mother doesn’t ask who she played with, or what she played with, instead she looks relieved that nothing bad has happened.
Marlene starts sending Linda on shopping errands, up to Lien’s, which is usually my job, so that we have potatoes and bread for when Mother returns from work. But also that little journey crosses my field of vision. From Hagan I see Linda go into the shop and she does not re-emerge for ages, and then she is empty-handed, so I have to go down and ask what has happened, only to have the note written in Marlene’s handwriting shoved in front of my nose. I take Linda into the shop again and explain to her that the idea is not that she should hide behind the shelves but nail herself to the floor in front of the counter and she shouldn’t budge an inch, neither for women, nor children, until fru Lien catches sight of her, and then she should pass over the note, snappy, like this.
Two days later she comes out empty-handed again.
“What’s up this time?” I ask, irritated and out of breath after having to break off what I was doing yet again. Once more I am shown Marlene’s list, and realise at length that there might have been a problem deciphering her handwriting, was that one or two loaves?
“You’ve got to
speak,”
I say. “Come here.”
We go back, I demonstrate my skills to Linda and catch myself shouting, all too late, however.
“One loaf! Wholegrain!”
“Goodness me, Finn,” fru Lien says, rolling her eyes. I blush in the crowd, take the loaf and drag Linda out.
“Now you just carry this and go home –
alone,”
I say sternly, still crimson to the roots of my hair. But she doesn’t want to, she stands hugging the bread with both arms, as if afraid it will make a getaway.
“Come on now. I’ll watch you until you have passed No. 8.”
After much hithering and thithering she goes, backwards almost, down Traverveien, but not around the corner, not at all, she stops right on the borderline between her world and mine, and starts mooching around and looking up at me, until there is nothing else I can do but go after her yet again and walk home with her, where I say to Marlene, who is listening to the radio and humming and singing while pairing off an ocean of small, almost identical socks:
“Can’t you bloody write properly!”
“What are you talking about?”
“This!”
I show her the note and explain, but Marlene is not the type to be knocked out of her stride by any old scribble, not even her own.
“Why don’t you ask fru Lien to learn to read?” she says. “Smart-arse.”
I close my eyes and visualise a deserted plain with a tiny apple tree. Then I open them again and tell Linda who is still clutching the by now almost flattened wholegrain loaf:
“Tomorrow I’m going to take the note off you, then you’ll have to
say
what you want, got
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